Partner, chronic illness, resentment

[Sundaybleugh]

I'm feeling guilty because I'm angry at my partner and I'm not sure if he can or can't control what's going on.

We used to have a great life.

About two years ago he witnessed something awful and developed some after effects. At first he was just jumpy, sleepless and cried a lot.

Then he started getting rages. Rages at everything. Buses. The weather. Anything and everything.

Then he got fibromyalgia and he's got agonising chronic pain and our life has disintegrated.

I've become more or less a carer. I do absolutely everything. And work full time.

Any leisure activities have become an ordeal because he complains the while time, says he's miserable or starts shouting.

I don't mind Looking after him, I've done everything I cam. But it's hard.

We don't have sex anymore.

His endless loop of negativity has made me very depressed.

Everything is about him. Literally EVERYTHING. If I've got a major life problem he twists it around to be about him.

He wakes me up every single day by him screaming in the shower or slamming things around the bedroom.

He's seen endless doctors but he won't go to counselling. He says he hates his job and life but won't take any steps to change them.

I tread on eggshells.

I love him and I know the person I love is in there somewhere and I'm sorry he's in pain and I don't want to leave but I feel like the happy person I was is gone.

We are just two miserable people now. I stopped crying. I just stare into space now and live my life on autopilot. None of it is enjoyable.

This weekend I have a life problem to deal with, but I can't talk to him because he'll make it about him and how HE can't handle stress.

So I just feel resentment today. I'm so tired of him not helping himself. I'm so tired of his relentless misery. I'm so tired of nobody caring about ME or whatever I might need that day.

I'm also so sad that he's in so much pain.

Am I a bad person to be thinking all this?

Is he willing to try to sort it out? Sounds like a trauma response in his subconscious mind to the incident he witnessed; if it is remedial hypnosis could sort this out, normally within three sessions.

Thanks for all the responses. We've just sort of been round the houses with doctors. Endless tests. They all find nothing. So fibromyalgia is, it seems, the default diagnosis. They've referred him for physio and of course he thinks it's pointless.

It comes in flares. If he does too much. If he gets tired or stressed.

I'm not sure where the PTSD ends and the fibro begins, but ANY SMALL THING completely sets him off. So I end up sort of avoiding doing or saying anything to avoid upsetting him.

Yes we do vitamins and supplements and diet. We do the gym, water therapy. Not much help, because he's permanently stressed.

He's permanently stressed because every tiny thing anyone else would brush off is a complete catastrophe in his mind.

I've read books and spoken to people but the bit I struggle with is the intensity. If i was in pain or tired, I'd want to lay down - why waste energy ranting and raving?

He goes on so much I do frequently block him during the day. Otherwise I get an angry play by play of raging texts from the minute he leaves the house

It's raining
The people on the bus are noisy
It's too cold in his office
His back hurts
Why is he doing this, he hates it, he doesn't get paid enough

And it can genuinely go on like that for HOURS. I'm not exaggerating.

He was nothing like this before:(

By lunch, he always feels better, and then he apologises.

I worry its me? Why does he hate his life? Why is he so unhappy? Why do we never have sex? We used to every day. I just feel like Im going mad

I've tried a million times to talk. I've left several times and he is desperate for me to come back and promises he'll get help then doesn't do it.

I was crying today and he was kind and loving and said he was sorry he was just exhausted and in pain and his brain can't cope with things.

We have two houses now. Do I just go and live I the other one by myself? I've no idea what to do but thus volume of misery makes me feel so down and also like there's something lacking in me that somebody's life with me is THIS AWFUL when I really do try my hardest to have a nice life

And can trauma honestly make a person feel and act thus way? It's so hard to understand.

Yes it was very bad and no please don't ask me to talk about it. It was just very bad indeed.

He can't remember anything really from the time. He can't remember the weeks following or anything.

He doesn't think that's the problem he just thinks his life is terrible

I'm sorry
I'd leave and live in the other house
There's nothing physically wrong with him
He seems to enjoy being miserable

You're not married?

You're financially secure?

Leave him.

How are your finances worked out? Do you jointly own both houses?

Easy to leave from a financial POV then.

If he won't get help then it's his fault, not yours

Honestly it’s very probable that the fibromyalgia is linked to trauma. It’s to do with the autonomic nervous system/vagus nerve/fight or flight response.

Several, world renowned doctors firmly believe that many conditions like ME are manifestations of a ‘too switched on’ sympathetic nervous system. Dr Stephen Porges coined the phrase ‘polyvagal theory’.

It's really interesting https://www.ifm.org/news-insights/understanding-ptsd-from-a-polyvagal-perspective/

OP’s partner needs to rake some responsibility for his recovery.

I'm sorry
I don't understand how witnessing something could cause such a reaction in someone
Maybe I'm naive?

His brain is stuck in trauma mode. It’s on red alert all the time. This is why he is irritable, bad tempered and all the rest. It sounds like classic PTSD.

Hes not going to move out of it without help or significant medication. He really really needs EMDR. IIt processes trauma and makes it disappear. It’s a game changer. That is what will help him the most.

