Paranoid husband

[Gemker]

I'm at my wits end with my husband. we have been together for 11 years and have 3 children.

He has always had a problem with drugs- cocaine, (il)legal highs, spice... they've come and gone, iv stayed by his side throughout. One constant which he is still on is marijuana. He doesn't see the problems that i believe it is causing, he thinks i know nothing because i do not take drugs. I have never cheated but he has in the past, before we got married. I do not believe He is cheating now.
He has never really treated me very well but, he is a good man when he is not being lead by drugs and at times he is a brilliant husband.
2 years ago, i had gone through a long period of him treating me very badly. I got depressed and couldn't cope, i became a different person and i left him. Around a month later i started dating a different man, i think this was because i just wanted someone to care for me. I was very open about it, i didn't sneak around as i believed the marriage was over and had visited a solicitor to start divorce proceedings. 4 months later, i realised that i was making bad decisions based on depression and i gave my marriage another try.
We fell straight back into the old ways and i am back at the point of getting nasty attitude, disrespect, it's a horrible way to live but the worst is paranoia. Despite my proving that i met the man i dated after we had split up-showing him the messages, people confirming it was over a month later... He refuses to believe this and says i was sneaky, i left him for this other man, he knows my game. This ous absolutely not the case, he has no reason to think otherwise. I think by blaming me for leaving, it means he didnt have to take responsibility for the way he treated me.

At first i tried to make him see reason, telling him how badly he treated me and how depressed i became and that i just couldn't take any more from him... but i understood his insecurity. now i can't take it anymore. I do not go out drinking, i go to work (alone as a cleaner), collect the children and am generally home alone with them each night as he will be out. I have 1 close female friend, did not socialise, I am open with my mobile phone-letting him take it whenever he wants, i leave my Facebook open, i do not keep male friends. but he thinks i am lying about where i say i go, i am messaging a man and deleting the evidence, i am letting a man through the back gate when he is out. I 'flap ' when he touches my phone. There is absolutely no basis for this way of thinking and things like the 'flapping' when he touches my phone is completely made up. He also makes snide comments that i have a tracker on his phone!
He never outright says it, he insinuates and when i call him out on it, he then says he didn't mean it that way so it must be my guilty conscience. I have tried getting angry with him because i believe he is disrespectful believing me to be a 'slag ' when i have never given him cause to believe so, i have tried to explain and show him how ridiculous some of his accusions are, i am doing everything in my power to be as open about my life as i can. I find myself avoiding all situations which will give him cause to accuse me, iv done it for so long that even though iv always had a small case of social anxiety, it is in full flow now.. but nothing is working. He truely believes he 'knows what I'm up to ' because he 'knows the real me '. I just can't deal with this anymore. I love the man with all my heart but i don't know what else to do.. changing his mind is not going to happen. He won't stop marijuana because he sees no ill affects, he will not see a doctor or seek councel because he is absolutely positive in his suspicions, to him he is not paranoid. I do not want to leave, i want to help him for him, myself, the kids.. what can i do?

I don't think you can do anything for him.
But what a mess for your poor dc.

You don't want to leave - I don't understand that you'd keep your dc in this situation.

He is a good father, and when i left him for those 4 months the children were distraught. I want to fight for our marriage but i don't know how.

You and your children are worth more than this

Tell him to leave

He is a good father.

This is not the case.

He has never really treated me very well.

The issue is not your husband's paranoia. The issue is that he has never really treated you very well.

I understand that you want to fight for your marriage and do not know how to. However, in this situation the children become the primary concern.

Do you leave your husband in sole charge of the children at the moment?

So he's not around for he kids because he goes out whilst you're there to look after them?
He cheated on you but he's paranoid you've cheated on him.
He wastes his time and money on drugs.
Sounds like you're worth more than this.
You won't change him so I'm not sure what answer you're looking for.

A skunk weedhead out every night + not treating his kid's mother well is neither a good man or a good husband. You need to set your bar higher and leave this bad influence alone. Arent you tired?! Life's really too short to put up with this shit. He's a man he isn't God - stop putting him first and bending yourself out of shape to be who he wants you to be, to prove you're loyal. Why on earth are you restricting your life like this? & for your DCs sake you should be out of all this anyway. Don't assume they'll grow up being grateful you stayed with their unstable dad and let them grow up in an unhappy home. They'll likely see it as being all about you and not them, and will treat you accordingly. You'll lose either way. Do you do anything nice/special with your DCs? Doesnt sound much like it as youre rooted to the spot aiming to show your man that you're the perfect woman. Take your eyes off this man and focus on your DCs and their lives more, they dont deserve all this

Thank you all for your advice.
I was hoping that someone would know how i could go about helping him or getting him help but have actually ended up portraying myself as a bad mother by omitting to mention the kids.

The kids are happy. He plays with them, is patient with them and gives them his attention. If i do need to leave him with them for any reason, he is never under the influence as he smokes his weed of an evening away from the house. I take them to all their extracurricular things- rugby, gymnastics, band practice, football, tap dancing as he is generally still at work.

