Dog Winked

Wave. Nod. Wink. These are all things my Aspie hubby does to our dog. I have never seen her respond in anything but a morose stare. He thinks she’s hoodwinked by his ploys. I don’t.

“You’re some kind of dog-a-ful to me.”

This is spoken in a ridiculous voice ranging from high falsetto to deep bass and back. Again, this is met with a gloomy stare from aforementioned canine.

“You’re just like a dog to me,” says he.

Well, yes Dear, she is, because she is a dog. She’s not a cat, or a gopher, or a raccoon.

When our family’s male parental unit is around our canine unit, silliness abounds. At least on the human side.

WrongPlanet.net has a great threat on Aspies and maturity levels. The subject is Love and Dating.

“I use to think my boyfriend had Asperger’s Syndrome, because he has strange body behavior, has an extensive vocabulary, is intellectually smart, talks like a little professor, is an engineer, has trouble reading others, doesn’t like change, has been living the same way and doing the same things for many years, is clumsy, and has intense and narrow interests. However, I’m beginning to wonder. Could it be something else? I’m beginning to think he sees the world through the eyes of a 13-year old. He’s clumsy, is always trying to be silly, is always reading silly books and watching silly shows… Perhaps, his strange body behavior and way of talking is really childish behavior and childish talking. Are these characteristics of [AS], or am I dating a 13-year old?”

http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt13141.html

This person is very lucky to have a 13 year old. At times I’m thinking that my hubby is only 5 or 6. Several responses to this initial question state that it truly doesn’t matter if the boyfriend has AS or not. What matters is whether the person posting is willing to live with the behaviors as the boyfriend may not change.

One person pointed out that delayed social and emotional maturity is quite common in those with Aspergers Syndrome, a pervasive developmental disorder.

A study in ‘The Journal of Intellectual Disability Research’ describes it this way:

Asperger syndrome (AS) is a pervasive developmental disorder characterized by autistic social dysfunction and idiosyncratic interests in the presence of normal intelligence. There is no history of language delay. Although people with AS are known to suffer from comorbid psychiatric conditions, few studies have systematically addressed this topic.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2788.1998.tb01647.x/abstract

So yes, silliness will most likely be present when our Aspie loved one is around.

Sure, the language and gestures may look funny, embarrass your kids, or seem foolish to you, but if it makes your Aspie happy, so be it.

I, however, refuse to wave, nod or wink at the dog, and she adores me, also.

Wink, wink. Nod, nod.