DH ignoring my breakdown

[Haywirefire]

I don't know what to do or who to turn to. My DH has been ignoring the fact that I'm currently finding life impossible to cope with. I have a full time job, a long commute and three small kids. He works shifts at weekends so I do all the childcare then. My job is very stressful and on top of all of this I've got anemia. I'm exhausted and I'm getting to the point that I can't cope. I'm constantly anxious, I have insomnia and zero patience with anyone. I keep trying to start conversations with him telling him that I'm not coping with my anxiety or that I can't cope with the kids and he just changes the subject. Or worse he wades in with 'yeah I'm tired too'. I feel like I really don't matter to him. I would love to leave him, but im trapped by a massive mortgage and I wouldn't want to put the kids through a divorce. There are days where I feel like taking my own life is the only way out. I'm currently having counselling but all it is doing is highlighting to me that I have very few options, which is just making me feel more despondent. What can I do?

Vitamin D tablets have made a huge difference for me. I hope they help you too. Vitamin D deficiency comes with a long list of symptoms which include fatigue, depression and anxiety. I've been on them 6 weeks now at 40000 units a week and am feeling much better for it.

gosh i might take some extra vit d3,always feel more energetic when i've had some sun🙂XXX

used to take them, hadn't for a while , and have been more down, thanks🙂.

Point taken re the anaemia and management but it's also not really possible for anyone but the gp to actually help you with that is it? You simply have to get them to give you an explanation for it and proper management, if they haven't already.

It also isn't much of a surprise that no-one has been able to offer you what you seem to want (a different life without any action on your part) because what you want simply isn't possible.

If you are as aggressively dismissive of other people's expertise as you have been here with professionals who could help you then they can't even begin to use their expertise to help you.

So you have two options really, concede to compromising your attitude, even just a bit, or continue in exactly the same manner.

(And no, that post is not about taking anti-depressants. It is about your attitude to being a passenger in your own life and refusal to consider any of the things that could help).

I don't think I've been aggressively dismissive, Offred. I've just pointed out the lack of evidence to support the suggestions other posters have made or where my point has been misinterpreted e.g. The suggestions that my GP would be able to help me and improve my mental and physical health by listening to my concerns and putting me on anti depressants. She couldn't even listen to me saying that being anaemic for 6 years is kind of grinding me down and could we try something else? I don't think that is being dismissive. In fact the suggestion is I should be more direct to affect some kind of change for my physical well being.

And Stuckin90s thanks. I don't think it is menopause or perimenopsuse. No other symptoms to suggest that anything has started early for me. But it does make me think if I don't leave my husband sooner rather than later that he will never in a million years cope with me going through the menopause if he can't support me while I'm overworked, stressed and exhausted.

OP

I think you've sunk into a hole where you cannot see any viable options but Offred is right - you are allowing yourself to be a passenger in your own life.

I was there. The biggest factor that catalysed major changes (though it was quite the crucible to go through, especially feeling as exhausted and unwell as I did) was leaving my now ex-partner.

You need to identify one thing you can do (big or small) and build on that.

The vitamin D may we'll help to make a difference (and really good quality B12 may also help) but you need to look at your life and make changes based on putting you at the top of the list of what matters.

You either have to shit or get off the toilet - and that may sound harsh but if you just keep on repeating ground hog day you're going to continue to wake up to ground hog day.

Something has to change and it seems to me that something has to be you. Step back and look at what you can change and there will be something as people are saying. I'm making a change to a job closer to home instead of a 45min commute. Am I scared? Yes because I'm going from a safe known to something else BUT I am exhausted and I'm putting my health first. Only you know what you need to do and that can be a scary thing

I havent read the full thread but my dh suffered from depression totally stressed hated his job. I supported him to the hilt at first but gradually as he wouldnt persevere with all treatments offered l stepped back. To be honest l was so angry at him as there was so much he could do but didnt eg take antidepressants stick to counselling ( he changed numerous times as wanted things changed immediately) cut back on work etc. Eventually l resorted to one sentence..lm sure you will work it out. He did eventually.
Do not wait for assessment for iron buy some over the counter in chemist
Get a teenager to help with dc at weekend
Consider taking anti dep.
Have you been checked for coeliac as does hinder iron absorption
Stick to one counsellor for 6 months.
Dont blame your dh. It is not his job to fix you and its a very common element of depression to blame those closest.
To be honest l completely switched off from listening about depression and was sorry l didnt do it sooner.
My dh is now on medication. Cut back on all the stuff he piled on himself. Cycles most days. And l am a very supportive wife!!

At no point have you given a single shred of evidence that you either understand all of the options available to you or that your thinking is in anyway rational. It may be, though I tend to assume that outright dismissal of everything is an indicator of irrationality or a lack of clear thinking.

