Wife chronically depressed, blames everyone everything for her unhapiness&unfullfillment, I want out

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PP , nowhere in your long, long post is any acknowledgment or appreciation of what your husband and kids are going through. They are just there to suck it up and make things better for you. Who is making things better for them? Your husband has to carry the financial burden 100% himself PLUS pay for the housekeeper but all you talk about is how it helps you, not what it does to him and to the long-term financial health of the family. You are talking to your husband about how you're feeling today, but have you shamed him into not ever talking about how HE is? Is the vibe in your home such that he is only allowed to talk about how to help you, not what this does to him? That's what you're doing. You're shaming OP into shutting up, as if he's not the real person, only his wife is.

Amen! I've been the functioning spouse in this kind of relationship and developed depression as a result. DH and I are still married but, like the PP, he doesn't know/ignores the price it exacted from me. People with mental illness aren't the only sufferers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP , nowhere in your long, long post is any acknowledgment or appreciation of what your husband and kids are going through. They are just there to suck it up and make things better for you. Who is making things better for them? Your husband has to carry the financial burden 100% himself PLUS pay for the housekeeper but all you talk about is how it helps you, not what it does to him and to the long-term financial health of the family. You are talking to your husband about how you're feeling today, but have you shamed him into not ever talking about how HE is? Is the vibe in your home such that he is only allowed to talk about how to help you, not what this does to him? That's what you're doing. You're shaming OP into shutting up, as if he's not the real person, only his wife is.

Amen! I've been the functioning spouse in this kind of relationship and developed depression as a result. DH and I are still married but, like the PP, he doesn't know/ignores the price it exacted from me. People with mental illness aren't the only sufferers.

Why do you assume that I don’t feel awful about how things are? I expressed the shame and embarrassment for being the reason things are this way. If OP’s wife had cancer would you say she should do what you are asking op’s wife and I to do? I worked for 25 years and outearned my husband, I receive a hefty monthly long term disability based on my leaving salary from my employers who also pay the whole family’s health insurance and still contribute to my pension both what I contributed and what whey contributed when I worked so he is absolutely not bearing the financial burden alone. I am also retraining so that I can start to contribute more to the family.
Because we have this help, towards with I absolutely do contribute, I can now be more present and happier with the kids and my husband, I can go out sometimes because I can prepare myself mentally, because I’m am not a crumbling heap of anxiety on the floor of my bedroom panicking about how I’ll get through the rest of the day. Thankfully, though reluctantly, by husband sees this as the way forward that will keep the family unit as a whole and our 4 kids happier and on more of an even keel.
I was giving the perspective of the other side. OP has to decide if it’s worth it for him to keep the family together. I went through hell with public shaming from my husband. With him telling friends about how awful I’d become. I paid a very high price in my dignity for having an illness I can not control.
OP can shout from the rooftops for all I care but what would that achieve? He could be bitter and angry, just like my husband was and make the whole family miserable or he could acknowledge that what his wife is going through is out of her control and they could seek the help she needs together.
Of course OP could also walk away and pretend that he did all he could. It is his choice.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP , nowhere in your long, long post is any acknowledgment or appreciation of what your husband and kids are going through. They are just there to suck it up and make things better for you. Who is making things better for them? Your husband has to carry the financial burden 100% himself PLUS pay for the housekeeper but all you talk about is how it helps you, not what it does to him and to the long-term financial health of the family. You are talking to your husband about how you're feeling today, but have you shamed him into not ever talking about how HE is? Is the vibe in your home such that he is only allowed to talk about how to help you, not what this does to him? That's what you're doing. You're shaming OP into shutting up, as if he's not the real person, only his wife is.

Amen! I've been the functioning spouse in this kind of relationship and developed depression as a result. DH and I are still married but, like the PP, he doesn't know/ignores the price it exacted from me. People with mental illness aren't the only sufferers.

