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.

good points

I think you need to look to the future and make a future for yourself. Find yourself, what you like and enjoy your life. Not point thinking about the past. If you are happy with your husband company it is ok to stay with him, as soon as he doesn't mind the changes you will have to make to find yourself. I believe that you didn't get your needs met in the past because you didn't told anyone you had any needs to meet and you were just trying really hard to meet everyone else needs instead. You probably were not even aware you had any needs, so you were happy as soon as everyone else you were helping was happy. I don't think your husband made you ill either. You could have bough a second hand desktop for less than 100 pounds on ebay with your stipident. And you could have made enough space by moving things around. You also were very helpful for everyone else to the point that everyone though you were really efficient. It looks to me like you gave more than you had to everyone around you and not just your husband , and left nothing to find or be yourself. Your PhD and research about different cultures etc probably made you realise that you were not yourself, because you weren't. You didn't allow yourself to be yourself because you wanted to be too helpful to everybody and you wanted to be like and you did that by giving your own self. All you can do now is find yourself because you can't go back in time. For example One of the rooms in your home to be your own room and you can decorate as you want . Go and buy food and cook what you want and find what you like . Same with clothes etc. Also separate finances and have control of your own money. Find a job in anything, supermarket, get your own bankcard, find activities or similar so you get a social life and you have your own money. The savings in an account with both your names on it or invest on property etc, but if you can try to work so you don't depend on anyones salary or need to spend the savings in day to day . I think you give to much value to prestige and you have to learn to accept who you are now. If you can work as a professor or similar, do it, but if you can't, you can try to work in anything else with less stress and you are not less of a person, neither you have less value for doing so. Value has nothing to do with prestige or job or earnings. The value of a person is inside them. You can also leave your husband but I'm sure your husband will probably just be fine with a few changes anyway as he never asked you to be exactly like him or to have the same likes or views in life either. You can carve a life for yourself and still be in his life if it is that what you want as soon as he is willing to accept you and your own decisions and to give you your own space in the house, etc too . If he wants a copy of himself and he is unwilling to compromise you will have to leave because you now know you are your own person and your mind will not let you be at peace and happy unless you meet your own needs too, you can't be happy anymore with being a copy, helper of everyone else around you and not being your own person, because you are awake to the fact that you have the right to be yourself and to have your needs met too, if that makes sense.

Presumably you were sectioned at the time of your breakdown as you stated physical harm etc, or at bare minimum under NHS crisis care. Who diagnosed you? Were you medicated? When were you officially diagnosed? I think you need to speak to your GP about getting referred back to your original mental health team.

I was thinking along similar lines and wondered and asked about NHS GP and if there was any continuing NHS treatment, and made some suggestions. I don't think there was an answer, unless of course I missed it.

It seems that you are feeling confused because you have been abused your whole life by your parents, sister and now husband. They have twisted reality around to suit them and have used you as the scapegoat. It is not surprising at all that you don't trust your own mind because everyone has taught you to doubt yourself and always carry the blame for everything that goes wrong.

It also seems that your mental breakdown was caused by the huge stress of all your relationships compounded by the tremendous intellectual exertion of your PhD. Many of your suppressed memories and emotions emerged at this time and your subconscious thoughts and feelings burst out in rage, anger, and pain.

Now you are left trying to make sense of it all and that is a good thing. Your mind is telling you you have to accept and deal with all these feelings, you can no longer dissociate or hide from them. For your own good you must sort yourself out.
Please keep seeing your therapist who is trying to help you. Distance yourself from your family who have proven they do not have your best interests at heart. And lastly, you need to wake up and recognize all the damage your husband has been doing to you. Do not confront him. He will never admit to or apologize for hurting you. He is a very damaged person and is harming you.

You need to get away from these people and find yourself. Please continue getting all the professional help you can.

why do you say he is a damaged person?

I think I answered in response to another post. I wasn't sectioned and I have no clue why at all. the original NHS response was very crap, the mental health crisis team came out and were pretty useless. they didn't give me antipsychotics as they said it was caused by catastrophic anxiety. im on two kinds of anti anxiety medication.

I honestly didn't feel like I wasn't my true self but when I had the breakdown I kept saying it wasn't me and I wasn't real. so there seems to be truth in that.

before the breakdown I never felt traumatised and every body thought I was an entirely stable person.

I think everything you are saying is extremely exaggerated.

If you had had the kind of breakdown you allude to before being pushed for detail, you’d have been sectioned and had significant inpatient treatment.

