I've been married for 10 years to a 62 year old man who acts like he is 8 yrs. and helpless.
I run a business, support our household, pay all the bills, manage 2 rental properties, manage a vrbo property, clean the house, manage my employees, manage our bookkeeping efforts, my husband cares for our 2 dogs, that is it. They are not trained and they are both spoiled. I'm getting angrier and angrier. I feel like I am going to explode. Yesterday was so bad I had heart palpitations and couldn't eat. I am at my wit's end. So here I am, to vent/complain.
These are the issues I nag about daily:
-Cabinet doors left open, drawers left open with things hanging out of them
-Front door left open (recently all night long)
-clothes left on floor right where he removes them
-cups, mugs, glasses left all over the house and yard
-The garage is mayhem, I couldn't park in it for 3 months, finally cleaned it myself
-toilet seat left up almost every time
-his zipper is always down
-speeding tickets (that I wasnt told about) found out from our insurance co.
This list could go on and on...I am told I am a nag, a bitch, control freak, and at times I do feel like I am all of those things. I run a primary school, and ALL of my 4 year olds are more responsible than my husband.
He is great at menial tasks if I give him a list and a pen to cross things off as he goes. Everything he does, even texts take triple the time of a normal functioning adult.
I told him we needed to go to therapy together and deal with this...He told his MD who sent him to a psychiatrist. He diagnosed him with depression, and ADD, put him on Wellbutrin. He lost 20 pounds on it, but no effect on the ADD symptoms.
He denies everything constantly. The couples therapy is being avoided. He doesn't want to learn how to be better. He does not want to change. In the past 6 years he has been unemployed 3 times and is currently unemployed and has decided to collect social security when his unemployment compensation ends. It's 1/10 of what we need to keep our finances in order. Everything is on me.
I have no suggestions, only
Submitted by PoisonIvy on
I have no suggestions, only empathy. Living like this stinks, especially when it starts to affect you physically.
thank you...
Submitted by sherbear on
Support and empathy is really all I need right now, so thank you. My parents and brother are both deceased and my daughter is grown and living in the mid west. None of our casual friends know of my husband's issues, to them he just looks like "the fun guy" with no cares in the world. I have become so bitter and resentful.
I'm hoping by posting on these boards, reading more about ADD and taking better care of myself, I can let some of this go, and learn to just take better care of myself
Focus on you, and don't worry about what you can't change....
Submitted by c ur self on
Hi sherbear I bet you are tough to live with....Your post is so familiar, cause I'm sure I have been at times and still can be..:)....It's goes with the territory sometimes when we're working our butts off and cleaning up after our grown 8 year olds....Try to relax, I had to the heart think also...I was the healthiest person in the ED who's heart was jumping around...I know where you're at....I try to not engage my 8 year old to much....The more I am able to live like she don't exist the more self aware she becomes...Maybe this will help you too.....All I know is she was having no stress and I was falling apart...Here's wishing you some Peace!
Blessings C
Why do you stay with him?
Submitted by overwhelmedwife on
For much of your married life with him he hasn't been faithfully employed and he has these issues that upset you.
Did much of this come out after you married or did you realize this before?
>>> He is great at menial tasks if I give him a list and a pen to cross things off as he goes. Everything he does, even texts take triple the time of a normal functioning adult.<<<
This is also true for my husband. He is great at very menial tasks (vacuuming, sweeping, cleaning the kitty litter), but he's awful at anything more complicated or that requires doing things in a certain order. It takes him forever to send a text.
Does your H feel bad that he won't be "pulling his weight" financially and in other ways in the house? This isn't like a 30+ year marriage where one spouse stayed home and raised the kids. It sounds like you married him when he was in his early 50s.
Was he married before? Do you suspect that his earlier marriage(s) or relationships ended because of these symptoms?