I crave a quiet simple life. I find I am trying to carve that out for myself within the confines of a chaotic marriage. I rarely do any social things with my DH. I have my few people that I see separately from him. I have my much loved children and grandchildren. I have my furbaby. And I have my daily routines which drive my DH crazy. He wants to run constantly and can't stand the mundane of daily stuff. Isn't that what life is mostly made up of? The daily stuff?

Not sure what I'm trying to say here except I am so very tired and want nothing more than a simple life and not chaos.

Husband is 52, I'm 31. Been together 7 years, married for 4 with a three and a half year old daughter. In the last 6 years husband started a side company that has taken up so much time, caused no end of headaches, two lawsuits, a bad business partner break-up and a bankruptcy. I felt I did most of the parenting alone to be honest, as he was too busy with work (working a lot, but not effectively I've come to realise), and we couldn't afford daycare (I'm English and my family are all in England, Husband's family in Canada, and we live in CA for his work - so no family to help out either). We also had to rent rooms out and use the money to keep the company afloat, meaning I was dealing with extra people in the house when I really just wanted to get to grips with motherhood without an audience. I lost trust in him quite a while ago to be able to pay attention properly when looking after our daughter as many incidents would happen on his watch (often, not bad, but still - they could've been! He's just been lucky). He was diagnosed with ADHD a month ago after I sent him to be tested and put on Adderall but he's not sure it's working great and it has caused some mood swings in the evenings, meaning we're fighting more and he's shouted at our daughter twice (which he was upset about - he's not heartless, just often too impulsive to think before he acts).

I'm really struggling in the relationship. In the last 3 years, I've had three near breakdowns (I've had two before, so I know when one is coming on), anxiety and depression issues, and according to the doc my blood pressure has been too high all last year. I also self-medicated with binge eating, but that's mostly under control now. The problem is, I'm really unhappy, I have been for at least 3 years, but I know I need to give him an adequate period of time to change now that a diagnosed issue has been identified, but I'm just not optimistic about how much change can happen, and I'm no longer attracted to him, nor do I respect and trust him to be able to do the things necessary for the safeguarding of our future without me always having to check on things, organise things, and prompt things along. I hear so much advice about "don't be their parent - let them take responsibility" but the stakes have just been too high! I couldn't "let him do his thing and learn his lesson" when there was potential grave legal consequences at the the end of his impulsive actions. And in many cases the person suffering from him learning his lessons hasn't been him! It's been me or my daughter. I've had to nag to make sure pension and college funds are being contributed to, and a trust set up with updated wills etc. Left to his own devices no provisions would have been made for me and my daughter in the event of his death. I even had to force him to go to the dentist after a 10 year lapse - inevitably, lots needed doing. 

I do want to say he's not a mean person. He never intends to hurt anyone or anything, and he's very quick to apologise when I explain things, but I'm tired of always having to explain things and myself when he's quick to anger or stubbornness. It's like he's missing a common sense chip and i understand now why I've never felt there's an age gap between us.. It comes out in so many things, big and small. Like when he couldn't fit a bed through a door to move it from one room to another, instead of patiently unscrewing the bedhead, he just took an axe to the damn thing! Claiming he'd buy a new bed. I stopped him and unscrewed the thing myself, but it's things like this that make me feel I can't trust him to respond appropriately in situations. My daughter is already a proper handful, so full of energy, and I'm so depleted from the last 5 years, and so much stress, strain, and damage has been done that I just don't know that I can repair it on my side. I'm tired, and I don't want to live the rest of my life like this - in a state of perpetual responsible anxiety. I vowed "In sickness and in health" but his sickness is making me sick too! I don't want to be with someone if I have to go on anxiety/depression meds to be with them (only reason I didn't go on them was due to breastfeeding). I feel selfish saying this, but I can't keep putting everyone else's health and happiness above my own. When my sister reminded me I have as much right to be happy as my husband and daughter do, I broke down and cried. 

I feel like the major stresses: parenthood, lawsuits, and bankruptcy, exposed the uglies in our relationship. I saw a lot of things I never knew were there when I got married to him, and while I care about him I think I'm no longer in love with him. I don't want to be touched. I don't want to be intimate. My health has taken such a beating from running on adrenaline for so long that I'm just spent and I can't keep living like this. Where does one draw the line? How much time do you give? 

So my DH just came barreling into the room telling me we are going to Mexico. No discussion no asking if I'd like to go...A buddy of his is going and my DH would like to go too. I do not want to go anywhere with him at this point. This is a man who screams at me daily. Treats me as if I'm a huge imposition to him but I'm supposed to be thrilled to go on a holiday with him. I do not understand at all.

I've been married for almost 25 years. My husband has never been officially diagnosed. During my first years of marriage, I believed our communication problems were due  to the classic tale of Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus. I tried all the different approaches that this sort of literature suggested. None really seemed to work.  A few years ago, a good friend of mine and child education; suggested that my husband may have ADD. As I began researching and taking workshops (one of my daughters has it) I've come to the realization that my husband also suffers from this. I've talked to my husband about it, and he's in denial. He doesn't accept it, therefore is not pursuing any help; because "that's the way he is".

I can deal with the forgetfulness, lack of help around the house, hiperfocusing, not being able to watch movies together; I've learned and am used to doing this on my own. What I can not get used to is not being listened to. Even my youngest daughter, who is just 6, always yells at him during their playtime "Daaad, you're not listening to me!".

I've tried speaking in "point form". I've tried speaking on one sentence at the time. I've tried pausing when I see he's mentally gone. I've tried the Q&A method. I've tried writing my thoughts (he has a terrible time reading too). 

It's normal for a spouse to want to talk about dreams, feelings, plans, ideas, etc. You want to share with your partner and make him part of you. But he's not there when I talk to him about deep meaningful matters. I can talk about the weather, dinner, kids' school matters, random daily stuff. Since this is not really meaningful, and "complicated", he's able to pay some attention. Usually these exchanges are short, and we can jump from one topic to another. But meaningful things... "couple" things, as soon as I begin talking; he's there for a few seconds and then he's mentally gone. Sometimes he comes back but he's missed so much speech, that he's lost as to what I'm talking about. If we're in bed, and I talk to him, he falls asleep while I'm talking, so I avoid this at all costs.

During a conversation, to be recapping all the time, it's tiresome and frustrating; because then the conversation keeps on getting longer and longer; and I can see how tired and uninterested he is by then. I feel like to his ears I'm the teacher from the Peanuts cartoon. Or like he just cancels me out and focuses on whatever is going on inside his brain. He's physically there, but not mentally; he's lack of attentiveness is so bad, that he can't realize when I'm still talking and just leaves to do whatever his brain told him to do, while I'm still talking!

So, any recommendations as to how I can help him engage in an intimate conversation? How can I just talk to him? I asked him once this question: Please, help me communicate with you, what can I do? His response was "I don't know", "just accept it, that's how I am".

Should I talk in "episodes"? I'm afraid that by the time the next episode comes by, he'd forgotten what the previous episode was about.

Should I just keep my thougths to myself? No meaningful conversations? I guess then our senior years, when there's nothing for him to do, we'll be very bored; since we can't be conversation partners. How sad.

What have you tried that seems to work?