I debated where to put this post but ultimately decided that it sort of stands on its own. We are about 2.5 years into our ADD (Inattentive) diagnosis and approaching 1 year of real work on it (1 year was spent with him grieving/denying while I educated myself, 6 months really getting a handle on tools & waiting on appts and SLOOOW progress to manifest, and now I think we basically know what to do but it is difficult to do except under *ideal* circumstances). When we are both on top of our game, we meet together regular and iron our the schedules, we each stay on top of what we need to handle, get it done well and happily while enjoying eachother and date nights and romantic time. Our life together is awesome....and then there are months like this one...
This has been a bad month for us and we knew going in that it was going to be. I took on quite a bit of extra work so that we could take a vacation, which we are going to see the Grand Canyon for the first time in May :) In order to keep everything flowing smoothly we need many things to be taking place. He has to remember to take his meds regularly (this now happens most of the time) He needs to be regularly meeting with and working with (he is meeting his coach, but she was at a conference for a week plus he has not been really DOING his work with her the last couple visits). And we also need me to take a certain role in making sure we keep meetings with eachother and stay informed on what needs to be done and who is handling it The problem is that our schedule has been screwy and I have not been taking the leadership role partly because I am busy and partly because I am ready for him to step up and lead this family.
He has ADD....fine we are educated about it, we have a buttload of tools, you are medicated, and you need to fulfill your family role regardless of other challenges. I am tired of being ultimately responsible for everything. Problem is as I get more overwhelmed, he seems to get more overwhelmed--in him this produces a *frozen* type effect where he gets little done. We had a silly argument the other day because I was talking to him about something important and my laptop (which we needed at the time) started to die. I asked him to hand me the plug and then he couldn't stop interrupting me to ask about the plug rather than listen to what I was saying about the issue (and it was IMPORTANT). When I replied that I had already told him the plug was in and charging and went back to what I was saying, he felt it necessary to interrupt me again to tell me WHY he kept asking about it charging. I wanted to scream I DON"T CARE!! SHUT UP AND LISTEN TO ME!! I didn't of course, but we both ended up angry and feeling unheard.
For me the core of anger was that he had the nerve to say to me, "You know I get distracted. You shouldn't have asked for the cord and kept talking since you knew I would be distracted." Ok first of all his ADD is not that terrible and yes he has a tendency to be distracted, but I don't accept that I can never ask for something I need while in a conversation. Especally if I got up to get it when it was right next to him, he'd have gotten just as distracted. I said "You have ADD and it is your responsibility to find ways to avoid distraction. It is not other people's responsiblity to conform everything to you. Stop blaming me for asking for the plug. I agree that ideally I wouldn't have asked during a conversation, but it needed to be done THIS TIME, so you have to find a way to stay on the subject or to get back onto the subject."
I just think ADD can become an excuse for everything. It is a challenge, and being aware of it allows you to develop tools to deal with it. I get that. I work with that all the time, but sometimes situations come up where you just have to control yourself. It is just life.
We just got unreasonably upset about eachothers' viewpoints. It wasn't worth that! I think the problem is that we are not both staying on top of our game and then things start to unravel...I am sure this probably happens to everyone but with ADD it is another level. We have the ability to have a marriage that works like a well-oiled machine (and I apologize for whining when I know a lot of you don't even have this option :( ). We love eachother dearly. His ADD is not terrible. We have lots of fun together. But it is so hard that when he is overwhelmed, I have to step up and either take on some of his load or rework the system until he can get going again, but when I am overwhelmed everything comes to a grinding halt until I again can pick up and clear backlog and get us back on track. I want a partner to keep things going well when I am not up to it. That is what a partner is to me.
I have been gone a lot these last few weeks and when I am home, I am gathering tax papers. I struggled all day yesterday to finalize everything and keep our afternoon appt to get our taxes done. It was so hard to get what I needed from him...most of what he should have provided each quarter last year and at the latest at year end 4 MONTHS AGO. Most of what he has been slowly providing over the last several months has been incomplete and had to be redone (which he claims is part of the reason he doesn't want to do it, but it is the same info every year so learn what to include!) I felt like I had to ride him to get what I need at a time when I was PMSy and overwhelmed, and it is just so UNFAIR! I gave him one assignment yesterday (not saying that is all he had to do....he had several others things also which got done). BUT as far as taxes went he had one job, he had to take one 1099 and reconcile it with the work he did and the pay we received. He had to do this because he kept very poor records of this particular job and we couldn't go by the filed stubs because he lost several of them. We couldn't go by the deposits into our acct because he sometimes forgot to write what the deposit consisted of and the bank couldn't provide it for several of the deposits he made by ATM. I felt it was only fair that he have to take care of it...a bit of consequences if you will...and he agreed.
During the time he did this ONE tax assignment, I reconciled 10 other 1099s. Now they weren't all complicated, but he only had to do ONE. He finally told me it was done and I was printing out all the final paperwork by months when I realize that he didn't tell me that part of the coding needed to be changed in our computer....he noticed this on his printout, but didn't tell me cause that wasn't "what he was doing." I blew a gasket...yelling about him not even able to do ONE THING to help our taxes on a busy overwhelming day. He insisted that he DID his job.....which he only saw as reconciling rather than making sure that our record was actually correct. I don't even see his side of this as what is the POINT of reconciling if you don't have a correct record at the end of it. I took it from him and finished it as I now had to get an hour's extention for our appt (which I did make him call for).
