I stumbled across this site this evening and read through many of the posts in the forum. Wow. I read a lot of experiences of women who are struggling in really painful situations with their spouses. Reading through this forum, I felt very sad. I felt sad about the pain and frustration that so many women are feeling in their marriages to ADHD husbands, and I felt sad about the generalizations I saw some of you make about people with ADHD. I wanted to throw in my two cents.
People can be unkind and have ADHD, but that doesn't mean they're unkind because they have ADHD. It sounds like so many of you are struggling with partners who are either strikingly insensitive to your needs or downright abusive. That sounds miserable. But I beg you not to conflate this with ADHD. I have (severe) ADHD and know quite a few other people with ADHD, both incidentally and through support groups. My friends with ADHD have been some of the most caring, supportive, loving people I've known. We all know and are deeply pained by the ways in which we sometimes let down people we love because of our ADHD symptoms. We berate ourselves for being late once again, or forgetting a birthday once again, and we have to work hard to push through the shame and forgive ourselves. And we find other ways of showing our love to the people we care about-- spontaneous loving gestures, or deep listening, or thoughtful and creative gifts.
Gender and the way men and women are socialized in our culture play a critical role in the dynamics many of you describe. I am in my early 30s and am not married, but have had several serious relationships, including one four-year relationship in which we lived together. I am heterosexual. I have experienced so many of the caretaking dynamics you described-- and I have been the one who was the caretaker. How many sitcoms and beer commercials have you seen on TV that depict a husband as a fun-loving man-child, and his wife as the long-suffering killjoy who keeps the household together? How many of you were given toy stoves as little girls, when your brothers were given toy trucks? This is the culture we have all been indoctrinated into.
ADHD makes it difficult for your husbands to perform the tasks of household management, but it's the gender roles of our culture that tell him it's okay not to pull his weight, and that tell you it's your job to pull it for him. Even in 2018. I have considered myself a feminist since I learned the word as a child, and I still found myself being the household manager and the caretaker so many, many times. "Did you remember to call the doctor about your back?" "I'll call and see if your prescription is ready." "Don't forget to pick up the bread." "Remember you have to be home for the plumber this afternoon." When I'm living by myself, I forget to do pretty much everything and live in a constant state of chaos. But when I lived with my boyfriend, I threw all of my paltry organizational energies into making our household work because somehow I thought that's what I was supposed to do. As it happened, he had ADHD, and I wasn't diagnosed yet. I thought, "Oh, I have to help him with these things because they're hard for him." I now know my ADHD is a lot more severe than his, and in retrospect I don't know how I failed to see it. He was profoundly supportive of me: he helped me with schoolwork I struggled with, and the emotional support and unconditional love he gave me were life-changing. He put time and energy into our home, too: he did all the cleaning (and my messiness really got on his nerves) and his good taste in furniture and curtains and such made our home beautiful. But I was the scheduler, the rememberer, the coordinator, the expense spreadsheet maker. I share this with you because if a card-carrying feminist with really severe ADHD took on that household management role for her male partner, there's something more going on here than "people with ADHD are irresponsible." These gender roles are hard to shake. If your husband is insensitive and unkind to you, to boot, that makes it that much harder. But it's not because of ADHD that your husband isn't pulling his weight. Even though I took on that managerial role, my male partner with ADHD was wonderful and supportive and kind, and it was an equal partnership.
I saw a number of you say, "How is it that you're supposed to manage all the organizational stuff for your ADHD partner but not enter into a parent-child dynamic?" I can understand that frustration. I have been on both sides of that. I think the most fundamental thing to remember is that your ADHD partner has gifts and strengths to offer to your relationship just as you do. That's why you fell in love with them in the first place. It's true that I really struggle with organizing and time management and memory. But there are lots of things I'm great at. I'm very outgoing, and I make friends easily and introduce them to my partner. I am loving and affectionate. I am spontaneous and flexible and I think fast in a crisis. I make boring things fun. I am warm and know how to make guests feel at home. I'm a terrific problem solver and find effective solutions to problems others give up on. I come up with fun outings for us to go on together. I am a compassionate listener, even though my mind wanders sometimes (I say, "I'm sorry, I care so much about what you're saying, but I just realized my attention was drifting for a little bit there. Can you rewind a few sentences for me?") A respectful relationship honors the strengths and weaknesses of both partners. Your partner has gifts that you don't have.
