Submitted by strengthnstrive on 11/27/2012.
I am a 27 year old, college educated and my spouse is 31 and the same for him. He has ADHD. This is not the first time that I have been to this site. I visited before while we were in pre-marital counseling and our therapist tried to help me understand our issues stemed from having an ADHD related relationship.
I learned well before that my DH could not handle too much at once, so I methodically gave him minor things to do, i.e.: the wedding planning. Passed with flying colors and I often gave him praises for his achievements.
He had at least four jobs since I have known him while I am still working on promotion number two since. It is not to say that I have thrown this up but I say because he was suspended from job one, demoted from job two, fired from job three, and then questioned about his integrity on job four... I asked at job number two if he had troubles keeping employment only because we were about to spend our lives together. And mind you, I ALWAYS kept him encouraged and NEVER put him down, but I needed to be sure that he was capable of supporting for his family.
Then I looked at other relationships he has with family and his close friends. They are difficult and I try to remind him that God (i am a Christian) wants us to love one another and expect no more than what a person can give. In the beginning we had the most adventureous times and I felt like I could talk to him about anything. I could tell him my day was pure hell and he always came to my rescue. He prayed with me when I had an anxiety attack and always consoled me during my roughest times. And I did the same for him for he could always talk to me about anything and who were we to judge anyone?? I guess that was the "hyper-focus????"
We have only been married for six months and now I have asked him to move. He was moving anyway as he told me there is a home we looked at and even though the lease is not up for another five months he wants to go now. When we got married, he gave up his apartment which was a transition for the both of us. We were new to the cohabiting part and yes that is a normal challenge. However, we have since argued over money, church, reading the bible together, communicating, affection, intimacy, housework, and now WHEN THE PROPER TIME IS TO PURCHASE A HOME. Of course I have nagged and yelled and repeatedly told him I was so frustrates because he tells me one moment he is going to do something and doesnt do it. Then when I kindly remind him, he thinks I am treating him like a child. Well, it seems that way because he cannot function like that of someone who does not have ADHD. Things that seem so apparent and practical to me are not in that order for him and I get that. So it definitely takes some work on both parts and I feel like I have done everything I can. And yes for six months of marriage, but in three years of living separately.
Now we are at the point of separating, divorce, "blame it all on me", whatever he wants to call it. We saw a home and now he wants it. The apartment we currently live in has my name on the lease which means that it will alter my credit score negatively if we just up and move. That means there would be fees associated with terminating the lease early. He is not considering the costs and he thinks that because we make just about the same (him1k more), that I should be able to cope with that. That statement completely undermined what I have already said about paying my student loans since I did go to grad school. He had a ROTC scholarship, he did not have to. So he also tells me that he is going to proceed with getting the house with or without me which leads me to believe that he is that unhappy and/or selfish. I pick selfish because that is all he has displayed ever since we got married. We were two very self-sufficient people prior to getting married so it is not like I would ask or expect much based on how I was raised. Now we have to work together, but dear God he just doesnt get it. *sigh
After all the arguments and discontentment for each other for the last six months, I just told him to go. Now he is packing and I returned to this site once again. I am sure he will try to do something to gain attention, but I really am fed up. I went to the doctor and was told that my health issues were heavily correlated with the amount of stress. Once she asked me if I had anything going on in my life that was stressed related, I could not hold my tears. I cried, "my marriage." So although it hurts me greatly because I know there is a deficiency here in our marriage, but I had to make a choice. Ruin me or let him go on. I wouldn't dare later move in that home because it was not one we would have purchased together.
Here I am at the fork in the road, do I still try knowing I will get the same results or just let him go? I am not afraid of being alone. I am able to cope with that as I did not have an active father in my life. A big part of me does not want to give up so easily, but it would cost me grief. The other says the hell with it at least I will have some peace.
I really love him and certainly got married for the long hall, but it may cost me my sanity.