Then while I was having the taxes done a question came up on some notes he gotten from a phone call to the IRS. He told me it had to be in 3 seperate sections which caused me to have to go through and change 4 items which were now in the wrong column, and I was mad at him for not telling me about it. He thought I understood "from his side of the conversation" So fine I change it, but he didn't clarify 1/2 the amount, so I called him back for clarification and he looked up the reference they'd given him & it turns out I had DONE IT RIGHT THE FIRST TIME!! ARGHHHH If I could have whacked him upside the head with something I think I might have at that moment-- which made me glad he was not with me!! Him too more than likely.
We made our peace last night and called it tax time blahs. He is sorry he wasn't more helpful and he claims I will have the first quarter of 2010 this weekend, so I feel we have a plan going forward (which we make every year but we have more ADD tools this time and I think it will be successful). We got up and had a nice companionable Sunday morning preparing for our religious services. Every month or so the booklet we use for the audience participation study changes. He is responsible for picking up the booklets when they come in and putting them in our bookcase so they are ready when it comes time to change. Last month he couldn't find them and we had to use a printout for the first week until we could replace them (this is because he doesn't look for them until Sunday morning) I HATE HATE HATE this and he doesn't like it either, but it happens every couple months or so. When I finally had enough last month, he assured me that we had the next 4 or 5 months filed there and it wasn't going to happen again. This morning he goes to get the new booklets and can't find them so we sit down to study together and he brings printouts. I flat out refused to study with him. I told him I am sick to death of him not taking care of his responsibilities.
I know a lot of this is residual upset over not the entire month's stress, but I don't know how to get over it all. How do you handle it when you are just SICK TO DEATH of either taking care of everything or having it be screwed up. This is not about booklets or forms only, it is just about being frustrated with it all being screwy if he has a hand in it. Not feeling like I have a soft place to fall when I am overwhelmed because I have to keep everything running. I agree with not minimizing his feelings and putting things differently and trying to play to his strengths, but what about when you just don't have it in you and all you want to do keep his hands off everything becaues it would be easier but you cannot humanly do it.
SO TIRED AND ANGRY AND OVERWHELMED TODAY!! :(
overwhelm
Submitted by brendab on
Aspen,
As I read your post I realized that most of the stress I had in my relationship with my ex ADDer is when I was tired and overwhelmed. My emotions would bubble over and increase the overwhelming feeling. Even though we are not together now, I have learned so much about myself. I continue to read this blog because I see how being nonADD makes me vulnerable to overdoing which becomes overwhelm. I've noticed that extra sleep and eating well can prevent an event from entering the emotional overload stage.
Thanks for writing a long post full of overwhelm to remind me to refocus my energy on things that make me less vulnerable. I am going to make a priority list to substitute sleep, fun and good food for all the "shoulds" I tend to prioritize first.. In my nonadd mind I tend to think I have to be on top of all these shoulds or there will be drastic consequences.
I asked my counselor once why I reacted to some things that didn't even register as concern to the ADDer. he told me I was "catastrophizing" an event in my own mind. He was so right--I would make myself crazy about all the dire consequences when in reality any consequences weren't likely to make much difference in my life. Funny thing is I am always blindsided and don't realize I am catastrophizing until the event is over.
Brenda
Thanks for the response Brenda
Submitted by Aspen on
and you are right on. The pressure to get taxes done, hormonal like I always get when PMSing, his lack of good communication skills, and my tendency to catastrophize when stressed....this type of thing occurs. My husband feels I overreact and I feel he underreacts, so maybe put us together and you have one sensible reaction :)
I appreciate your getting all the way through that posting of mine!! I should never write upset because that length & disjumbled type of posting comes pouring out, but when I am not upset I don't see as much need to post in general....go figure
I do sincerely want to know how you deal with holding to the special ADD stuff you have to do....family meetings, special ways to communicate, certain types of reminders....when you are overwhelmed and just want them to take care of their own stuff the way that you do. I feel this is an attitude issue, but it is also a "I can't be in charge of one more thing until I get a handle on all other things" issue. If he was saying, "It is time for our family meeting" it would be one thing...but we mostly don't do it if I don't take charge of it & that is one of the issues I have when overwhelmed...I don't feel up to doing anything special or extra.
leadership, partnership expectations
Submitted by arwen on
Aspen, you say "I am ready for him to step up and lead this family". I'm sorry, but in my experience, this is not a realistic expectation to have about someone with ADD, unless you are willing to follow without reservation or criticism (which it doesn't sound from your post like you are willing to do). I don't mean to suggest that people with ADD *can't* lead -- but it isn't typical.
You also say "I want a partner to keep things going well when I am not up to it. That is what a partner is to me." Boy, do I know what you mean! This is also what a partner is to me, and what I want. But it isn't going to happen, and I've had to accept that. I've come to realize that this definition of partnership is more ambitious than my husband is capable of, and accepted a simpler definition of partnership where my husband at least considers the potential impact of his choices on me, and fulfills his basic responsibilities towards me. I'm grateful that my husband has actually managed to learn to either follow my lead or voice his objections, when in the past he would neither lead, follow, nor get out of the way.
Not only my own experience with my husband, but also what I've observed of other ADD marriages/relationships leads me to the inescapable conclusion that the kind of partnership you are looking for can only exist when the partners have structured their lives and marriage so that they are very very simple -- super low maintenance, lots of slack in everyday life. If your goals are more ambitious, you will probably have to compromise on the nature of your relationship.
I agree with you that ADD should not be an excuse -- but there are limits with ADD that can't be wished away, either. My husband can often do one thing (e.g. communicate well, focus carefully on what I'm saying, put the dishes from the dishwasher away properly) that his ADD makes very diffcult -- but then he can't do anything else but that one thing. Or he can communicate fairly well AND listen fairly well AND put the dishes away mostly right, all at one time -- but then I can't be guaranteed that we won't have a misunderstanding or that he will remember the conversation correctly later on. I don't doubt that he could eventually learn to do these three things perfectly at one time, but it would take a whole lot of practice that frankly I don't think is worthwhile -- I'd rather he spent his time and efforts elsewhere.