That said, I know there is often an inherent parent/child or boss/employee dynamic to the managerial role in a household. And I know it's exhausting not to be able to rely on someone to remember to do an essential task, especially when really important things like your mortgage or your toddlers are at stake, or to have to say the same thing over and over. When other people do some of my executive functioning for me, the way they do it makes a big difference.
- Not constructive: "Oh my God, how are you still not ready??! What are you even doing?? We're already twenty minutes late! HURRY UP!!"
- Constructive: "Hey, I'm starting to get anxious-- we're already twenty minutes late, and it's really important to me to be there. How soon do you think you can be ready?"
The first way treats me like I'm trying to make trouble on purpose and makes me feel ashamed. I feel angry and resentful and it's even harder for me to focus and motivate myself. The second way is respectful and motivating: it gives me the sense of urgency I need and empowers me to act on it myself.
Finally, I think it's really important to remember what your partner with ADHD can and cannot control, and judge their commitment by their effort. Here's an analogy: if I'm short and you're tall, it's always going to be harder for me to put things away on top of the kitchen cupboards. Does that mean it's impossible? Of course not. I'd rather leave them on the counter for you to do later, because you can do it quickly and easily. But if you tell me "It is really important to me that you put these things away, and I feel sad when you don't," I can drag out the stepladder and take a few extra minutes to climb up and down with each piece of china and do it. It won't look exactly the way you want it to, and if one morning I am running late and my hands are full and I just don't have time to get out the stepladder, I might wait till evening to do it. But I'll do it. I don't just say "Nope, I'm short, no can do."
Is your partner trying really hard and still letting you down sometimes, or are they not even trying? If they forget to do something you asked them to do, please don't accuse them of being passive-aggressive and trying to thwart you on purpose. We really do have poor memories. If they only remember to do 25% of what you ask them to do and you are (justifiably) stressed out by this, and you have a conversation with them about it, and you work together to research and try out some systems that will help them remember to look at a to-do list, and now they follow through on 75% of what you ask them to do, please give them some credit for it. Don't diminish your own needs, but don't think they're making your life hard on purpose. They have a disability and they are trying ten times as neurotypical people for a fraction of the result.
On the other hand, if you tell your partner "You often forget things I ask you to do, and it stresses me out," and they shrug and say "Tough luck, I have ADHD so there's nothing I can do about it," that's not OK. But in this case, it's not their ADHD forgetfulness that's the problem. The problem is their insensitivity to your needs and their unwillingness to work with you to find creative strategies to help prop up their poor memory. If your partner genuinely doesn't care about your needs and you blame that on their ADHD, you are doing a disservice to people with ADHD and to yourself. Don't go around saying people with ADHD are uncaring. That's insulting. We are every bit as kind and caring as the rest of the population. And don't stay with someone who truly doesn't care about your needs and doesn't make any effort to show you love. That's not about ADHD, and you deserve better.
It is now almost 3am and that was several hundred words more than I intended, so I think I'll conclude this impulsive hyperfocus session right here. The end.
Thank you!
Submitted by Zapp10 on
I appreciate your entire post.
I am the non wife of an Adhd man.
Through my experience with this discovery of adhd in our marriage I have come to the absolute necessity of separating Adhd from other behaviors. It has taken me a while but I am "getting there".
You have chimed in with very necessary info especially concerning that Adhd is NOT the reason behind every behavior.
My H's adhd is the least troubling to our marriage and I see that now. Progress for us hinges on addressing issues that BOTH of us brought with us. He has way more than Adhd going on but that doesn't change the need for compassion FIRST....on my part. Without that.. I don't see well.
Follow-up
Submitted by ADHDme on
I love this reply, especially what you said about the importance of putting compassion first. Yes. And I believe in doing that in all our relationships. I am so glad to hear this was helpful to you. That means a lot.
I was thinking after I wrote my post that I didn’t address some of the emotional issues that can occur with ADHD, and that that omission could be misleading. I wanted to name a few of these and clarify. Emotional dysregulation can be a real challenge in relationships: some of us are very sensitive; some have a quick temper; some say insensitive things impulsively. Some people with ADHD show a dramatic difference between hyperfocused loving attention at the beginning of a relationship and distractable attention later. Some people with ADHD might not notice on their own the effects that some of their actions have on other people (while others may be painfully aware and deeply ashamed).
