I have been married for 15 years to an ADD husband. He is medicated, we have been in counseling, not currently, but the counselor is kind of on "stand by"--we see her as needed. Most of the time we do okay, but man the lying thing--WHAT IS THAT?!?! Our whole married life, hubby lies about small stupid things. He has always been terrible with money to the point that I took him off our accounts because he overdrew then, gave the debit card to a friend, etc., so he has his own account with a small amount of spending/gas money in it. Guess what? He overdrew that and there is no savings account attached to it to protect that overdrawn amount. He got that letter about a month ago and has done nothing about it. So along with him being bad with money, I typically give him money for gas each week and whatever else he might need. For example, he plays softball on Saturdays and if the guys on the team are going for lunch or a beer after, I'll give him 20 bucks so he can go. Well, last night I go to put some laundry away in his top drawer and lo and behold there are $400 worth of Visa gift cards in there with various balances written on them. I assume they are gifts from suppliers at his job (that's not uncommon--he gets a ton at Christmas). Two were for $100 and one was for $200. The smaller ones had balances written on them of 30 or 40 bucks, the larger one still had a balance of $120. WHAT???? Why in the world am I giving him money for gas, etc., when he's walking around with $400??? He didn't tell me he had them and my guess is he is just pissing them away on small stupid stuff. That bothers me a great deal. I don't think he should hand them over to me, but how about saying I got these cards, that should take care of my gas for a while. Also, he will need some new clothes for work in the fall and he would like a new iPod--$400 would go a long way to paying for those things. Did I mention that he had three hospital stays and a major surgery in February that we are still paying on??? Or that our youngest son needs a surgery later this summer? Or that our youngest also just had $3000 worth of testing that told us he too has ADHD and ODD, possibly Asperger's??? What is my husband doing with that money????? Why am I continuing to give him money when he has way more than I run around with on any given day??? Where has the rest of that money gone? We have been down this road so many times I can't even tell you. He lies about money without a thought. I realize it sounds like he is pretty hen pecked that I hand out his "allowance" but what am I supposed to do when he is so careless with our money? He will think I was snooping if I bring this up. What do I do? We were doing pretty well, which always makes me nervous. I start to wonder what's going on.
thanks
dana in chicago
This sounds like money
Submitted by Miss Behaven on
This sounds like money management is your main issues here, a common struggle for ADDers.
Hubby and adore a TV show here in Canada called Till Debt Do Us Part. She teaches you how to track money, use cash only as much as possible (a big one for ADDers) and how to keep money in labeled jars or envelopes to keep track of how much goes where (another ADD friendly strategy). She also advocates automatic bill payments through your account to make sure things get paid on time (this is awesome for ADDers) as well as online banking (another great tool for ADDers)
ADDers don't really learn much they are not actively taught and we don't teach people how to be good with money. Not unless you have very plugged in parents. You hubby could do well with taking a money management class. If you can't afford that right now, try a video series, or get that TV show I mentioned online or on DVD. You shouldn't have to teach him, it will be stressful and hard on your relationship, he needs to learn from an expert.
Why can't you tell him you found the cards in his drawer while sorting laundry? Putting away clothes or getting rid of undies with hole sin them etc? And just talk about it?
With ADD cash is king. Cards make money imaginary toys that never run out.
As to why he might be lying and being secretive there's a few possibilities:
He might be forgetful (as most ADDers are) and honestly forget to make deposits when he is supposed to or forget about the cards for a week at a time. He will also forget exactly how much money he has and where it is and what he is supposed to do with it.
He might be running late a lot (also common for ADDers) and might not make it to the bank on time.
He might be living in the moment and not thinking about the future as he should.
He might secretly like having you dole out small amounts of money each day as it takes the pressure off him to budget.
He might feel that he should have more play money than you'd budget for so he hides those cards.
He might be clueless about money management.
He might be a jerk.
Obviously none of these things are okay. Its time for him to learn to handle money properly.
Yes. I can explain.
Submitted by SheThinksImLazy on
I can explain.
My wife and I are a much more moderate version of your husband and you.
He lies and is secretive to avoid humiliation. To avoid more humiliation, I should say.
He experiences humiliation with every money mistake he makes and recognizes himself.
That humiliation is compounded and intensified when you "discover" the error or omission and point it out along with the litany of expenses above. He is a bad money manager, bad husband, bad parent, and stupid. He knows it. Certainly by now he knows it! This is severe humiliation, but the familiarity of it makes it bearable. He has coping mechanisms. Maybe silence. Maybe "Yes dear." Whatever.