Bottom line -- my experience is that in a marriage between an ADDer and a non-ADDer, the non-ADDer's most critical task is to develop a good understanding of their spouse's abilities and limitations, and the second most critical task is to try to make sure that neither partner gets overwhelmed any more than is absolutely unavoidable. In my life, that has resulted in (among other things) lowering my standards, backing away from some personal goals, and spending way more time than I ever wanted researching stuff I never wanted to learn. I don't like it -- but this is the best compromise I've been able to figure out for myself. You may need to reconsider your values and expectations as well.
"It matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be." Albus Dumbledore
Thanks for your thoughtful response, Arwen
Submitted by Aspen on
I just lost a reply that I'd spent 45 minutes writing, so maybe I will just bottom line my issue...like a gift to the board :)
I can tell from reading your posts here that you spend a lot of time setting up ADD-friendly environments to help your husband. I think this is a wonderful idea and something I personally want to do more of, however what do you do when you are overwhelmed and aren't up to setting up the *ideal/ADD friendly* environment for the family meeting yet you still need to have it? Or to edit your words so that they come out in an ADD sensitive manner? I imagine that it becomes more natural the longer that you do it, but so far it is work that I am willing to do normally yet when I am overwhelmed I don't seem to have it in me.
You also make a good point about learning what his limitations are exactly, and I hope this is something that I can discuss with his psychologist, but my experience with him thus far is that he mostly can find a way to do things that he considers to be important.
He has proven himself over and over in serious situations that he can be a better partner that I've hoped or ever expected him to be. When we had 5 friends die suddenly, he was able to put his grief on the backburner and keep our life running while I laid in bed crying & helping with funeral arrangements...even for weeks after I wasn't doing much more than the necessities and putting one foot in front of the other--he even paid bills! When my grandmother was dying slowly and I needed to spend extra time with her and her doctors, he picked up the slack at home including cooking every night and cleaning up too--for MONTHS. When I had to spend 2 weeks in bed because we were trying to avoid foot surgery for a break, he kept up with the house--this man who is so messy sometimes that I wonder if he was raised in a barn.
He is awesome in a crisis. He can move more slowly than anyone I ever met & be almost impossible to wake up in the mornings, yet when I needed to go to the ER after hurting my eye in the middle of the night he was up, dressed, had the car running, and was helping me get dressed WITHIN 2 MINUTES. I had never seen him move so fast....and I think possibly I haven't seen it since either! :)
I asked him where this gear came from (I've teased him for years about not having a high gear), and he laughed and said he's always had it but we just don't normally NEED it.
I really think for him it is an issue of need and importance....in his own mind of course....and once he gets that something he doesn't want to do is really necessary for us, he will generally suck it up and do it and even eventually internalize it into his routine . For example I battled with him for months over saving receipts so that we can claim his work deductions on our taxes, but once he finally got it he saves them routinely....course he also sometimes misplaces some and gives them to me sheepishly weeks later, but he never throws them out anymore.
He CAN do so much. He CAN be the most wonderful husband I can imagine, and then sometimes I get overwhelmed and really need him to step up and he just freezes and does nothing. I wish so much I could find a rhyme or reason to make him understand these overwhelming times feel like just as much of a crisis to me in the moment as the other things do.
Reading this post does make me understand the need to appreciate all the wonderful things that he does do. Absolutely I need to do that more. But I also need him to step it up when I am overwhelmed especially if it is because I am overwhelmed because we want to take a vacation or because he has screwed up giving me his paperwork for our taxes.
I don't know how to get that across to him and to deal with him when I am feeling overwhelmed and he is acting oblivious even though we discussed before taking on the 80 hour weeks that it was probably going to get to this place, and I WARNED him as it was happening....how can he still act oblivious?
oblivious
Submitted by brendab on
I have been working 70+ hours a week since mid January so I totally understand the overwhelm. I think that it is harder for nonADD women to overschedule because we have high expectations for our relationships and our homes. It takes time to create a quality, relaxed environment. When we can't possibly keep up with the pace, we are stressed to our limits and can't relax in the chaos.
I don't know how the adder can shut down and ignore the extreme pace of 80 hours a week, but perhaps it is a coping strategy or they just don't sweat the small stuff like we do. One of the things my adder friend taught me was that I need to adjust my strategy and not do so much when I have so much on my plate. Or get some help to do the things that are causing me to stress out.
One thing I have done in the past is to create a "done" list on my computer desktop. Instead of a "to do" list that screams at me to finish it, I write down everything I accomplished during the day and then congratulate myself for a productive well done day. I do my best and this helps me to focus on my success not my failures.
brenda
oblivious/overwhelm
Submitted by arwen on
Aspen, I truly do understand where you're coming from and sympathize. I certainly didn't mean to suggest that there shouldn't or couldn't be times when your husband steps up to dealing with your overwhelm -- what I was trying to say was more on the order of "you can't count on it". Even if an ADDer *isn't* oblivious to your overwhelm, they don't always have the wherewithal to handle it.
As far as your question "how can he still act oblivious"? goes -- maybe your husband has the same problem mine had in similar circumstances. I joke (but it's seriously true) that my husband's brain and my husband's gut feelings don't talk to each other much. The brain part hears the discussion, the warnings -- but it doesn't *feel* anything, it doesn't have any empathy, it doesn't understand that you actually have a problem going on right now -- the brain is just treating your words as abstract ideas. It has no connection to the *feeling* process, wherever that resides (I do know that it actually is in the brain, too -- but it is in a very special different part of the brain than the parts that handle abstract knowledge). Until I can establish a connection between the feelings and the abstract ideas, my husband is -- oblivious!