But like any other issue, what’s important is for both partners to communicate honestly about these things. If you have sat down with your partner and been very clear about your feelings and needs—Nonviolent Communication (NVC) offers a useful paradigm— and they are dismissive or belittling, that’s awful and I’m so sorry you are dealing with that, and I hope you’re able to get out. But in that case, the underlying problem is not their ADHD. It’s the fact that they aren’t taking your feelings and needs seriously and making an effort to work with you to find creative solutions.
LOL...It's was a very important session, you did awesome!
Submitted by c ur self on
You said some very help things...Thank you!
You sound much like my wife...She is very thoughtful and caring, loves to do things for others (new stuff)...But the one big difference is denial....When you live with a spouse (attempt to have a loving and healthy attachment) who want communicate and take ownership of their behaviors, it makes it quiet impossible to have any peace with them...When the best you can get the majority of the time is justification, indifference and blame it makes it difficult to grow together....And you are so right, most of that isn't add/adhd....So because of things that isn't add/adhd, we learn to not engage when we would like to...We learn to set boundaries to protect our rights, and theirs....Some times it's best that can be had under the circumstances....
Thank you again for sharing this wonderful post.....
c
@ c urself: thanks!
Submitted by ADHDme on
Thank you so much for your kind words. I am so glad to hear that this was helpful to you. The situation with your wife sounds really difficult. That lack of self-reflection and insight is such a challenge in any relationship. I suspect that people with ADHD are even more likely to be defensive than others because they have dealt with so much blaming and shaming in their lives, especially in their developmental years. It really takes a toll on you. I read somewhere that some researcher estimated that kids with ADHD hear 20,000 more critical comments by age 12 than neurotypical kids do. Or something like that. It was a huge number. You get the idea. I think that if you’re the “acting out,” externalizing type, you’re more likely to wear your shame defensively and respond to criticism with “Screw you, lay off and leave me alone!” Whereas if you’re the “acting-in,” internalizing type, you’re more likely to crumble and say “I am such a horrible, worthless person.” Of course neither of these is a healthy orientation toward self and others. The call is to grow in insight and self-awareness and other-awareness— just as it is for each of us, ADHD or not. We each have our wounds and burdens and gifts.
And on that note, I’m going to miss a train if I stick around here any longer this morning, so I’m banishing myself for a while. If you see me peeping ’round the corner, O neurotypical friends, please remind me to go pack for my trip. ;)
ADHDme....
Submitted by c ur self on
I hope you made ur train....I have to smile when I read your stuff....Not the wise parts...just the end lines...Because you know I live it everyday w/ my DW....;) Yes all that you say here is so true...So; understanding the dynamic you have listed above (her reality)...I must understand that the ONLY thing I can do that is real help for her and us....Is to just look for those healthy ways (and available moments) to show my love for her....And when that's not possible in an engaging way, due to the mindset of the moment....Love her enough to not engage, when I know what the end result of my effort will be....
Much of what non-adders (me included, although I may have ADHD on some level) struggle with, is this exact thing....Wanting to have a spouse who is always there for them....Always capable of showing love, always capable of communicating calmly and in a healthy way (no denial or blame)....So when the expectations we would place on ourselves just isn't being met by our spouses...We want to know why?? Most of us learn to never place the same expectations we place on ourselves on to our spouses....It's just a huge mistake....Not because she isn't smart, loving and gifted...It's just because a mind effected by add on the level she is (clinical), will always be consumed by focus issues, time management, and other things many of us take very little thought of....I worked at the same place she does for 38 years until I retired...I was usually at work 30 minutes early, having coffee...My first memories of her, before we ever officially met....Was her running down the corridor in her scrubs w/ wet hair, trying to get to the time cloak on time..:):)...She is always very proud of her self when she make it on time:)
She has been difficult on me...LOL...I grew up w/ out a Father in the home...I'm also a perfectionist type to a degree, or use to be....She has taught me to relax, and that a mess want kill you:)...She calls me the rule keeper....She's a bad girl...LOL...
c
Awwww
Submitted by ADHDme on
I love that image of your first memory of your wife! That made me smile a lot. How sweet. And that’s lovely that your wife has helped you loosen up and be more okay with a little mess in life.
