Julie: Tim can be difficult to live with sometimes. And I’ve got two children as well, with autism as well. It can be quite hard at times. I think problem is Tim and John are very like and it’s sometimes I’m in the middle, you know, trying to smooth things over, because John takes things very, very literally, and because Tim’s people skills, maybe aren’t the absolute best. He’ll say something which John will misinterpret and then before we know it we’ve got major problems, and then Martin don’t understand what’s happening. So he’ll then get upset and so I spend a lot of my time, just sort of mediating really.
And with work I think he does really well in his work, but working in sort of IT field again, he can get his head down and he can sit and communicate with a PC all day and limited communication with people as much as possible [laughs]. He can communicate with people can’t you?
Tim: Oh yes. I have to do it in work.
Julie: He does go into meetings and he has to do.
Tim: I do have to go into meetings and I have to talk to customers so…
Julie: Yes, but you come home and sometimes you’re quite exhausted by it aren’t you? If you’ve had a day where you’ve had to interact a lot you can see that it really does take it out of him. But you’re happiest when you are just left to do your own thing aren’t you?
Tim: I do sometimes worry that I don’t manage the tone of voice and I am speaking very well either.
Julie: Yes, quite often he’ll shout me, and it’ll be “Julie come and has some tea.” This is what he really means, but it’ll be “Jules!” You know, and I think oh my goodness the house is on fire or something, you know, it’s hard to sometimes he can’t pitch it at the right, you know, to convey the right message can you?
Tim: No.
Julie: And quite often he’ll shout kids and they’ll come running down stairs thinking that they’re in trouble you know, and it’ll be just oh you know.
Tim: Tea’s ready.
Julie: Tea’s ready [laughs]. But to be honest we’ve come to a point now, haven’t we, I’ve spent a long time sort of working with Tim, we can change him, you know, but you can’t, you can’t, you just have to work with it. And find ways of adapting to accommodate these things.