This is so very different from the way I deal with things that it's very hard for me to really grasp how he can manage to not connect the dots himself. But I've learned over time that he really does lack this connecting ability.
"It matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be." Albus Dumbledore
What if you don't want to compromise?
Submitted by Sueann on
Arwen, I know you are very wise, and you are making your marriage work, and this is not meant as a criticism.
What if you CAN'T compromise? What if you can't give up as much of yourself as it takes to make your marriage work? I'm not interested in learning how his mind works and remembering how many things he can remember. I'm not interested in being the facilitator who makes his life work at the expense of my own. I want him to come live in my world, with the 90+ percent of us who DON'T have ADD.
I find I'm doing double the work with half the energy. I find being responsible for making another person happy to be exhausting.
He loves me, as he defines love. But love to him means he feels positive toward me. It doesn't mean he should do anything. It certainly doesn't mean he should consider me when he decides to do something, or not do do something. It certainly doesn't mean he should think "Sueann has had some bad falls on the laundry-room stair, so I should do the laundry." I find I just don't care if he loves me, because he doesn't do anything about it.
He takes his meds but there do not seem to be any opportunities, with our fiancial situation and in our small city, to find counseling or coaching around his ADD issues. So nothing changes. Even marriage counseling is unavailable to us since we work opposite shifts.
Should I just give up? That seems to be what counselors that i see on my own are suggesting. Should I just accept that I will do all the work in our household, no matter how painful it is, and give up what little physical strength and comfort I have in the service of doing the things that are not interesting enough for him to do?
I don't feel like ME now that I'm married to him. My knees hurt so much more because I have to do twice as much work. I don't have children with him, so I haven't the same tie binding me to him that Arwen has to her husband.
For those of you who have made marriages with ADD partners work, like Arwen, how do yo do it? How do you not miss the clean home and the other things that are important to you? How do you not miss YOURSELF?
great questions, Sueann
Submitted by arwen on
First of all, let me say a couple of things about where I've come from. I don't believe marriage is intrinsically forever. To be honest, even when I married my husband, even though we loved each other very much, I had doubts about whether we had "what it takes" to make a successful marriage. As a result, when we wrote our vows, we didn't say we would honor, love, obey for as long as we both lived.
And there are some things that I absolutely will not compromise on. I would never have agreed to any compromises that hindered our (very smart) kids from getting the best education available. I will not compromise on safety. No beating a child. I would never have accepted repeat offenses of extra-marital affairs or addictions (in my mores, people can make a serious mistake and repent and be forgiven -- but they had better never do it again, either).
If I'd been in a situation with my husband where staying in the marraige would have forced me to compromise in any of these ways, I would have left.
I don't believe that *anybody* is responsible for making someone else happy. Happiness is each individual person's own responsibility. Yes, sometimes I make my husband happy, but it's not my responsibility -- it's a gift. I wouldn't keep giving gifts to people who never gave me any.
I don't believe in double standards -- what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. Actually, that's not emphatic enough. I *abhor* double standards. But that doesn't mean that everything has to be exactly identicallly equal. I believe in equal *effort*. In some areas of our life, my husband works harder than I do -- in other areas I work harder. As long as it evens out, I'm OK with it. I believe in equal misery, too -- no one partner should bear all the brunt of whatever pain and sorrow must be dealt with. Maybe one partner is miserable for a period of time dealing with some very bad situation, but if the load can be transferred, at some point it should.
See, to my mind, marriage isn't just about love. You can find love in all kinds of other relationships. To me, marriage is about love AND partnership. When we married, my husband knew how to be a good partner, but as his ADD resurged around age 40, he lost his partnering skills. Our separation occurred fundamentally because he didn't take his partnership responsibilities seriously enough, and I couldn't take that anymore. Fortunately for our marriage, he changed.
How do I not miss the clean house and the other things important to me? I do miss them (although not continually). When I was first making compromises about a clean house and my career and my ambitions, I was frantically busy with an insane schedule -- when you are that busy, it is easier not to notice the things you are missing. Eventually, so much time went by that I got used to it, to some degree, and was able to settle for "clean enough" and "happy enough" and "successful enough".
How do I not miss being me? Well, a lot of me is still here. I do miss some of the parts of me that are gone. I guess you could say I settled for being "me enough". Because of the amount of time and effort and money invested in my marraige, and because of my strong feelings about my kids, I sort of feel that I was faced with something akin to the choice that a person with blood poisoning might face -- do you want to amputate, or die? I opted for amputation, and like the amputee, I'll manage even if I do regularly miss what I've lost. I haven't lost so much of myself that I feel I'm not me -- I'm just a somewhat less satisfying me in some ways. And at the same time, I've gained some things I never thought I would have. I am actually capable now of patience -- nobody who knew me from before my marriage would have ever believed it.
Unfortunately, from your posts, it doesn't sound like "me enough" is likely in your marriage, nor are you reaping any other benefits. This doesn't sound like a partnership, or anything else remotely fair.
And to me, that's really the bottom line. Saint Paul may have written in his first letter to the Corinthians that the greatest virtue is love, but I'm afraid I disagree. The greatest virtue is justice. Today I have justice in my marriage, and that's what makes it possible for me to make it work.
So, in short -- if I were in what sounds like your shoes -- I'd leave.
