What help can I get dealing with manic depressive and alcoholic DH - for me !?

[justoverit]

it's a long story. But recently dh has had a series of severe depressive episodes, fuelled by alcohol and culminating in quite extreme behaviour including suicide threats. Its happened 4 times over the last few months, each time we have fought and shouted and eventually talked and made decisions on how to get him out of this. The depression is a long standing problem, and drinking has been a problem on and off but the two are now more severe than ever. We have just now got him into counselling, via an alcohol recovery unit. We have two young dc (6 and 3).

He was only seen by the doctor today despite us having gone there a month ago for assessment, and is now on a waiting list for counselling. They say his problem is manic depression (which we have both long suspected) and not alcoholism. But he does drink a lot an in an alcoholic way, basically self medicating trying to stop himself feeling anything. He drinks all day and gets in a terrible state. At the worst point of one of the episodes he went to A&E and asked to be sectioned so that he could be taken into rehab but it turns out that doesn't happen these days and we've just had to deal with it ourselves while waiting for the alcohol recovery place to process him. He's very volatile, irrational and difficult to deal with and the whole thing has left me exhausted. The times in between i've just been dreading the next episode. Now it's happened again I feel i'm at the end of my tether. I'm not sure if I want to be with him in the future as I can't see it ending. I would support him a lot more wholeheartedly if he wasn't drinking. THe drinking makes me livid and i find it very difficult to be sympathetic to him, which is what lots of the arguments are about.

Since the beginning of this everyone's been telling me that i need to get some professional support. I have supportive friends and family. But the part about me getting prof. support has just been put on hold while the various ups and downs have happened. i've just been trying to keep things normal for the children and offload onto my friends but there is only so much they can do. It just seems that the help for him has taken so so long to sort out despite him telling them that he was suicidal. It makes me feel whats the point in seeking help for myself, and so I put it off but I know everyone's right and I need it. I'm feeling less able to cope this time and worry that i'm going to get depressed myself. I'm already really tired and have been ill for weeks on end which i'm sure is connected.

I wondered if anyone has been through anything similar and what I can realistically expect it terms of professional help for me. I feel that the Samaritans etc are just not adequate - like who do you call when your dh is threatening suicide with a knife to his wrist at 3 am? Can I get help ie with someone to look after the kids while i go to counselling? I don't feel that the help he's getting is really adequate either. I'm not sure where to start.

If he is getting in this state thru drink on the night before a school/work day then you need to make some kind of plan.

Can he not see how irresponsible that is ?
Shows how totally selfish he is.

If he is going to be suicidal it could be. Any day.

It is hard to detach.
But if he can function enough to be trusted to take kids to school etc then you have to assume his state is not totally beyond his control.

But at some point you may be forced to take decision on whether it is ok to leave kids in his care or not if he in an "episode" for real .

Just - what you seem to be saying is that you're totally dependent on a drunk with an untreated mental illness. You rely on him for childcare. How do you feel about that?

I'm sure there are lots of good things about your relationship but your last post makes it sound as though you cling on to him for babysitting. Would you hire a babysitter who is great with kids but can't control their drinking or their moods, and can't be trusted not to show up pissed or mutter dark thoughts to your DC?

What if he does top himself, get arrested, stagger under a truck or end up in a psych unit? How will you manage the childcare? I think you need to start thinking laterally and practically, for BOTH your sakes as well as the children's. This is not a "leave the bastard" post but, similar to an OP making up reasons why she can't leave an abuser, it will do you good to sort your act out and become autonomous. You can't help a weak person while you're leaning on them.

On a side note, do you have health insurance? They often cover rehab, which would also get him dealing with the bipolar.

Can you afford an au pair?

Have you ever tried telling your clients you start at ten?

Can the nursery hours be extended?

Are there any after-school clubs?

Could you make arrangements with a classmate's parents; perhaps pay them a bit to do your absent hours?

That sort of thing :)

If you put an ad on gum tree for child care eg pre and post school you will get a load of responses. If you can put up a live in aupair even easier. So if he goes into rehab/hosp there are options .

Does he go out to work?

Yes it's happened during the week. The episodes have happened 4 times over the past few months. He was sober for 6 months. Then one evening we had a huge row, he was being impossible, I said i have had enough, I think we should get a divorce. This was not out of the blue we've talked about it before. He went and got a glass of wine (we had it in the fridge as had friends around the day before. There's not usually any drink in the house but we were both not worried about it as he was doing really well sober) This was on a Monday night and he carried on drinking all week. He drinks wine and beer in the day, small amounts, then whisky at night which is when he gets dark, morose and sometimes belligerent. He's not outwardly drunk in the day and can cope, he's just a bit blue . The same thing happened 3 weeks later, then again, and again last week. Each time started on Monday/Tuesday, each time triggered by something that upset him. Some big stuff and some seemingly nothing. Yes he's irresponsible and selfish. He works for himself and doesn't have to go in every day as he does projects with time off inbetween.

