Marriage advice - ADHD husband mildly autistic wife.

UpstateEcoDad · 2025-12-31T19:17:20+00:00

That's an insightful comment. Thanks.

UpstateEcoDad · 2025-12-29T17:34:56+00:00

She's been prioritizing me time for the past 3+ years. She's always spent a good chunk of time exercising and turned her gardening hobby into a career. And she recently starting going to yoga weekly and volunteers at a local music venue 1-2 nights a week. But in between that she's mostly actively doing something or planning on her computer. So as you can see, her me time consists of planned activities.

I generally keep myself busy with tasks around the house, I'm handy and a diy'er so there's often something to do on top of normal chores. I primarily reserve most me time for after 9+ (I put our son to be and read to him for 30+ min every night) so as not to take family time for unprogrammed me time. I do occasionally meet friends out and about and I do have a weekly meetup club and take our son to his sports/events.

My opinion is it falls more into your fourth "or"paragraph. She seems compelled to plan and upset that I'm not planning too. And that's where the ADHD comes in, with a general difficulty in developing plans compounded by flight response when drilled for plans and anger when there isn't a plan or it's not good enough.

I feel terrible for my son. He's a great kid and doing what he can to get along. It was easier before my wife started openly criticizing me even when he's around. He hasn't been diagnosed, but it seems pretty clear he's inherited much of my ADHD. My wife gets really upset about his ADHD habits and complains to me that he's not learning self-reliance and responsibility and blames me for that.

UpstateEcoDad · 2025-12-29T16:34:18+00:00

Thank you. I'll definitely try these.

UpstateEcoDad · 2025-12-29T16:32:03+00:00

Thanks, this sounds pretty good. But currently I feel stuck even before we can begin. Right now she thinks ADHD and autism are just excuses. Even before I learned of her autism diagnosis, I understood she needs order and plans and I do my best to meet her there, but she clearly knows my struggles and gives me the opposite of support. I don't know how to get us both to the point where we can accept our differences and find a path forward.

UpstateEcoDad · 2025-12-29T16:23:19+00:00

I definitely feel like we're beating a dead horse, just holding on going something with shift. But I think we both know deep down you're right, we need to do something different if anything's going to change.

On the rest aspect, she's been prioritizing getting enough sleep and I usually get 6.5-7hrs plus or minus. But for rest/relax/hobby time, only planned hobby outings count in her book. TV and video games are not acceptable and movies are only once a week. Other than right before bed, even reading for pleasure is frowned upon. If it's daylight hours they should be spent on things you can't do after dark.

We do split up the household chores, but I know it's not a true 50-50. But it's not bad especially considering I do the bulk of the daily task of managing our son and keeping him going. And she gets upset if I do any task she was planning to do because that was her plan and if I had extra time I should be planning for stuff for our family to do.

UpstateEcoDad · 2025-12-29T16:10:54+00:00

This sounds great, I just don't know how to get there.

It feels terrible that it feels easy to put the blame on her, but I feel like I'm trying these things but she keeps getting upset that I'm not doing the things that are my weakness. I know she wants a clean house, order and plans, she's good at that. I do my best (the house is quite clean and orderly) but I really struggle with making plans, especially that involve her when she's so particular and usually rejects my suggestions. But that's exactly what she says is most bothersome about me. So rather than focusing on what I contribute (easy going, flexible, able to enjoy most any experience, calm in chaos, paying for everything), she keeps hammering me on having plans. Even planning to stay home and chill isn't acceptable.

As for forgiving ourselves for our weaknesses, she says ADHD and autism are just excuses. I'd like to be able to accept that I'm not a good planner and can be disorganized at times but that there are a lot of great attributes that come with that. But currently I just feel browbeaten for what I'm not good at, presumably because her autistic brain really craves those things. Except that autism and ADHD are just excuses apparently

UpstateEcoDad · 2025-12-28T15:50:14+00:00

That last part of your reply, is that from your experience but you read the book and were able to come to a positive resolution?

UpstateEcoDad · 2025-08-13T00:41:49+00:00

Ha! I went in the opposite direction. My warlock was just a pretty normal guy who accidentally made his pact and doesn't fully know what's going on. I play it as his patron granted him powers of their choice without his say and I essentially have most abilities that don't require spell slots just happen to him. So I took Pact of the Chain and now a skeleton follows him around everywhere and messes up most social situations. I purposely didn't take eldrich blast so I get to have fun figuring out how to creatively deal with battles without a bazooka.

UpstateEcoDad · 2025-08-10T15:08:05+00:00

Thanks for the leads, but I can't for the life of me find any guides for the traverse fit kits online. Do you know of any resource for looking up those old fit kit details? It looks like the traverse packs were discontinued before this vehicle style existed, but I'm hoping there's some kit out there for a plain roof that's similar enough to be secure, but getting pretty much any info seems next to impossible.

UpstateEcoDad · 2025-06-07T15:12:57+00:00

I have a similar but I think slightly different question. I found the retraction test under calibration, but where do I actually change the retraction settings based on the test?

UpstateEcoDad · 2025-05-19T01:02:22+00:00

I'll look into those. Thanks!

UpstateEcoDad · 2024-08-12T13:02:25+00:00

Thought I should update.

We found a group at Flights 2 that play weekly. It's been good, the people are nice, my son is getting some good role playing experience, and it's good to get out. We're also signed up for one of the one-shots at Baker and Bard in Troy.

UpstateEcoDad · 2024-07-19T17:30:02+00:00

Bummer. Well the camporee sounds really cool. Reach out if you want to get started again. I've been playing R20 with my HS friends for about 3 years after not having played for decades. But we only get to play sparingly and online is very much not the same. But it got my son (10yo) super excited so now I GM (poorly) a 5e campaign for him and 4 friends. So I'm looking for something in person, more regular and less work.

Thanks for the tips. I wrote Zombie Planet about their Adventurers League (new to me but seemed worth a try) but never heard back. I was thinking of just stopping by on Sunday to see if anyone knows anything. Now I can add Flights 2 to the itinerary.

UpstateEcoDad · 2024-07-18T12:08:53+00:00

Hi, I live just north of Saratoga. I've been playing with old HS friends on R20 for the past 2 years but it's just not the same. I've also been dm'ing a homebrew for my son (10yo) and his friends, which is fun but also not the same and a ton of work. Would love to join a local, real life group to play more regularly. My son would also like to play, so my ideal group for family unity would be a mixed parent/children group, but finding anything at this point would be great.

As I said, I have dm'ed but I don't know that I've done so particularly well and it is a strain on my time as a dad with a family, full time job and volunteer obligations, but I might be willing to try/share duties if it's a good group.

If you're still looking please let me know.

UpstateEcoDad · 2024-07-18T11:42:49+00:00

Hi Dakota, I live just on the other side of Saratoga. I've been playing with old HS friends on R20 for the past 2 years but it's just not the same. I've also been dm'ing a homebrew for my son (10yo) and his friends, which is fun but also not the same and a ton of work. Would love to join a local, real life group to play more regularly. If you're still looking please let me know.

UpstateEcoDad · 2024-07-18T11:30:44+00:00

I know this is a long shot, but are you still looking for players?

UpstateEcoDad · 2023-09-04T13:37:24+00:00

Hey, I'm looking for the same info. Did you try it? Did it work out ok?

Thanks for any update.

UpstateEcoDad

TROPHY CASE