"It matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be." Albus Dumbledore
I feel like Arwen's response
Submitted by Ren on
I feel like Arwen's response is basically, "Well, you're tired and overwhlemed but you married someone with ADD so you're just going to have to settle and deal with the fact that your emotional needs won't be met." I don't buy it.
My husband has ADD. He is not retarded. He is not autistic. He was not in a car accident that left him partially brain dead and non functional. In fact, he is a highly-intelligent, functional human being who has no problems getting national awards for his "real" work and anything else he finds interesting enough to focus his attention on. ADD is a highly treatable disorder. While it may rquire understanding on the part of the non-ADD spouse to see that some tasks might be difficult for the ADD spouse, I do not believe that it means that it falls on the non-ADD spouse to work harder and pick up the slack on everything. If anyone is going to have to work a little harder to have a "normal" marriage, it's the ADD spouse. They are the ones with the problem and who will need to take the tools and techniques that are so widely out there seriously and put it to use in the interest of their family.
I totally get where Aspen is coming from. It's not even the amount of work. It's not having a soft place to fall. Look. I get that my husband is not going to be able to keep receipts, or do the taxes. Ever. So I took a half day off of work to do it. What I want is to feel *appreciation* for what I am doing to keep our family running, and to feel taken care of by my husband in the ways that he can demonstrate that. Love is not a feeling. It is a VERB. There are many "non-executive function" ACTIONS through which an ADD spouse can be a rock, a guide, and a soft place to fall. They can listen and empathize with your feelings of overwhlem. They can do things to make you more comfotable, like fix you coffee, or rub your feet, or cook dinner for you. They can offer to take care of the kids while you go out and get a massage, or exercise, or whatever makes you feel better. They can be your moral support, a cheerleader, and tell you not to worry, that you're doing a great job, and that you're the best thing in the world. All of these are ADD-compatible ways that can make life a whole lot better for the non-ADD spouse who is about to burn out.
The idea here is that ADD does NOT prevent anyone from being able to anticipate his or her spouse's needs and try to meet them in the best way they can. It does not prevent anyone from showing appreciation and gratitude for having an AWESOME spouse without whom life would be in shambles.
I refuse to treat my spouse like some kind of half-conscious invalid who is incapable of doing anything. Yes, there are things that I might be comparatively better at than him, and I can do those. But being a leader of the family, particularly for a man, is less about doing the executive functions and more about respecting your wife and knowing and believing that you have a pretty good deal going on -- and making sure she knows it all the time.
you are fortunate
Submitted by arwen on
Ren, I'm very glad for you that you have this kind of positive dynamic with your ADD spouse. But all cases of ADD are not equal. Some people with more debilitating cases of ADD truly find it a real struggle to listen, to empathize, to be aware enough to offer help. Some don't know how to be a moral support or cheerleader. (Of course, you could take the time to teach them, but that would add to the overwhelm, it seems to me.)
I've learned over 20 years of experience with my ADD spouse that I have no soft place to fall that I can count on. Neither does Sueann, or Breadbaker, or quite a few other non-ADD spouses here. I know many couples where one partner has ADD and one doesn't. Some have that soft place to fall because the ADD partner's disorder is less debilitating, and some don't because the ADD partner's disorder is more debilitating.
My response to Aspen was based on my experience, as I explicitly stated in that response. I wasn't trying to state any hard and fast facts. Obviously your experience is different from mine. I promise I won't put down your experience if you won't marginalize mine.
"It matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be." Albus Dumbledore
Appreciate Your Thoughts
Submitted by Ren on
Thanks, Arwen. I didn't mean to marginalize your experience. I was mainly reacting to the sense of hopelessness that a lot of non-ADD spouses (including myself) can have when we get to the overwhelm point. I think that it's easy to throw up your hands and say, "Well, I guess this is how life is going to be with ADD," and then feel like you can't have any expectations. And I know that for me, that thought is really, really depressing. I think that it's OK to have expectations of your ADD spouse, you just have to be careful that you have expectations that the ADD spouse can meet.
By the way, I did not mean to imply that I have been successful in any or all of the ways I mentioned, in terms of having a soft place to fall. My husband and I still have a looooong road ahead of us on that front. But in reassessing what he can and cannot deliver, I've concluded that while it's probably unreasonable to expect him to do certain things (like file taxes), I don't think it should be out of the realm of possibility that he can be supportive in other ways. Fortunately he agrees, and he is trying, though as you said, I really do have to teach him how he can be there for me in ways that would matter. (It's kind of strange to me that he was able to do this on his own when we were couriting, but now I have to spell it out for him, but anyway...)
So, I hope that clarifies my point. I just don't want ADD to be an excuse for not being able to deliver anything emotionally to your spouse. I'm not saying that it's easy for the ADD spouse to do this, or that the non-ADD spouse won't be let down on this front. But it's OK to have a vision of a great marriage, and to try to work towards it. Of course, I think Melissa's point that your experience depends a lot more on what you do to change yourself than what your spouse does is well taken, and something I think you are way ahead of me on, Arwen. You seem to have a lot more peace on this issue than I do, and I hope I can get to a point where I am as accepting of my husband's limitations as you are of yours. But I also want to challenge him to overcome some of those limitations, in order to be a better husband and a father.
thanks for clarifying -- overwhelm and hopelessness
Submitted by arwen on
I could not agree more with you that it's absolutely appropriate to have expectations of your ADD partner -- in fact, imho, it's essential. I've found with most of the ADDers in my life that matters get even more squirrely if there are no expectations. ADDers may have trouble meeting expectations at times, even realistic ones, but I believe from my experience that they still need those targets to shoot at in order to mature (when they are younger) and continue to grow (when they are older).