Things have clearly all come to a head for you at that point, but if the experts said you were not suffering from psychosis and did not need anti psychotics, then politely you did not suffer medically defined psychosis.

Likewise, if the abuse was physical and was as severe as you allude to, your father would have been arrested.

Focus on moving forwards not telling these stories about the past. I think you’re constantly rewriting history because you’re stuck there and with every replay you’re adding layers that probably don’t actually exist. Then you believe them and it becomes another ‘memory’. The core I have no doubt is real but it’s becoming skewed and exaggerated over time.

I don't know why I wasn't sectioned. I tried to starve myself to death and lost 4 stone.i was scratching all over my body and scratched an open wound into my side. I believe the security services were coming to arrest me for hate crimes and that I was condemned to hell with no way back. This is all recorded on my medical notes. Its fact. I was delusional but had no hallucinations or voices. they said it was from anxiety because all of my delusions were based on real events but were then overblown to the level of delusion. the research I was doing was on a very sensitive and personal subject.

I honestly don't know why you would question the veracity of my account of my childhood abuse. In the 1980s so many children were abused and nobody was arrested. Although my mother tried to get me to state my father sexually abused us, I personally have no recollection of that at all. although I was exposed to pornography at a very young age. Again, this is all documented in court records at the time. I have 8 out of 10 ACES. its fact.

I think you are rather naive about the efficacy of both our mental health services and the amount of child abuse that occurs and how prosecutions for those things work. I suspect if I wasn't living in a leafy middle class area with a husband who was saying he would look after me I would have been sectioned. I should have been. for some reason the doctors didn't think that anti-psychotics were the route to go down because of the way the beliefs were from real events. im not knowledgeable to know whether this was the right call.

No doubt if I had testified in the court hearing that I was being sexually abused them he would have been arrested.

quite frankly, I think you are inclined to believe that because I had such a breakdown that I am not able to state actual facts that are documented and a matter of record.

you should take a little look round a CPTSD mental health forum and see how many of those peoples parents were arrested - very few indeed. even for sexual abuse. I am absolutely adamant that I down recall any sexual abuse that so why I should make up all the rest I do not know. You clearly do not understand anything about trauma and its impacts and how it can surface later in life. the impact of the trauma was to make me hard wired to perform at all times for approval. you should read the story of Bradley Wiggins. He talks about the secret of his success being the abuse he suffered from his father and his coach and how the struggle with that only really emerged after retirement.

And again as I have stated before unit lthis delusional breakdown I showed no signs of mental illness except ones that served me professionally and socially which was extreme people pleasing even with my husband who I had no need to fear. I was driven to be perfect in every area at all times and it nearly killed me.

Very good points

I take your last point and think that can happen.

there was no doubt I was having severely delusional beliefs in my breakdown.

its hideous for me as I was always a person to move forward. to be blunt, you do not get from a background of poverty and abuse to a phd at an elite university and a fellowship at the library of Congress without being a person who is driven and outs to move froward all the time. in fact one of the things I found difficult with my husband was that nothing ever happened it was always put off so outside of my work that I could control, change was blocked. if I wanted change I made it happen, at one stage I was overweight and set to diet and lost six stone. that's difficult to do especially as food was my emotional crutch.

I’m not sure what you are hoping from this thread as you have gone into extreme detail of breakdown which I understand happened 8 years ago and your husband and you have got through all that. How did the meeting go with adult social services? Are they returning to check up on you. If you have said their concerns regarding your husband were unfounded what is it now you are hoping to achieve? A calm living environment rather than raging at each other is preferable. You keep referring to the past what is happening now? Is your communication between your husband and you any better from the intervention by social services?

the meeting was long but fine. they listed the points that the reports had made and asked about each one. I answered truthfully. I was surprised but the point they seemed to be most concerned with was the hoarding issue. I showed them pictures so they got an accurate idea of the extent of it.

they said they would like to visit us both at home but my husband is not to keen. they said they would leave that up to me to decide. However, my father is the kind to be an extreme bully and I imagine he will try to bully the social services to take more action. none of the things my husband is doing are criminal so I don't know what they could actually do - im honestly not sure. I mean one of the complaints was that the house needs repairs - well it needs a couple of slates fixing on the roof and decoration but as far as I know that's not an office or abuse or a danger to anybody even if the decorating bit is unpleasant for me.

my husband has been trying to tidy up since the meeting. he is very upset by it all because I honestly believe he never ever intended to ham but only to protect me and love and cherish me. I do believe that and im honestly quite shocked how much people think he was abusive especially before the breakdown. I know his behaviours had an impact on me but I blame myself for that in being insecure and hypersensitive although I didn't realise that at the time.

im on new medication which is helping the peace somewhat but it is still very difficult whilst my husband refuses therapy and I am still so lost and unwell.

is still very difficult whilst my husband refuses therapy and I am still so lost and unwell.
Sorry @LucyLoo1972 this 'therapy' for your dh, is it a separate private therapist for him, or is this him to see your therapist, who's saying Its all his fault?