I'll read those
Thank you

Read up about PtSD. The brain gets ‘stuck’ in trauma mode and can’t move past it.

*widowtwankywashroom · Today 13:36

I'm sorry
I don't get it
Witnessing an event brought on fibro?
I'd leave
I'm sorry
I couldn't live with someone who didn't make me happy*

Peoplr with depression, anxiety, trauma, ACE all have lots of problems with pain. It’s well recognised. Fortunately most medics are a bit more enlightened than you.

l have severe pain due to anxiety. The nerves are locked on red alert.

@Sundaybleugh trauma can make him all the things he’s being, absolutely definitely.

You don’t have to live with it though. that’s the bottom line. I can’t tell you enough how 6 months of trauma therapy would help him. If he won’t do it though, you have to leave, for your own health.

He can't cope with any noise or disruption. He says he can't relax, ever. I don't know who this angry stranger is sometimes, but it breaks my heart that he hates our life and everything in it.

I want to be clear he's not cruel or unloving to me. He's gentle, kind, and does many lovely things but he's just not himself.

For example every day he walks in from work and kisses me and tells me I got prettier while he was out, and we have a giggle.

But overall he wakes up every morning in pain, exhausted, angry and lashing out at objects. And verbally he complains incessantly. He can't sew the positive in anything.

Can PTSD make you feel deeply miserable and angry like this so relentlessly? I really don't understand what's happening so I just think it's me.

Never said I was a medic

Yep, l would say all if this is caused by trauma. As l said his brain is tick on red alert.

He will be:
irritable
sensitive to nouse
anxious
jumpy
in pain
angry

It can be treated though. Yet again, he needs EDMR. That is NICE recommended for trauma.

No, but most people understand a bit about trauma too.

You could have a google about PTSD and why EMDR works for lots of people - there are some really good explanations that might help him engage with it.

Another approach might be something like the Gupta Program, which I found really beneficial, and has a good explanation about the evolutionary/biological basis for getting stuck in a state of hyper alarm (so that normal things are perceived as much greater threats/impacts etc than they would be if the nervous system was regulating itself properly).

My suggestions above are only for if you want to keep engaging with it though OP.

It is absolutely ok for you to decide that you've had enough.

if you aren't ready to cut ties completely, you could leave with a conditional offer to review your decision at a particular time, eg if he makes positive steps towards addressing his mental health then you're willing to have a chat with him about things in X months.

But to reiterate, it's absolutely ok to tell him it's his turn now to be responsible for his own recovery, and you won't be, and go.

I want to be clear he's not cruel or unloving to me. He's gentle, kind, and does many lovely things but he's just not himself.

But overall he wakes up every morning in pain, exhausted, angry and lashing out at objects. And verbally he complains incessantly. He can't sew the positive in anything.

How is him behaving like this ^^ being loving, gentle and kind?

We don't own either house. We rent both. I rented the second one because the city is noisy and crowded and he needs silence. I thought that would make him happy but it hasn't yet.

We got it last month and he just complains. For example complaining we could afford a holiday because we got the country house. Like he has this turd lens over everything.

I have read a lot on PTSD but some things are missing. He doesn't have flashbacks. He doesn't avoid things that remind him of it. He doesn't relive it...actually he can't consciously remember it much at all - or the months following it.

He drunk very heavily in the momths after and acted like a Vietnam veteran or something. Nightmares. Jumpy at any sudden movements. He was very strange.

He acts like it never happened and the problem is here, now, his job, the cost of living.

But he has definitely been a different person since the incident. Never been calm or happy since. Things that used to make him incredibly happy (me), don't anymore. Nothing does.

He says he feels 24/7 like something really bad is about to happen and its impossible to relax.

It sounds awful. I think I would be asking him to go to couples therapy and if he refuses then think about moving out.

@Sundaybleugh google interviews with Dr Porges. Trust me, PTSD could be causing every single one of his feelings.

Have you ever experienced anxiety waiting for some news or lost your appetite when you’re stressed? Felt immediately better when the news is good or something is resolved?

Recognise the feeling you have if you have a near miss in a car? Magnify that feeling by 10,000 and feel it constantly. That’s what he could be experiencing.

He wakes me up every single day by him screaming in the shower or slamming things around the bedroom.

At the very least tell him to stop attention seeking before you have even opened your eyes. Ask him to refrain from screaming and slamming shit till you have had your first cup of tea/coffee. Look, no matter what issues he has the biggest problem you face is that he has simply got used to being the centre of your world. He has got used to you pandering to him and having his own way. This dynamic will be impossible to flip. You get one life, you were not put on this earth to be his support human. Go to your second home and take a long time to rest, recuperate and think about YOU for a change. You need to look after you because sadly he won't. Do not let him pull you down any further than he has. I mean that OP, you cannot continue as you are, no matter what he promises, when someone is used to the home revolving around them, it will not change. Ever. For a week or two at a push.

How long have you been together, OP? How old are you both?