Why do you assume that I don’t feel awful about how things are? I expressed the shame and embarrassment for being the reason things are this way. If OP’s wife had cancer would you say she should do what you are asking op’s wife and I to do? I worked for 25 years and outearned my husband, I receive a hefty monthly long term disability based on my leaving salary from my employers who also pay the whole family’s health insurance and still contribute to my pension both what I contributed and what whey contributed when I worked so he is absolutely not bearing the financial burden alone. I am also retraining so that I can start to contribute more to the family.
Because we have this help, towards with I absolutely do contribute, I can now be more present and happier with the kids and my husband, I can go out sometimes because I can prepare myself mentally, because I’m am not a crumbling heap of anxiety on the floor of my bedroom panicking about how I’ll get through the rest of the day. Thankfully, though reluctantly, by husband sees this as the way forward that will keep the family unit as a whole and our 4 kids happier and on more of an even keel.
I was giving the perspective of the other side. OP has to decide if it’s worth it for him to keep the family together. I went through hell with public shaming from my husband. With him telling friends about how awful I’d become. I paid a very high price in my dignity for having an illness I can not control.
OP can shout from the rooftops for all I care but what would that achieve? He could be bitter and angry, just like my husband was and make the whole family miserable or he could acknowledge that what his wife is going through is out of her control and they could seek the help she needs together.
Of course OP could also walk away and pretend that he did all he could. It is his choice.

DP. There is a difference between you "feeling awful" and having true empathy. You don't seem to have any, in a way that is striking. Maybe it is your illness, I don't know. Narcissism does come with mental illness sometimes, but I obviously don't know your situation. However, just as a reader, I have been struck in both of your posts about how little empathy you seem to have for your spouse or children. That other PP wasn't the only one who noticed.

The cancer analogy is not the right analogy for mental illness, because in cancer, the supporting spouse isn't at risk of catching the disease himself. Severe mental illness is more like ebola, avian flu, or something serious and contagious. It's not the fault of the person who got it, but it's also high-risk to the people around the sufferer. If you had a spouse with ebola, you would do what you could to support that spouse, but you would also protect yourself and your kids. This is what you don't seem to understand or have empathy for. You don't seem to empathize with your spouse's suffering. You are angry that he talked with people about your behavior to him that harmed him, trying to to shut it down as "shaming." Why should he be cut off from a support network because you don't like the fact that people learn about harm your illness caused him? That's a remarkably, shockingly narcissistic point of view.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP , nowhere in your long, long post is any acknowledgment or appreciation of what your husband and kids are going through. They are just there to suck it up and make things better for you. Who is making things better for them? Your husband has to carry the financial burden 100% himself PLUS pay for the housekeeper but all you talk about is how it helps you, not what it does to him and to the long-term financial health of the family. You are talking to your husband about how you're feeling today, but have you shamed him into not ever talking about how HE is? Is the vibe in your home such that he is only allowed to talk about how to help you, not what this does to him? That's what you're doing. You're shaming OP into shutting up, as if he's not the real person, only his wife is.

Amen! I've been the functioning spouse in this kind of relationship and developed depression as a result. DH and I are still married but, like the PP, he doesn't know/ignores the price it exacted from me. People with mental illness aren't the only sufferers.

Why do you assume that I don’t feel awful about how things are? I expressed the shame and embarrassment for being the reason things are this way. If OP’s wife had cancer would you say she should do what you are asking op’s wife and I to do? I worked for 25 years and outearned my husband, I receive a hefty monthly long term disability based on my leaving salary from my employers who also pay the whole family’s health insurance and still contribute to my pension both what I contributed and what whey contributed when I worked so he is absolutely not bearing the financial burden alone. I am also retraining so that I can start to contribute more to the family.
Because we have this help, towards with I absolutely do contribute, I can now be more present and happier with the kids and my husband, I can go out sometimes because I can prepare myself mentally, because I’m am not a crumbling heap of anxiety on the floor of my bedroom panicking about how I’ll get through the rest of the day. Thankfully, though reluctantly, by husband sees this as the way forward that will keep the family unit as a whole and our 4 kids happier and on more of an even keel.
I was giving the perspective of the other side. OP has to decide if it’s worth it for him to keep the family together. I went through hell with public shaming from my husband. With him telling friends about how awful I’d become. I paid a very high price in my dignity for having an illness I can not control.
OP can shout from the rooftops for all I care but what would that achieve? He could be bitter and angry, just like my husband was and make the whole family miserable or he could acknowledge that what his wife is going through is out of her control and they could seek the help she needs together.
Of course OP could also walk away and pretend that he did all he could. It is his choice.