As far as the strangeness of why your husband knew what to do for you when you were courting and now seems to need to be taught those same things -- it's likely that when you were courting, his hyperfocus abilities were engaged in some ways. MRI studies of brain activity in people with ADD seem to indicate that hyperfocusing utilizes different parts of the brain than everyday information processing does -- and unfortunately these various parts of the brain don't seem to interact very well in people with ADD. So, the knowledge is probably in his brain, but he probably can't access it in the mode of your current dynamic because he's not hyperfocusing anymore.
As far as the soft place to fall -- it's not like we haven't tried to work on giving me a soft place to fall -- unfortunately this is one area where my husband hasn't been able to make any significant progress. Although I'm a very consistent person, I'm afraid I'm consistent in a more complex, detailed way than he is able to understand -- and I'm emotionally quite different from him, so he can't use his own reactions/experience as a guage -- so most of the time he really has no clue about how I'm feeling. To counter that problem, I routinely tell him straight out how I'm feeling -- but this only helps him on an informational, intellectual level -- he still has trouble engaging his empathic abilities because he can't *feel* what I'm feeling. On the other hand, he has been able to make changes to reduce my stress level, so I have less need of a soft place to fall, for which I am actually quite grateful -- it has been hard work for him to do that.
Accepting my spouse's limitations has only occurred after many many years of trial and lots of error and exhausting every way we (and our counselor) could think of to tackle some of the problems, without success. My situation is also complicated by the fact that my husband has Seasonal Affective Disorder, which doesn't make him depressed much but does very much worsen his ADD problems. Even though he has seasonal treatments now which help a lot, there are still difficulties. The hardest for me to deal with is that his memory problems worsen quite a bit during SAD season, and he forgets some of the better behaviors he's learned during non-SAD times and lapses into bad old behaviors -- and even when SAD season is ending, he can't remember the better behaviors and has to try to relearn them from scratch. Some things turn out to be easier for him to relearn than others. The ones that are hard to relearn -- I have to be realistic and decide whether they are important enough to go through the grief of relearning them each year, or whether it's just better to accept the limitation. Since this is an annual process, I confront these decisions more often than I would probably have had to do if he didn't have SAD, and I've probably become more proficient than the average non-ADD spouse therefore at recognizing what can and can't be reasonably dealt with in what ways. My "peace" in accepting his limitations doesn't stem from overwhelm or despair or frustration, it comes from having expectations, trying everything possible to achieve them, but recognizing the repeated evidence of SAD season problems, and trying to maximize the return on our efforts by working on the high-importance/high-achievability areas and letting the low-importance/low-achievability ones go. If I did anything else, I'd be and emotional and psychological basket case every spring!!! (I've tried that too, and it isn't worth it!)
I hadn't realized it until just this second, but I guess maybe I'm suggesting that the hopelessness many non-ADD partners feel may in part derive from difficulty in seeing clearly what the ADDer realistically and reasonably is and is not capable of. I've had so much more practice in this because of my husband's SAD effects that I don't feel so hopeless in recent years, because although I can see areas where he's probably never going to manage any better than he does now, he has learned to manage a lot of things pretty well in recent years, and I can also more clearly see areas where it seems very possible where he can improve without excessive pain for either of us -- a hopeFUL thing! And having good grounds for hope of progress in these other areas also helps achieve that peace of acceptance for what won't change.
I have to also say that it really helps me a lot to know how hard my husband really does work most of the time to address his ADD issues. In the past, when he was less committed to finding ways to achieve better behaviors, I certainly felt more overwhelmed and hopeless because of that. It took our separation several years ago to motivate him to a wholehearted effort to address his ADD in ways that worked for both of us, but since that time I can be assured that if he isn't making progress (or even going backwards during SAD season), it isn't from lack of will to do better.
I really appreciate your thoughtful response, Ren -- you have really got me thinking about some new perspectives. I hope at some point I can return the favor!
"It matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be." Albus Dumbledore
Ok experts! What is the best way to deal with this...
Submitted by Aspen on
Today a situation came up that tends to happen to us and I want to deal with it differently than I normally do.
I spent most of the day gone today...mostly fun but some work as I've been shopping with the girls a bit lately to pick up things we still need for our upcoming vacation. Hubby worked 2am-8am, slept until about 10:30am (he'd gotten about 4 hours sleep before work also), and then decided he really needed to take care of the yard. He has been needing to weed eat our yard and my parents' for at least 2 weeks. Our deal is that my dad (who's property backs up to ours) mows both yards with his riding lawn mower and my husband weed eats both since we have a rolling weed eater. It works out great since our yard looks better than it would with only hubby to mow it (it always needs it for at least 3 weeks before he can drag himself out to do it). My dad mowed our yard 2 weeks ago and again yesterday while my husband has not yet done any yard work this season.
I was really happy that he decided on his own to take care of it...he can easily do both yards in an afternoon as there isn't a lot to do....around our small pond, front landscaping, and trees, and primarily around my parents large pool, along the fence, and around their landscaping/driveway.
When I left home around noon, our yard was mostly done and he had just gotten back with more gas for the weed eater. I talked to him when we went were going into a restaurant for dinner and asked what he was up to and he said he was finishing weed eating. I thought that was awfully long but didn't say anything, but during the course of our conversation he mentioned that it was running a bit hot and he was allowing it to cool down and to see if it needed some tuning up since this was the first run of the season.
I just got home after working....and he has already left for his evening work (will be back around midnight) and I discover that he did not weed eat around our trees AT ALL, he didn't clean up any of the equipment or even boxes that he had in our yard from a job a week and a half ago and he actually MOWED AROUND THEM!! And besides all this, he didn't "get a chance" to do any of my parents' yard today at all. Because this took him all day???