The peak of humiliation, though, goes well beyond this private, familiar shame at home. It is more painful than any schoolyard abuse. The peak of humiliation is beers with the guys. Imagine if the guys found out that this poor man was on a leash so tight he might have $20 in his pocket... but only if he asked his wife for permission ahead of time. You could get the entire bar laughing out loud at that poor sap with that one. That would scar a man for life.
Hope this helps.
- SheThinks...
Out of Focus Man
Submitted by StateOfBeing on
Hello. I have arrived in this forum at my wits' end.
Don't know where to begin. We are a very creative nuclear family. We have recently moved to the country and it, in itself, is glorious, and the best place for us.
I should be happy and relaxed, especially, perhaps, having just returned from a holiday.
I've known this in one way or another for the 18 yrs or so of our relationship, but while on holiday, I realised that something is actually not working in my spouse. It's not right. It was like a veil was lifted, and I didn't rationalise or mediate my observations of it anymore. I didn't look 'compassionately', for a moment, if you like. Didn't just round things out, fill in the gaps, make it right. Bad timing, huh? I was meant to be having 'a wonderful time' (holiday wise). But it was exactly in the context of all our worldly distractions and obligations being absent, without the incredible weight of it all, that I could see how dysfunctional his communication is. Fundamentally. Almost every verbal interaction sent off alarm bells in me. I was in a terribly bad mood on our wonderful holiday. Ha.
As we drove along I would share an observation about landscape, and he would recycle my comment back to me, either exactly with different intonation, or with slightly different words. I'd ask a question and he would say 'yeah' or something - and it was not a yes/no question. Or we'd be in conversation and I'd be waiting for a response and he would not answer. Eventually I'd ask: did you hear what I said? And he'd immediately - immediately - say 'yes, and I was replying, if you'd just give me a chance' but the time that had passed had really suggested that no-one was in the room! I'm not sure if this adequately conveys the sense of things. In other situations, I will ask him a question that seems fairly factual, perhaps to do with tax, like 'do you have the statement for such and such an account?' and he will say something like 'well you don't need that statement' and I'll say, 'I don't understand, I'm doing the tax, and I need the statement, just like we've gathered those statements before, so I can list the expenses' and he'll say 'i never said we needed to list those expenses' and it goes on, when for YEARS we've listed those expenses...NOTE that I'm not even asking him to do the tax anymore, just agree to rummage for a statement that might have ended up in his stuff (quite reasonable to assume). I DO NOT want to do the effing tax - but am in the position of hounding him for things, which is only because he doesn't take responsibility for them in the first place.
Oh, I could go on. But I will sound awful!!! And I don't want to be that person. I really don't.
It all leaves me feeling terribly lonely. There is such a gulf between his internal and external dialogues perhaps? I observed him speaking with others, people from all walks of life, and it was the same; and I'd observe their responses; he'd say something that mirrored their comment and not add anything at all, but he'd try to carry it off with the intonation of it being a witty bam-bam; the other person would laugh, going with the bam-bam cue, and then I was aware of them puzzling, realising that it wasn't witty or funny at all. That is what I know so well. It's like he is trying to get away with things. Somewhere else completely, and has sent his proxy to make a bam-bam comment of some kind to earthlings.
Yes, he has lied. I really think that his heart is good, and I don't doubt his love. Though I'm not sure of the meaning of that love, if we have no idea of who the other is. Yes, he has lied about stupid things. Not the real stuff, but the stupid stuff around it, which makes him look very suspect indeed.
He is dyslexic, and I had always thought that various aspects of this were dyslexia; but then again he is a high achiever in his way, and certainly on the (freelance - always freelance) job very high functioning. I mean, on a corporate level too. Kind of interesting, that. I have wondered if this is a kind of survival instinct...Then again - it's all about pitching, selling...weaving dreams, in the moment.
There is no doubt that he can be brilliant artistically and has a great sense for craft and construction and is quite sensuous and a gorgeous lover. And there have been times over the years in which he's snapped into himself, like he's dysphasia or 'dys' of whatever kind has evaporated and he's been completely present and I've thought - wow! you're here! and I like you! - and it was like he knew that too, and was excited about it - but it has been years between each moment like that.