And it is not rational to refuse to even consider any medicine in your situation. As has been said before not all medicines that could help you are anti-depressants, not all anti-depressants are SSRIs, considering them is not the same as being forced to take them, neither is them being recommended by medical professionals the same as being forced to take them, your view that GPs just give you pills because of big pharma has an essence of my view too but it also does not mean they may not be appropriate or helpful for you.

I have concerns also about women particularly being told 'this is life as a woman' and given pills when they need practical life support and therapy but I also take anti-depressants of different kinds offered at two particularly difficult points in my life where I stopped being able to manage on my own. They helped me manage on my own to do all the practical and therapeutic things.

You may not want or need them. Leaving your partner may help you to manage the practical things, getting signed off sick may help you manage. It's your choice what pressure you decide to relieve but you cannot continue with everything the same as before IMO.

And please understand that my view comes from feeling the way you are now at my worst. I understand being so depressed and hurt that you have no motivation to actually take action and feel totally negatively about any future or decision.

Your anemia is caused by your diet and you are unwilling to consider altering it yet you feel your doctor should find a solution for you. Depression is a result of chemical imbalance in the brain and you are unwilling to consider a medical solution.
For the sake of your children I feel you have to re-evaluate your intransigence. You are not rational at the moment.
I wish you well, most of all I hope you protect your children, they are the most important consideration for any mum.

If you're as dismissive of DH as you are of people on here and professional advice, frankly I'm not surprised he's frustrated. You sound like your own worst enemy with a large dose of martyrdom thrown in for good measure

I can't tell you what your GP thinks re your anaemia or what investigations they have done re that but I remember you have mentioned that you changed surgeries I think and that you have seen a number of GPs and have not got anywhere with any of them. That leaves me inclined to believe that the GP IS trying to help with the iron tablets either by giving you supplements to help with your unsustainable dietary choice or because they deem this is the appropriate treatment for you for some other reason.

Thing is Offred, you say I'm not demonstrating that I understand all of the options available to me, but really what are they? Lots of people have posted that they think I have a mental health issue that needs medication, but seem to think I'm stubborn because I refute that. I can't change my job as I cannot earn less than I currently do. My anaemia is not caused by my 'unsustainable dietary choice' as my body does not retain iron - 6 years of iron tablets haven't changed my iron stores, which is why I'm frustrated with my GP not offering me anything else to consider. As I have said before, what I would really like is the support of a partner who cared about me. I'd asked for advice on how to get through to him that I'm physically unwell with vitamin deficiency and not trying to out do him with a tiredness competition. I need him to step up and he's not doing that.
And if I sound pissed off, it's because I am. I'm not a martyr though. I'm a knackered and stressed working mum with very little emotional or practical support at a tough time in my life.

It is not that you sound pissed of. It is that you are intransigent in your belief that the only thing that will help or that you can do is get your husband to be a different person - a fixation on such a solution, as it is not possible, I theorise is just another way of your negative thinking keeping you miserable.

I don't believe that several GPs have all failed to treat you appropriately. Whilst possible, particularly because you may well be an extremely difficult patient, it doesn't seem likely. It is more likely that those GPs have explained to you what they believe is causing the anaemia and given you the appropriate treatment.

What has the GP actually said about your anaemia?

The treatment for my anaemia has been to take a blood sample, put me on three months of ferrous sulphate tablets, take another blood sample at the end. Then after a month or two my symptoms are back and the process is repeated. I've been following this process for the last six years. I don't think that makes me a difficult patient! If anything I think it makes me a passive one as I've kept on following the advice and hoping that each time the problem would be solved. I switched practices as my old one didn't have a permanent GP, it was nurse practitioner led and I felt I wanted to be seen by a GP as I wasn't making any progress.

But what have they said to you?

In six years of anaemia and a number of different HCPs one of them must have said to you why they are treating it with iron tablets and blood tests....

Have the blood tests you have already had tested for coeliac for example?

And TBF the most difficult patients ARE ones who have both a passive and intransigent attitude. The ones who feel that it is the doctor's responsibility to heal them but do not listen to or respect the doctor's advice/suggestions of treatment.

What I am sure people are wondering is whether the HCPs have in fact excluded the possibility that this is anything related to absorption and have clumsily suggested you eat meat rather than referring you to a dietitian or given you advice about how you can improve your iron intake whilst continuing your vegetarian diet?

And it is very clear that you are in significant distress at the moment and people don't tend to take you seriously when you are. If the HCPs really haven't looked into and excluded absorption issues and continued to just give you iron tablets for six years then that would be malpractice, especially as one of the causes of problems with absorption is cancer.

haywirefire, I just wanted to apologise for not having read the bits of the thread about what your husband said to the children about you leaving. He may well regret saying this, but I do agree this was wrong, and he should probably apologise to you and children for saying this. I know life is hard for you at the moment; just want you to know that lots of us struggle , I would have found it impossible to work when I had young children, your situation is hard, but hope you can find a way to feel more hopeful, and also that you are useful whatever you do or don't do, you are your children's mother.