This is the thing, I've been caught right in the middle of normal life and just had to get on with it. I don't have time to make arrangements and work out how to cope I've just had to muddle through. I only work odd days and so him being in charge of the kids has only happened a few days out of all the episodes. Other days i've taken dd to school and taken ds (only in nursery 2 days a week) out of the house to do stuff, talked to dh, rowed, tried to research helplines etc, a few nights i've got him to leave as explained above. In the middle of all this he's been going to appointments at the alcohol recovery centre but as i say the appointments have been far apart and they cancelled a few. Then the weeks in between he's been sober.

But anyway I'm rambling, I just wanted to try and put it in context a bit better. The week when he threatened suicide i was in bits, i didn't have work but did have to deal with the kids. I just didn't know what to do. At least I know what to do if that happens again though i hope it doesn't.

i will try to get an emergency plan together though so that if needs be i can get him out of the house.

I see i cross-posted. I was answering celavie re the drinking being mid week and only just seen the above.

These are all good suggestions but won't work for our situation. I work on irregular days, he works for himself, self employed designer who works on projects, right now he's not working on anything that can't wait. He can work from home when he's up to it as well although he has a desk space out of home. On the days i work, he comes home earlier and picks them up from school/nursery. So am reliant on him on odd days to pick up dc. I have to leave here at 9 and don't get back until 7 and that can't change.

Young dc is in nursery until 3 which is their hours. I have left him in charge of the dc only a few days when i have been booked into work and he's been capable, and i have been taken by surprise by him starting drinking the previous evening. You're totally right, I would never book a babysitter with his problems to look after the dc. The only reason i've left him with the kids is that i've needed to go and talk to my friends about what's happening to us. And go to Alanon. Without getting out I would be at home with him trying to ignore his drinking and keep myself from rowing with him about it.

i was just trying to explain that if I threw him out, I wouldn't be able to go to work on those days/out to friends/Alanon as i haven't had notice that he's going to have a relapse. I know you're trying to help but it's all so difficult to work out, I just feel so trapped by it all. Aren't we all reliant on our dp/dh for childcare?

The way I read it, you are far too focused on him and not on you, almost enmeshed and treating him like a child. Definitely enabling. He is an adult. He is responsible for himself. You are responsible for yourself. You need to separate these out. Even if he is mentally unwell, even if he is a drunk, why should you take the consequences of his behaviour and let him totally off the hook. Yes, something bad might happen to him. It might not. You have no way of predicting that. Telling him how to solve his problems, is enabling him. He needs to take control of his own life and path. And you yours. You are not taking care of yourself.

You need to make alternative child care plans. That is what I did. So I don't get out to all my meetings in the evenings. Friends can come here. I can get a babysitter. I miss some Al Anon meetings and just make a few. But I am not leaving my children with someone who may be sober when I get back, or may have drunk in front of the kids. And I am so very proud of myself for that. I will be solely in charge of the children, but I am not relying on someone unreliable. And you know what, once I got my head around all of that, it feels really really good. Empowering.

You will hear lots of of people at Al Anon admit that yes they left their alcoholic in charge of the children, when they were at their most desperate, before they got recovery from living with a drunk and took charge of their lives again. But that is not something they continued to do and not something they are proud of. And if something you can't predict happens and social services get involved, they will either remove him or the children from the home. Have you considered that.

I feel you are making excuses (I know I did) about being caught up in real life. In fact what I did was bury my head in the sand, and refuse to accept reality. I refused to be an adult and take charge of my own life and make the best decisions to take care of my children. That was a difficult situation to get out of and I admit I needed therapy to do that. The way I found the strength to do that was imagining the rest of my life being the same. OMG.

Very good post, dilly, and wise. A lot of it is letting go of the 'normal family' fantasy, isn't it? It's pretty usual to cling even harder to it as the family starts to crumble - perfectly understandable, but unhelpful and impractical.

Just, it's not 'normal' to be without parenting cover, no. Most parents have support outside the home unit. Whether their resources are paid for, family, friends or a mixture, they have backup in place for when things go wrong.

It isn't 'normal' to assume you must deal with a domestic crisis alone, without even considering the emergency services.

What I'm trying to show you is that you've already become trapped in the strangeness of life with a mentally dysfunctional person. Things are not supposed to be this hard! Please have another read of dilly's post, then start stabilising your life and your children's.

