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800 Maynard Ave S, Suite 200, Seattle, WA 98134
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His denial of sex and affection probably comes more from having no idea how to deal with other human beings rather than manipulative assholishness.
Just recommend counseling and get it over with.
Were the husband's interests over her head when he was getting his PhD? Or is this just a recent occurrence? And who cares if you don't understand what he's talking about? The point is being a supportive spouse, right? Listening to the day he had is a VITAL aspect of that support. I just don't think there's that much a difference between complicated computer shit and Jersey Shore shit. Different people will be utterly confused different things.
Counseling would be good, but both of them need to learn to communicate better. CI needs to communicate to husband that his explanations aren't working and truly just more confusing. Husband needs to understand that sometimes we can't all be excited about the same shit. And the withholding of sex thing is just wrong.
But if you don't think you'll ever get it (I still can't tell the difference between JWow/Sammi and Ronnie/Pauly) what's the point asking questions that will just get you more confused? Listen, nod, hug, kiss, repeat. Being a good listener doesn't mean you have to actually understand the details of his job.
p.s. Dan, you can call me any time to discuss 16th-18th C. English royalty! What is your theory on the death of Christopher Marlowe?
I don't usually like DTMFA regarding spouses. I think it's a glib thing for those of us not involved to say, and relationships are about making compromises, bah blah bah. I also don't think that all those being complained of are necessarily motherfuckers, just because the letter writers are unhappy with them.
But this is a clear case of DTMFA if ever I've read one.
He seems ungrateful for the attempts you are making to listen to his interests, even if you don't share them; he sounds selfish and manipulative, and kind of Aspergers-y.
Anyone who criticizes your attempts to be polite because you don't want to sit through "hours long computer science" lectures doesn't sound like someone to want to stay married to. You say you're already avoiding conversations with him, and you're only in three years.
Do you have kids?
If you're not ready to walk, try couples counseling, but if your description of it is accurate, this relationship seems doomed.
Also, I know hardly anything about autism or asperger's or anything, but this guy sounds kind of like some of the people with Asperger's I've read about: talking on and on about a technical subject they're passionate about and failing to notice that their partner checked out of the conversation long ago.
I'll discuss 16-18th-C English royalty with you, offer my theory that Marlowe proves that good writers can also be bad boys (or even spies), and more.
But can we expand into Pepys' diary?
I find it hard to believe she didn't have some hint of this behavior before she married the guy.
Your husband is an insensitive moron if he expects you to listen to hours of programming drivel when he knows you aren't interested, and he's an asshole for withholding sex.
Dan is totally right. DTMFA.
Seriously: if start droning on about DHCP and mounting the store and authentication and blah blah blah, Mrs. Fnarf starts openly laughing in my face after about twenty seconds. Guy needs to get a life.
My husband's a programmer and I work in theatre. He talks about his day for a bit, and I listen. I talk about my day a bit, and he listens. I'm a reasonably technologically intelligent person, so he'll explain some basic stuff to me so I can understand what he's saying. He's a reasonably artistically intelligent person, so I'll explain some basic stuff to him so he can understand what I'm saying. Then we both shut the fuck up about our jobs and talk about mutual interests and life events like normal people in a functional relationship.
I'm finding myself in the group that says this guy is socially leotarded and needs to be made aware of why he's not being cool.
We share a love of snorkeling and the Galapagos. Guess what we talk about more often than not?
As a team, though, we are deathly good at trivia. except for sports. which we both dislike. We need a little sporty dyke on the side to round out our trivia death panel.
Point out to your husband that he's being a complete asshole. If he doesn't seem to care that his behaviour is making him a total jerk (and this includes changing his behaviour, not just realising that it exists), then he's not worth staying married to.
I gather you don't ascribe to the "argument over the bill" excuse. Neither do I.
As far as Pepys, goes, he's one of the more fascinating ass-wipes in history. But still a major ass-wipe.
But more on-topic, I think it's silly to look for medical explanations when this is classic male-dominant behavior, which is still prevalent is some societies today. The man could have grown up in Saudi Arabia, or Utah. I recall a story about a brilliant Turkish mathematician who would have starved in a house full of food if his wife wasn't around to cook for him.
Wait...
Stop. I swear I won't date another geekier than me type again.