I think loving and appreciating your wife is the most important thing you can do, and I love that you said that. Other things you can do include educating yourself as much as possible about ADHD, which it sounds like you’re already doing, and perhaps also connecting your wife to resources that may help her (if she’s interested and willing, and if she doesn’t already have them). Education about how my brain works and strategies for managing it have been so helpful. And new ways of understanding ADHD continue to emerge, so if you read everything you could get your hands on 15 years ago, time to go back to the library!
You might try checking out other resources that are designed for people with ADHD, like the “How to ADHD” YouTube channel, for example. The videos are brilliant and the comments people write are so illuminating and heartwarming.
Oh, and nope, I didn’t make my train. But I got on the next one. I’ll explain how that happened in response to another comment shortly.
Yes...
Submitted by c ur self on
I agree, love is the way, also educating ourselves....Most of us who are working to have successful marriages and positive attitudes are pretty well read..;)
Thank you for the suggestion, great advice....
What a lovely written post.
Submitted by barneyarff on
What a lovely written post. And you did that at 3am? Pretty impressive.
May I respond? I agree that ADDers are some of the "funnest" people around. They have a childlike engagement for fun that I envy. This makes them a great date or guest at a party. This does not help at all for the mundane minutia of everyday life. The mundane minutia is something most people don't like to do (including me) so why do I have to do most of it?
Your piece about gender roles and housekeeping was fascinating. I've always wondered if the housekeeping issues were mostly from gender roles. He comes from a very very traditional household. His Mom didn't work outside the home. In fact she wasn't allowed to have a drivers license until I came into the family. My FIL never forgave me for that. My FIL "helped" by cooking Sunday breakfast but not cleaning up his mess and my MIL had to be in the kitchen to hand him things. I can remember a month ago, I was home for some reason and decided to cook a new dish (something my husband loves to have happen). The weather was fine and all the windows and doors were open. Many of the kids in the neighborhood seemed to be home that day and were running in and out of everyone's houses even though they are young adults now I laughed at how they still got into my refrigerator and cleaned it out. It was a lovely fun chaos. My husband came home from work and I could see in his mind's eye that he saw himself as Ward Cleaver (Leave it to Beaver show) coming home to his beloved family and he was the patriarch of it all. Did he help set the table or clean up afterwards? No, of course not. He ate dinner and complemented me on it. Took two helpings. but it never occurred to him to help with the dishes.
I might be more forgiving about that except he has decided to work a $10/hour slave labor job even though he has 2 degrees. I make lots more money than he does, work full time and run a small business. So I don't understand why he gets to see himself as the patriarch.
I hear my husband say he is "trying" but he will not write things down. He says nothing works and he's tried EVERYTHING. Or he complains that the ONE THING that EVER worked is broken and he cannot find another one (I found one on Amazon and offered to buy it for him but he wouldn't answer me) This is called "Mental Load" where usually the wife has to keep everyone organized and make sure everything gets done. I'm at an age now where I'm over it. Plus, my brain isn't as agile as it used to be because of the brain damage from chemo although I'm much better.
I was particularly intrigued by your story about being an ADDer and when put into the "wife" position, suddenly your management skills improved. I promise you I will be rereading that time and time again.
My husband has had all the MRIs and neurological psych exams and everything comes out normal. In fact it's so normal that it's not normal. One professional said that everyone falls below normal in one test or another and my husband was normal in all the tests.
He does test as extremely depressed and since he eats so much ice cream, etc and has diabetes that it plays havic with his brain. That and his sleeping habits. In fact one professional said she didn't think he had ADD at all, it was his depression and bad habits that looked like ADD.
The odd thing is that I think my husband still loves me and is just so full of denial about certain things that it has ruined any positive feelings I have for him.
I do thank you for talking about when "Others do the executive functioning for you" (what an incredible way to put it!) If there is any advice I would want from you, it would be this. I've already said in kind quiet ways "husband, we need to leave at 5 pm in order to get there on time" about 4 times. The 5th time it's 5:05 and he's rushing around and asking me where we are going and what should he wear. Really? Were you not attending the 4x I reminded you? Why oh why does the 4x I said things nicely not enter into his executive function? Why does he wait until I'm frustrated and had it before he wakes up? And why should I put up with that? I have gotten so I just leave. There have been times he has called me to ask the address, etc. Sometimes I respond and sometimes I don't. That has been the only way he has gotten better at all although he gets very angry at me for leaving and tells me what a mean person I am. But why does it have to be that dramatic?
