Recent forum posts (all topics)

  • Don't even know what I want any more by: momto2 12 years 11 months ago

    So I'm new to the site and have been reading many posts and decided I'd finally join and post my story.  My fiance and I have been together for 5 1/2 years.  We have to beautiful children, a girl who's 3 and a boy who's 1.  my DF was recently diagnosed with ADD after I did some research and spoke to him about it.  He's very eager and excited about the possibility of him feeling somewhat "normal" for the first time in his life.  He's always said he feels he's just wired differently. 

    Anyway, our relationship started out great just like most others on this site.  In the beginning, we felt this strong connection and he treated me like no one had ever treated me before.  We moved in together and then moved two hours away to another state for a new job he had been offered.  A few months later I became pregnant of my daughter and from then on it's basically been a roller coaster.  When we moved initially I didn't have a job yet so I spent my days cleaning and keeping up with the home, the house was basically spotless.  He loved that because he was raised with a very very clean almost OCD mother and sister and was in the military.  Once I started working, I was working 10-12 hour days and came home to make dinner and do dishes.  We traveled back to see our family almost every weekend so I had very little time to clean as much as he wanted me to.  The fights about the cleanliness were a constant, but he never offered to help.  He would leave to our hometown and would leave me at the apartment without a car to get anywhere and sometimes with barely any food in the fridge, until he decided to get back, until HE was over being mad.  During my pregnancy I got sick with the flu and was basically in bed, he left me once again for a couple of days.  When i felt better we got into a huge fight about it and he hit me because i told him that he wasn't taking care of me or our unborn child.  Then he told me that he hit me because i deserved it.  I left, and after him apologizing and begging and telling me that he would do whatever he needed to control his temper and rage I came back. 

    Things got better for a little while but the fights kept coming up about every little thing, my hair in the drain, a dirty spot on the floor, basically anything that he could nitpick about.  He called me names and cursed at me almost every time we fought.  I got pregnant with my son and that pregnancy was basically hell as well.  He's never hit me again but the verbal abuse has never stopped.  I've told him time and time again that I will not tolerate the abusive behavior and it hasn't made a difference.  He denies that he is abusive and says that he thinks it is OK to call someone a name if he believes that it is what they are, or how they're acting at the moment.  He says that i'm not accountable for the things that I do and that he does all of these things because of me.  I once asked him if he would want a man to treat our daughter the way he treats me and he told me that, that would not happen to our daughter because he will make sure that she does not turn out to be like me.  

    He is HORRIBLE with handling money.  I taught myself to make cakes when my daughter was born and have become a successful cake decorator.  I literally bust my butt making cakes while staying home with two children and doing all of the chores and handling our bills and finances so that I can always have that little extra cash at hand for when he decides to make bad decisions with his money.  I love what I do but it gets very difficult to do the detailed work that I do while maintaining our home and taking care of our children 24/7 with no help from him or family.  He travels a whole lot for his job so I think that has actually helped.  I actually look forward to his trips because it is when I feel most at peace.  One of our recent fights was about me leaving a couple of pants on my desk chair and the chair was a little dirty since my son had put some yogurt on it.  He basically called me a pig and a slob and said that my lack of hygiene is destroying are relationship.  I told him that since i cook, clean, do dishes, laundry etc etc.  why couldn't he just clean the chair if it bothered him, he said why should he, he's the one working.  So yesterday, in the middle of yet another fight,  I told him that I feel that his ADD, which has been diagnosed, and he's being treated for, is the cause of most of our problems..he blew a gasket and told me that it was the most hurtful thing I've ever said and to go F---- myself and that it was over.   

    He is a great father, he really is and I'd love to keep my family together I just know that I can't tolerate the abuse for myself or for my kids and can't help but feeling that maybe this is what I needed because I might not have had the strength to end this myself. ...thank u for reading