I want so badly to call him up and ask him what he was thinking with this terrible job....that took all afternoon. In the past I have made that call, and while it makes him aware of what he still needs to do--and his lousy time management-- I know he will get defensive immediately and probably hurt that I don't appreciate the work that he did do (esp since he knows that I only worked half the day and got to shop the rest). I do appreciate that he went outside and did some work, but it seriously makes no sense to me to do a job in this way that is going to have to be finished another day especially when he is so far behind.....PLUS he didn't do my parents' yard at all which he absolutely should have done first since he is behind on living up to his (easier) end of the bargain anyway.
I don't want to approach it that way because I know it won't get me anywhere, but I can't think of a way to broach it that won't upset him. In general he wants me to acknowledge the good things he does and if at all possible not mention anything negative, but I genuinely have no way of knowing if he actually thinks he completed this job or not. He certainly sounded on the phone like he thought he got it done, but it is not done. Since he knows what he has to do and since it isn't much, I don't see how he left out doing half of it and went around TRASH too on accident....completely baffling. I didn't say anything when he said he didn't get to my parents though I was confused since he didn't mention doing anything but yard work the whole afternoon and evening (he left at 7pm) doing the little that he got done. .....though now I do remember him saying he had to do our ditch by the road and I know he HATES doing that, so he probably took several breaks in trying to get through that. He doesn't seem to grasp that he could get it out of his life much more quickly if he didn't keep stopping so he could concentrate on dreading doing the rest. Now that I see what got done, I am REALLY confused as to how he spent an entire afternoon/evening doing it. There is no more than 2 hours worth of work done in the yard and that is including picking up gas and basic tuning up!
assume there could have been some reason
Submitted by arwen on
Aspen, I can't count the many many times I've been in this situation. I've found that with my ADD husband, the best approach is to assume that there *could* have been some at least quasi-legitimate reason for the way things have turned out they was they have, that my spouse hasn't communicated to me.
In your situation, my conversation with DH would go something like this: "Honey, I noticed that you didn't weedeat around our trees, or do any weedeating at my parents house. I'm confused -- when I left at noon, you were just about to start the weedeating, and it doesn't seem to me that what you did weedeat should have taken all afternoon. Was there some kind of problem that you didn't mention to me?" DH might respond with any number of things, like "I was so tired I had to take a nap and didn't start until 6pm" or "Remember, I said it was running hot? when I started using it again, it got real hot again after only 15 minutes, I had to keep shutting it down and I could only use it in short bursts. So I decided to try to see what was wrong with it, and that took all afternoon." (Or, of course, he might said something less acceptable, like, "well, I did a little and then I got hungry and decided to have a snack and I sat down to watch cartoons while I was eating and lost track of time.")
Whatever he answered, we would then discuss the wisdom/folly of his decisions and thinking process (not in those exact words! something more like, "well, I understand that you were tired, but why didn't set an alarm to wake you up early enough to finish?" or "I certainly don't want to break the weedeater either, did you fix the problem?" or "we both know you can't keep track of time watching cartoons, don't you think that was a poor decision under the circumstances?" I think you get the idea). If the problem was that he just kept taking breaks (my spouse does this a lot too), I would haul out the old kitchen timer and suggest he use it and discuss how long it would be appropriate to set it for break periods and work periods, respectively.
Generally speaking, I would explain why he made a bad decision, if he did, and we would try to figure out a way to avoid a similar kind of decision in the future. If he made a good decision, I would tell him that he'd done a good job of analyzing the situation and choosing an appropriate course. In the course of the discussion we would also talk about why he didn't communicate whatever this missing information is -- regardless of whether his decision was ultimately good or bad, it would have been appropriate for him to inform me of the hitch in the original plans. Finally, I would point out to him that I would have expected him to do my parents lawn first, since good manners dictate that you always serve others first and yourself last. Again, with both the communication and manners issues, we would discuss why he made the choices he did (or didn't) and what would be better in the future. I might or might not discuss mowing around the boxes -- it would certainly frost me, but I find if I hit my DH with too many issues at once, he loses his grasp on them all, so since this one seems to me the least egregious (although perhaps most bizarre) decision, I might save it for another time.
I guess my point is, I would attack the *root cause* of the results rather than talk about the results themselves -- it seems to me that the *reason* (good or bad) for the results is really what is the problem. And the same for dealing with the communications and manners issues -- *why* didn't he tell me?? ("I didn't think you needed to know" -- "well, I do need to know when chore plans go awry, in order to plan appropriately going forward") and *why* didn't he do my parents lawn first? ("when I started I thought I had plenty of time to do both" -- "well, you need to plan for the unexpected and assume a worst-case scenario").
Of course, none of this guarantees that the next time the results will be different! But I've found that after we've had the same basic "root-cause" conversation (about the weedeating, the laundry, the vacuum cleaning, the window caulking, the dishwashing, the gift-giving, etc etc etc) maybe a thousand times, it sinks in. (I'm exaggerating -- it doesn't take a thousand -- maybe only 500, lol. Whatever the number, more than I like, I admit!)
Hope this helps in some way, or sparks an idea.
"It matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be." Albus Dumbledore
Small tasks
Submitted by Nettie on
Small reminder that some ADHD readers (Nettie) may find it difficult to read long responses before replying, so I may repeat something written. Anyway, who made the initial deal? Is your husband the best lawn care maintainer (maybe he is, maybe he does enjoy it, IDK)? If not, maybe he can help with something else while you delegate lawn care to someone else. If he likes it, but doesn't perform well, then maybe he (like me when asked to mow a large yard as a teen), needs the task to be broken down into some parts in which he has success. It used to drive my parents crazy when I stopped between each section of the yard, but that's how I got it done (hating every millisecond except the pretty scenery and the fast drive back to parking the mower).
