Dont know what to do...

[germinal]

Married 7 years, 3 dc (beautiful, we love them so much). I work full time, DH part time and studies part time. DH suffers from chronic fatigue though his condition varies and is closely linked to stress/anxiety.

Recently DH has been irritable and snappy. He gets annoyed if I ask him for help ("I do enough") and I just do most things,myself to avoid conflict. He is selfish in many ways but I do genuinely love him. The dc love him too, and he is great with them when he wants to be. About 10% of time he is not really present and is sometimes snappy. The very worst thing he has saidis call the DC "bloody idiots" when they nearly broke his computer. Once he said "get lost".

I dont know how bad all this is. I hate him HATE HIM 20% of the time. The rest I love him like crazy. I really do, and for excellant reasons.

I just dont know how to handle his bad behaviour and whether 80% is enough.

Stress or anxiety seems to cause a deterioration in his CF symptoms which in turn causes him to be irritable. It does not last long but he is unbearable when stressed and I just dont know what to do.

He has tried counselling twice at my insistence. First counsellor was flakey, second one great and he really valued it initially but stopped going after a month or so....

You need to have ground rules laid down and make it absolutely clear to him that the way he speaks to them when he's angry is unacceptable.

It might be time to sit him down for a really serious talk. He needs to realise that he's being selfish and that you shouldn't have to take everything on.

When he said "get lost" my dd got upset and he felt awful and apologised. But since then he has snapped again. He is v defensive but I know he doesnt want to be mean but just gets in this awful morose state.

I cant live like this though....

Then you need to talk to him about it. Pick your moment; obviously if he's in a foul mood anyway then he won't be responsive, but you need to do it soon so that he remembers your daughter's reaction to him.

I told my (now ex) husband that I wanted to live in a happy home and our children deserved that. If he was making other people unhappy, he would have to go and live somewhere else. I said there was no reason why anyone would want to live with someone who makes them unhappy and every reason why I should leave someone who made our children unhappy. You have to be absolutely blunt.