DP. There is a difference between you "feeling awful" and having true empathy. You don't seem to have any, in a way that is striking. Maybe it is your illness, I don't know. Narcissism does come with mental illness sometimes, but I obviously don't know your situation. However, just as a reader, I have been struck in both of your posts about how little empathy you seem to have for your spouse or children. That other PP wasn't the only one who noticed.

The cancer analogy is not the right analogy for mental illness, because in cancer, the supporting spouse isn't at risk of catching the disease himself. Severe mental illness is more like ebola, avian flu, or something serious and contagious. It's not the fault of the person who got it, but it's also high-risk to the people around the sufferer. If you had a spouse with ebola, you would do what you could to support that spouse, but you would also protect yourself and your kids. This is what you don't seem to understand or have empathy for. You don't seem to empathize with your spouse's suffering. You are angry that he talked with people about your behavior to him that harmed him, trying to to shut it down as "shaming." Why should he be cut off from a support network because you don't like the fact that people learn about harm your illness caused him? That's a remarkably, shockingly narcissistic point of view.

What in your eyes constitutes empathy?
I have to say how I know how bad my spouse must feel? Well I do. The shame and embarrassment come from that. That I cannot be the wife and mother my family deserves. I think your desire to be given a pass to see things as you want to and not the other side is what is driving this. Where is your empathy? How do you show you understand how yours and the OP’s spouse are feeling and what are you doing about it?
My husband had a five year affair that he slipped into before we were married while he worked away and I held him as he cried when he cut things off with her. As he screamed and hollered at me, pushed me away in his pain I told him he could leave if he felt he would be happier with her. He did and then came back after 3 weeks. I never berated him, yelled at him or tried to heap blame on him. As he sank into depression I read up on how he must be feeling and directed him to the help he needed. He opened up to me about how he felt. We went to individual and couples counseling to help him work through his feelings for her. I sat through him talking about his grief. I encouraged him and never ever acted the injured wife. It took a year of leaving my feelings aside and helping him through his for him to come through on the other side. And he thanked me for it and still thanks me to this day.
There are many facets to a relationship that one cannot always put down on these posts.
Yes I understand his anger and initial confusion that his once vibrant social wife is now a a very different person. But he is also an adult who can pick up a book or visit a dr with his wife to understand how she is feeling. I am saying that sometimes we have to put our own feelings and pain and frustration to one side as we really take on what our spouse if feeling. If my husband had not done that we would not be in the path to healing that we are on today. But you are free to take a different path. But that takes time, commitment to a marriage and family unit, maturity and a selflessness that many do not feel they should sacrifice anymore. Everyone wants to look after number one .
You and OP want a free pass. Take it. You have free will.

[Anonymous]

PP, I am the one in my marriage who has struggled with mental illness. I am not OP, not in OPs situation, and I am not looking for a "free pass," whatever you mean by that.

I don't think you sound empathetic, and I don't know what else to say. Your disease (and mine) isn't like cancer, and you don't seem to want to allow your husband to even talk about his experience living with a severely ill spouse. You are clearly, obviously still angry at him for the fact he shared his experience. That seems totally narcissistic to me, but I don't think you are willing to understand or listen, so I don't see the point of continuing the discussion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PP, I am the one in my marriage who has struggled with mental illness. I am not OP, not in OPs situation, and I am not looking for a "free pass," whatever you mean by that.

I don't think you sound empathetic, and I don't know what else to say. Your disease (and mine) isn't like cancer, and you don't seem to want to allow your husband to even talk about his experience living with a severely ill spouse. You are clearly, obviously still angry at him for the fact he shared his experience. That seems totally narcissistic to me, but I don't think you are willing to understand or listen, so I don't see the point of continuing the discussion.

