Submitted by k8e308 on 04/04/2011.
My husband was diagnosed with ADHD when he was a child. I believe he was put on medication, but I'm not really sure because he won't talk about it at all. Now he believes he's grown out of it and it doesn't affect him at all. I can see that it's not true, but he can't. How can you possibly convince someone to seek diagnosis and treatment if they don't think they have a problem?
You cannot convince
Submitted by js on
Sorry to say this, but truly, you cannot convince him to seek diagnosis. You can suggest, maybe explain your feelings, but he will only seek help and treatment if he wants to. I have learned this the hard way. My husband and I are entering a divorce after nearly 20 years together. It took me 10 years to get him to see a dr. He did when his new job became so overwhelming he could not handle it. He took medication which improved his behavior greatly; however, he had a lifetime of habits that needed to be altered. He is not willing to accept this nor is he willing to go through counseling to the degree that would help him. Nor, is he willing to attend marriage counseling to save our marriage...because deep down, he knows it will open doors that he would prefer to keep closed.
Agreed...
Submitted by YYZ on
I am an ADDer and did not know I had it until I was so stressed by the perfect storm of job stress, death of an important family member and stress at home. Anxiety attacks, which I had never had before then, sent me to the doctor. Forty plus years old and finally answers to what I thought were my own weird way of thinking.
Your husband has to know there is something wrong and low self esteem makes this difficult. Once I knew what I was dealing with and knowing I don't have to go back to that ADHD Fog, I choose not too. I wish you the best and hope you can continue reading and hopefully he will address the issue, because it Never goes away and you have to face it to improve yourself and the affects on your loved ones.
YYZ
I agree with js that you
Submitted by Rakkaus on
I agree with js that you cannot convince him to seek a diagnosis. I suggest you read Melissa Orlov's post on getting past denial. (http://www.adhdmarriage.com/content/adhd-and-marriage-getting-past-denial) and maybe suggest that your husband read some of her other posts. Maybe he will identify with them enough to see his ADHD for what it is. If not, then all you can do is educate yourself so that you have a better understanding of what his daily life is like. One of our favourite posts is 'when doing well enough can help' (http://www.adhdmarriage.com/content/adhd-marriage-when-doing-well-enough...). This post actually opened the door for my ADHD partner and I to finally have a conversation about ADHD being part of our relationship, instead of just a problem that he deals with.
However, I do feel like there are a lot of horror stories posted by people in failing or failed marriages so you might want to find the articles that you find interesting and print them for your husband so that he doesn't get weighed down by some of massive negativity on this site. You might want to start with articles that focus on what the non-ADHD partner can do make everyone's life easier. This might make the topic of conversation come across as ADHD is part of our life and not a blame game of 'you should get this fixed' - I don't mean to assume that the conversation would ever go like that for you but approaching the conversation this way worked for my partner.