Submitted by Hoping4More on 06/18/2010.
While my wife is working to change some of her behaviors, she has also said to me a few times in the last couple of weeks that she it is wrong for me to want/expect her to change. That I should just love her as the person she is, and that we should focus on the positive, spend time together doing fun things, etc. I agree that we should focus on the positive and doing fun things, AND that we need to work to make some changes - both of us. She is having a hard time, I think, becuase most, if not all, of the changes we are working on center around her ADHD-related behaviors and my response to them. How do I respond to her comment - that it's not fair for me to expect her to change - in a way that is helpful?
She might be afraid or having
Submitted by Miss Behaven on
She might be afraid or having a hard time understanding what shape the change will be. A lot, maybe all, ADDers are scared that the changes they make, the meds, therapy and everything is going to make them a different person. That the people they love want them to become a different person.
ADD is not who I am but it affects who I am. It affected me growing up, it affects how I speak, think and feel and how I express that. Its really hard to tell where I end and the ADD begins because they blur together, one affecting the other. Just like how ADDers are afraid they will loose their creativity when they go on meds we also get afraid we will loose ourselves and our personalities, when we try to change our ADDness.
Is my go getting spontaneous personality just a result of the impulsivity of ADD? Would I become a stick in the mud if I got rid of my impulsivity? That's scary stuff.
She might need reassurance that while you want her to learn to be better oganized and less stressed and all that stuff that you still love, cherish and adore HER and all the things that make her great.
I used to tell my ADD hubby all the time that I want him to loose the habit of not picking up after himself but not loose his sense of humor. Things like that.
Honestly Hoping it sounds to me like she is being stubborn
Submitted by Aspen on
She doesn't want you to have issues with her ADD, she doesn't want you to *help* her with her ADD, she just wants to do what she wants to do and for you to feel it is enough.
I would seriously consider just taking a break from helping her with anything. Sometimes we sorta do a moritorium on the ADD talk/help/suggestions or even try to have a few days where I try to compliment the good without ever mentioning anything that could be done better. I am a perfectionist and think that for both of us it is always good to be thinking of improving in the future. My husband sometimes says "why can't it just be good enough?" That's a foreign thought to me...why wouldn't you want to do better? Why settle? But he doesn't see it that way, so I try to be sensitive to that.
I think your wife has a lot of anger and resentment that you even think her AD/HD is a problem. She doesn't want it to be a problem so therefore she wants to pretend it isn't one right now. It clearly is, but your suggestions regardless of how gentle they are put right now are being met with rebelliousness and defiance as far as I can tell. I'd just refuse to engage. I wouldn't share suggestions that aren't asked for. If something is taking her too long....so what....let her figure it out. Eventually she may come to you as a person who has always helped her in the past with suggestions and solutions. If she doesn't then at the very least she should have to face how difficult her AD/HD is making things FOR HER and maybe she will do more about it.
The comment about her anger/fear at being asked to change being because she is thinking that you don't accept her as she is sounds on the button to me because that is basically what she stated in her email a few weeks ago. I responded there how ridiculous of an idea that is *to me* because in my mind ADD is what is standing in her way rather than being what she is at her core. Some ppl with ADD do genuinely feel differently and that you are attacking what and who she is. Perhaps you could eventually have a dialogue about what she thinks she is being asked to change and explain that you don't want her to lose HERSELF and what makes you love her.
I'm fortunate because my husband mostly looks at his ADD as something that gets in the way of who he is and who he wants to be, so he doesn't generally feel I am attacking an intregal part of himself when I ask for a behavior change. But even so it is a delicate balance because he is so unconditionally accepting.......he doesn't ask me to work on my snotty PMS attitude for example ( I mean I try to work on it on my own but he's never asked) because he sees it as me and he loves me warts and all. He wants to feel the same way. I try to reinforce to him all the time how much I love him......all different qualities about him..... because I need him to truly feel how much I love him. It just is a fact that when ADD is involved thereare compromises/adjustments needed for both ppl to get their needs met.
Support group?
Submitted by Miss Behaven on
Aspen's post is awesome!
I know it helped my hubby to go ADD friendly forums and the support group we found at the time. To hear from other people with ADD that its doesn't change the very heart and soul of who you are to treat ADD but enhances it and your life. I told him over and over again but its like I was too close because I was his wife, hearing from other men who were saying how they were better men now that they were getting a handle on the ADD seemed to help a lot.
Taking a Break Sounds Good
Submitted by Hoping4More on
You are right that my wife is angry that I even think her ADHD is a problem. She has said to me things like "Nobody ever complained before." To which I respond something like "Maybe they didn't care that you weren't spending time with them or giving them your undivided attention." Or something like that. Because surely, if we each just went our seperate ways - her doing her thing and me doing mine - I would find ways to fill my time and not have anything to complain about, because I wouldn't be around her enough to be frustrated by things like her talking too much, etc. I f I was not in her presence I would never feel neglected, invisable, belittled, etc. But I'd hate for that to be my solution - distancing myself.
I like your suggestion that I just take a break from helping her with anything. I hope I can do it. I know it will be hard when she is frustrated and working on something in my presence and expressing that frustration with expletives and/or loud comments. Sometimes when she does that I can leave the room. But sometimes she does that when I am in the kitchen fixing dinner and she is on her computer, which is also in the kitchen. I know - the "simple" solution here would be for her to move her computer into another room. I don't see that happening though by the way our house is set up. I know, for example, that she would hate having to go upstairs to the bedroom everytime she needed to do somethin on the computer. Nor would she want to go down to the basement. That leaves the first floor, and since we live in a townhouse, any room is within my earshot. I could try using listening to my iPod with headphones when she is on the computer and starts yelling. In fact - maybe I will try that.