It sounds like you are over worrying about your family’s reactions especially your father. Firstly you admit you are unwell, as such you are probably not able to fully judge and maybe are overreacting the situation, social services are able to judge they can deal with your fathers bullying if that is how he continues to act. Frankly what your fathers reactions and behaviour is irrelevant it is not for you to worry about that now. If you are your husband agree social services meeting is not necessary tell them. Continue to see your doctors and take any medication. They are closer to you then any amount of stranger replies on the internet. Help your husband with the hoarding if that has caused you stress in your home take positive actions by small steps can you clear space a little at a time so you have room to make your own desk space again or a small chilled out study space, surrounding yourself by things you love? Small positives steps make change happen. Your husband sounds like he doesn’t know what’s for the best hence his reluctance for therapy. I would have a joint 2nd meeting with social services to see if they can bring an outside help or if you all agree you don’t require their involvement. With your history with your family I wouldn’t discuss things with them for now let the dust settle and concentrate on practical matters. Sending hugs

My therapist has asked whether he could meet with him for 15 minutes for him to explain to him what a CPTSD diagnosis means and also to check some of the facts around the initial breakdown as I was in a psychotic state and therefore my memory may be impaired. it is in no way to blame him and say its his fault at all. nothing like that has been mentioned and would as others say be unethical because my therapist hasn't seen what happened so how can he now.

It has been suggested that my husband would benefit from private indicual therapy with a hoarding problem with things and money as severe as it is and also the fact that he would benefit from support given the horrific changes that have happened in our lives. not only has this happened and im not getting better quickly but his father has died, my mother has died and his mother has dementia. any one of those things is difficult to deal with especially because his only real emotional support and the person he relied on very heavily even for daily stresses that were very small is noe incapicated. he does not have any friends he will speak to despite their persistent attempts.

and I have asked him to do couples therapy with me which I don't think is unreasonable given how terribly bad things are. I would like us to try that before we separate. it seems ridiculous not to.

so nobody is blaming him.

I suspect the SS will want to help him with hoarding as this is what they seemed most concerned about.

Your posts, the way you write, the running round in circles and using the posters here as a sounding board to endlessly relive your past, the way you are contradicting yourself (in one post you had a breakdown because you couldn’t live in the hoard, in another post it’s no biggie, just a bit of stuff here and there nothing to see there really) all suggest that you are very vulnerable, have limited insights into your situation despite extensive ruminations, and are in need of external help.

I really hope your family pushes SS more and will not drop this. Your husband is a grown up man so I assume not matter how much you try to shield him he will have to meet SS at some point. From your own posts - he’s a hoarder and a plonker. These features are neither desirable in a partner, nor helpful for your mental health recovery.

I honestly don't know how much the hoard effected me. there were so so many factors in my breakdown which I haven't even written about here. stresses way bigger than any of my husbands behaviours I think. external pressures from various elements of academia and to do with the nature of the research.

before my breakdown I didn't think it was such a biggie honestly which is why I never pushed harder for a resolution to it. but now I have learnt it can have a huge impact - its proven scientifically that clutter raises cortisol levels and I was already dysregualted form trauma although I didn't know that at the time.

im just not sure how I got from the state of very competent to so vulnerable. my friends are honestly shocked and flummoxed by the change.

and I do go round and round in circles for eight years and it makes me more and more unwell and is probably the hardest thing for my husband to cope with.

thanks - this is all really helpful advice - thank you!

I honestly believe he never ever intended to ham but only to protect me and love and cherish me. I do believe that and im honestly quite shocked how much people think he was abusive especially before the breakdown. I know his behaviours had an impact on me but I blame myself for that in being insecure and hypersensitive although I didn't realise that at the time.

When people have mental health problems they don’t necessarily mean to harm other people they just do.

