So tired of dealing with DH mental health

[Airdustmoon]

AIBU for being so tired of dealing with my DH’s mental health difficulties? I’m just exhausted by it all today.

Together 17 years, married for most of that. 1 DS age 7. DH had a bit of a breakdown, almost 5 years ago now. Anxiety, insomnia. It feels like I’ve been his emotional crutch ever since.

In the last 12 months he’s had a lot of physical health problems as well from long Covid. His physical health has finally started to improve and I thought his mental health was too but it’s still so fragile. He has no resilience whatsoever, the smallest thing sets him off. An offhand comment from a friend, a problem with a company which needs to be resolved - he just can’t seem to cope with any of the small trials and tribulations of normal life. I mean he’ll hold it together and deal with it in the moment, but then I have to deal with the fall out later, hours of emotional support.

I have an extremely high pressured job (and am the sole breadwinner as DH became a SAHP a few years ago, and is a good one to be fair) and I am just exhausted by it. I don’t want to be his support all the time. I want him to pull himself together, but he can’t take any amount of tough love.

I don’t think there are any solutions here. I don’t want to leave him. I just need to vent.

I may be way off base here but I think he needs to get a job, something out of the house. Even voluntary work? If your son is at school then I think 2 things might be happening:

1. he has too much time on his hands and is filling it by wallowing and spending so much time alone is allowing him to feel overwhelmed by life
2. this is my personal experience, I have anxiety and I try to cut everything out of my life that causes me anxiety because it seems like it would be a sensible thing to do. In actual fact it just magnifies even the smallest task into a massive, stressful one and is a circle that is hard to break.

For example, you’re a busy person. If you needed a dental appointment you would make one, and not think about it again until you are running out the door to attend it. Your DH probably stressed about it for days before he even makes the appointment, doesn’t sleep the night before it and won’t function on the day until he has been and then it wipes him out?

I’m not excusing it. I have anxiety but I don’t find offloading helps and I’m mindful of not doing it. I’m also on anti-anxiety meds and am fine on them, just need to find the right one.

My mum has also had a couple of breakdowns and I’ve had her dump on me until I’m wrung out and honestly I wouldn’t wish that on anyone in their home. He needs to help himself I’m afraid and all you can do is encourage/insist gently that he does that for him and yourself. Good luck and Get d bless x

Don’t talk him back up, this isn’t your job! When he starts just tell him you’re not interested, if it’s not important enough to get proper help for, then you don’t want to hear about it. Until he gets professional help, I’d ignore it completely and just tell him you’re not a trained mental health professional so you can’t help. It may sound harsh, but picking him up all the time is not good for your mental health and enables his behaviour.

Have you tried a guilt trip about the effect on the child he is looking after? It can’t be a good environment for them.

obviously your distress and weariness are not enough to motivate him to try to get help, but perhaps a sense of parental responsibility might be a prod.

I’ve been there too, many, many years ago. Don’t spent half an hour talking him down, go to work on time and tell him why. He does not deserve more consideration than you, or your employer , or your child. The same, yes; but not more.

So yes, really he isn’t doing anything at the moment to help himself, which is part of the problem

I would be extremely resentful having to prop him up him and work myself to the bone to pay for everything, while he refused to do anything about any of it.

I think I’d have to tell him that we were at an impasse and either he sought private therapy, which I’d have to pay for, or we look at separating because he is ruining more than his own life.

You are amazing OP. You love and support him despite these difficult circumstances, and you support your child too. I have no advice but just wanted to recognise YOUR effort.

I had this and it nearly broke me. I ended up getting reprimanded in work because I was cutting so many corners covering for him and doing all childcare etc. He had to go into hospital in the end so all I was doing was delaying the inevitable and making myself utterly miserable. You need to put your own oxygen mask on first x

@Puckthemagicdragon thank you. I am sat at my desk at work feeling very tearful and your message was nice to read.

thank you to everyone else who has replied too. It’s helpful to hear from people who have had mental health difficulties themselves. This thread has given me a kick, something needs to change.

Totally agree with @Naunet
you gave such a mixed message this morning, the first part was amazing, telling him to get on with it, and then you totally blew it by talking him back up for 30 mins.
Think of his anxiety/depression as a totally separate part and one that you need to ignore to get it to go away. Any attention will feed the anxiety so just stop doing that.
Think of it like the whiny voices kids get, that my ears just can’t hear 😁

I understand completely how exhausting it is. My DH also has periods of insomnia and anxiety that can last for months. During this time it's just awful. He is so broken and can only talk about his mental health. I have so much empathy (I've been there myself) but it's relentless and exhausting.
However my DH is very proactive in seeking help. He has counselling and takes medication. Medication is absolutely vital for his recovery. He takes Mirtazapine which is an antidepressant but also extremely effective against insomnia and anxiety. My DH did have side effects. He was like a complete zombie for 2 weeks, but then the side effects disappeared and he feels completely normal now. Great, in fact. It took 6-8 weeks for the medication to work so your DH really needs to stick at it. Most side effects are short lived. If not, then there are plenty of other options these days. Medication has saved me in the past and now my DH. I also had anxiety/nervous breakdown 20 years ago but it was the antidepressants that helped me.

I think actually you probably aren't helping him by the "support" you are giving (not blaming you in the slightest, just suggesting a re-frame)

He is putting the responsibility for his well being on you. You can't make him better. Only he can, with professional help. He is copping out, to everyone's detriment.

How you get him to grasp that, I m not sure (other posters jave more direct experience though). But grasp it he must.

