Husband's attempted suicide

[mummyjones1977]

Advice/ guidance needed. My husband took an overdose last week and after a couple of days in intensive care he survived, and now he's home. My question is - how the hell do I get over it?

He has been suffering from depression since December and attempted to kill himself on 17th February. This was at his Mum's and I didn't have to deal with the immediate impact of that overdose - didn't have to call the ambulance or anything - she did. He only took sleeping tablets that time so was only in hospital for 6 hrs then back to his Mum's to sleep it off.

This time it was me who found him, having just returned home with my 2 year old and 4 year old from their music class. He had locked himself in the bathroom and left a suicide note. He was in a semi-comatosed state when I found him and I called an ambulance.

I know he's ill but I can't get over what he's done. Hate living my life a day at a time and worrying about whether he's going to do it again - he didn't seem suicidal last Wednesday so how do I spot the signs? Also, he won't promise me that he won't do it again since he promised before and that didn't mean anything did it?

Can't see what future we have at the moment. He has put me through hell, but acts like nothing is wrong. I'm not allowed to mention it and now his mum's telling me it's me who needs to speak to a counsellor to get over it. Why's this all become my problem? I won't do anything rash like kick him out but the thought has crossed my mind. He's being seen by psychiatric specialists and I know that I have to just hang in there and wait til he gets better, blah, blah. But I've been riding this emotional rollercoaster for months now.

I feel for you, I really do. Sadly, if someone is so bloody determined they will keep trying. Ive had two cases close to me recently Has the depression been going on for along time? Has he had his meds changed recently? is he even taking any? Please look after yourself and your babies. Good luck.x

That sounds incredibly stressful for you and I hope the specialists act quickly to provide treatment for your dh and take some of the strain off you. I DO think you should have your own support - perhaps an independent counsellor - not to get over it but to help you get through it. This is not something you can just 'get over' in a few days - and it's still an ongoing situation.

There is a limit to what you can do for your dh and you cannot be responsible for his actions. Is he in hospital now (I hope so...)?

So sorry you're going through this. Has anyone talked to you about having him sectioned? It really sounds to me that he needs it tbh.

My brother had a couple of attempts, wasn't sectioned then he was successful on his 3rd attempt. I still feel really let down by the medical professionals that they didn't section him on that 2nd attempt.

He can get better with the right help, sometimes that help needs to be forced onto people or at least saught out by their loved ones.

Oh dear, so sad, poor u.

I dont really know what to say but if he is that depressed that he keeps trying to kill himself then I dont think you can't be expected to spot the signs or help. He obviously needs professional help. Have they not talked about hospitalising him possibly in a psychatric unit of some sort. I feel its unfair for you and your children to have to live with this personally.

Hope you get some answers, must be bloody awful.

Lots of luv and hugs to you. X

People who try to kill themselves don't always have a treatable mental illness like depression and they can only be sectioned if they do. I presume that after a serious suicide attempt with note he was assessed by a psychiatrist.
I'd be wanting to accompany him to his GPs to find out details of the duty psychiatrists assessment of him.
People with personality disorders also self harm including overdosing. if my husband had a personality disorder I'd want to know.
I couldn't live with someone who wouldn't let me help them with something like this and would wonder why living with me was so awful they wanted to kill themselves. If you are married it isn't just his problem it's both of yourses problem.
Pretending it didn't happen isn't an option, or wouldn't be if he wished to continue living with me.

Sorry but why is he living with you still? What if your children find him dead, they're just babies. Can't he stay with his mum?

My Dad committed suicide 11 years ago.

I went to see a Psychotherapist and he told me that I could have been with Dad less than 10 minutes before he overdosed and would never have known what he had planned.

I'd get all the Mental Health professionals that you can involved and if that involves Sectioning your DH so be it.

Junglist how would his living with his Mum help? She'd be the one to find him then. This isn't about saving someone from finding a person has been successful in a suicide attempt but about trying to make sure that attempt doesn't get to happen.

why cant you "kick him out" ?? - -not really in that way but send him to someone who can monitor and look after him.

can you look after him plus two children?

there comes a point where you have to say to the medical people - "i cannot do this". " i cannot care for two small children anda husband who wants to kill himself"

send him back to his mother??

i had to say this and my exP was admitted to psych unit - i refused to have him home...had 3 dcs to look after... eventually he agreed to go to his father and brother in spain for a while. the only alternative was a half way house they offered him as he was not sectioned and could not stay in psych ward...
the day he left to fly he was calling his friend who was going to pick him up from airport saying "i just want to kill myself i am not coming" fortunately they insisted and offered to help him...he got much better there. (we now ex as i realised when he was away so many other issues too).

sis there mental health crisis team involved? have they given you the number? does he have a named psychiatric community nurse?

yes see a counsellor -to give you the strength to decide what you intend to do.

if you chose to be his watcher/carer then fien - but please make sure your children have someone to care for them too when you have to rush off again to hospital with him.