We both, too, were college
Submitted by copingSAH on
We both, too, were college educated. It's now 20 years later and he's about the same and his job is steady (but no advancement opportunity).
I on the other hand, committed career suicide having left the office to be a stay home mom (most his wishes, but he has refused to let me continue higher education). I also have unresolved father abuse issues so I would fall into the adapting, ignorant passive aggressive mode. Since quitting my job, I've gained 60lbs, have health issues and stress (of ADHD/non-ADHD dynamics). As soon as I became the stay home parent, although dh insists we are equal, all the financial aspects are controlled, as well as any decisions regarding major purchases and work done on the house. So I've I felt financial abuse (anger, breathing down my back, yelling in public) although it has gotten so much better the last 2 or 3 years.
If you stay, be prepared to fight for your right and discover how to compromise and negotiate in a different way than you've been doing. You will have to drop away whatever resentment and whatever typical response you would have for a neurotypical person. This took me an unbelievable 20 years to figure out that I had to do this. You have to put a stop to his tit-for-tat mentality (maybe your dh did the wedding planning, now he expects to take over his choice of a house in a big way and gets upset if he is being asked for anything else).
While my dh hadn't threatened to buy a home without me, in hindsight, I did feel a bit pressured into our first and only home. I wasn't prepared to move that far from my family. But he seemed so in love with it, and again falling back on adapting, I went along. It's not a badly chosen house by any means so I can't complain. On other things once he set his sights on something he could care less about how I felt about it. He just goes towards it and my experience is that he doesn't plan anything, nothing is related to other things like family/future/rationale. He took out two loans in two years (granted they were for a car and roofing he chose to do back to back). We are okay but it has placed us in a position where we don't want to be financially. I had talked about getting a car years earlier but he wouldn't hear of it, instead putting $3K or more into a beat up rust-bucket before it died in the middle of traffic.
Being where I am now, I'd advise you take control of your own life and go with it. Don't put your faith in another person completely like I did, in the long run you're the one to suffer the effects. If you feel it's not going your way and there is no compromise, work that out, get some intervention from family, have friends be the second opinion, etc. Like you, I am most self sufficient when I am alone, having to get "tough" when young due to father's neglect. If I had to do all over again, I would have stayed single to be honest, and gotten rewarded with life experiences of my own choosing rather than living a life of constant conflict with someone that comes off as a hot-head in private.
Perhaps you can visually show
Submitted by copingSAH on
Perhaps you can visually show how it will negatively affect your credit score if you mapped it out in a diagram (i.e. arrows going "if, then" "if not, then") for all possible avenues buying a house this early would not be a good idea. Sometimes written communication is better than him feeling like you are confronting him. That's one piece of advice that could possibly work in your case. You say he's college educated too so he must have a knack for the visual diagrams and logic.
great tactic
Submitted by strengthnstrive on
I feel and know your pain. I
Submitted by dazedandconfused on
I feel and know your pain. I too am a Christian. It seems like we take a bigger brunt of guilt because we are told that divorce is bad. Your story is similar to mine. We dated (didn't co-habitate) for a year and a half before getting married. He was wonderful; accepted me, was someone I could lean on when the going got rough, he was great spiritual support, etc. Unfortunately, he was fired from his job two days before the wedding and it drastically altered him. Less than a year after our marriage, I wanted out. My family rallied around me, supported me even though divorce was bad. They knew my pain and just wanted it to be over with.
But it's been almost five years now. We're still together. Prior to March of this year, we had only spent about nine months under the same roof. I didn't ask him to leave, but he took a job that required a move and I encouraged him to do it. Had we stayed together, we probably would have divorced. Things are oh so much better now, but still a far cry from what I envisioned married life to be. In my darkest moments, I wonder if I can keep doing this. Can I really rely on God to heal the brokenness of our marriage, depend on Him to make the changes that need to be made in the both of us? It's hard to find Him when you feel like your heart is breaking.