Our relationship was like
Submitted by newfdogswife on
Our relationship was like that for many years, me doing my thing and my husband doing his thing. He had a problem living in a stable environment and I had a problem living in an unstable one. He was a very angry person and I could not stand the verbal, emotional and mental abuse so I made the choice to distance myself to keep my sanity. It was an awful period but necessary. It was during this time that he was diagnosed with ADHD and we had some answers as to why he was the way he was. It's better now but we still have a long way to go. He finally realizes how his previous actions have had a negative effect on me but it is going to take time for that effect to go away. I still from time to time take a break from helping my husband with anything, too. I remind myself that this is his disorder to deal with and it gives me a chance to recharge.
Comment on Change
Submitted by plantlover on
I wish my husband was open to reading some of this. He is dead set against dealing with his ADD in any way, because he doesn't want to have to "change." He wants to be accepted 100% as he is. What he doesn't accept is that he has changed in the past several years. A lot of his ADD behaviors have become more pronounced and difficult to deal with. He rarely thinks about what he's saying at all - just opens his mouth and whatever is on his mind comes out. It's very rude and hurtful to his family. I don't know if he does this with friends. He almost always leave a last step off of a project, leaving a mess for me to either clean myself or ask him to clean. I've told him that I think his life would be easier for HIM if he'd make some changes, but he won't do it.
When your partner wants you to be totally responsible for everything and doesn't want to do their share in the relationship, there isn't much room to grow. I'm exhausted all the time now, and my patience with him is almost nil. I've done this for so long that I just don't want to do it any more. I'm tired of being the responsible one who remembers everything, manages all of the details, and does all the little bits of things that he doesn't want to do.
I hear you plantlover!!!!!
Submitted by newfdogswife on
I hear you plantlover!!!!!
resistance to change is natural
Submitted by arwen on
While there are some folks who relish change and even seek it out, the vast majority of people would just as soon not have to deal with change, thank you, and a small percentage have to be dragged kicking and screaming into change. But, change is also a natural part of life and inevitable. Personally, therefore, I've always thought the idea that marriage partners should accept each other just as they are is just plain unrealistic -- only a very very very few partners are such a perfect fit that neither needs to change to make the marriage work.
My experience has been that one of the challenges in a marriage is to try to manage change in such a way that each partner's change does not undermine the other partner, or the marriage itself. My experience has also been that in a marriage where there is an ADHD partner, that spouse has a harder time with change than the non-ADHD spouse -- not because of any laziness or bad attitude, but simply because of the way that ADHD brain function makes it so much harder to form new habits. Think of it as riding bikes side-by-side, except you are riding on a smooth tarmac and your wife is riding on a badly rutted road -- how many bike rides do you think she's going to want to go on under those conditions? Unless she can see what she gets out of it, she's likely to be unenthusiastic.
From your posts, it has sounded like your wife would have agreed in the not-too-distant past that your marriage was having some problems. You and your wife may not have been on the same page about what the problems were, but the simple acknowledgement of any kind of difficulty impllies some need for some change. If your wife thinks that her behaviors are fine, but the marriage has problems, it seems fairly inevitable that she thinks *your* behaviors are not OK and need changing. But if that's the case, isn't she doing exactly what she is complaining about you doing? Not accepting you the way you are? Isn't she expecting you to change in order for the marriage to work? If that's the case, it's a double standard, which in my personal opinion is an anethema to a happy marraige (unless one partner is a masochist -- which it doesn't sound like either of you are!).
In my marriage, both my husband and I had behaviors that were problems for each other and our marriage, and we both needed to change, *if we wanted to stay married*. Thankfully, neither of us is in that small percentage that utterly resists change (we fall on the border between embracing change and resisting change). But even with that, the changes were hard for both of us. There were plenty of times when we questioned whether there was any point to our efforts. There were plenty of times when we reverted to previous bad behavior. But fortunately we were both also patient enough -- my husband is naturally more patient than most, and although I am naturally a very *im*patient person, I have learned a good deal of patience over the years.
It's possible that your wife is feeling overpressured by too many changes and/or in too short a time, and is looking for a rationale for avoiding the truly enormous effort it costs her. Change can sometimes be so difficult that it *hurts*, and it's hard for anybody to accept hurt on purpose. I'm so proud of my husband because he did accept this and shoulder the burden when it really mattered, but it was a hard hard thing for him to do sometimes. I found that there were times when he was better able to sustain his efforts to change than others, and I learned to look for the cues that he was experiencing more stress and trouble, and tried to ease up on the pressure a little bit until it seemed he could handle it better. Just like when you are running a race, sometimes you have to slacken the pace and take a bit of a breather, before you charge forward again.
It's also possible that your wife is being stubborn, as another poster suggested, but it seems to me if that were the case she would have been stubborn from the get-go, which it hasn't sounded to be the case. It's also very possible that your wife fears change, as yet another posted has suggested -- it seems to me very possible that this could be part of her feeling, but I'm not convinced it is the whole story (it certainly hasn't been with most of the ADHDers I've known who have not been in total denial about their problems).
I guess my approach, in your situation, would be to say something like, "What I want is for us both to be happy together, and it's been my understanding that you want that too." Assuming my spouse agreed with that, I would continue, "Well, it seems to me that neither of us is as happy right now as we'd like to be, so it sounds to me like we both probably need to make changes so that we can be as happy as we'd both like. I understand that change is hard, and maybe it's harder for you than it is for me. But I don't think that means that I should be the only one doing any changing -- that doesn't seem fair, either. What do you think would be reasonable for both of us to do about making changes?"
Hope this sparks an idea!
"It matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be." Albus Dumbledore