Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yikes. Do you have kids together?

No we do not but I was hoping to TTC soon. Now I am terrified of his personality change and am wondering what I can do.

Do NOT have kids! The only thing worse than being a single mom is having an ex who is irresponsible, can't hold down a job, doesn't pay child support on time, and you have to fear everytime you leave your kid(s) with him. Please do NOT have children!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Are you familiar with the concept of "confounding by indication?"

Nope.

Ah, then that's part of the problem.

Be clearer in making your point.

Sure! The comment about SSRIs and suicide is both incorrect and not relevant to this case.

The black box warning about suicidal ideation in this context is limited to children and adolescents, not adults, does not show a relationship with increased likelihood of actually committing suicide (but a small increase in talking about it), and is not higher than the risk of suicidality in untreated depression.

"Systematic reviews and pooled analysis of experimental, observational, and epidemiological studies have investigated the use of SSRIs and their association with suicidality. Taking account of the methodological limitations of these studies, the current evidence fails to provide a clear relationship between their use and risk of suicidality in adults. However, in children and adolescents, there appears to be a bit of increased risk of suicidal ideations and attempts, but not of completed suicides. This risk can be anticipated and managed clinically."
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3353604/

Many studies were rejected because they did not control well for "confounding by indication." That is, if the risk of something is increased because of having a disorder, and it is treated, then the long term effects of that disorder can erroneously be confused with a side effect or sequelae of the treatment. So, for example, people treated for depression are more likely to have depression, and people with depression are more likely to have dementia. That doesn't establish that antidepressants cause depression. Similarly, people treated for depression are more likely to have depression, and having depression itself is associated with increased suicidality.

Hope this helps!

^
This information above, while medically accurate, is irrelevant to this thread. PPs above are concerned about the SSRI possibly having triggered mania, which is quite different from suicidal ideation.

I agree that anti-depressants can be very helpful, but I also know from personal experience that SSRIs in some people can drive a hypomania that is often dismissed as part of “relationship problems” or personal existential crisis. When medication is not recognized as the problem, it can wreck lives.

https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/856106
Treatment of unipolar depression with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) or venlafaxine (multiple brands) is associated with a significantly increased risk for subsequent diagnoses of manic or bipolar disorder, new research shows. However, theories to account for the association weigh heavily on the side of undiagnosed bipolar depression.
"Although our findings do not demonstrate any causal link between antidepressant therapy and bipolar disorder, the association of antidepressant therapy with mania in people being treated for depression reinforces the importance of considering risk factors for mania or hypomania in people who present with an episode of depression," the authors write in their study, which was published online December 14 in BMJ Open.

Anonymous wrote:"Waiting to gain financial stability" - you sound like a loser too. Are you expecting money to fall from the sky? Get a job and DTMF

This. Get a job, any job, and get out. It is the tightest labor market for 60 years...

"Waiting to gain financial stability" - you sound like a loser too. Are you expecting money to fall from the sky? Get a job and DTMF

Anonymous wrote:Op here. It has now been 3 months and my DH behavior has completely deteriorated. He refuses to come home and stays out all day every day until 4 am or sleeps overnight. He says he is “sleeping at the office” but the gps tracker on his phone shows that he is out at bars and restaurants and then winds up at random addresses and hotels. I have spied multiple hookup apps on his phone and multiple random numbers that belong to random local women and even an escort service.

He cannot bear to be around me and screams and yells at me saying he hates me and I need to go away. When I tried to confront him
About his hookup app he screamed at me and threatened to kick me out and chased me around the apartment almost hitting me. He harbors so much anger and resentment towards me. He is drinking every night all night. He sleeps in until 2 pm and goes into work at 3 pm. He tells everyone he is depressed because of his crazy wife that won’t stop screaming at him and falsely accusing him of cheating.

He has suddenly withdrawn all contact and affection from me. He acts so distant and cold and makes me feel like a worm.

I feel like I am in a fog. Im still around as I am not employed, and am waiting to gain financial stability. How will I survive this?

You need a plan to get out. What you’re describing is abuse. Do you have any family who could help support you until you get back on your feet? Or an old job in a city you used to live in?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We don't have all the information but from what OP described this clearly sounds like a reaction to the life scare and new meds. It is stunning to see so many people advise dumping the spouse. It's not like this has been going on for a decade and the husband refuses to treat it. It's like as soon as you hit a rough patch you should bail on the marriage. I don't know if these are trolls or what.

I say this as a person who has went through a divorce.

Most people will advise working it out if they are older/have been together for decades and/or have children. In other words, circumstances make it hard to start over. Otoh, OP's dh is 30. They have been together for a couple years at most. And her husband is having issues this early on in the marriage with no kids or other kinds of major stress? OP is young enough and unencumbered enough to start over.

New poster. PP, you are advocating for divorce as an immediate knee-jerk reaction to what may be mental issues and/or meds talking. This may be fixable but you want OP to walk without even attempting to work with this as a potential medical issue first.

Do you simply walk away from everything and everyone that gets difficult in your own life, PP? I would not want to be in your family if you abandon people so readily rather than making any effort to help them first.

She can dodge a bullet by quickly dumping this guy before they get too far along.

"...for better or worse, in sickness and in health..." clearly means nothing to you.

Short of abuse or utter financial ruin, she should help her husband get treated. I'd probably try to lockdown the credit cards and bank account access.

Are you willing to give up your whole life to take care of your spouse (who you’ve only been with for a few years)?