Fair enough. It’s a futile conversation anyway. Calling me a narcissist is your way of making me feel bad. Frankly I don’t care because I know that’s not the case. Anyway moving on. Won’t be back to this chat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP I am your wife and you are my husband and it’s been 5 years of hell. I struggle daily and fail at being the person I was before crippling anxiety took hold. I see a dr and therapist and I have tried so many different medications and I have also been frustrated by how long it’s taking to get better. I’m embarrassed and ashamed of the person I’ve become. One who cannot be spontaneous and fun because I’m so scared of having an anxiety or panic attack when I’m out. I sleep a lot because my medication makes me soooooo heavily drowsy.
I plan my life around my illness. Making sure I’m not out when my meds are wearing off. Making sure there is a place to hide when I feel panicky, not driving long distances.
I want to be a fully functioning member of my family but I simply cannot do it. I’ve just changed doctors hoping this one will help me find the perfect cocktail of drugs that will make me normal again.
My husband also initially did not fully grasp how all encompassing a mental illness can be particularly since I look “normal” while I am a wreck inside. He’d tell me I’d abdicated my role as a parent and contributor to the house hold -i haven’t worked for 5 years. He’d ridicule and put me down much the same way as your opening post. This added depression to my anxiety because I didn’t want to be all the things he saw me as and it hurt so badly that rather than see that I was suffering he’d decided to blame me for the way I am.
If your wife had cancer and her treatment wasn’t working would you give up on her so readily? Mental illness is real and the sufferer is trapped in a sick mind in much the same way as the cancer sufferer is trapped in a sick body. Even your wife’s reluctance to seek help is part of her sickness. It took me 4 years to be willing to take medication because I was too scared and it’s been 5 years since treatment started and I am still not myself.
Please have compassion for your wife op
Over time we’ve implemented the following:
Instead of cursing me out for being a lazy cow we now have a full time cook and house keeper.
I take my kids to school which is hard because my anxiety is crippling but I tell myself that I’ll be home in 30 minutes so I go. The thought that someone is there if I can’t pick up from school or take to activities or face household tasks is huge.
By the time I get home my meds are starting to kick in so I study a little for what I hope to be my next career which I hope I can handle in the way I handle dropping and picking up kids from school-telling myself that in one hour I’ll be done and back home to safety.
Then I become too sleepy and sleep for up to 3 hours. Everyone accepts that is how it will be until I can hopefully change my meds and they respect and work around that.
When the kids are home I spend all evening helping with homework and projects. Again not having to stress about having a panic attack while picking up a child and taking them to activities or planning a meal is huge. I feel safe at home and really invest the time with my kids. I would be a wreck if I had to worry about having a panic attack in traffic or while talking to other parents at basket ball etc. or if I had to worry about what to cook. I have some good days when I go but there is no pressure.
I talk to my husband about how I’m feeling,when I’m not up to something and we find a way around it.
Things are still not great with my husband but he appears to be accepting that this is how things will be for now. The endless fighting and disdainful attitude has greatly reduced and we’ve reached some level of equilibrium.
I would advise you to lose the attitude and really talk to your wife about steps going forward. What her struggles are, how she thinks they could be overcome or reduced. Go with her to the dr (my husband did though he wasn’t happy about it) so you get some understanding of what she is dealing with and how the dr hopes to tackle it. Put things in place to help her much like you would put a chair lift if your wife could not use her legs or get a part time helper if she was otherwise incapacitated. Treat her illness like a real illness that she cannot control then you would not be so angry with her. Most of all, try to understand that she would love to be the person she once was if only she could. She is not choosing to be this way.

All about you. Selfish.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP , nowhere in your long, long post is any acknowledgment or appreciation of what your husband and kids are going through. They are just there to suck it up and make things better for you. Who is making things better for them? Your husband has to carry the financial burden 100% himself PLUS pay for the housekeeper but all you talk about is how it helps you, not what it does to him and to the long-term financial health of the family. You are talking to your husband about how you're feeling today, but have you shamed him into not ever talking about how HE is? Is the vibe in your home such that he is only allowed to talk about how to help you, not what this does to him? That's what you're doing. You're shaming OP into shutting up, as if he's not the real person, only his wife is.