Leaving him is the correct thing to do....
Submitted by c ur self on
The first boundary I put in place was time management...I told her, I go on time or a little early...I told her that I would love for you to go w/ me...But, I also respect your right to come when you want to....
By you leaving him, he is forced into accountability....His victim reaction (telling you that you are a bad person, because he can't manipulate you, and force you to run late with him LOL..) is normal for a person who wants others to carry them in certain areas of life....Distraction is add/adhd....Laziness and ignoring our spouse is not....
Good for you!
C
Punctuality
Submitted by phatmama on
Punctuality is extremely important to me. My husband is almost never on time. We spent 19 years screaming at each other every time we had to leave the house together until a therapist looked at me one day and said, "Why don't you just leave without him?". Wow--really? Why did that not occur to me? We haven't ridden to church together in two years. I am there early and get the seat of my choice and save one for him for when he comes dragging in at the last minute or after it has already started. We are both relaxed, no screaming, no resentment. He also gets overstimulated in stores and can't stand to shop. He will tell me several times he is ready to go, but I tend to tune him out and say I need "just one more thing" or "oh, look at this". This has led to some truly volcanic disputes between us right in public, unfortunately. (Once in Kroger, my youngest child asked right in the middle of the ice cream aisle if we were getting divorced--it was that bad). Not a great memory or moment. Telling the therapist this, she looked at him and said, "Why don't you just go to the car and wait for her outside if you need to go and she's not finished?" Again--duh! Why do the simplest things become such complicated power struggles? I want that perfect camaraderie where we are BFF's who are always in sync, but that is not possible. Trying to fit that square peg into a round hole caused untold amounts of Hell in our home. I wish I had realized sooner how much harm was being done by digging in my heels.
@barneyaff re your comment, and on getting places on time
Submitted by ADHDme on
Hey Barneyarff,
Thanks for your kind words. And yeah, I totally agree, it is not fair for one person to do all the fun things and the other to do all the mundane things. It’s so important for your partner to learn strategies that help and to find external tools that will help do some of the executive functioning for him. Like the stepladder in my analogy earlier! Yeah, giving up because you can’t find the one tool that works for you sounds like not the greatest approach. Has he tried ADHD coaching?
I really hear you on the woman’s mental load thing. I think the gender dynamics are exhausting for the woman in a traditional heterosexual relationship where one partner has ADHD, no matter which one it is. If it’s the man who has ADHD, the woman may well take on a whole extra load of “managing” because the man is not only socialized to let her do it all, but he also struggles cognitively to do it himself. If it’s the woman who has ADHD, her male partner and her entire culture expect her to be in charge of managing these things that are so hard for her. (And she feels like a failure as a partner and mother, particularly if she’s undiagnosed, like many adult women with ADHD.)
What you wrote about “when put into the ‘wife’ position, suddenly your management skills improved” made me pause and reflect to think what made the difference for me. I think it wasn’t necessarily that they improved in an absolute sense. (Or at least, if they did, they’ve gone back to where they were before now that I live alone again!) But I’m an extrovert, and I always function better around others than on my own; being in a supportive relationship made my anxiety go down a whole lot; and the ways he support ed me freed up space in my mind for me to function in these other ways. And also I think I had this sense of accountability, which is the gendered part of it. Somehow I believed it was up to me to do these things for the two of us, though he never asked it of me. Many people with ADHD (and many without) will tell you they’re more apt to do something if someone else is relying on them to do it than if it only affects them.
I think problems with executive functioning can come from a lot of different sources. It’s important to know whether that’s really what he has going on. For example, for myself, I’ve come to know the difference between “can’t get off the couch even though I want to because I just can’t seem to activate myself” (ADHD/executive functioning problems) and “can’t get off the couch because I can’t summon the will to care” (depression). He may well experience both, like me and like many people with ADHD. If you spend your whole life feeling like you’re a failure, like always letting people down and can never live up to your full potential, that’s pretty depressing. It’s painful.