you say he acts like nothing is wrong - so how is day to day? depressed or is totally ok then suddenly disappears to try and kill himself? is his responsibility to deal with his illlness - you have to decide and choose how much you and your children can be a part of that recovery....

it is ok to say "i cannot deal with this and care for my children". you need to be telling the medical people this. you dont have to be his community carer - but if you chose to be then you wont get any support unless you shout for it.

you are entitled to a carers assessment as his carer - because if he is this suicidal and at home then you ARE his carer. you might be able to get someone to watch him while you out with kids.

or you could pack the kids off to someone while you care for him. you have to consider your choices here. at one point i put my exP first, spending my daughters birthday holding his hand at psychiatrist appt and after - while he cried and cried. big mistake. it didnt do anything to help him - and my child missed out...

kids are young...but how much damage could it do to them to find him dead?

yes please see a counsellor to talk thu your options here in short and medium term, til he really does get better.

"kicking him out" to someone - his mother? maybe the ebst thing for you and children.

ultimately you cant stop him killing himself if he choses too or is so ill he sees it as only option. if he isnt sectioned then he has to realy make effort to seek treatment to get well.

you have dcs and have to choose who you can care for and who comes first. i really dont think it is possible to look after a suicidal partner AND small children - i could not. at some points i had to take dcs away, leaving him self harming and not knowing what we would come back to... it was hell.

the best thing i did was saying "no" "he cannot be here in the family home any longer" "the medical NHS social services have to step in and care for him" .

you do have a choice to care for him or not....but think of how it impacts on the children and have people in place to take them away and care for them when it goes belly up....you have to shout loud and long to the medical people to get support in doing so, especially if you chose to care for him at home, not knowing what you will wake up to or come home to.... cruel to be kind,,,and cruel (perhaps) to him to save yourself and your children.

You poor thing. This is a bloody traumatic time for you.

'I'm not allowed to mention it and now his mum's telling me it's me who needs to speak to a counsellor to get over it.'

Counselling, yes - but more for support - hollow laugh at the idea of 'getting over' something like this when it is clearly a current threat to you all.

Not allowed to mention it? Is he refusing to talk about it? So who is HE talking to, and who CAN you talk to about it?

Does he have a mental health diagnosis? I'd agree about wanting to know about the psych report, even if you can't see the report itself at least some idea of what the psych considers the risks to be?

I just can't believe you are being left so alone with this. Hope you're at least talking to your GP. Many sympathies to you.

Of course it is a very difficult situation.

When my mother was suffering from depression and eventually needed a stay in a semi secure unit after several attempts on her own life, I can only say how grateful I am that her DH supported her though that difficult time and thankfully now she is much better, happy, and all those dark times are a distant memory.

I do hope if my DS when grown up and married suffers depression he is equally well supported.

Obviously it's not a situation you want your DC mixed up in, which seems correct, and your DH does need the support of his loving wife (you), therefore perhaps they could go and stay with your or his parents for a while whilst you work through this.

I agree that you may yourself need counselling, it's a difficult situation which most of us (myself included, having my xP become depressed and turn to self harm) are not emotionally equipped to deal with.

If you don't see yourself having a future with him, then please consider doing this anyway even if only for the sake of saving a life, surely that's a worthwhile pursuit?

Thank you all for your messages. His mum is staying with us at the moment so that I can still go out with the children. They are mt priority and I am doing everything I can to make sure that they are not too affected by this. They didn't see my husband in the bathroom last week - got them out to a neighbours as quick as I could.

I have contacted a therapist that I used ages ago so that I can talk through with them. Husband is under psychiatric crisis team but they don't really talk to me unless I insist, plus they just come out with a load of crap half the time about taking baby steps and well done for getting out of bed today. All very frustrating. One thing getting out of bed - one million steps from getting back to work.

As for who is HE talking to. These crisis people but being encoraged to look forward not back. I know we can't change the past but I can't stop thinking about it. Today was particularly bad because it was last Wednesday that I did it - so it was back off to music class etc. Bought it all back.

Thanks for all the messages. Useful to know that I am not a complete cow for doubting what the future holds and for not being able to "just accept it"

xx

How are things for you today, mummyjones?

My mum kicked my dad out when he had an affair; he committed suicide a few months later after several failed attempts. The situation is absolutely not your fault, nor ultimately your responsibility. Your DH is an adult and only he is responsible for whatever actions he choses to take.

How awful for you all.

I have no real advise and the other posters seem to have it pretty well covered but I do think he needs 24hr care at the moment. Ofgourse you can't kick him out but it's not fair on your children for him to stay. Can you imagine if your 4 year old were to find him ?

It sounds terrifying for you

What everyone has said, mummyjones. And no, you can't rely on spotting the signs. This is a way so many people beat themselves up in these situations, imagining they should have seen it coming. Look after yourself and your DCs.

Please put it out of your head that you can spot the signs. I Someone I know tried to kill themselves and there was no real clue. Completely spontaneous and i couldn't be sure it wouldn't happen again, still can't really.

