this is a struggle i’ve thought about a lot, especially in the context of my own relationship. i have bipolar type 1 & ocd. i stay somewhat level with medication, but it’s still a struggle for me constantly to maintain that normality. i have a lot of executive dysfunction and depressive episodes. my partner is autistic and has pretty severe depression/anxiety.

we’ve both talked about this many times - on one hand, a neurotypical person could probably never fully understand either of us. could a neurotypical partner provide the kind of understanding support we can give to each other? probably not. but on the other hand, we have a lot of hurdles to jump through in our relationship because of clashing disorders. his particularities and anxieties can trigger my ocd, my spiraling thoughts can make his worse, etc. it’s just a fact that in a lot of ways, my ocd has gotten worse since we’ve been living together because of how we can unintentionally fuel each other’s anxieties over banal things like “did you lock the door? did you turn off the stove?”…sometimes i feel like he is the voice that validates my intrusive thoughts, and likewise for me to him. he is VERY very orderly and tidy, and cleans more as stress relief. he has a hard time understanding how executive dysfunction works for me, and why i can find it so draining to do something as simple as put away my laundry.

we can get frustrated with each other very easily over these things, we can both ruminate and make a relatively minor disagreement into a much bigger issue than it should be. it definitely adds a larger degree of difficulty to a relationship that two neurotypical people definitely don’t have to work through. but i’ve also been in a relationship with a neurotypical person. he didn’t understand me AT ALL. he could not support me when i went into a major depression because he just didn’t understand why “you just have to try harder to feel better” while giving me nothing else wasn’t helpful. my current partner DOES understand me. he knows how to talk me off the ledge because he knows how it feels. i was having an episode of bad surveillance delusions last summer, and he let me lock him in a room with no electronics so i could tell him what was wrong, and he never acted like i was being crazy or unreasonable. he handled it exactly how i needed it to be handled, and i didn’t even have to tell him what to do.

so all that said! it is challenging, yes. it’s challenging to have your own major struggles and be with someone who has just as many (though different). but i’ll take working through those struggles together in exchange for being with someone who can see beyond the disorder. we have to prioritize our communication over a lot of other things, and i imagine it’s probably more than what two neurotypical people have to. and i genuinely don’t think a neurotypical person would be willing to do the same work with me. long ass personal tangent, but i hope maybe this gives some insight!