Aspergers in Love Book

I first decided to read Aspergers in Love: Couple Relationships and Family Affairs by English couples counselor Maxine Aston when it was recommended in perhaps the seminal clinical work on Asperger's Syndrome, Tony Attwood's The Complete Guide to Asperger's Syndrome. Having experienced a divorce, in part as a result of my (then-undiagnosed) Asperger's, and having had few other real relationships, I was curious as to how my Asperger's played out in the specific realm of the romantic. Aston's work, first published in 2003, was a revelation.

The more I read about Asperger's, the more "normal" I actually feel, if only because I feel ever less alone with everything I read. I felt less alone in my difficulty in romantic relationships due to Aspergers in Love as well. There is something very comforting in knowing that countless other adults with Asperger's'most of whom, at least the males, have chosen neurotypical partners'have struggled and continue to struggle with couple relationships and all that goes along with them. Most reassuring, as Aston builds to by the end of her book, is that despite their trials, tribulations, and real limitations on communication and behavior, many couples in which one partner has Asperger's ultimately persevere and succeed.

One flaw with Aspergers in Love'which is why I gave it only four stars as opposed to five'is that, having been published in 2003, a full ten years before I read it, Aspergers in Love all but takes for granted that the diagnosis is less understood, has less social support, and is just plain less ubiquitous than it is in late 2013. Where the behavior of many couples described by Aston is far more egregious than mine ever was, Asperger's is more prominent now, and where far fewer couples had the benefit of a counselor with specific expertise in Asperger's in 2003, that is not the case in 2013; I even know several couples personally who have persevered in the face of Asperger's. That being said, I was diagnosed well after my divorce was finalized, and without the benefit of a couples counselor trained to recognize Asperger's (even if the relationship is better off no longer), so maybe Aston has a point when she emphasizes the need for mutual understanding.

Ultimately, volumes like Aspergers in Love function primarily as self-help books of one sort or another, and Aspergers in Love is, well, no different. Perhaps its best aspect is its offering of lessons in how to compensate for the difficulties in communication and empathy that Asperger's causes between life partners. In that sense, Aspergers in Love truly showed me how not to repeat the same mistakes I made in past relationships in my future relationships, and how to be a better father to my daughter. Aspergers in Love gave me the confidence that I can have a long-lasting, successful, fun relationship with the right woman'and what better praise can I offer Aston and her book than that?