You have not portrayed yourself as a bad mother. Whether or not your husband is under the influence when you need to leave your children for any reason, his paranoia may well be around whether you are in the room or not in the room. This is the reason he is not a good father. The effects of marijuana are not limited to the period when one is intoxicated. The link between marijuana and mental ill-health including symptoms of paranoia is becoming increasingly well established.

You can't help someone who doesn't accept they have a problem. Your husband does not want to change. He has you where he wants you and won't do anything while you remain. In my experience, someone has to hit rock bottom before they accept there are issues. I hope you can find a way out of this marriage that is causing you so much misery. Trust me your children know that you are both unhappy whether they show it or not and the best thing you can do is show them this behaviour is unacceptable and go and build a better life for yourself and them. If this was your daughter telling you this about her husband, what would you say to her?

How can the kids be happy when in your words he is disrespecting their mother, calling her a 'slag' and giving off a nasty attitude?

How can you help him if he has had a problem with drugs throughout the 11 years you have known him?

Your op is all about proving how you are not having an affair. What a sad way for you all to live.

OP you said you are alone with your DCs as your OH is out every night. Now youve switched to say he gives them time and attention, and youre fine to leave him with them as he smokes weed in evenings away from the house. Your story is completely contradictory in terms of how much time your OH actually spends with DCs. He is lying to himself, and you are lying to yourself. You're trying to present him as a man worth saving, and having. Its all about him. He is not going to change for you so its either live with him in misery, or start plans to go and make a life for you and your DCs. Is your relationship model what you want your DCs to see as they're growing up in life? Take your eyes and mind off this man and see whats really going on here. Counselling would help you, you could speak to your GP for a start, to help you accept the truth of your situation and clear your head re next steps.

So basically this man treats you appallingly, gets to go off and do exactly what he wants and waste family money on his drug habit, then come home to do the fun stuff with the DC while you do all the parenting and running around.

Where is his motivation to change? He has got a pretty cushy set up.

If you really want to help him provide him with a reason to change. Chuck him out and tell him he can't come back until he is clean and has learnt to respect you.

You might be fighting to save this marriage but you are the only one who is.

There is no reason for him to want the status quo to change because he can say and do anything and you will accept it.

OP. My Ex husband is a weed smoker. Unfortunately I gave him an ultimatum in October and he chose the weed.

You deserve better. We all do. And i fought and fought through the various stages over the years whilst he experimented with various drugs (pain killers, legal highs, tramadol addiction (purchased on dark web), poppy tea addiction); to get out of his head.

His bouts of anger. Kicking and punching furniture, doors. Thinking he might throw me down the stairs around 3am 2 days before my 'wedding anniversary'.

I didn't go out for 10 years and didn't have any friends over due to his social anxiety and he never came anywhere with me and the kids.

But he's a 'great dad'. I just had a gutsful of my life being all about him.

We childcare 50:50. Unfortunately I cannot stop my kids growing up with him being this way and rolling joints, but they don't see it in my house anymore and I don't have to put up with his shit and his negative attitude on everything..

Hope my story gives you some inspiration. You deserve more than him..

I was hoping that someone would know how i could go about helping him or getting him help
He doesn't want help.

If he did want help he would find it on his own or ask you to help him.

He is probably quite happy the way things are because he gets to treat you like shit, go out whenever he likes and get stoned whenever he pleases.

Why don't you see that both you and your children are worth more than this???

He sounds unbearable OP. Think about how he treats YOU, not the children. You two are 'modelling' adult relationships to them. Your kids are going to grow up thinking that is how relationships work, that love is jealousy, that it's ok to treat women like shit and that women should put up with shit.

OP, are you getting any counselling for yourself? In all seriousness, have you spoken to any domestic abuse charities? Because what you have described sounds like psychological abuse (of you, in case that needs pointing out).

Weed is closely linked to psychosis and paranoia both as a causitive factor and as a mal adaptive coping mechanism/self medication. There is evidence that using it as a teenager significantly increases the risk of developing serious mental illness (psychosis and schizophrenia, both of which are characterised by paranoid delusions). It is also common that weed provides short term relief of symptoms but several hours after using it worserning of those same symptoms. At this stage though you can only get help for your husband if he wants it. He is unlikely to get assessment from mental health services whilst he is still using weed unless his symptoms deteioriate to crisis point as they may stop if he stops using. There are some new NICE guidelines on dual diagnosis (serious mental illness in conjunction with addiction to drugs and/or alcohol) these would probably not be applicable as he doesn't have a mental health diagnosis, though I think that there is something in them stating that drug use should not prevent assessment for mental health conditions. Unless he is a risk to himself or others though he would have to be willing to have an assessment,which it ddoesn't sound like he would be.

Ultimately I agree with PPs, he is the only one who can help himself and you deserve better than the way he is treating you. And I say that as someone who's DH has a episodes of psychosis and a history of self medicating with various substances. It took him ending up seriously ill and sectioned to get a diagnosis and once he got the support and medication (+ education about how harmful the self medication actually is and how it was making things worse) he stopped using other substances. If he hadn't I couldn't have stayed with him and I'd told him this, which I think was another factor.