My DH is ill and I am struggling

[JimLaheysWhiskeyBottle]

This is my very first thread, so please be gentle. Mid thirties mum of two, full time job etc and we live abroad away from family.
My husband has a diagnosis of bipolar, (I have added to threads a few times about him).

We’ve been together over 20 years and had lots of ups and lots of downs. The last 3 years have been rough, his mental health has not being good. Currently he is receiving treatment (the treatment and care here is absolutely outstanding and I am very aware of how lucky we are for this). He is also due to be voluntary admitted later next week for two weeks as he is not in a good place at the moment.

Now is the point where I feel like an utterly shit person. The last 3 years have been brutal. My DC2 was born whilst DH was on a very long sick leave. I have done 100% night feeds, appointments, care, baths, bedtimes. A lot of this is due to side effects of medication, but it has made me feel taken for granted.

I have 100% of the mental load as well as food prep, cleaning and all the other stuff that goes along with family life.

I feel that over the last 3 years he has slowly become more and more selfish. It feels like his needs and happened are so much more important than mine. Yet, at the moment they are, he has a very real risk of harm.

It’s my birthday on Sunday and i know for absolute certainty that he has forgotten, despite the fact that we have been together for 22 years. I know he has forgotten as i have access to the finances at the moment due to his risk taking behaviour whilst he is manic. I realise that it sounds precious to be bothered about my birthday, especially as he has all of his health issues at the moment, but he is perfectly ok to text me a list of his xmas present wishes.

When he eventually realises he has forgotten, he will be devastated, but part of me doesn’t want to remind him. Not to be game playing, but almost as confirmation to myself as to how little i actually matter.

I don’t really know what i am asking here. Maybe i need some sense talking to me, he is seriously ill, yet here i am acting like a dick.

Hi, just wanted to check in quickly. Hang in there. When you say you have access to the finances "at the moment" does this mean you don't usually have access to the finances? It sounds to me like more of the family resources need to be devoted to active support for you in the long term, whether that's a cleaner, some counseling just for you, or something else. Is that possible at all?

@youvegottenminuteslynn

I have bipolar and am lucky to be stable due to medication, I don't have (or at least haven't had for a few years) flare up episodes thank goodness.

Even as someone with the same diagnosis as him I plead with you to remember this - one person's mental health doesnt trump that of another person's.

Him being bipolar doesn't mean that you should be able to magically cope with being last on the list all the time, taking 100% of the mental load and feeling increasingly unwell yourself.

It is not up to you to make yourself smaller at the times his symptoms get bigger, to accommodate him into your shared life.

While it's sad and difficult for him, that doesn't lessen the impact on you at all. It must be utterly exhausting and those disappointments (like forgetting a birthday etc) add up to death by a thousand papercuts.

You aren't an awful person if you have simply reached your limits when it comes to what you can cope with. If someone's diagnosed mental health issues are impacting your own mental health, it doesn't mean that impact is something you should dismiss.

It's your life too

This.

And you have to think about the impact on your children as well as they grow up. There needs to be a place for your wellbeing and the children's, not everything spinning around him.

I couldn’t cope with what you’re going through and I say that as somebody with previous partners with MH issues.
You count too. Your children count too.
Your life counts too.
I hope the treatment works. If it doesn’t you need to think about if you can live like this for the rest of your life. I’m so sorry you’re going through this

Remind him. You may not want to, and I understand why you don't, but I would think that handling his 'devastation' at forgetting would be worse.

If a risk of self harm wasn't there would you leave? If that is a big factor look at how you can resolve this. We had a terrible rough patch after my divorce (his MH) but he got treatment, complied with it and moved on. It was the right thing to do for the long term. You will break and be no good to him eventually...nor your DC.

People adjust to their circumstances too, if you have been his very competent carer, parent to his children and provider for 3 years he will have adjusted to that without even being conscious of it. He will have developed dependencies and become comfortable with it. That's just human nature. But this is not sustainable for you, you're already exhausted so they're needs to be an exit plan for this situation, hopefully one where he is able to be self aware and want to stop leaning on you.
I hope this can happen I think you are amazing to have got this far and I sympathise with you completely. Where does he end and the illness begin? Such an difficult question to answer, when the boundaries may change at times too.

Tusen takk for all of the wonderful support so far, it really is greatly appreciated.

To answer a few posters questions and give a bit of background now that it’s quiet here at home.

We met at school, both had very loving stable families. All of our siblings are in long term healthy marriages. My dad died suddenly when i was young, but i would say in no way did my parents ever model a «carer» type relationship, or his parents to be fair.

I have been financially independent since i left home at 18, worked and funded my own degree, emigrated in 2010 and moved to a few different countries, sometimes for my work sometimes for his.

I can’t fathom in my head how I can be so together and independent and yet have sleepwalked into this situation. It wasn’t always like this, we had «episodes» but i always felt these manageable. The last 3 years have been brutal. I have lost sight of who he is and he definately isn’t the person i fell i love with, i got excited to move to new countries with etc.

When i refer to finances, i mean that i have guardianship. In Norway everything is in your own name, so to safeguard our financial security i have guardianship, this also means i can speak to his doctors too.

I can categorically say that I loathe being a «carer». I want someone to bring me a coffee in bed in the morning, to ask me how my day at work was, someone to put the dishes in the dishwasher after i have cooked dinner. This has disappeared gradually during the last 3 years, to the point where it is non existant.

I think this is why the birthday has been a catalyst for my thought process. 4 years ago, he bought me an extremely thoughtful gift, the last 3 years i have brought it up, it has niggled at me as i had a feeling he would forget, but this year i have said nothing and i feel it has shown me what i feared, i am most definately not seen. And that does not feel good.

Leave. Be happy. Marriage is a choice not a life sentence

OP it's so, so hard

My DH had bipolar 1 and we were together for 20 years. He would come off his meds and lie to me about it, then go manic and psychotic. The worry between episodes that the next one might be coming, then the awful times when it did arrive - it nearly broke me. And as a previous poster commented, there is no meaningful support available for spouses who find themselves designated "carers" for their partners.

I left with our 3 DC during his last manic episode when he became aggressive in response to me telling him he was going manic (classic loss of insight).

Your DH is responsible for managing his illness. You are not, however much you love him and want to help him. You cannot keep him well.

Sit back and ask yourself what your boundaries are, for you and your DC. And do not feel guilty if you have reached your limit. It is ok to decide that you have done all you can.

I divorced my husband. The root of our problems was his untreated depression which had gone on for almost a decade. When I left him, he'd started taking antidepressants a couple of weeks before. I work in mental health and I just couldn't keep it together for myself anymore. I left for my own sake and my children. We had a myriad of problems, all which led back to his depression. You're not a bad person for struggling. It's not easy, at all.

Oh darling I’m so sorry. I don’t have advice but wanted to say you are doing amazing. If I lived closer to Norway I’d drop father Ted round myself and sink a bottle of wine with you x