I am on medication for post-natal anxiety and it has been life-changing. I feel like my best self again! It can be a trial and error process to find the right meds and dosage for you, and there are often side effects that settle down after an initial adjustment period, but it is so, so worth it.
He needs to take responsibility for helping himself. I wouldn't often suggest an ultimatum, but I think that'd be fair in this case.
Best of luck, you sound like a very loving and supportive partner who is close to breaking point xx

You need to have a stern word. Tell him his life does not need to be like this. Tell him there are solutions. Tell him you are now in a position where you feel like you have given all you can give in relation to his scenario and what you can offer is not enough because he is still struggling

You are not trained in MH and nor should you try to be his saviour. He is a grown adult and a role model to your son. Your son could well be an anxious adult after seeing his fathers struggles.

Your husband should make a plan to also return to the work place as this will give him something positive to focus on

So he doesn't want therapy but he's ok with you dropping everything to support him for every minor issue?

This isn't ok. It's up to him what treatment he has but it's up to you whether you allow him to exploit you like this. What would he do if you weren't there as the easy option?

Time for change. You signed up to be a life partner not a therapist. The lines have become blurred/ nonexistent regarding offering support. Tell him he has to find other ways of coping- after all these years it’s clear that you haven’t actually managed any long term changes despite your best efforts. ( not a criticism but useful in pointing out to him that this isn’t even helping him)

Ideally you’d tell him to seek his solutions himself but realistically you might have to help. GP for sure, talking therapy, hypotherapy ( fantastic for me) are all options.

Id tell him that you each have 5 minutes to share your day and beyond that you need to focus on other stuff.

Good luck!

I am the one who had serious mental health problems and my partner picked up the slack.

It has taken me 10 years to get to a good point, where I can deal with shit life throws at me, but throughout that time, we communicated and I was proactive in getting help, I went through so many antid's it was stupid, therapy as well, which sometimes worked, sometimes didnt

Mental health can be very selfish, but it really is up to the person dealing with it to get help, yes I still had massive down days, where I would spend the days under a duvet not dealing with anything, but as time went on they became less and less.

My partner was supportive, but not in the place as a therapist just as a partner helping someone they love through a really shit time.

The things that really helped us was communicating and the fact he can see I was trying to get help, that helped lessen any resentment that might have built up.

Tara 66

which lsd drops?

LSD is illegal

That sounds utterly unbearable for you. It must be taking a toll on all of you.

I couldn't cope with someone who was unwilling to try anything they could to improve the situation. Not engaging with therapy or trying a different kind of drugs would be it.

You are not his therapist, his mother or his doctor. You are his wife and deserve to have an equal and fulfilling relationship and family life. Yes, people have ups and downs but adults take responsibility for their own actions and the effect they are having on those they love.

What amazing advice - break the law for him OP, to buy something that has no proven benefits for mental health. 🙄

Is this a reverse ?

Enough is enough. Your child has two parents and one of them is about to drag the other under.

You have shown ample caring and understanding for five years, if you are at the end of that well of benevolence, and who could blame you, then it's time for a change.

If money is available, find yourself a therapist, and let him know very clearly that you need change, and that involves him finding and sticking with a therapist, and also finding medication that helps. Deciding it's "not for him" and he would rather drag you down with him is no longer an option. If he's not able to do this now, and he may not be, then you would be within your rights to make other changes in order for you to improve your own quality of life.

I had to spend 30 minutes talking him back up again before I left for work

this stood out, because, you didn't, but you chose to. There's a fine line between caring, and enabling and therapy will help you draw that more easily so you can get your life back and focus on you and your DC.

I was, in some ways, like your DH, and my mental health was part of the reason my ex left me. :(

Conversations about how hard it was for him just left me feeling guilty and angry cos cos I felt I couldn't change things. Thinking from his side what might have changed things would have been to draw back from being in the counsellor role (which just leads to resentment), show more interest in actions that I was doing to try to help my mental health, and use his outside viewpoint to help make sure I got the right diagnosis and accessed the best kind of therapy. From inside a mental health problem it's really hard to step back, look at it dispassionately, and work out what wider steps would help you.

I think you should set boundaries around how much time you will spend giving him emotional support, and instead use your energy to find him some treatment options, and then really insist that he explores those options.

We all have different limits of what we can deal with and live with. Personally I couldn’t live in your situation, I would have to leave, I wouldn’t be the right partner for a person with long term depression or anxiety. It’s a hard road so I would recommend some therapy sessions to try and tease out what you need.
I would also recommending looking up some of the interviews with Fiona Millar/ Alastair Campbell. They speak quite openly about what his mental health difficulties did to her and their children.

Your DH is being entirely selfish by not wanting to get help and I say this as someone on anti depressants myself. Im
currently going through a very bad period. I can just get myself out of bed each day but I’ve never felt like I’ve burdened my husband with it. He had been my rock and my crutch but it’s me who has to do the work. I’ve had a lot of health issues lately which has not only caused my health anxiety to come back with a vengeance but my depression too. I’ve been put on a new medication for nerve pain but it also
helos anxiety. I have no nails left as I’ve chewed them down. I feel like shit. I have no motivation for life BUT if I ever felt like my husband was going to leave me I would sure as shite do my utmost to pull myself up and sort myself out. My mental health is not his issue. He helps me because he loves me, but he is not a doctor and it would be cruel and selfish of me to put all my problems on him.
Your DH needs a wake up call sorry. He’s wallowing at this point.

It must be exhausting. What is completely unacceptable is that he refuses to seek help "because it's rubbish" ; but still expects you to perform the role a therapist would. He is offloading his MH onto you. He benefits, you suffer.

That is unsustainable, in the end that level of stress and resentment will damage your own mental health and the marriage might not survive.

I think you need to lay that on the line for him; you are resigning as his therapist/mother/ comfort cushion and he needs to get his act together, find some professional help and start addressing his problems.

For the sake of the child , marriage and family he shares responsibility for.