Impact of Autism on Marriage

[auntie]

From the outset, having a child with autism invited scrutiny of one's marriage. No sooner had Dr. Leo Kanner first described the condition he named autism, then he had a few things to say about the parents of the 11 children he diagnosed with it. He noted that three of their marriages were "dismal failures," and "even some of the happiest marriages are rather cold and formal affairs."1



That was 1943, but marriage concerns persisted well into the 21st Century. A few years ago, celebrities and activists pointed to a supposed 80 percent divorce rate among parents of children with autism. They used this statistic to underscore the stress these families face and their need for services. Certainly, both research and common sense say that having a child with a disability can add stress to a marriage,2,3 as well as a family.4 (See a related article, Stress and the Autism Parent)...

iancommunity.org/whats-truth-about-autism-and-marriage

[macchiatto]

Thanks for sharing! DH and I actually just started watching Parenthood and when they mentioned the 80% divorce rate, DH googled it and found a similar article. I've heard the idea that parents of multiples have a high divorce rate is a myth, too.

[freezorburn]

I remember seeing this a few months back and then being disappointed with the article saying well, yeah, maybe, but who knows.

It did make me wonder, though, not just in terms of the challenges and stresses of caring for a child with ASD, but whether ASD (suspected but undiagnosed) in the family is a contributing factor. Maybe I'm somewhere on the spectrum ... maybe DS's dad is. Sometimes I see behaviors in DS that remind me so much of my own father -- a rigidity that I always thought was cultural, but now I'm wondering if it's part of his neurological makeup, and what are the odds that I could pass that on to my child?

And, what is it about our brains that influences how we deal with stress, and how we may or may not communicate with our partner? There have been instances in which our divorce coach has attributed some of our miscommunication to "gender culture."

I don't know ... there are so many contributing factors. But I do know that it's not DS's fault that we got divorced.

[auntie]

freezorburn, ding, ding, ding.

You are totally on to something. There are some traits associated with autism that do not bode well for a successful marriage- immaturity, self focus, impulsivity, poor empathy, lack of filter, seeing partner in a restricted "special interest" mode for a time and then moving on to the next thing.

If I had a buck for every dad I know of who was diagnosed after his child was, I could pay off my house. There was a lot of this in my early days in Autismworld. Aspergers only hit the DSM in 1994, so there was a generation of young dads who were never diagnosed. The thing is, this is quite heritable as a condition. It's thought that presentation becomes more atypical down the generations. IME, you'd see a sweet, quirky and loyal to a fault IT or engineer dad diagnosed with Aspergers after his son was diagnosed with PDD-Nos or autism. This would lead to a dad (and grandparents) with no sense of urgency about diagnosis or interventions because "he's just like me and I'm fine".

It's interesting, in the first IRL support group I found, all of the founding moms had children with more classic autism- most were quite impaired. All but one of these 8 women were divorced and remarried happily a second time. None of them had an easy time co-parenting with their ex; this was a regular topic at meetings. New to the diagnosis and already in a second marriage, I was terrified. I know a couple of moms with sons 5-10 years older than mine who have married. A few of those women are raising a second generation of kids with ASD because the parents can't cope with the responsibility. This terrifies me as well.

[macchiatto]

Lots of good food for thought.

Re genetics, Leo reminds me a bit of my dad. I don't know that my dad ever would have quite met criteria for ASD but he doesn't always grasp social cues (e.g. he'll stand too close, or not necessarily when someone is trying to bring a conversation to a close) and there's something about his gestures and mannerisms that are similar to Leo's.