For my husband's part, he is not as demanding as someone of the ADHD spouses on here seem to be. He does try, but is often misdirected. It seems like when he gets momentum going, something comes along and distracts him. It's hard for me to sit back and see that because I'm so focused.
If you've asked him to leave, I highly suggest going to a counselor to see if you can work on things. Not a church pastor, mind. A real counselor. I wonder how different things would have been had we sought our pre-marital counseling with someone besides our pastor. We've been in counseling for a year and we've made good progress. It's the clinging to the progress that's the hard part.
Best of luck to you.
Update
Submitted by strengthnstrive on
He sounds very much like my
Submitted by dazedandconfused on
He sounds very much like my husband was when we first married...or actually until recently. He was very immature. He wanted to the perks of being married without having to put the work into it. Separating from him made all the difference. He hit a real low in his life and once we were back together, I definitely noted changes in him in regards to who handled our finances, living arrangements, and the like. My hubby did no cleaning when he was living on his own, so I didn't expect him to clean once we were together. I ask him to take his dishes to the sink, but other than that, I am in charge of cleaning. It's not a huge deal with me, though I feel overwhelmed from time to time. Is a messy house worth divorcing over? Absolutely not. Hire someone to come in once a week or even once a month, if your budget allows. Tell he can foot the bill since he is unable to help.
I see where your issue is...you want to compare your marriage to other couples. That's a bad thing in any marriage, whether it functions correctly or not. I used to torture myself with the idea that all of my friends and family seemed to have happy, healthy marriages. It took my counselor saying that in this Facebook culture, we're all about appearances, and that in real life, what we see is probably not what is going on. I think the moral of the story is build your marriage on what is important to your husband and you. If deep down, you don't really care about a clean house, or who cooks, or whatever, don't make it a big deal because your sister's friend's husband cleans the house or cooks all the time. Some men are more thoughtful than others. Does that make the thoughtless ones bad? Absolutely not.
I really want to reiterate that you guys could use some time and space and some professional counseling. You need a referee and you need to get this stuff off you. He needs to be called on being a jerk about the house. You're married now which makes you one unit; you can't be going off and signing contracts on houses without the other ones approval. At least, if you didn't, then you guys should have sat down and had a proper conversation about. Has he ever told you why he wants the house? Is it a screaming good deal? Will the monthly payment be less than what you are paying in rent? If so, then maybe you should act on it and pay to get out of your lease. Breaking lease will not effect your credit unless you move out overnight and stop paying the rent. Is that your only objection? If so, have you said, "I'm not sure if it would be beneficial for us to break lease and pay X amount of money to get this house? I'm not opposed to the idea of buying a house, but maybe we should wait until we are closer to the end of our lease before committing to something." With that being said, five months is not all that long in the real estate world. You can even put a clause in the contract stating that you don't want to close on the house until you're out of your lease. The owner may turn it down, then you're back to square one, but still. By the time the thing closes (two to three months), you'll almost be out of the lease.
With ADHDers, it's all in how you phrase it. You may think you're sounding neutral, but they will interpret a million different ways. Recently my husband talked about joining the military again. I'm not opposed to the idea but I reminded him that he would have to get a waiver for his ADHD, which meant he couldn't be on any meds for a year prior to his physical. That was me being realistic. He interpreted it as not being supportive. I guess I should have said, "I'm OK with that, but how are you going to do this with these obstacles in the way?"
Honestly, I think you guys are just struggling to adjust to marriage with the added complication of ADHD. The ADHD can magnify your problems x100 and make you feel like you've made a mistake. When all actuality, you're just having a hard time. And at the end of the day, remember that when you divorce, not only do you carry your baggage from childhood, single life, etc. but you will also carry the baggage from your failed marriage. Yeah, you're young and and you think you can do better, but is it worth it? Just a thought.
exactly..perks of marriage
Submitted by strengthnstrive on