  • You have got to be kidding me! by: How Long will t... 12 years 11 months ago

    I feel like I live on a roller coaster. Some days it's fun other days it's just pure exhausting... for no REAL reason. My ADHD husband works six days a week, so you would think that the one day we both have off together you would try extra hard to have a nice day and enjoy each others company. But more times that not Sunday mornings seem to always start off on the wrong foot. This morning he was watching TV and I was riding the stationary bike. He looks over at me and says that's why the house smells. I said what do you mean (I didn't know the house smelled). He goes that bike, it makes the house smell when you use it. I said why? He said the brakes. I laughed- I thought he was trying to make a joke (He jokes with everyone else). Off he went saying I never believe anything he says. When I tried to explain that I thought he was making a joke because obviously there are no brakes on a stationary bike he very carefully explained that there are brake pads that make the tension. So then I asked what it smelled like as I couldn't smell anything. And off he went again. I just don't understand how something that is a simple question can make someone so mad. Needless to say we spent the day doing our own thing. I had a joyous day at the beach, (which he will never go to with me). This is just an example of how a typical fight starts.... and I am always so bewildered over the explosiveness over nothing.  We have been married 16 years and I can go so long where I excuse it, but it seems the more I excuse it the more it happens, maybe because he thinks he can get away with it. Then after several episodes in a short period of time I'll just stop talking to him.  I think it wakes him up and then he is good for awhile. It is so frustrating.  I mean once he called me a very nasty C word because I questioned him about a pizza place he went too. He thought I was calling him a liar when in fact I was just trying to figure out which pizza place out of the 300 in our area he had gone too. It's crazy and I truly think it affects my health.  I went to a reflexologist recently and she said you are very stressed.  The only thing that stresses me is HIM!

  • 5HTP by: needsalifeline 12 years 11 months ago

    Just a short question...has anyone tried this and with what results?

     

    Thanks!

  • I feel so hopeless. So useless. So...damaged. by: leopardprints67 12 years 11 months ago

    I first have to say how grateful I am for this forum. I've been reading and reading  but hadn't joined. But I have no where else to vent or ask for help. I don't have many friends and the ones who understood what I am going through, I've had to stop talking to because of trust issues with my husband and I. So I'm coming here, hoping for help. Hoping for any tidbit that will make me not drive my husband and family nuts.

    I was diagnosed with ADD/ADHD back when I was 19. I'm 44 now. I've tried Adderall, Strattera, you name it. I've tried it. None of it seems to help, although I'm on Wellbutrin 300 mg a day now. It's all my public assistance will cover for ADHD since I can't afford the copays and whatnot with the crap insurance I get from my job.

    I'm in counseling now, primarily for the sexual abuse that I've suffered for the majority of my life,  but that's a recent thing. I'm a mess. It seems the harder I try, the more I fail. My husband is drained. Mentally, physically and emotionally it seems, too.

    He's a good man. And he does try to understand, I think. But he keeps losing patience with me. Just when I think I'm finally doing it, that I'm on top of things,  making him proud and not disgusted with me, I find out, yeah I'm doing great at one thing and severely screwing up another.  I try to write notes to myself, but I forget where I put them half the time in my struggle to stay on top of things. He's disabled physically (something he blames me and my kids for at least in part) and I try to keep up on all the housework, work a full time job I'm fighting for success at, take care of the kids and stepkids, work on my art business.  I'm incredibly overwhelmed! Every day from the second I wake up to the time I go to bed, I'm struggling just to get through the day. Every day is an internal battle to just remember, remember, remember. And no one seems to understand what I'm going through. My whole life I've been called an airhead, scattered, immature, stupid, a mess, a ditz...I could go on and on. There are days I just wish I were dead and gone and then, I wouldn't be such a burden and a failure anymore. 

    My husband feels like he has to take over the adult role in our relationship and take care of me. And he's disabled and wants someone to take care of HIM the way he's been fighting to take care of everyone else his whole life.  And I try. I truly do. To the point that I'm a freaking nervous wreck. I'm just disgusted with myself because I feel I'm just not  the woman he needs me to be and may never be.

    Last night he tells me that he's happy and calm until I come home. Then, apparently, my nervous energy annoys him and stresses him out. I work 3 to 11:30  pm and after a stressful day at work, it takes me a bit of time to calm down and relax. If I were working a regular day job, I could just throw myself into the after work schedule of cooking, cleaning, family. But at night, the kids are asleep, it's too late to do housework and it's just the two of us.  I just don't understand. Why am I so unacceptable? Why am I such a a mess despite trying so hard to NOT be one? I try so hard. So, so hard. I can't tell you the books and articles I've read, trying to understand my condition. All the tips and tricks where  I've tried to stay organized and failed. My husband is frustrated. He's SUPER organized. He's a clean freak. He's always neat and tidy. He wants to know why can't I be, too? Why can't I be more like him or just try harder or why can't I just calm down? Why can't I just sit down and relax? Why can't I remember simple tasks, why can't I stay organized? It's all I feel like I hear anymore. Sometimes it's so overwhelming that I just ask him to please, please tell me ONE nice thing about myself so I don't feel like a complete and utter failure. 