Seriously, this sounds like my ex. Only throw in minor temper trantrums about nothing when he gets frustrated about something completely unrelated. They're not bad guys, but they can be taxing on your sanity. But, hey, you're lucky. Your guy knows what he rambles about. It's worse when they don't know what they're going on about. Trust me.
One of the things *he* could be learning from his marriage is how to describe his work in less time, and with easier-to-understand concepts, to a lay audience. That actually takes a stronger understanding of the subject than just rattling on and on about everything he knows (Mark Twain reportedly demanded more prep time and money for a ten-minute speech than a two-hour speech). If he'd stayed in academics and had to teach undergrads, he would have had to learn that lesson too. Smarter people than him -- Albert Einstein, Stephen Jay Gould, Lynn Margulis, Arthur C. Clarke -- found that one of the most difficult and rewarding aspects of their careers. (May not Isaac Newton, but his romantic life was a barren one.)
But maybe that's why he got out of academia and into the hermetic world of computer security: he doesn't seem to want to convey information, at least not in a way people actually understand. He just wants to show off. And with your spouse, that's getting into DTMFA territory.
So not true. This is probably more socially/emotionally immature behavior. Think of a 7-year-old who prattles on and on about Pokemon or Yu-Gi-Oh or whathaveyou. Note that he'll get hurt and withdraw emotionally if you tell him what he cares about is lame.
Now, change that interest to computer science and put the same personality in a 30-year-olds (or however old this dude is) body. It's probably quite similar.
The guy sounds like a person with no social skills who IS AN ADULT and can't figure out when someone he's talking to (lecturing too) is BORED. Maybe he has Aspergers, maybe he's just a douche, but this is ridiculous. A conversation is a two way street, not a college seminar.
Either way, he's alienating his partner (it's not entirely clear to me the letter writer is a woman). You have to be able to read the people you're spouting off to. If they are all glazed over, shut the fuck up. Most people learn that when they're 15, by the time they're 30 (I'm guessing his age here) it's a very unpleasant trait.
I work in IT, and my hubby gets some of what I do, but mostly I shut up about the technical aspects of it. He's been very helpful in assisting me with figuring how to deal with difficult clients, since he works with people all day in a retail setting and I don't.
I don't get upset with my girlfriend when she loses concentration while I'm telling her about cool bio stuff, and she doesn't hold it against me when I go all glassy-eyed while she's discussing anime.
Standard issue geeks don't bother having deep technical discussions with their nontechnical spouses, because what's the point in having a conversation when the other person has no idea what you are talking about?
CI, leave him or don't, but either way take some responsibility for your own happiness! You are not obligated to put up with anything that makes you miserable. It's not reasonable to expect that of yourself or for anyone else to expect it of you. But you are responsible for making the changes that need to be made.
That isn't a partnership. He sets up the benchmarks for judging a person. You have no curiosity, because you aren't interested in the things he finds interesting. Anything that interests you that he finds boring doesn't count, because it doesn't interest him.
And you are feeling guilty about not being a good partner or not being sufficiently intellectual. It makes sense, he keeps telling you that you are inferior, because you do not meet his standard of being him.
Whether he intends to or not, these are classic abusive behaviors. So, make him change his behaviors or DTMFA. It doesn't matter why he is doing it. Either he can change his patterns to healthy ones that treat you with respect, decency, and courtesy. Where you each talk about your interests equally, and not to a point that it bores either of you. Where neither of you regularly insults or belittles the other person. Or you separate, before you do serious harm to each other. Your letter has several red flags. Please do take it seriously.
The letter writer already mentioned that her interests are too nontechnical for her partner, which is not a good sign. I would test him to see whether he's worth keeping. For example, if she goes on and on about an interest of her which bores him, how does he act? Is he at least as nice to her as she is to him? Does he try to change the topic to a subject of mutual interest? Or to one that only interests him? How does he act when told that he is being rude by either not noticing her boredom or being bored? How many mutual interests do they have and do they acquire new ones easily? The answers to these questions should be a good indication whether there is anything worth saving.
Diagnose me! Diagnose me!
I get it. I have Asperger's. But just you wait 10 years and you'll all tell me I have something different based on its visibility.
Anyway, why don't people marry people with whom they share a major passion? I don't get everything my husband talks about (he has Asperger's! You can't have a relationship with them because they have ASPERGER'S!), so I listen, and then I focus on my other passions, including my passion for him.