If you let your husband's illnesses dictate your thoughts & expectations, you will all become consumed by them. Have you heard the expression "detach with love"? Your best chance of helping him lies in creating a stable, strong and healthy home. Not trying to fix his issues or cushion his falls, but focusing on yourself and your children while he gets on with fixing himself (or not).

i left my dc in the care of my now ex when he was increasingly anxious.
i would call friends to check on him when he picked up at school.
they would report he was "bad" (displays of anxiety, ticcing, breaking things etc. )

it was wrong and i regret it.
like you i felt i was "trapped"

but - you can take charge as dilly says.
you can take charge now before it becomes an emergency situation.

arrange other childcare while he is in therapy/recovery.

while he is still drinking however many times per week he is not addressing hat issue and that will impact on the other depression issue.

so really you have to either give up your work til he truly is recovered or get outside childcare.

he is continuing drinking with no consequences.
maybe he needs to leave til he sober.

and you can advertise on gumtree for a live out au pair/nanny-there are loads out there looking for work - i've just advertise for summer care and got literally hundreds of responses. you could use a baby sitting agency or nanny agency if irregular. try childcare.co.uk

you need an alternative back up childcare other than your h.

so you can take charge now
if he still drinking ask him to leave and live elsewhere til he sober and makeyou own childcare arangements.
take a stand of no alcohol no drinking at all. zero tolerance. because his drinking is a problem.

or you can wait til the next time he threatening suicide at 3 am and you call 999
or he drunk and you decide not to let him in the house
and that day you take charge.

on balance it might be easier to take control in a controlled way on the day of your choosing.

Ok. He is not drinking now, and like I said, I want to give him a final chance. He is going to AA meetings every day. He's calm and stable and focusing on recovery and taking it seriously. I'm feeling really stressed though, or at least I was yesterday. I was reading this thread and thinking it all over and I ended up crying on my way home from work, and having to take breaths to calm myself down, my head was spinning. 'i'm not going to post any more, and i should just leave it here but I feel that I should point some stuff out as you are giving advice to people online and someone else might possibly benefit from me saying this..

Please don't think i just don't like hearing the truth. The truth is that I'm in a horrible situation and have hard times ahead of me whatever happens. I'm trying to help him and have been so far been let down by the NHS. Please remember that I am right at the beginning of this. I feel that you are expecting me to do what took you years and years to do and I feel totally overwhelmed and paralysed by some of the advice. You need to be a bit gentler with people that are asking for help and not to make assumptions based on your own experiences.

What i was trying to explain is that, with this recent problem, he has had periods of drinking that have lasted 4-5 days. In between he has been sober but a bit low, but we both thought he was ok and were starting to work out what to do (counselling etc), to try and address the underlying problems. Each time it has happened I have not been expecting it, and so have just had to deal with it. I have gone from stabilty to what feels like a nightmare, overnight and no, I didn't have plans in place to deal with a crisis because this has never happened before. I feel like at every turn i'm just being told that I'm enabling him. And that I am irresponsible leaving the kids with him, even when I went to an Alanon meeting. When I went to that meeting I left him at home in a perfectly functional state and I won't feel guilty about it. I really needed to go and it helped enormously. I am struggling here just to keep normality going ie get kids to school and get to work on odd days that i have committed to - not to create the illusion of a perfect family life. i would not - and have not- left them with him if he was in a real state and it's not helpful that some of you assumed that. When I went to work, it was the same, I knew that he was capable of carrying out his usual childcare responsibilities. I could not miss work, that would mean really messing up my relationship with my clients and future bookings. It was two days. No I won't do it again if he's drinking. I was just explaining why, that week, i chose not to throw him out. If i had listened to some of your advice i would not have gone to that Alanon meeting or to work.

Another example of unhelpful assumptions - re what I said about booking him into a hotel in future, because we can't expect our friends to take him in, I did not say or imply i would use my own credit card, or put him in a nice ensuite,and he would not be laughing at me for doing this. He would be sitting in a shitty b&b, feeling terrible about himself and it would have come out of his own money. I just think it's unfair and unhelpful that you assumed the worst. Whoever said "what if he tops himself", when talking about childcare.. do you think that's an appropriate phrase to use about someone's husband when they are worried about his suicidal feelings? It's scaremongering for one, and disrespectful. He's someone I love, and the father of my children.

I went along to his appointment with him at the recovery unit this morning. I can imagine people on this thread saying that this is enabling, that I'm treating him like a child. But ..He had NOT been getting the care he needs; The on duty nurse at A&E told him he probably wasn't depressed though he said he felt like killing himself and wanted to be sectioned to stop drinking. The alcohol unit told him he may be manic depressive but accepted him saying he doesn't want to take medication and put him on an 8 week waiting list for treatment, despite knowing he was recently suicidal. They have cancelled his appointments and left weeks in between them. The doctor there told him he's not an alcoholic which is not likely or helpful. He has been too despondent and, frustrated to take control of his treatment. Are you seriously saying that i should just let him get on with this on his own? I went today to try to make sense of this, so that I can cease to worry about it and concentrate on myself. He is now officially in the system, at long last, and they are going to help him alongside him going to AA. I'm not trying to fix him myself, just trying to give him support as he negotiates the NHS system which is now a minefield, woefully understaffed and under funded.