Amen! I've been the functioning spouse in this kind of relationship and developed depression as a result. DH and I are still married but, like the PP, he doesn't know/ignores the price it exacted from me. People with mental illness aren't the only sufferers.

Why do you assume that I don’t feel awful about how things are? I expressed the shame and embarrassment for being the reason things are this way. If OP’s wife had cancer would you say she should do what you are asking op’s wife and I to do? I worked for 25 years and outearned my husband, I receive a hefty monthly long term disability based on my leaving salary from my employers who also pay the whole family’s health insurance and still contribute to my pension both what I contributed and what whey contributed when I worked so he is absolutely not bearing the financial burden alone. I am also retraining so that I can start to contribute more to the family.
Because we have this help, towards with I absolutely do contribute, I can now be more present and happier with the kids and my husband, I can go out sometimes because I can prepare myself mentally, because I’m am not a crumbling heap of anxiety on the floor of my bedroom panicking about how I’ll get through the rest of the day. Thankfully, though reluctantly, by husband sees this as the way forward that will keep the family unit as a whole and our 4 kids happier and on more of an even keel.
I was giving the perspective of the other side. OP has to decide if it’s worth it for him to keep the family together. I went through hell with public shaming from my husband. With him telling friends about how awful I’d become. I paid a very high price in my dignity for having an illness I can not control.
OP can shout from the rooftops for all I care but what would that achieve? He could be bitter and angry, just like my husband was and make the whole family miserable or he could acknowledge that what his wife is going through is out of her control and they could seek the help she needs together.
Of course OP could also walk away and pretend that he did all he could. It is his choice.

DP. There is a difference between you "feeling awful" and having true empathy. You don't seem to have any, in a way that is striking. Maybe it is your illness, I don't know. Narcissism does come with mental illness sometimes, but I obviously don't know your situation. However, just as a reader, I have been struck in both of your posts about how little empathy you seem to have for your spouse or children. That other PP wasn't the only one who noticed.

The cancer analogy is not the right analogy for mental illness, because in cancer, the supporting spouse isn't at risk of catching the disease himself. Severe mental illness is more like ebola, avian flu, or something serious and contagious. It's not the fault of the person who got it, but it's also high-risk to the people around the sufferer. If you had a spouse with ebola, you would do what you could to support that spouse, but you would also protect yourself and your kids. This is what you don't seem to understand or have empathy for. You don't seem to empathize with your spouse's suffering. You are angry that he talked with people about your behavior to him that harmed him, trying to to shut it down as "shaming." Why should he be cut off from a support network because you don't like the fact that people learn about harm your illness caused him? That's a remarkably, shockingly narcissistic point of view.

What in your eyes constitutes empathy?
I have to say how I know how bad my spouse must feel? Well I do. The shame and embarrassment come from that. That I cannot be the wife and mother my family deserves. I think your desire to be given a pass to see things as you want to and not the other side is what is driving this. Where is your empathy? How do you show you understand how yours and the OP’s spouse are feeling and what are you doing about it?
My husband had a five year affair that he slipped into before we were married while he worked away and I held him as he cried when he cut things off with her. As he screamed and hollered at me, pushed me away in his pain I told him he could leave if he felt he would be happier with her. He did and then came back after 3 weeks. I never berated him, yelled at him or tried to heap blame on him. As he sank into depression I read up on how he must be feeling and directed him to the help he needed. He opened up to me about how he felt. We went to individual and couples counseling to help him work through his feelings for her. I sat through him talking about his grief. I encouraged him and never ever acted the injured wife. It took a year of leaving my feelings aside and helping him through his for him to come through on the other side. And he thanked me for it and still thanks me to this day.
There are many facets to a relationship that one cannot always put down on these posts.
Yes I understand his anger and initial confusion that his once vibrant social wife is now a a very different person. But he is also an adult who can pick up a book or visit a dr with his wife to understand how she is feeling. I am saying that sometimes we have to put our own feelings and pain and frustration to one side as we really take on what our spouse if feeling. If my husband had not done that we would not be in the path to healing that we are on today. But you are free to take a different path. But that takes time, commitment to a marriage and family unit, maturity and a selflessness that many do not feel they should sacrifice anymore. Everyone wants to look after number one .
You and OP want a free pass. Take it. You have free will.