Concerning leaving tools out, with my spouse, I appeal to his extreme thriftiness. I say I'll buy a new tool if the one we have isn't cared for, and it gets put away.
P.S. Also, as an adult, I've chosen not to have a large yard because I know myself and my husband's proclivities.
Well I found out what happened...
Submitted by Aspen on
it took him longer to mow because it was so long and thick...sorry I have no sympathy there as he is the one who set up that situation. And the rest was a result of poor communication. He told me he was going to get gas to finish the yard work, but when he came home with the gas he came inside and ate and goofed around to avoid doing it, so he got the gas but didn't actually then go outside and finish the work right away. Then when he finally went back out it seemed to be running hot so that made it take longer. When he told me he was "finishing up" the yard work around dinner time, he meant *finishing what he was going to be able to get done* vs actually finishing the yard work. He didn't mow around the trees because he didn't get to the left half of the lawn at all, and he had no recollection of mowing around the trash but he promises to fix that when he goes back out. So he actually only spent about 2 hours in the yard which wasn't enough to finish it with the 2 complications of having to go slower because of it being too long and the equipment needing a tune up.
The positive was that it was a good, calm conversation and it almost wasn't since he called about 15 minutes after I posted here when I was still pretty angry about the whole thing. He did start to get defensive, but I was able to be calm and reasonably explain why I needed him to tell me what happened and he backed off being defensive which made me very happy. He agrees on how long the job should take, and he is going to try not to let it get to the point where it was this time. He briefly got defensive with a "it takes as long as it takes" type attitude and I told him that when he is taking breaks and avoiding doing it and leaving it half undone after half a day that isn't *as long as it takes* it is just procrastination. He agreed but not exactly wholeheartedly. He agrees also that he should have done my parents first and promises he will do that in the future.
As far as answering questions: My husband was hoping against hope for the deal because one of my big concerns about moving to this home (which we both absolutely love) is that my husband is so much of a procrastinator about the yard work & this yard was going to take more work than our previous home. With the deal with my dad he actually has LESS yardwork to do with at least a double amount of land. I was almost at the point of turning the house down (offered to us at a great deal by a family member) because I could see yard issues stretching out before me like a runway, but he insisted it would be no issue at all esp with the deal he made with my dad. He was happy with the deal, but that doesn't seem to get him out there doing his part promptly when it is time. He has actually convinced me into two seperate rolling weedeaters to make this job easier with the agreement that he'd take care of the yard promptly, so in my opinion he really just has to live up to his part of the three seperate deals that he made at this point.
Neither of us like yard work, and I am the only other choice for a person to do our yard work, so he should kiss the ground my dad walks on that he doesn't have to mow it all too. There is no way I am taking on one more thing around the house and I see absolutely no reason to even consider trying to hire it out especially since I know of no one in our area that does this and there is too little work with the weedeating to get a good deal if anyone had to travel any distance to do it.
He doesn't exactly work himself to death around the house if you know what I mean. He helps more than most husbands, esp those with ADD, but that was always our deal since we spend a similar amount of time outside the home daily.
I can see that he might like it broken down into parts, but what happens in reality is that he waits 2-3 weeks to even get started, then he spends three times as long as it takes *doing* and in this case it is only done half way, then he has to go out and finish it which won't be until the weekend when he has a some time. All completely ridiculous when he could have finished it easily in the amount of time he had available on Monday. I don't care how he breaks it down over the course of one period of getting it done but there is simply not enough to do to justify dragging it out like this.
Oh and unfortunately threatening to buy new does no good at all to my spouse. He doesn't make the mental jump between if we have to buy (or rebuy) THIS then that means you can't buy THAT because the money is gone, so in his mind he'd be thrilled at the idea of buying all new tools every year or so.
Hopefully he will stick to what he agrees to this time, but he needs a better way to keep track of his agreements. Which I will be bringing up at the next family meeting and he will hopefully not be getting defensive. At this point I am just hoping he'll get to the yard over the weekend since he seemed to have picked up a bit of a stomach bug and he's spent all the time he hasn't been working over the last 2 days in bed :(
good for you!
Submitted by arwen on
Good for you for staying calm, Aspen! Now, set up a tracking chart or spreadsheet or checklist or whatever with him, and get him to use that kitchen timer I love so much (or whatever else will keep his nose closer to the grindstone).
You mention your spouse was sick around the time of the work period. I don't know about your situation, but I find my ADHD spouse's brain is more dysfunctional when he's sick than when he's well. It's not just a case of not feeling well so not feeling up to doing things (although there certainly is some of that!) -- his brain really gets pretty sludgy when he's sick. I've seen my husband struggle with tasks that are usually easy for him, or that he enjoys, when he is sick, because his brain is running like "molasses running uphill in winter", as my grandad used to say. Not to excuse your spouse, but this might have been a complicating factor that he doesn't even realize.
I must say I totally agree with your take on this whole episode, I think you've got your head wrapped around the right ideas here. You go, girl!
"It matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be." Albus Dumbledore
Thanks!
Submitted by Aspen on
When my husband is sick, he generally goes to bed and stays there as long as possible. Fortunately for us he does not get sick often & he almost never misses work due to sickness. I felt so bad for him last night because he just sounded terrible...and looked terrible when he got home.
He had a stomach bug hit him like a truck on Wednesday and it could have been that he was starting to get sick on the work day which was Monday, but until Wednesday evening he didn't have any symptoms. You could be right that he was starting to have somethng, though, because he has really been trying to sleep more than normal even when he got a decent night's sleep.