Why isn't your husband ever ready to leave on time?
I LOVE your question about what on earth is happening when your husband isn’t ready to leave by five even though you’ve reminded him four times. I'm sorry it has become such a painful and charged situation that results in unhappiness for both of you. But there are skills he can learn that can help him.
This situation is so very familiar to me. So often I will say to myself, “OK, it’s 30 minutes away and I have to be there at 5:30, so I have to leave at five.” So that’s what’s in my head: five. “Five five five five five,” I say to myself over and over, just like you say to your husband. Do you know when I start thinking about leaving? Five. I know it sounds ridiculous. But so many of my ADHD friends do the same thing. I’m working to train myself out of this habit.
Let me try to explain what’s going on.
When somebody says to you, Barneyarff, “Be ready at five,” your brain thinks a whole bunch of things that are so automatic, you’re not even aware of it:
You do all of this effortlessly. I have to think about it. I am a smart, competent, adult woman, and I only even learned in the past year that that's what you have to do to leave on time. (You probably never thought about it either, right? I would guess it's almost unconscious for you.) Even now that I know, it’s still excruciatingly difficult for me. It’s as if you, Barneyarff, are speaking in your native language— you don’t even have to think about it— while I’m thinking in a language I’m just learning: "OK, the second person is tu vas… or wait, should I use the formal ‘you’? vous allez… what’s the word for library again? Oh yes, bibliothèque… I think it’s feminine… ok, vous allez à la bibliothèque…." It’s EXHAUSTING. And it takes a lot out of me mentally, just like trying to speak in a new language does. The more other things I had to do that day, the worse I’ll do at getting out the door on time. (And the language analogy only goes so far. Unfortunately, a year in Paris will not improve my executive functioning. Practice helps a whole lot, but I'll probably always speak executive functions with a strong ADHD accent.)
Here are some other things that help you (the neurotypical partner) get out the door by 5pm:
I can’t emphasize enough, for almost my whole life, I didn't even KNOW I had to do any of this stuff or why it was so hard for me. All I knew was that no matter how hard I tried to be on time, I never was. I thought I just sucked. I'd forget the things I needed to do before leaving, or that there even were things I needed to do before leaving; or if I did remember some of them, I would vastly underestimate the amount of time they would take, or I'd get distracted while I was doing them.
People have lots of ideas about why others are chronically late. They assume we're disrespectful, or irresponsible, or uncaring, or passive-aggressive, or intentionally self-sabotaging, or that we subconsciously don’t want to go to the things we're late to. I didn't think any of these things sounded quite right, but I didn't have a better explanation. Until I started learning about ADHD, I was as mystified by my inability to be on time as you are by your husband’s. And let me tell you, that is really painful. I just figured I was kind of a rotten person.
Now I use apps and timers and post-it notes and a whole abundance of things to substitute for what my brain struggles to do on its own. I learned about these strategies from books and websites and ADHD coaching. (I loved online group coaching, by the way, because I got to connect with other people like me, which is fantastic for helping to release some of that burden of shame.) It’s all still really, really hard. But at least I understand better what’s going on and how to fix it.
Whoo Hoo! Keep on typing. I
Submitted by barneyarff on
Whoo Hoo! Keep on typing. I love how you write.
Did you know that I have to go through that whole backwards time figuring out thingy too? In fact I can remember in 4 H or Girl Scouts or somewhere this type of planning was addressed.
And my husband grew up with bad examples. I can remember there would be a extended family picnic planned at the lake and my FIL would not decide until past the very last minute whether the family was going or not. THEN my MIL would start fixing a jello salad (putting in ice cubes to make it set faster) and there would be a huge rush of getting ready. Now part of that was my FIL using control and his bastardy skills ( he was the head of his chapter) to keep the whole family at his beck and call while he sat in his holy sacred chair deciding if they would go or not. What I never understood is that whether they went or not my MIL could have made the jello salad the night before. That would have taken the wind out of the sails of my FIL because I'm sure he did his little act to control my MIL.
As for my husband using timers, and his phone, etc to stay on track, he has every excuse as why he "can't" He won't read anything (because reading is "hard") and a coach? I don't think so. There is no solution that he will accept. And to me, that is what I hate. He is happy just depending on me. And I'm so very very tired.