What I will take from this thread is the advice to have a back up plan for childcare in case he starts drinking again and I have to throw him out, and need to work. I have worked out my boundary is I won't have him at home while he's drinking. Incidentally, he never physically drinks in the house or in front of the kids. I will make sure that he has somewhere to go but that he sorts it out himself. Yes I have heard of detachment, with love, and yes i am trying to work that out but its early days. Alanon is not instant is it, though i wish it was. i'll also speak to CAB about benefits etc to see what would happen if i eventually decide to leave.

Thanks to those posters who have been lovely and sympathetic and tried to give practical advice. And thank you to the lovely alcohol and drugs counsellor who got in touch with me to suggest that the tone of some of this thread was off, and the advice might be unhelpful, which gave me courage to stop taking it all on board and freaking out. and to post this.

I am sorry for your upset. I hear everything you've said and understand why you felt affronted by some of the things I posted.

I'm delighted to hear you've taken on board the points you mention above, and congratulate you wholeheartedly. It's hard to get to grips with any of this. It's most impressive that you've taken such positive steps.

I, for one, wouldn't criticise you for supporting H with his appointment! There's a world of difference between enabling selfish behaviour and facilitating recovery :)

I wish you all the best.

Not sure whether it's wise or appropriate to explain this right now - but, in hopes that you may still be reading and in the expectation that you may soon stop:-

I want to clarify what "rock bottom" means. It's the point where the sufferer decides their life has become intolerable and unmanageable. THEY decide this for THEMSELVES. There are no external criteria; it's completely subjective: a matter of finding one's own state so bad that things must change.

My addiction was small by comparison with my peers in rehab. I was, however, more psychologically & emotionally distressed than many of them and this led to my crash at a relatively early stage of substance abuse. While I wouldn't wish the same on anybody, I was quite lucky that my life didn't (yet) revolve entirely around my substance - essentially, I still had self-awareness and that allowed me to get the best from my treatment.

This is the reason for the advice you'll receive - not only from me - to detach as quickly & efficiently as possible, in hopes of speeding up your sufferer's 'rock bottom'. There's no guarantee they will fully engage with recovery, unfortunately. But it is guaranteed that enabling them will extend and deepen the problem.

I apologise if anything I wrote was offensive to you and wish you all the best of luck.

The only thing I want to say still is please please please take the focus off him and start looking after yourself. That doesn't mean do anything to stop the relationship, but you still seem so focused on rescuing him that you don't talk about your needs, wants, dreams, life. If you "put your oxygen mask on first" you can better support him.

I also found it horrible to hear people's advice here before I was ready to too. I felt defensive, I was adamant I could be different, that my ex's drinking & MH issues were different. That I could save him. And I have since admitted to them on another thread that everything they said was absolutely correct, it just took me a lot of time, heart ache and to be honest two breakdowns to finally admit that to myself. But it is a journey you need to go down, and I really do hope you get the outcome that you so want.

apologies too.

i do know about the frustrations of the MH services. rationally asking to be admitted doesnt seem to get you the help...
his CBT practitioner had to call psychiatrist on call as he was hitting himself in the session which he had asked me to attend. but both told us to go on planned family holiday as it "might help" despite nowexP hitting himself on head and begging to be admited.
psychologist said he wouldnt like it as it would be "full of sick people".
the holiday was disaster he was beating himself up in the shower, cutting himself and veering between almost normal and completely out of it...when we got back he flipped totally. they wanted to send him home with me and DC when he was covered in self harm bruises had atacked himself with a knife and had attacked my DS. (your h isnt doing this but you mentioned threatening suicide. )

it was only by me refusing to take him home with me that he got admitted. that is how you can help him get help by refusing to take him home if he gets in that state again and is asking to be sectioned.

(the next time i saw the psychologist a few years later was when i was flipping tv channels late at night and she was on a sex ed show talking about the joys of anal sex...but that is another story)

do get support for you - nhs counsellor you can talk to.

attending appts with him of course this is good and useful for you and him.

having a back up plan for if things go one way or another is also good.

setting your boundaries.

putting you and DC first .

and if he gets in crisis call 999

Hi, things are still calm etc, he is doing well with meetings and i'm feeling more on top of things. i just wanted to say thank you for apologising, didn't want to abandon the thread as I do know you were trying to be helpful.