There are 2 versions of your relationship with your DH: the rose-tinted one - we are so in love and he’s been such a support to me, friends think we have a great relationship etc; and the reality which comes out in little drips - he is a hoarder with a drink problem who downloaded his day on you every single day, controlled his environment and you to such an extent that you couldn’t have blinds, music or a tidy desk to work at. You were his support and your friends didn’t know how you put up with him.

As others have said your bar is so low after your childhood that not actively hitting you is seen as a win.

Someone who really loved and cherished you would consider your needs. They would ensure you had blinds, music, a clear space to work, approve of your paying for a typist for transcription, get a cleaner, take you out on your birthday etc. The sad truth is you don’t actually know what real support feels like.

I think you have created an airbrushed version of your marriage which is understandable after the childhood you had. You want to believe you survived your early life and found love and security. The problem is divergence between this narrative and the dysfunctional man with mental health problems who prioritises his needs over your own and uses you as a tool in his significant control mechanisms.

So I think one of the reasons you are “stuck” is that while you have done a lot of work on your childhood you cannot face honest engagement with the reality of your marriage. It’s very difficult to fix your own mental health issues when you are enmeshed with someone who has their own that they are not dealing with, and you form a key part of their coping strategy.

Conceiving that your DH a may be part of your problem may be terrifying and threatens the one secure thing after your breakdown. But until you recognise that this security is actually quicksand in which you are sinking, you cannot get yourself to place of true safety and recovery.

Thank you. I think there is a lot of truth in what you say. given how awful things are it is very surprising to me that my husband gets very agitated if I talk about a separation, even as a trail.

I thought it was work stress which was the major problem but after a couple of years after the breakdown I began to see my marriage differently. funnily enough the most diifcullt thing for me in the marriage was his emotional unavailability and stonewalling and refusal to communicate or plan for our lives. things I haven't even mentioned here.

you seem to know a lot about these things. have you been through something similar?

I honestly don't know why you would question the veracity of my account of my childhood abuse. In the 1980s so many children were abused and nobody was arrested. Although my mother tried to get me to state my father sexually abused us, I personally have no recollection of that at all. although I was exposed to pornography at a very young age

I do think you need to understand what abuse is and the fact that there are many types of abuse

You say your father didn’t sexually abuse you but then go on to say you were exposed to pornography at an early age. So unless this pornography belonged to another person your father did sexually abuse you.

I think you have rigid ideas of what different types of abuse are and if anything falls outside those narrow boundaries then it isn’t abuse

Hoarding just adds anxiety to those that live with it.
Why is your dh tidying up when SS have already seen pictures of the hoarding. Does he think that a bit of tidying is going to have them forget what they have already seen
Is he so arrogant to think he can gaslight them into thinking you have over exaggerated the extent of his hoarding and suddenly make the photographic evidence disappear

Hoarding is a mental illness but being able to tidy up his hoarding indicates something else
It does sound like it was done on purpose and he didn’t care what you thought. It again is that constant drip drip drip of poison.

Until you start seeing your dh as he really is then you will remain in a life never lived

Can you do some research on abuse and the different types of abuse and the ways abusers keep you in their life.

Of course the abuser isn’t going to abuse you everyday because you would have left years ago. They will have periods of time where they are nice to you to pull you back in and you think everything has changed but then subtly the abuse starts again

Imagine that every single time your dh brought something into the house to add to his collection of stuff he instead slapped your face

How many slaps would it take for you to see he is abusing you.

Everytime he has kept you short of money, he instead put his hands round your neck and strangled you till you passed out

How many times till you saw the abuse

Everytime he told you that buying something was a waste of money and you didn’t buy it he instead punched you in the stomach

How many times before you realised you were being abused

none of the things my husband is doing are criminal so I don't know what they could actually do

I think you need to look up what is and isn’t criminal behaviour

Coercive control, where you don’t recognise that you are being abused is a criminal act

If everything was fine and your dh had a clear conscious why is he tidying his crap

I think the roof slates needing to be replaced are an almost perfect parallel to your life

Your roof was fine, like your life was

Then you marry your dh
2 roof slates become loose

After years of being fine (but slowly being abused by your dh) you had a breakdown after buying a duvet.

After years of being fine despite multiple down pours, the rain gets into the roof beams.
After one more downpour the roof collapses

You dont see that fixing 2 roof tiles for a few pounds will save you thousands

You don’t see that your Dh’s abuse has cost you thousands in a career cut short

Any chance that you were at a higher level than him, more intelligent and he wanted to be the man of the house, the main earner and his ego couldn’t take your career

I suppose you have to ask yourself

If you had lived on your own and never met your dh

Would you have had a breakdown