    Don't get me wrong. My husband is very supportive, but he's as frustrated as I am. He's tells me when I say one negative thing about myself, I should find 10 positive things. But I can't find anything positive about me. Not when I feel like such a loser that can't do anything right. I'm very hypersensitive anymore to criticism. I feel constantly attacked and "unacceptable".  Not just by him, but by my job, my family. Myself.

    Basically, I'm at the end of my rope and begging for any help I can get. 

  • It Just Bothers Me by: summerwine 12 years 11 months ago

    This probably won't win me any popularity contest but it really bothers me how people describes people with ADHD as children and babies and not adults. We have a disability but we are adults. It hurts, it bugs me. It's bigoted. I know it comes from a place of pain but I don't like it at all. It's demeaning and disrespectful. If someone had a physical disability and needed help would it be okay to call them a manchild? One lady here has bad knees and needs extra help and can't do some things. Can I call her a little girl? It's just wrong and I don't like it. How can you expect someone to want to love you and be married to you and make themselves better if that's the sort of names you call them? It's abusive. Plain and simple. If I treated the kids at my work, at the special needs daycare with that attitude I'd get fired. If my boyfriend ever called me a grown baby or something I'd break up with him. It's not okay. It's just not.

     

    /vent

  • how to explain that ADD is not just "I have that too sometimes" by: ghanADDer 12 years 11 months ago

    How do you guys deal with people "comparing" themselves to your ADD?  Does it mean they think they have ADD too, that everyone has ADD in some way, or that they don't think my ADD is a big problem because hey, they are dealing with "the same" problem without any medication?  I hear all the time that "Everyone can't focus sometimes."  YES, BUT!  

    So, what *is* the difference between my procrastination and any college student who pulls all-nighters before every major assignment?  How do we explain that yes, we *do* have it worse than average, and yes, meds work for me and I am right to take them, and that I feel my brain function doesn't compare to a "normal" person's unless I have those meds in my system?  That yes, I am different from someone who "just can't pay attention" at work?

    Yesterday I "outed" myself to a coworker.  I described lack of impulse control as one major symptom.  I said ADD runs in my family and told her how my grandfather can't control his impulses to save everything that he finds interesting - how he says he might read that section of today's newspaper again some day.  He's 84 and has a spare bedroom and a basement piled floor-to-ceiling with stacks.  

    My coworker started talking about how her family also had hoarders and how her aunt can't sit on her own couch any more because it's covered with stuff.  Well, sure, there's even a TV show about hoarders, but that isn't the point I'm making.  Does she think her aunt has ADD too?  Or what?

    Is it just an urge to compare yourself, to tell similar stories, to make conversation?  Or is it somehow lessening the importance of my different brain chemistry?  Every time I hear "Oh, I/my mom/my brother/my cousin does that too," my first reaction is "You're trying to say I'm not legitimate.  You're saying, we all have that problem and how come I should get help for it when you have it too and have done fine?  I'm not worse off than any average person and ADD seems like something everyone has." 

    I was diagnosed when I was nine years old and have been taking Ritalin since then - and it's worked.  I've made good.  I earned a master's degree from a respected university and am holding down a successful job, living as an expat in Ghana, with a loving (though often impatient!) boyfriend.  I'm sure Ritalin would help anyone concentrate... and I'm just as sure I wouldn't have gotten this far without it.  So how do I justify that I'm, well, more different?  How do I explain the difference between garden-variety "can't focus on a paper" and my own worst days, when I can't even focus my eyes on the person I'm talking to two feet in front of me without immense effort?  And no, friend, making lists doesn't always work, because I can't always hold myself to my own commitments.  And no, I can't "just tell myself not to buy it."  And yes, I get that you were "hyper" as a kid and exercise can help with that in everyone.  But please believe me that you AREN'T "just the same," and that on a normal day you are able to TELL yourself to focus and then like magic you do it, while me, the muggle, posts in forums rather than doing work because the idea of making this post is magnetically drawing me back, no matter how often I close the window or start other work-related tasks.  