An affair is different form mental health or health issues. Very different things. Why you'd ignore a 5 year affair and blame it on depression is nothing that OP is describing.

[Anonymous]

OP, it’s a serious medical issue. Stick with your wife and help her find a solution. It will be a benefit to you and your kids to do so. Others have posted good ideas about calling upMD, finding a new one if the current one isn’t helpful etc. there’s more that can be done.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My depression was a big factor that led to divorce. I wish my ex had PUSHED me to treatment with the truth "I love you. You aren't the funny, happy person I married. I hate seeing you suffer and your suffering is making our whole family miserable. You need to get treatment or I'm not sure our marriage will survive."

I think this script is the best recommendation on the entire thread.

OP, this is good advice. Please don’t leave her without letting her know your thoughts.

You’ve tried to do the right thing and so consider this as the next right action. Give her a chance. It’s worth it for both your and your kids future.

OP here. This script is helpful. thankyou.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My depression was a big factor that led to divorce. I wish my ex had PUSHED me to treatment with the truth "I love you. You aren't the funny, happy person I married. I hate seeing you suffer and your suffering is making our whole family miserable. You need to get treatment or I'm not sure our marriage will survive."

I think this script is the best recommendation on the entire thread.

OP, this is good advice. Please don’t leave her without letting her know your thoughts.

You’ve tried to do the right thing and so consider this as the next right action. Give her a chance. It’s worth it for both your and your kids future.

OP here. This script is helpful. thankyou.

+1 on the script. Make this about *her* living a happy meaningful life. You might read a book called "I'm not sick; I don't need help" by Xavier Amador. He is a doctor who has a mentally ill brother (schizophrenia or bipolar, I forget....) It focuses on an aspect of mental illness called "anosognosia" which means that the person who is mentally ill doesn't recognize that they are ill (also true in some neurologically based illness/disorders). Amador writes a lot about how to talk and ally with a person in a way that helps them help themselves to get treatment and to pursue goals that are good for them (and good for you).

Also, please consider taking the NAMI Family to Family class. It will teach you a lot about all aspects of mental illness which you will need to understand whether you stay together or divorce.

There's another book I like about the choices caregivers make to stay or to leave or something in between -- Burden of Sympathy, by David Karp. I think everyone comes out in a slightly different place depending on facts about the illness, the degree to which the person is able to recognize their illness and struggle to get better, kids, presence/absence of violence, financial risk, personal ethics/values, etc.

[Anonymous]

I have also suffered from depression and I wish my husband had just literally said to me: I've made an appointment. It'w on Thursday at 3. I am coming home from work to take you to the appointment.
And not given me an out.
I went eventually but would have gone sooner if he made me go.
For the lady upthread who describes crippling anxiety, I know that I found living in a very competitive part of Northern Virginia, with very competitive moms and the whole school vibe, etc. very anxiety-provoking. I grew up lower middle class and never fit in in our NoVA suburb, never got over being intimidated by the mean moms, etc. My anxiety lifted significantly once we moved to a farther out suburb with a more relaxed vibe. I feel like my kids relaxed too. Maybe not for everybody, but I wonder if the dad who started this thread has thought about that and would consider moving to somewhere less stressful. Not everybody is meant to be a high powered big city person.

[Anonymous]

You sound like a duck.
You need to step up and parent as well as support her. You have no idea what's it like to bear child raising responsibilities when your spouse has no empathy.

[Anonymous]

Do some research on "mental load" to begin to understand.

[Anonymous]

'Wife chronically depressed, blames everyone everything for her unhapiness&unfullfillment'

Sounds like my ex!