PS: That "typical American Female" poster up there not only has ASPERGER'S!, he don't got no date neither.
Maybe the husband does have Asperger's, or maybe he's just clueless. It's hard to tell. But it's certainly possible that he either doesn't know that people can't be faulted for not taking the same interest in his passion that he does, or doesn't care.
My boyfriend of ten years is also a programmer, and conversation about that bores the shit out of me. So he knows not to subject me to it, just as I know not to feel all pent up and angry if he doesn't feel like reading my PhD dissertation. It doesn't mean that either of us are stupid; just that some of our interests are very different. No denial of sex is involved, and no hurt feelings. LW has no reason to feel guilty or dumb, and if his/her (love how everyone assumes it's a "her") husband keeps trying to inflict those feelings, then DTMFA.
ymmv, but i would bet explaining your pov will probably only be turned into some sort of computer code in his head, and further the disconnect, to no good end.
i guess sadly, it depends on how much you are willing to
put up with this behavior.
in any case good luck, i think you might need it.
I see your Asperger's and I raise you Autism.
oh, that is sooo fucking rich.
CI is trying to be GGG in the context of the conversations. Her husband does not seem to be making an effort to be GGG in this context at all.
I know I can be a selfish person...but, jeez, I sure hope I'm not THAT bad.
< those that read and for whatever reason and still take that shit to heart...
My husband and I have almost nothing in common, and we've been married for 23 years, and he even builds computer programs, so it is possible, but only if you are aware of when you are driving the other person slightly insane.
But I wouldn't, not for a new york minute, because the last thing I want to do is talk shop after a day at work. I might toss off a few things just to vent, here and there, but as others have said, I wouldn't expect anyone -- whether they could follow along or not -- to put up with more than a few minutes here and there.
Not quite sure how to address this problem, though, especially if he gets all hissy when you aren't interested or can't follow along. That's pretty inconsiderate. I don't suppose simple things like changing th etopic, or getting into some other hobby that both of you enjoy would help or not (or maybe all you need is reassurance -- which you've got -- that you're not out of line to want to dial it back in order to try some other ways to deflect this).
Hope you can work something out.
As for Tudor's and Stuarts, I read recently of Yet Another Theory on what might have ailed Henry VIII to result in so few or sick children & to bloat up so much in later life... You probably spotted that though. (I fell in love with British history after first travelling through there -- there's something very satisfactoryt about how all the history is nicely broken down by distinctive monarchies (I was never able to keep all the Louis' straight so French history remained opaque)...) I learned all the British kings & queens long before getting the presidents straight (and we''ve had more presidents already!)
Ah, history. And to think of how much I hated it in high school :)
@59, I'm with you, I think this is from a guy. I just reread the letter and I don't see a hint that this is a husband and wife. "I've been with my husband for almost three years...are we obligated to adopt our partner's interests...my knowledge of the internet being limited to updating my status on Facebook...Am I being a jerk?"
Not we've been married for 3 years, should I tell my husband I'm not interested in computers, am I being a bitch. And does anyone think a woman would take that long to change her Facebook status to married? Nope, I'm betting this is 2 guys!
CI has expressed both interest and confusion in topics that are incredibly interesting to her husband. He probably believes she's smart enough and is doing his damnedest to help her here, offering up multiple hour lectures and encouragement. Honestly, in his clueless way, I imagine he's trying to be GGG, but also lacks the emotional maturity to deal with CI's conflicting statements and actions.
I think the correct test is for CI to explain unequivocally that she's expressing an interest in him, not his current field of interest and that she is currently happy with her level of understanding. Give him some time to process this emotionally, and it will probably take him a couple days. If that doesn't start them down the path to resolution and he is resistant to counseling, then it's time to leave.
Still, I have some difficulty scraping up sympathy for CI's almost willful sounding lack of interest in her husband's interests and professions and her repeated insistence that these things are just over her head. I'm not a biochemist or an economist, but I can still manage to be utterly fascinated by conversations in these topics, and it's probably totally unfair, but I can't help but think that one who fails to be at all interested, who just claims that such things are "over their head" is intellectually lazy or just plain dumb.
