Family reported my husband to Adult Social Services

[LucyLoo1972]

Its a long story but eight years ago I suffered an absolutely devastating psychotic breakdown after I submitted my PhD. Before this time I had what a thought was an amazing and near perfect marriage. I love my husband very very much. Over the time I have been unwell things have been very difficult. We had never really had a row before my breakdown (at the time I thought this was good but now I see it was a sign of lack of honesty and communication). Since being unwell I have seen a lot of things that were putting a serious strain on me which have come out in therapy. My doctors have been fairly certain though that at root the extreme and total breakdown is rooted in childhood trauma. My father, mother and sister were all abusive especially my father.

I have spoken to my sister about some of the issues that are difficult in my marriage as my husband has not responded well to my illness. I am a totally changed person and having never said a word about anything before, after the breakdown it was like a volcano of rage and anger and frustration coming out for my husbands neglect of me and my needs.

I spoke to my sister about the difficulties which have included my husband's hoarding, verbal abuse (in response though to my anger which has been out of control at times of which I am not proud), him not transferring money into my account on time sometimes so I don't have access to money, him not wanting to eat in the same room as me or be with me, him not engaging with my therapy and my abusive family with whom we have had little interaction on a regular basis are frustrated that he refuses to answer phonically.

Yesterday Adult Social Services phones me to say my father and my sister had made a report of concern for my wellbeing and safety at home. This morning I had to go to a meeting and explain the concerns to them.

AIBU in feeling this is an overreach by the state? I was there for two hours explaining everything to them and my husband os devastated as for eight years he has tried to care for me when I have been seriously unwell and devastated and angry that my whole life has been taken from me and Im not really getting better. Im especially angry that the report came from my original abuser.my life is in utter and complete ruins.

I cry everyday seeing him under the pressure he is under and I believe that it was within my power to avoid getting so unwell.he is completely an empty cup.

I don't have an inheritance yet.

the rage is never about things he does. its a rage about the whole situation getting to such a state that I can't even work or function when I had overcome so much to have a fully functioning and happy life. I worshipped my husband and that didn't help.

He grieves me so terribly

Seems like they would both be better off apart.

it felt like the dumpster fire happened eight years ago when it was like my Brian got wiped and I died as the person I was quite honestly. what I do not get at all is how I thought things were so perfect before the breakdown. there were so so many good things. real love and connection.a lot of my rage is because this beautiful thing has been lost.

You were masking, I’d say. If you are neurodivergent but ‘pretending’ to be neurotypical the strain can be immense. It’s notable that you had your breakdown after you completed your PhD.

If you’re ND, it’s likely your husband is too. I’m much more tolerant of my DH’s little peculiarities than his ex was, because I have ND traits of my own (raging ADHD). We spend forever getting things done in the house, btw, but eventually one of us snaps and orders the blinds or whatever. Actually, we agreed on the blinds three weeks ago but they haven’t been ordered yet!

I love my husband very much.He is very very reluctant for us to separate permanently.

It’s nothing to do with him being male, it would be the same if he were female, it’s the dynamics that betray the abusive aspects.

Comments such as - well she gets angry and flies off the handle, she’s the abusive one - are based on a fundamental naivety about abusive dynamics with stereotyped ideas of how a women in abusive relationships behave.

yes my psychologist thinks he is ND too. OCD and ADHD most likely.

I kept saying after the breakdown that it wasn't me before and I wasn't real, things like that. and I believe I had done some horrifically evil act.

and yes I think I was tolerate of him because we would have similar tendencies

Have people recommended “Women who Love Too Much”? You could do with reading that.

nobody noticed anything bad about our marriage either except for the quips about how I deserve a medal for being able to put up with my husband.

Can you see that that is a non sequitur? They saw what he was like and marvelled that you could put up with him. But in the end you couldn’t and you cracked.

not severe abuse but constant bullying

The more you talk about your therapist the worse it sounds to be honest. He should t be armchair diagnosing your husband

you’ve been stuck like this for EIGHT YEARS. You’re getting angry about what in themselves are quite minor things from eight years ago (sorry but even the desktop computer thing is minor). You need someone who will help you move forward not keep raking up the past.

yes life was unnecessarily stressful for sure and it added to my pressure and stress. the psychosis was from stress. but there were a huge number of factors. and also I would go to him fro soothing - we both did to each other.the impact on me though is that I am like night and day.

yes I agree. and I'm not really living as a human being and I LOVED life.

my therapist said he can't diagnose but hoarding at that level is a form of OCD. he has seen pictures.