They’ve only been together a short time. Should she give up all her hopes for a family and the type of life she dreamed of to become this guy’s caregiver???

I wouldn’t throw my life away like that.

Op here. It has now been 3 months and my DH behavior has completely deteriorated. He refuses to come home and stays out all day every day until 4 am or sleeps overnight. He says he is “sleeping at the office” but the gps tracker on his phone shows that he is out at bars and restaurants and then winds up at random addresses and hotels. I have spied multiple hookup apps on his phone and multiple random numbers that belong to random local women and even an escort service.

He cannot bear to be around me and screams and yells at me saying he hates me and I need to go away. When I tried to confront him
About his hookup app he screamed at me and threatened to kick me out and chased me around the apartment almost hitting me. He harbors so much anger and resentment towards me. He is drinking every night all night. He sleeps in until 2 pm and goes into work at 3 pm. He tells everyone he is depressed because of his crazy wife that won’t stop screaming at him and falsely accusing him of cheating.

He has suddenly withdrawn all contact and affection from me. He acts so distant and cold and makes me feel like a worm.

I feel like I am in a fog. Im still around as I am not employed, and am waiting to gain financial stability. How will I survive this?

Anonymous wrote:This is tough OP. I agree that it sounds like the medication could be behind this abrupt of a change. I would go to the doctor as others have advised and report the changes you are seeing, because, at the very least, your DH may not be able to see them clearly for himself. I know if I were affected by meds in this way, I would hope and pray my DH would do this for me, and not just leave me.

OTOH, if your DH is somehow refusing to cooperate with medication changes, is someone you can no longer live with, is dangerous, etc., then you must look out for yourself.

As a person with a bipolar ex, I really think this PP has the balance correct == if you're married, hopefully you would expend some energy helping your DH get help. On the other hand, sometimes mental illness can get really out of hand really fast. There is no "timeline to stay or leave" in this situation. I stayed with my DH for 2 1/2 years. During that time it was clear that he was engaging in behaviors that were problematic (drinking, hyper sexuality, depression, anxiety) but he was never correctly diagnose or medicated. He also never committed to stop self-medicating and take the prescribed medication consistently. I think that many people don't realize that people with mental illness sometimes engage in behaviors that are abusive, even if those behaviors are driven by illness. In other words, one person is shouting at his wife because he's depressed, and another one is shouting at his wife because he's a domestic abuser -- there's really no difference. I was the wife on the receiving end of a lot of inappropriate behavior and the fact that it was driven by "illness" didn't mean I had to tolerate it or live with it long term (or even short term). I had to protect myself and my future. Perhaps I would have felt differently if my DH had been committed to working through his troubles with a psychiatrist and therapist, but he wasn't. Maybe he didn't want to because those people didn't diagnose him properly and as a result what they were doing wasn't helping him. That's sad, but also not my responsibility to stay with him if he is behaving inappropriately.

In the end, at a certain point, I had to take care of my now health and safety and life first, as well as my kids'. TBH, I am glad I stayed to help, but even 2 1/2 years was too long and VERY damaging to us all.

I do believe in "in sickness and health" but I don't believe that "sickness and health" includes addiction, abuse or adultery. Any one of those can be a component of living with a mentally ill person.

Anonymous wrote:Move on. You are young enough to find someone else and have a family. You know your DH is prone to mental health issues. Just leave.

DCUM wife of the year right here.

Move on. You are young enough to find someone else and have a family. You know your DH is prone to mental health issues. Just leave.

He's got to agree to a joint visit to his doctor.

You should consider counseling for yourself.

And yeah, don't get pregnant.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yikes. Do you have kids together?

No we do not but I was hoping to TTC soon. Now I am terrified of his personality change and am wondering what I can do.

Definitely do not TTC until he gets sorted out, and make sure he stays sorted out for a while before you even think about it. I think you already know this, OP, but having a child--while it is a wonderful thing--makes relationships so much more difficult.

Pardon, that should be "That doesn't establish that antidepressants cause dementia." (Depression is well-established to do that on its own)

Anonymous wrote:

Are you familiar with the concept of "confounding by indication?"

Nope.

Ah, then that's part of the problem.

Be clearer in making your point.

Sure! The comment about SSRIs and suicide is both incorrect and not relevant to this case.

The black box warning about suicidal ideation in this context is limited to children and adolescents, not adults, does not show a relationship with increased likelihood of actually committing suicide (but a small increase in talking about it), and is not higher than the risk of suicidality in untreated depression.

"Systematic reviews and pooled analysis of experimental, observational, and epidemiological studies have investigated the use of SSRIs and their association with suicidality. Taking account of the methodological limitations of these studies, the current evidence fails to provide a clear relationship between their use and risk of suicidality in adults. However, in children and adolescents, there appears to be a bit of increased risk of suicidal ideations and attempts, but not of completed suicides. This risk can be anticipated and managed clinically."
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3353604/

Many studies were rejected because they did not control well for "confounding by indication." That is, if the risk of something is increased because of having a disorder, and it is treated, then the long term effects of that disorder can erroneously be confused with a side effect or sequelae of the treatment. So, for example, people treated for depression are more likely to have depression, and people with depression are more likely to have dementia. That doesn't establish that antidepressants cause depression. Similarly, people treated for depression are more likely to have depression, and having depression itself is associated with increased suicidality.

Hope this helps!

I can’t believe how many people are reinforcing stigmas around anti-depressants! Surely you haven’t dealt with chronic mental illness.