But then, yeah, I think about an economist-friend of mine and how, when he gets going for a good half-hour spewing dry, technical econo-jargon, everyone at the table just glazes over and starts looking at their watches...
Still, how the fuck did she even end up with this guy? How did they ever make it beyond their first dates? What did she honestly expect to share in common with him? What kind of future could she possibly have imagined with such a person?
I suppose she could have been so desperate to marry him for some unsubstantiated reason that she went along with the situation hoping it would get better. But it's hard to take her seriously when she asks if she's being a jerk after that laundry list indicting him. Could she be trying any harder to angle for all the sympathy in response? Then again, they might be well-matched, if only they both get better in counseling at compatible rates.
She writes, "...usually I'm lost within the first couple sentences and spend the rest of the "conversation" trying to just nod at the appropriate times and not show how bored I am. If I don't do this, he gets super hurt and offended...."
Note that the letter writer doesn't actually say anything about directly discussing how she feels with her husband. Again, he's obviously not a social genius, and may just not GET it.
Be direct, don't beat around the bush.
If she has been direct, and he's still being a manipulative asshole, then and only then consider DTMFA.
Umm...... Yeah. I mean, you have a type of behavior that has been a part of nearly every civilized human society, that has existed for millenia and is woven deeply into cultural heritage v. the pop psychology syndrome du jour.
Oh, never mind, I give in: This is obviously munchhausen-by-proxy. I saw that on X-Files once, so it makes me an expert.
I find that very strange as well.
However, I also knew an amazing and smart woman who married an Aspie and didn't realize it until about 3 years into their marriage. I'm really not sure how she missed it - perhaps it was lost among some of his other fairly remarkable qualities. Last I heard, he was driving her completely nuts. I don't know if they are still together.
If this was a case of classic male dominance, the guy wouldn't be discussing serious professional matters with his wife. He'd be telling her to be a good girl and make him and his buddies sandwiches while they talked about important things that she couldn't possibly understand. And to be quick about it.
@68: Just because you don't know anything about mental health doesn't mean no one else here does.
She needs to pull her husband into the bathroom and start going on and on about all of her make-up. Ridiculous detail after detail, with comparisons of color to wardrobe. Even if she's not particularly into this type of thing, she needs to fake it and be ready to fake it for 2-4 hours non-stop. When he finally asks if it is necessary because he's lost or uninterested, she should answer no, and that that's how she feels when he goes on about work and computers.
I'd suggest though that they find a hobby or two together so that they have some common ground.
It could be Asperger's, but I don't think so. Aspies tend to be socially awkward, whereas he is being a deft social manipulator. He is very successfully manipulating his spouse into giving him exactly what he wants - attention to his lectures with no requirement that he reciprocate. And he is doing so by using several classic abuse patterns (insulting, withholding of sex, blaming the victim). And you see several classic victim responses in the letter, where the letter writer feels guilty and at fault for not being good enough. The letter has insecurity about various types of inadequacies, which is generally what an emotional abuser instills in his/her victims.
It's a classic pattern. It's just that this guy isn't being as controlling or awful (as far as we know and currently) as one would generally expect. He's just using it to totally dominate conversations and shut up his spouse (who has no right to his attention about his/her interests).
That isn't a classic aspie pattern, but it is a classic abuse pattern. It's just that being interested in a technical field and obsessing on a single subject are typical aspie traits. Of course, it could be both - an abusive aspie. But even if that's the case, it's the abusive patterns that are the serious problem.
You can start with an ultimatum to stop the supercilious lecturing and acting butt-hurt or get dumped, but from your time-line, this guy is 30ish, by which time anyone reasonable would have noticed that all-nerd-all-the-time doesn't cut it with most people. So, good luck with that.
And a +1 to @ 65: how did it get this far? Unless you have two noses and both have damage from leprosy, you DO have other options. Pursue them.
Though, I'm kind of edgy on the OCD-comment. It was brief in passing, but remember it's an actual brain-wiring difference in people and takes away from your argument because OCD isn't the guy's fault, especially if he's not aware that he has it. But, it's likely he's just got a personality thing going, and I agree with you.
This is what I call the Sonny & Cher Syndrome.
Initially (and here I will guess that he is older and she younger) the Sonny appears as an older brother, father figure. Fascinating and full of new information. The Cher figure of course provides the ego boost to Sonny.
