Hey everyone I'm new to the site and was wondering if anyone had been in same situation/has any advice.
I'm in final year of phd and an finding it incredibly stressful.
Bit of background, together 9 years married 2, generally great relationship. I had bad anxiety and stress during my undergraduate degree, eventually found a way to manage it, got counselling dealt with some family stuff. Improved dramatically.
I'm now doing a phd. At the beginning of my final year I had an accident and got concussion took me 6 months to recover and one side effect I'm still feeling a year on is my anxiety has returned and I'm now writing my phd applying for jobs and am very stressed. This isn't helped by the fact my husband hates his job, we have little money, he has health issues that cause him chronic fatigue, the flat is a tip and things just keep happening to cause more stress. We currently have at least one big argument a week over nothing (usually triggered by me) and both of us are struggling to cope eg one argument:
I had been working late all week and wanted a night in, friends has suggest we watch a particular film. I found it really upsetting and triggering and had to walk out halfway through and sat in bedroom, husband offered to turn off but I said don't worry keep watching as he was enjoying it. After it finished I wanted to talk it out as I felt upset and I started ranting about how corrupt the world is for seeing that as entertainment and he said 'do u mean me -because I just watched it' I said 'no but' and it escalated (I am ashamed to admit) to the point I started comparing people who enjoy violent tv to the people who throw rockets in gaza.
I have since apologised as I realise that is not a normal reaction to watching a film (after having a rant to family and friends also) I overheard my mum and husband talking about how hard I am to deal with at the moment and my mum assuring my husband I would get better after my phd was done.
Essentially I'm in a cycle I am finding hard to break, I keep getting upset, ranting about something unrelated to release tension rather than express my feelings (often I don't know how I feel I just get angry about some issue in the world) and triggering an argument, later I calm down and get self awareness and feel bad and we talk things through. I tried counselling but I really didn't help (she said she didn't understand why I don't just say what I'm upset about instead of ranting - not helpful, if I could do that I wouldn't be here!) my husband doesn't know how to handle me and usually either withdraws (which I find infuriating) gets angry (not violent usually just storms out yelling 'I can't handle this stupid argument anymore')
He is getting depressed and last night I said what do you need and he said he feels guilty saying it but 60% of his stress is me being unpredictable and ranty. I suggested why don't I go away for a week and give him some alone time, but he says he would feel guilty if he felt relief and that he made a vow for better/for worse and doesn't want to abandon me because I'm stressed, my phd will be over in a couple of months and hopefully things will get back to normal.
So basically what do I do, I am making mine and his life a misery, I love him and in my more rational times we have a great time together. How do i break this cycle? Also even if we split up, which I hope it doesn't come to, I need to sort this out for me and my mental health otherwise I worry if I have kids I will be a terrible mother. (I come from a bit of a dysfunctional family, we never talk about our feelings and don't handle stress well, but I seem to be the only one who is this bad/wants to change/sees it as detrimental to my health)
Any advice? I feel like I'm going crazy!
(Oh also I got my brain checked out ensure it wasn't a health thing related to concussion but apparently my brain/blood looks good so it's not that - although I do feel more easily overwhelmed since the accident)