Your priority is your children as they only have you to help them, your husband should have other people - his mum, the professionals.

I really hope you all get through this well and happy.

I'm really sorry to hear you're in this situation - but just to echo others, this really isn't your "responsibility" and you can't be on the look-out for signs. In my experience, suicide is a very spontaneous decision - when I had my darkest days it took me 20 minutes to flip from "OK" to OD. It's not as though you say "oooh I'm feeling really rough, if things don't improve I'll do it on tuesday".

Your MIL is really not helping - but perhaps she doesn't want to admit to herself how very serious this is.

As he's taken an OD and been admitted he should've been under 72 hour psychiatric observation. You need some specialist help here, you yourself alone cannot do all of this - and nobody expects you to!

Please phone your GP today and demand that some action is taken - sectioning might well be the very best option for all of you right now.

Well under 10% of people who overdose and get admitted end up with 72 hour observation, and under 5% are sectioned so the "should've" is completely wrong.
This is why I would want to see the psyciatrist's report (with my husband they couldn't show it to me without his consent) to see why they felt he was OK at home, particularly if he's refusing to discuss things and I don't think he's improving and is still suicidal.

rebecca I'm shocked - I thought it was taken more seriously than that - you know "duty of care" et al.

"People who try to kill themselves don't always have a treatable mental illness like depression and they can only be sectioned if they do"-
This isn't entirely correct, they can be sectioned (under Sec 2 of Mental Health Act) for a period of assessment to establish whether there is a Mental illness.

After that, any subsequent admissions can be under Sec 3 (the treatment one)

regardless- he should be getting some help if he has made two attempts on his own life. is he under the Home Treatment/crisis team??

The person who helped me most in a similar situation when the CPN was the laziest arse in the world was the social worker from the community mental health team. She could listen, come to the house and see how stressed everything was and advocate for me with the services to get him admitted or whatever. After years of a terrible mess I finally managed to get the idiotic arrogant psychiatrist to change his meds and within a week he was recovering. 2 years on he is well, back at work and only now occasionally wanting to discuss what happened.

It's a long slog, sometimes I wished he would succeed in killing himself because the stress of not knowing if he would be hanging in the hallway when I cam home was unbearable. He went to stay at his parents many times when I couldn't cope.

I personally don't buy the 'if they are determined then that is their choice' line that I got fed by some psych services They are mentally ill FFS, it seems perfectly logical to them now but when they are well it will seem as unreasonable as it does to you now. With a lot of patience, hard work, fighting for services and support as well as a bit of luck, we kept him alive through the illness. it is possible to come out the other side of this. Good luck.

my (now ex) attempted suicide many times....more since we've split,but around 25 occasions. he has a personality disorder,asessed by a psychiatrist.

i had 4 dc when living with him. for him,it was a control thing....his brother had comitted suicide and he knew how it affected people....he always attempts when he knows he'll be found too

op.....your dh knew he'd be found in time....so he has a problem which needs discussing. has he offered any explanation? trouble at work? money worries?

what was you H like before ie before december? is this something totally out of the blue? what has triggered it? (if anything)

as TBB says - there may be something more to it...or simply he has been struck down by the illness out of the blue and needs correct meds/therapy...??

agree with ohmeohmy - it is a long slog...is not something that happened last week and then let's all forget and get over it...

to reiterate:

who is supporting you? (other than MIL)?

if it looks like you are coping with him at home then no one will help .

hope you have numbers to call on weekend - if needed. otherwise always 999

How distressing for you, mummyjones. Sorry to read that you're going through this.

My ex showed signs of having a mood disorder, although he was never diagnosed. I did call a support charity at one stage though, and was advised that if he was posing a danger to himself or to others, I could call the community mental health team and they would likely have him sectioned - even without a diagnosis. Is this an option?

You can't keep living with this level of stress and worry about him; he has a massive control over your emotional health, and you have little ones who need to be protected from witnessing future attempts.

I hope you're able to get the support you need. Good luck.

i left in the end.....other reasons,but couldnt cope with him and dc too. as they got older i certainly didnt want them picking up on it,or worse,seeing it!!

my ex used suicide as control....so different to you.....but the fear never went. i couldnt walk in the front door without worrying,same every time phone rang...

mummyjones I am so sorry you have gone through this.

I have a similar experience of suicide, although with a family member, not myself or my DH.

He tried with sleeping tablets a few years ago and told his DP that if that didnt work he would make sure next time it did. She tried all she could to get him the help he needed but he refused.

I wont go into too many personal details but in the end it destroyed their relationship. She couldnt live with the idea that every phone call from an unknown number would be the police saying he had succeeded.

In black and white that sounds harsh, it wasnt that harsh. It was her way of caring and she did care, adn continues to love him although he finally did succeed last year.

We talked about Sectioning but it didnt happen.

If you have to do that then please consider it. If he wont get the help he desperately needs then he will have to be,I am afraid.