Fast forward after the marriage 3 years later. He's still thinking he got the best end of the deal. She's looking at herself in the mirror and thinking...I gotta use this now!
Lesson to be learned: Don't Marry Your Whore
I thougt I once read a thing that stated that the first couple of years were spent getting to know your partners quirks, and the remaining was spent dealing with them.
Also, @68 I pity the man who dates you, what with you seeing sexism and misogyny around every corner.
That's all I need to know. That's Asshole Behavior,and it needs to stop. You don't berate your wife for daring to be different from you.
Your wife does not need to understand the intricate details of the problems that you are tackling at work every day in order to love you. Learn to summarize. Also, learn to shut up and do your share of listening to HER, for a change. Have you ever heard the phrase "monopolizing the conversation?" It's what you are doing. It isn't a compliment.
You have an entire fucking corporation to talk to about this stuff, all day long, folks who are actually fascinated by it. You display a level of insatiability that makes me agree with the other commenters who suspect neurological problems.
Let him drone on until he runs out of steam. Show him the elapsed time, and tell him he is going to listen to YOU talk about makeup for an equal amount of time, or he will be sleeping on the couch. If he complains or exhibits boredom, berate him for his lack of sensitivity on a topic near and dear to half the human population.
Next day, when he wants to open conversation about work, brandish the stopwatch.
Eventually, he will find himself editing his monologues down to a few minutes.out of a sense of self-preservation.
An habit born of deep insecurity, I'm guessing.
I'm a mathematician and my wife is not. Occasionally there is something I just have to talk about because there is no one else around or because it's just so interesting. She listens, asks questions (because I've done a good job of teaching her some of the basics of what I do) and puts up with for a bit. But that's all I really have the right to expect. And that's all this woman's husband should have the right to expect. If you want to talk computer programming, make a friend or find a colleague.
People like the husband here - and both my own husband and I have our moments when we lapse into lectures about the things we've studied, worked on, or read - should marry people like them, in different but similar fields.
Maybe he's feeling inadequate or insecure at work, and so he feels like he has to assert his dominance by babbling on and on to his spouse about these technical subjects, and berating the LW for a lack of interest? Or maybe he's always felt slightly contemptuous of LW's lack of interest/ability in technical fields, and now that they're married he feels like he can really start browbeating his partner about not being his exact intellectual equal?
Whatever it is, he's acting like an asshole, and the LW is only enabling him by smiling and nodding. There's no reason for LW to put up with this behavior, and using these avoidance strategies is not going to help. What freaks me out about the letter is that LW seems to agree that the husband's interests and talents actually are more important, legitimate and serious than LW's own interests! Honey, that's not true. It shouldn't be your role in this relationship to sit and reinforce his perceptions that he is a genius and you are an idiot. You're smart and interesting too. His refusal to acknowledge that you, too, have a legitimate career and real intellectual passions is very very worrying.
My eyes have gone to glaze indulging my last boyfriend's Magic cards fetish, but even then he would stop rambling after 5 or 10 minutes and let me get back to blowing shit up in WoW. But we had WoW in common so that was always something fun to mutually geek out about. If you and this guy don't have any mutually geekable topics, then maybe it just isn't meant to be.
Perhaps a visit to a psychiatrist for a diagnosis is in order for CI and her husband. Understanding that he is wired differently will allow both of you to begin to work toward a reasonable solution to your communication problems and hopefully keep divorce off the table, unless of course he refuses to change. Many with Asperger's see the world as being the one with the problem, so they expect the entire world to change to suit them. If he values you and your marriage, then he will at least try. If he refuses, then you're back to the first line: DTMFA.
1- Do not, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, get pregnant.
2- Tell Mr Clueless he needs to share some of your interests.
. . .Take him to counseling so you can work on your communication skills.
. . .If he resists move on......
enjoy-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxUuDPNbk…
He was getting his PhD when they started dating. That means that he was spending vast amounts of time thinking about, talking about and working on neurobiology. His time with CI probably represented the time he spent not dealing with neurobiology in some way. It was probably a welcome break.
In computer security, he's not required to spend all his time on it. So he has to obsess on it recreationally. He has to enlist CIs help to spend all his time on it.
This behavior is unfair to CI. I agree with that. But it is behavior that CI's husband has been rewarded for for a while now. I just don't think he's necessarily a complete basket case. Maybe he just needs time and help adjusting to the real world of just hanging the fuck out and talking about irrelevant crap.