Oh, I'm sorry for this mish-mash. It's late. I'm feeling particularly lonely this night, and also considering my options. I'm tired, and added to which, we have a teenage daughter who is almost certainly ADHD. I am carrying the consciousness of two eternal children. It is very hard, as I am very creative and have much work of my own to do and am trying to have a career but I end up stuck in the banality associated with maintaining these two people who just scatter their thoughts and energies around. How I would love to be free of it all and think for myself! And have better, more fulfilling conversations, day to day.
I also love them quite regularly and care deeply. But I'm feeling terribly sad and that my life is being wasted.
Goodnight x
Its very hard to love someone
Submitted by Miss Behaven on
Its very hard to love someone you don't communicate with properly. It is lonely to not be able to understand someone else.
As an ADD woman I don't understand anyone else as they all communicate differently than me. I am always lonely. People assume that because my hubby is also ADD that we would automatically communicate brilliantly and while it does seem slightly easier for us than an ADD and nonADD spousal team, it doesn't make it "easy". We went to many years of therapy together and separately to learn how to talk to each other. It was worth it and we are still (and always will be) working on it.
It will take time but you guys can learn how to communicate with each other. Have hope.
BTW: ADDers are not eternal children, we function differently but we are not kids in grown bodies, please do not degrade us by calling us that. We maybe different from you but we still deserve our dignity as human beings. Thank you.
I don't disagree
Submitted by Aspen on
with anything posted here about the value of communication. And I agree that people with AD/HD are not eternal children (well at least that they don't HAVE to be) and that every person, children included, should be treated with dignity. However, I also feel that everyone has to be honest about what their situation is and some people with ADD act very much like children. Irresponsible and demonstrating a severe lack of understanding as to what needs to be done to keep a household going. Many of the women here feel like having an ADD mate adds as much caretaking responsibility as having another child, and if this is their reality I don't see there is anything wrong with saying so.
Clearly this is not true in Miss Behavin's family as it isn't in mine, however we are dealing with people who choose to acknowledge their ADD and learn to deal with it in a productive manner. Calling my husband a child in general would be incorrect....saying he is acting like a child when he is sick would not be incorrect. I don't see that it's wrong or robbing anyone of dignity to state things the way they are. If you have a mate, with or without ADD, who is showing a child's lack of maturity I see nothing wrong at all with calling it that way.
Looking up
Submitted by StateOfBeing on
Thankyou Miss Behavin and Aspen. I really appreciate your considered and empathic responses. I see your point, Miss Behavin, and I do apologise if my reference to 'eternal children' is offensive to you. It is not meant that way and is not a judgement or intended so, really just my personal expression of frustration at the burden of responsibility for practical awareness in my own daily life that I have felt for so long (alone).
I do have some good news today, which is that this morning I spoke with my other half about ADD - as it was really only last night that I realised that this must be precisely what he has! (it was a revelation to me) - and after some initial shock (we had barely had a cup of tea to start the day) he started to understand, really understand, what I was describing, and how full of potential things might be with this awareness...and also, importantly, that neither he nor I were alone with our struggles.
We actually started to get excited about it all. He had always been told of dyslexia growing up but there was no testing for or talk of other conditions such as ADD way back when and I suppose once out of the education system, many people are unlikely to consider diagnosis of such things. Once an adult, an adult, right? Dyslexia never fully explained things with him, and he had always sensed that too. He has carried much low self esteem and fear as he came from an era of left handed children had their left hands tied behind their backs - for being deviant, of course - and were forced to write with their right hands. He had always felt dumb and outcast and this, in combination with, I think at least, (adoptive) parents who must have been well intended but were not informed and not healthy communicators themselves and...well...
He has spent the day moving between ADD internet research and working in the garden...
We are thinking that it would be very helpful for him to seek more information and support and also to have some formal testing. I think we'd be open to the idea of medication too, in conjunction with cognitive and behavioural approaches, even if the medication is just for certain patches, to enable him to focus and learn from that focus, then take that learning into non-medicated life increasingly. Is that how it works? Forgive my ignorance, it's a case of early days...
With regard to our daughter, I am very clear about her ADHD status, but see no need to have a diagnosis, at least not at this stage. I'm wary of that, and perhaps because, thank goodness, in moving to the country, we've found a brilliant alternative school who are very arts focused and able to work with her attention issues as they are, and she is thriving, albeit still highly distractible which does slow her progress academically. In any case, academic achievement is not really our main concern with her; she is quite clearly brilliant and a unique and delightful human being, and we just want her to be happy and empowered and to enjoy school and people and life.
Thankyou again, for your insight and support.