I agree. I cry everyday for him. and the terrible thing is I was so very very calm and stable before - I never ever had an outburst over anything (which actually wasn't good). we were so very happy together. I know it must be terrible for him as he is a compassionate person and loves me and doesn't want to see me in any pain.

he is so committed to me and that the irony because I in my subconscious Brian didn't act like I was in a secure relationship when I was and caused all this horror to happen.

no I've not had that one mentioned but I did love too much yes. to a ridiculous degree.

thank you

Have You had this same therapist for the whole time op?

we have a lot of money. around £200,000 in savings.

he sees value of spending on some things and not others. the therapy comes from our money.

yes we have a turntable. one of the problems is there are thousands of records so I can't choose which music to listen to as I can't find it.

life shouldn't have to be that hard with thousands stored up - what's the point?

my therapist just wants to ask my husband some questions about what happened to me when I first got ill and to explain to him what my diagnose means. he knows nothing about trauma.

I agree. If my husband started shouting and screaming at me because his therapist told him that was a way to process teenage trauma I wouldn’t be impressed.

What device are you accessing MN on? Can you not listen to music on that?

My anger is always about why he didn't help me when I asked for help and said I was struggling before my breakdown and some of his finical choices during the moths before my submission (if oeuvre does a phd then you will know how incredibly difficult it is to finish work you have been doing for sic years). I needed to pay for some interviews to be transcribed and needed some space clearing in the house os I had space to work and for my books amongst the hundreds and hundreds of books. it was overwhelming. but he didn't help with that and I lost the career I worked for

I think the issue is many are having a hard time now the narrative has swung somewhat from he was abusive as never ‘let’ you buy a radio or computer to descriptions like the above, where it seems that when you were well, high achieving, in a good job, with what would be assumed a good salary to go with, YOU chose not to do these things. It wasn’t that he didn’t let you but he made a comment and you chose not to. Then claim it was abusive behaviour from him that led to a breakdown.

For example you say you couldn’t get a radio or computer because you once bought towels and he made a comment that it was a waste because he liked old scratchy towels. It makes no sense. The normal approach would be to respond to your DH ‘No, it’s not a waste because I want nice new soft towels. If you like the old scratchy ones, that’s great, you use them and I’ll use the nice new soft ones’. His problem if he wants to use shitty old scratchy towels. Then buy a radio and computer if and as you want. If he comments on the computer a normal response would be ‘oh no, it’s not a waste, it’s for me, not you, you don’t have to use it, it’s for my research work’. As for space, you could have cleared that, just get everything in the way, pile it up somewhere in the room and tell him his stuff is over there, you needed some work space. It’s obvious something was amiss before the breakdown as your behaviour beforehand was not normal.

Last summer, I thought a (freestanding) fan would be a good idea. In natural conversation I mentioned this and that I had it on my list to get one. DH went on that we didn’t need one, it was such a waste, blah, blah. So I just ordered a fan. Because I wanted one. I didn’t NOT order the fan, suffer, and then claim DH was abusive for not letting me have the fan. I mean, what was going to happen - he would divorce me over buying a fan when he thought it wasn’t needed🤣. Okay. He could crack the fuck on with that if he felt that strongly. Not surprisingly, I then didn’t get to use the fan much as he discovered how marvellous it was and funnily it appeared to migrate to his work area🤣🤣🤣. So obviously I bought another😆.

Edited to add, I’d really consider another therapist at this point as not sure the current one is doing more harm than good to be frank. I do think therapy is needed but maybe give consideration to trialling someone else?

I was the same. A man I thought was my best friend - I stuck to him for years.
Eventually I left him. It was really hard at first, but I met someone else who treats me well and it is a night and day difference to my mental health.
Turned out that man had been abusing me emotionally for years but I just couldn’t see it because I thought I was lost without him.

OP, this could ultimately be helpful. I was in a similar situation - outing so won't post too much here - and we ended up with children's services involved. I cared for DH for seven years after he had a major breakdown, then eventually had a breakdown myself.

Both breakdowns - DH and I - were linked to our own childhood trauma.

Ultimately, we could have done with a lot more support a lot sooner.

Caring for someone after a breakdown is incredibly tough. Could it be that your DH could do with extra support too? I have had moments where I was far less than perfect and we had SS involvement due to DH's verbal abuse during manic phases. DH and I both ended up with support from the local carer's network because we realised we were caring for each other

I'm not in any sense saying verbal abuse is okay - I ended up with DVS involved before it was all resolved and thought for a long time that we might end up divorcing.

I would look at it as a potential avenue of support, which can be incredibly difficult to access. Have you told SS about your relationship with your family and childhood trauma? They are usually pretty canny when it comes to difficult family relations.

It is completely devastating having SS poking around - I think it caused part of my breakdown - but in the end, they were helpful and put us in touch with some assistance that we could have done with from the start.