Book Review: The Partner\’s Guide to Asperger\’s Syndrome

The Partner\’s Guide to Asperger\’s Syndrome, by Susan Moreno, Marci Wheeler, and Kealah Parkinson, is pretty much what it says: a book that tackles the challenges that may be faced by couples where one partner is autistic.  The scope of the book is somewhat limited in that it focuses intently on male autistic partners with female often highly socially-proficient neurotypical partners.  They acknowledge their advice here is limited to that situation, and autistic-autistic partnerships or female-autistic partners with male NT partners may have different situations to handle.

That said, some of the advice given here was broadly applicable regardless of the partnership composition.  There are certain tendencies addressed in this book that often apply to autistic people.  In many cases, these were exaggerated version of traits I sometimes display myself but could clearly see why they were painful to the neurotypical spouse or partner.  This similarity made the book rather painful for me personally to read, but I expect it would be rather enlightening for people who don\’t have an innate understanding of these behaviors.

Included sections are things like differences in communication, social skills, executive function, sensory processing issues, how to cope with stress, parenting, and common situations a NT spouse may find themselves in.  All included sections seemed highly relevant to the book\’s overall message.  The authors even attempted to give the book some balance by including a \”positives and negatives\” chapter about autistic traits.

I appreciated this effort to present the strengths an autistic partner can bring to a relationship, but I feel that overall the book focused intently on our deficiencies.  I felt rather sad and like I\’m a broken human as I read the book, matching some of my tendencies to the stories of dysfunction in various real and fictitious relationships described in the book.

I feel like this wasn\’t really the authors\’ intent, and it\’s possible I\’m being oversensitive on the subject.  After all, this is a book to help NT partners handle communication breakdowns and manage living with someone very different than oneself… it\’s not a book celebrating fully functional relationships that have few problems.

My sadness aside, the book had valuable (if rather brief) information on all the subjects it addressed.  I would suggest this as a starting point for a partner, and then to follow up on specific questions and subjects.  Like, if the autistic partner has severe rigidity, there might be specialized resources for that.  Or they might have touch sensitivity but not visual or sound sensitivity, so you might look into a book or expert who knows a lot about that subject.

The last thing that struck me about this book is that it strongly recommends finding three therapists: one for the autistic partner, one for the NT partner, and a relationship counselor for the relationship or marriage.  The authors also caution the NT partner to find a therapist that understands autism, because otherwise their concerns may be waved away as being a worry-wort or being overbearing.  I have no personal experience on the matter, but I can definitely see something like this happening, and I wouldn\’t wish it on anyone.

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