One thing I have learned from being exposed to so many children over so many years is that there are children that actually do have special needs that have to be worked around and understood. There was a time that these special needs were not understood and these children where often punished when they simply didn't do what is considered "normal behavior". NOW with understanding different challenges children are HELPED to learn how to manage their challenges and function better around others.

Given that the OP's mother talked about him possibly being on the autistic spectrum tells me that she has had challenges with him all along and noticed he was difficult to parent and understand and probably did not respond to normal parenting. It's one thing when a challenge is recognized and a child is TAUGHT how to manage their behaviors and interact with other better, and yet another story when a challenged child has never really had their challenges addressed. It's not surprising to come across adults that exhibit confusing behaviors where they never actually learned how to better manage their behaviors where they can engage in behaviors that appear to be "toxic" or "selfish" etc.

Depending on what challenge this OP's husband has, be it that he is on the autistic spectrum or has some OCD challenges etc., this kind of behavior may actually be normal to how the OP's husband NEEDS to have more control than the average person. As I have mentioned, I have been around children and interacted with them that are on the autism spectrum and I have also noticed how their own parents had to learn how to understand their child's wiring and work around it. I HAVE seen how these children DO need more control than the average child too and I had to learn how to understand that when I interacted with them myself. And in all honesty, people who don't KNOW what this challenge actually means tend to view these children as ill behaved and a problem too. In fact, because of this perception there has been a growing effort to provide support groups for parents who have these children so they can bring their children together and do things with their children where if the child starts acting out, they are not embarrassed and have others around them that understand this challenge. I have been to events where several of these challenged children get together, it's very different from a group of children that interact normally. Also, when it comes to the autism spectrum children can be mildly challenged to so severely challenged they cannot even talk. I have noticed that they tend to be in their own little world too.

Control, control, control tends to be the very essence of their challenge too. The sad thing is that the reason they are like this is due to trying to manage their own way of dealing with what is often something they themselves can get very frustrated with. Often they isolate not because they are being mean, but because they are less stimulated that way and can function better.

Quiet honestly, the fact that the OP's husband needs full control of this dog is a red flag, but not really the way most might think. It sounds like he really can't bear to have his wife draw this dog's attention away from him towards her. Actually, this symptom contributes to how children on the autism spectrum often don't do well with playmates. It can be so sad to see how a child on the spectrum wants to be able to have friends but just can't seem to engage in "play" normally so they fail to have friends. Often if they need to understand how to share one of their toys for example, instead of allowing another child to touch and play with their nice little train set, they will often immediately get upset when a little friend moves their train set or tries to touch it and will want to rush over and stop THEIR train set from being touched. OCD can present similar challenges where a person can get very uncomfortable if something they interact with gets out of place. Stress presents with anything that is "out of order" in someone's autistic world and it can get unbearable. It's not unusual for these individuals to excel in math and even computers because there is "order" to these things and that is what tends to be more calming to these individuals.

What this OP is dealing with is probably due to how her husband is wired and she did not see it as well until this dog came into the picture. I caution encouraging her to decide this is purposeful abuse, especially since his mother shared that she suspected he might be on the autistic spectrum.