Thanks for your kind words,
Submitted by ADHDme on
Thanks for your kind words, Barneyarff. I’m so glad this is helpful.
How cool that you learned planning as a child in the girl scouts! I wish I’d learned that at a young age.
I’m sorry your husband hasn’t been willing to accept help. FWIW, a lot of ADHDers have trouble reading, but many like audiobooks, and there podcasts and videos, too (I love the How to ADHD YouTube channel). It would be wonderful if he could find a coach or support group he likes, but if he doesn’t want to change, I guess it’s up to you to figure out whether it’s worth being with him. Which I know you know. I truly hope you are able to find happiness no matter what.
A couple more thoughts: it sounds like there’s all kinds of gender dynamics going on. The patriarchal behavior you describe makes me cringe. It’s oppressive. I do want to go back to one thing you wrote in your earlier comment:
“ My husband came home from work and I could see in his mind's eye that he saw himself as Ward Cleaver (Leave it to Beaver show) coming home to his beloved family and he was the patriarch of it all. Did he help set the table or clean up afterwards? No, of course not. He ate dinner and complemented me on it. Took two helpings. but it never occurred to him to help with the dishes. I might be more forgiving about that except he has decided to work a $10/hour slave labor job even though he has 2 degrees. I make lots more money than he does, work full time and run a small business. So I don't understand why he gets to see himself as the patriarch.”
First: again, yuck at this behavior. I would hate that. A lot. Second: it would surprise me very much if he is proud to be working at a “$10/hour slave labor job.” I would imagine that this is very painful for him for at least two reasons: (1) he has two degrees and probably expected a much more higher-ranking job, and probably carries other people’s expectations of that for him, too; (2) you make more money than he does, and our culture (and particularly his very patriarchal background) tells him that this arrangement is mortifying and emasculating. He’s supposed to be the provider. Do you think it’s possible that this might in fact be why it’s so important to him to play that Ward Cleaver patriarch role, to cover up some of the shame he must be feeling?
You praised my writing. Thank you. I’ve been told since I was a child that I was a talented writer, and my dreams of being a writer and publishing my work have grown duller and smaller every year. It’s hard. It’s so hard to live with ADHD. It’s so hard to have to put so much effort into every single thing— feeding yourself, getting enough sleep, finding lost things, remembering to keep up with your friends, remembering to keep up with your medical appointments, finding jobs, keeping jobs.... It’s so draining, and sometimes it feels as if there isn’t energy left over to become the person you were meant to become. And then there’s focus and prioritizing. “I don’t have time to edit and submit my writing,” I tell my mentors, “I’m just so overwhelmed with my job and with keeping my life together.” But here I am spending hours writing to all of you, because in the wee hours of this morning I saw some unfair generalizations on here about people with ADHD and I got all fired up about countering them, and then you responded, and then I responded, and then you responded.... I’m glad to be having this interaction with you. It’s lovely and I hope it’s helpful. But (and I hope you know I mean no disrespect any of you) it’s not furthering my larger aspirations for my life. There are so many undone things I have to do. So many little emails I need to answer. So many big ideas and ambitions I want to realize. But this was shiny and it popped up and drew me in.
So, when you talked about your husband’s two degrees and his $10/hour job, I felt a deep pang of empathy for him, and for all of us who see our potential and are terribly afraid we’ll never reach it.
A bit of encouragement for
Submitted by barneyarff on
A bit of encouragement for you. I've written 2 books. It is hard hard hard for anyone. Your ADD distracts you but please know it's just plain damn hard to face a blank piece of paper. It's like staring into the void.
As for my husband.... He was a professional..... his new boss didn't like him. I tried and tried to tell him to move departments but he liked his work and wouldn't face the fact that this ....person..... would get rid of him no matter what, so one day he was fired (he's lost several jobs like most ADDers) This last time I just refused to help him out. I was fed up. On the day he was fired two other things happened that were quite bad (really really bad) and I was overwhelmed. Because he wouldn't read the writing on the wall at work, I just was fed up with him for not reading the atmosphere of his surroundings, even when I was pretty plain spoken about it. Even I could see he was going to get fired. He just gave up. And at his age I tried to encourage him to find a different path. Goodness knows, I had to do that after almost dying from cancer, but no! he won't/can't do that. He just whines and blames me.