For example, oh, maybe a man who believes that his career and his field and his hobbies are obviously MUCH more important and difficult and interesting than his wife's boring, frivolous, and useless work, whatever the hell it is she does all day while he does REAL work, and thinks therefor that it makes perfect sense that he should lecture her and berate about this for HOURS on end. Our culture's ingrained sexism just miiiiight have influenced this guy's view of how relationships work.
It's obviously not the whole story, but you can't just ignore it because you don't want to see "sexism and misogyny around every corner" (and racism, and ableism, and homophobia, and...). Who does? They suck. Most sane people can agree on that. But they are there, and pretending they are not and berating people who try to discuss them will not make them magically go away. Actually discussing the possibility will actually do SOMETHING rather than nothing.
My advice: Explain to him explicitly how it is making you feel and lay down some enforceable rules. ie max 15 minutes of computer talk a day. With a counselor if necessary. Feel free to add an ultimatum or two. But stand strong: it may not be easy but he'll respect you more in the end (and if he doesn't see Dan's advice ;). If you are going to be with each other the rest of your lives, then both of you - not just you - need to learn to enjoy each other's company.
(And yes, I know what a witch Emily Yoffe can be. She's no Margo Howard, but I'm addicted to advice columns and Dan doesn't write enough.)
This is the part that bothers me. CI's partner doesn't just want to talk at length about the differences between python and perl, this dude wants his/her RAPT, UNDIVIDED ATTENTION as he talks about things that he must know s/he has no interest in. I suspect CI has tried to discuss it in polite terms,* and has gotten only the brush-off and the accusations that CI "isn't curious enough." Regardless of whether his neurochemistry is wonky, that's just selfish, and makes me think that this marriage isn't worth saving. S/he owes him one last conversation/fight about how he needs to learn that s/he's not there to hang off his every word whenever he feels like talking, and then I think CI should ultmatlyely leave
I doubt it's Asperger's, too, as CI would have gotten indications of that earlier in life, it's not exactly adult-onset. And, as much as I hate to say it, if it is, does that require CI to stay with a partner who may never meet his or her emotional needs in the way s/he wants? If a partner comes down with the sort of serious illness that makes themkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk
And, for the record, this guy is an idiot. When and if CI leaves him, where is he going to find another human being who will put up with hours-long discourses on the minutia of computer security? That sort of love and compassion should be treasured, and this dude is a moron if he throws CI away just because he can't leave work at work.
Your argument would also hold water if it was exclusive to men, and also exclusive to straights. As a man dating a man, dating somebody kind of like this (and, also, to a point, being somebody who can be like this unchecked), I don't know how misogyny works itself into the relationships I have. But, you could possibly work misogyny into it.
Side rant: I recently read somebody saying how they didn't like gay porn (though they were gay themselves) because gay porn tended towards the same type of dehumanization of the bottom as straight porn does towards women, thus inducing a misogyny into gay porn. Which, to me, is a hilarious post-feminist argument against all porn for being misogynistic. Retarded (oops, ableist...I mean moronic) but hilarious.
In other words, you're an idiot for wanting to interject something cultural like an -ism into somebody's social limitations. Stop being such a liberal nanny willing to blame society for your problems and deal with the actual problems at hand.
CI, another way to get your husband off your back: have him tutor students in Computer Science. It will burn off the extra CS energy he has now that he is his own student. At least when he was in neuroscience, he had other students to blab on and on about.
I bet she's over-reacting. I bet he gets frustrated with her because he's wicked smart and she's not, and that's why he gets angry and withdraws. She should dump him, if he's unlikely to dump her, at least to set him free.
I've finally placed CI though with her overextended selflessness - Gerda Christow in *The Hollow*. Maybe this marriage will have the same ending.
THIS article might help explain some things and gives hope to this couple, and aspies and their partners in general. It is written by a man who finds out he has Asperger's (he is probably early 30's when he finds out?) when his marriage starts to fall apart, ironically, it its 3rd year :http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/17/fashio…
Why is Emily Yoffe a witch? I like her advice, and she frequently has questions to deal with that are pretty complex. I don't always agree with her answers, but then I don't always agree with Dan's answers, either.