     

    So how do you guys go about telling people that it's more than "we all have that sometimes, just yours is a little worse"???  Do you have any particular argument(s) or examples or metaphors you've found very convincing to help people get it?

  • Is this what I can expect from now on? by: kage007 12 years 11 months ago

    I started dating a man about 3 months ago. It was the craziest most fun and exciting courtship of my entire life.

    We just moved in together two weeks ago and suddenly everything has changed. He will tell me he's on his way home from work and not get home until 3 hours later. If I call and see what the hold up is he gets frustrated and tells me that I'm needy and selfish of his time. One morning I went to give him a hug on his way out the door and he flipped out and said I was trying to hold him back from what he needed to do. He later apologized and said he was just "on a mission".

    This all came to a boiling point this weekend and I told him that it felt like he was trying to clue me in that he wants to break up with me. Through all this arguing he has maintained that he still loves me and is treating me exactly the same and doesn't understand where my feelings are coming from. I went for a drive to clear my head and his mother called me because he had called her and she wanted to try and help me understand what was going on with him. She told me that he was diagnosed with ADHD as a child and that the way he is behaving is normal for someone with ADHD. Having done some reading on it now it all seems to fit perfectly.

    I take solace in the fact that his feelings for me haven't changed, but at the same time I don't want to be treated like this for the rest of my life. Will there be highs again? Will his attention and focus return to me from time to time or can I expect to be an after thought and seemingly taken for granted for the duration of our relationship?

    I'm a bit of a loner and don't mind spending time by myself, sometimes I even crave it. But I also don't want to be alone all the time, which is kind of how it has become. He comes home whenever he feels like and that mostly only includes the sleeping hours. He no longer includes me in his activities like fishing or random things that he insists must be done right now. He makes a new friend (always men) every week or so and that person becomes a pet project to him until he finds someone new.

    I brought up seeing a doctor last night and he said he would do anything for me but that he hated being medicated. I don't want to push him to change his personality I just want a bit of what we had in the beginning.

    Any insight or advice would be greatly appreciated.

  • My experience, as a friend of one with ADHD by: confused_friend 12 years 11 months ago

    I joined this forum because my girlfriend has ADHD, and I’m pretty confused about aspects of our experience together.  As we grew close, I have encountered a level of emotional intensity I have never experienced before. Whenever she “acts out”, she attributes it to her ADHD, and expects me to understand all her behavior for it. The problem I have…her behavior has become extremely intense, directed at me negatively, and puts me in a state of fear, worrying how I will offend her next. Whenever these explosive scenes occur, I try to explain to her how her behavior makes me feel, but this only creates more conflict and explosive anger.  Well, I’m simply writing this to try to understand her behavior because I cannot tell what is due to ADHD, and beyond her conscious control, and what is due to her own choices. Here is a brief list of my experiences:

    • Explosive tirades, containing expletives, towards situations whenever I "err."  In one case, I picked her up from school and bought her some sushi as a snack to eat as she drove home. Then she said she was finished, and asked if I wanted what was left?  I said sure…and then she threw the box at me, screaming and swearing that I was a "greedy ****".
    • She picks up on very subtle physical cues, such as slight facial expressions, drumming fingers, or even breathing—as signifying something very negative about my character. It makes no sense to me, and I cannot change her mind about it.
    • Giving me a gift, then accusing me of being a “parasite” and “manipulative” because I accepted it from her.
    • She considers every female friend I have—which I am completely platonic with—as proof I’m cheating on her. Even momentary eye contact with any woman arouses intense feelings of jealousy in her and often, a expletive-laced tirade.
    • She is very possessive of my time, and often expects hours-long conversations during the middle of the day, when I have work to do.
    • She monitors everything I say, down to the minutest detail. When I say something slightly differently, she assumes I am lying, and another tirade begins.

    Well, after number of these tirades, I could no longer “laugh them off”. Trying to be supportive, I would ask her how exactly I offended her, and then I expressed how I felt in the situation. Then, she became this “different person”, and started a non-stop onslaught of my character, using every personal weakness I shared in confidence as a weapon against me. Needless to say, I left her to reclaim my self-respect and peace of mind.  I’m not suggesting this is typical ADHD behavior; I’m just confused, trying to understand.

  • My Psychologist diagnosed my ADHD Husband by: gpresper 12 years 11 months ago

    I'm a newbie but I have learned a wealth of information here and I thank you all for sharing.  My Husband and I who have been together for sixteen years and married for seven, we separated two years ago due to my fine investigative skills and women's intuition. Needless to say he went on a "date" which he still calls a hangout because he said our relationship was over in his eyes.  So I threw him out and six weeks later I found out he was on Match.com and everywhere else actively dating while we were separated.  We continued to be intimate with each other because we felt safe with each other (I don't believe he was having sex because I know his problems with sexual intimacy) and then I found out I was pregnant again.  We had a ten year old  at the time.  He never apologized or asked to come back home but he just kind of moved back in.  Of course I was vulnerable; pregnant and being a single parent for a while I was just desperate to get my family back together and he seemed like he really wanted us to be together.  So all of this hurt and betrayal built up in me and after the baby was born, May 2010, I began drinking heavily again.  But this time it got worse......Although my drinking returned,  I take care of my girls, work full time, working on my second degree and I am trying to launch two businesses and finish my book.   This time women's intuition really hit me hard and I saw all the signs:  increased interest in his body, working out after work every night (never could commit to working out in sixteen years), complaining about how he has no clothes, etc...So I visited the old POF.com and there he was in all his glory.......single and searching for a long term relationship.  He said he didn't care that I had found it and once again the relationship was dead any way.  He said he would live in the house until he could find  a place and do whatever he pleased.  Needless to say, he was kicked out the day before Thanksgiving!  So we're still intimate and he's out there dating (living with mom again) and I'm crying profusely every hour.  So my Doctor gave me a referral to work on my own issues which I won't get into but that is the book I'm working on.  So I visited my divorce attorney last week and Psychologist yesterday and we're going over my life and we get to the present.  I told her I think he's going through a mid-life crisis and she says no he has ADHD and she asked me lots of questions and I was like Eureka.  I know I need to let him go because he has no boundaries and cannot finish a project around the house to save his life. He blames me for everything and as of late started calling me a drunk every night and constantly tells me I am the cause of him resorting to dating sites and the failure of our marriage.  He says I am the selfish one.  What do you do with this?  Can I ever expect him to set and abide by boundaries? It seems he wants his family but also his other life and I just can't do this to myself anymore.  I believe in marriage and I took an oath before God, but infidelity I just cannot get through again, whether sexual or not. Again, I am working on my issues and praying a lot and I guess I have a tiny glimmer of hope that a miracle will happen.......yet I feel it may really be over this time.  But then I find out I was right all these years and he raelly needs help.  Any thoughts or advice?  Thanks!

  • Another lovely day in the neighborhood...NOT by: needsalifeline 12 years 11 months ago

    So my DH decided to not go to class today because he was too tired, but he was online about 20 minutes after I left the house....yeah he was reallllll tired.  More like he wanted to be on Facebook or talking to his gf more than he wants to pass school.  Not to mention he started an on campus group for the radio and he hasn't shown up for the last two meetings they had (yeah hes the president of the group) because they wont do things his way and hes not seeing this work out the way he wanted.  Or he is having one of the whores from one of the sex dating sites hes on coming over.  Who knows anymore...... 

    Right now we are fighting via email (I'm at work) because he broke his tooth and we have no dental insurance.   He has decided

    • Its my fault we don't have insurance because I switched jobs.
    • Its my fault he cant get the state to pay for his dental work cause we are married and they consider our combined assets which causes us to have to pay $700 before the state will pay anything....funny seeing I only have the house in my name and the truck and 401K (which is the real problem) are his.  He has decided this is one more reason he doesn't want to be married anymore because there are nothing but "disadvantages" to being married.
    • He doesn't see us together in 5 years anyway because we have to many problems so why keep trying.

     

    Yep my day is just going peachy!  I cant wait to get home bitching and fighting and hearing how I have trapped him and made him get married and how much he hates it.  I freakin GIVE UP!!!!!!  I just want to crawl in a hole and never come out!!!!!

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