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Hi, I am new to posting on this site.  I have been reading posts on it for a few months here and there and find, of course, myself and my marriage to a man w/ADHD in all the posts.  We have been married 13 years, and he was "diagnosed" when we sought marital counseling about six years ago.  He never has had formal testing, but the therapist we worked with discerned it through a history and when he suggested meds, my husband agreed to try and we noticed immediate results.  He stopped taking the meds a few months into it, as he was having some side effects.  We moved a while after for a job change, and when he began having similar career issues, he tried taking meds again.  At that time, however, he was also taking meds for high blood pressure, so he never increased the dosage to a truly effective amount.  He has since resigned from his job--after being asked to by his employer--and stopped taking the meds in order to save money--his idea not mine.  This past year has been the hardest of my life, as a lot of his unmanaged ADHD symptoms have reached what, to me, has been a limit I never could have imagined.  After reading several blogs on here about infidelity and nasty financial issues, I am thankful for what has NOT taken place in our life together, but when I discovered some deception around finances in addition to him coming home drunk and unable to care for himself, I insisted we start counseling--after months of saying I think we could benefit from some work and he insisting we could handle things on our own.  So, we have been in counseling together for a while, but it really is more crisis type counseling, as he has not really been addressing ADHD. 

So, like most of us here, I could comment on all of his symptoms that just take away from our marriage and family, but I am at the point of wanting to just make whatever changes I can in my own life to get back to being the person I know myself to be.  I think that is what saddens me almost more than anything about our marriage.  What I thought would be a life enhancing marriage has instead been a life drain.  Dreams of what we could do and be together have not been realized.  I had become someone I do not want to be, someone I would never have imagined myself to be.  We have three wonderful kids, one w/clear ADHD, one w/some impulsive issues but clearly gifted, and our youngest appears to have some very mild autistic spectrum behaviors, though the pediatrician (whom I trust) does not think so--and I agree.  In my role as wife and mom, and because it is how I am wired, I have don a ton of reading around ADHD, nutrition, aspbergers, autisim, OCD, ODD, and while no expert, I feel that some of the changes I have initiated (and I will say my husband is willing to implement them w/me for our kids) for our kids are helping.  Because we homeschool our kids, we have been able to feel good about not medicating our son w/ADHD, but recently, due to some emotional issues and increasing academic challenges, feel that we need to begin that soon. 

Now I find myself at the point of realizing: I am seriously grieving the loss of a marriage and life I wanted but have never had.  I recently began to take a medication for depression and anxiety and feel physically balanced for the first time in a long time.  I had no clue just how out of sorts my body was.  I now feel able to clearly begin to think through how I need to RESPOND to my life, rather than react to my husband.  I have let a lot of things "go" over the last year--the house is a lot messier than I like, but for the sake of avoiding conflict, I have learned to live w/it.  And I will say, I think my family is better off for it.  I am not as on top of the finances as I would like to be.  I have stopped feeling obligated to be at every event my children attend--and since little league baseball is a hyperfocus safe distraction for my husband, there are a ton of baseball games I could attend.  My ADHD son misses me when I am not there, but I think he is seeing me model the reality that no one person can do all things.  I am trying to live without being impacted by the urgency and chaos that my husband's unmanaged ADHD has brought to my life for so many years, but it is hard.  I have a hard time knowing how to do that w/out disconnecting.  We have always enjoyed good conversations w/one another, but in the past year, I simply can't listen to him share his thoughts for hours on end while I need to be sleeping.  I no longer desire to share my heart with him because his distractability (in my estimation) makes it appear that it is just information for him, not anything that he considers or does anything with.  I feel he likes to have the information for informations sake, to feel valued, but not to know me.  I want to be respectful to him, but I no longer have a lot of respect for him--who I thought he was, he doesn't seem to be.  I know it is not because he doesn't WANT to be that person, but rather he is blocked by his ADHD symptoms.  And him not seeking treatment for it is what I probably disrespect the most.  It is treatable, for pete's sake! 

So, I am trying to accept the reality of what is.  Seeking help to manage his ADHD is his process, not mine.  Over the years, I have tried to offer tidbits of information about ADHD, I have asked him to consider medication, I have bluntly said "i think you need to do something about your ADHD" and it really has not helped, at least not in the long term.  I am trying to discern what is important to me and trying to live by that.  Recently, the priorities for me that I am sensing are to: take care of myself physically and spiritually and emotionally  (I am a christian and am finding such an increasing depth in my relationship w/God even though it is still a hard season--and I have been doing individual therapy as well as couples counseling), to take responsibility for my individual relationship w/my kids (I think we have been a bit enmeshed as a family, kind of passively controlled by my husband's ADHD--is that a common thing??), to take charge of my own future potential--with my husband's recent resignation, I am studying for re-licensure in my profession, having left it behind 10 years ago, and to take a look at how my inappropriate handling of appropriate anger and frustration have impacted our marriage and family. 

I will say, though, I don't always want to live in a messy house, or feel like we have to live so tightly because of my husband's financial weaknesses.  I know there will be a time in the future when I will want to again address how we can share or divide responsibilities, it is just right now, I don't believe it will be effective because he is not managing his ADHD and I don't trust that anything he promises will come to pass.  For now, I am trying to use my understanding of the "now or not now" time sense--if I want help with something, I either ask when the help is needed, put off the request until he has the time to help then ask, or ask to schedule within a couple of days or a week at most.  I try to not feel bothered by the fact that he doesn't remember when he has promised something anymore, but rather understand that if he is not treating himeself of course he won't remember, but try to not let that put me off from asking.  That does leave me feeling a bit like the more mature one, as I equate responsibility w/maturity, and thus I don't feel so attracted to who he is as a man.  While I remain committed to our marriage, and do believe that over time he will make some changes, i really do--especially as I get out of his process, I feel the need to accept where we are in the here and now for my own peace, sanity and heath. 

Any thoughts or practical suggestions on how to live w/an ADHD husband who has not fully accepted his diagnosis or at least the need to manage it (and I understand it is more than just medical management) and to accept his pace in the process while trying to live a contented life of my own? 

Thanks! 

Forgive me if this is jumbled, it's really late right now.  My husband posted here before me.  In a nutshell, my husband sought treatment for his ADD after our marriage was in dire straits 6 years ago, was good about getting treatment, but gave it up eventually and slowly stopped his medication all together.  Big surprise, our marriage is in a state of falling apart.  Except I am in much worse shape emotionally than I was before, and I was a wreck then.  I can't stand myself, my relationship with my husband, and had lost all hope of any of it changing until I stumbled on this website.  The day after I read about everything I could here, I had an epic blow up at my husband - again - because he was blaming me for his problems - again.  This sent him searching the internet for direction and, lo and behold, he stumbled onto this website on his own.  It opened his eyes to understanding me and himself.  Honestly, I didn't think that was possible.  It hasn't been until now - 6 years since we last tried to fix our marriage - that I have read something that has spoken so much truth to what both my husband and I have experienced as a couple together.  Melissa Orlov is a heaven sent.  Being married to someone with ADD, or having it yourself is a complicated situation.  It's very easy to see why people give up on relationships of this kind.

The problem I’m finding now is mustering the strength to begin again.  I can’t get myself to reset my gears.  I’m so exhausted from my blow up at my husband a few days ago, my internal compass is failing me, I’m ashamed at how utterly dysfunctional I’ve become, and the stress is so bad that I am feeling it in my entire body.  I need a break from him, but it would devistate the kids.  Yet I truly CAN’T go through the vicious cycle with him again.  I spoke with my husband about these feelings and he is taking the last few pills from the last time he got treatment to help him out until he can get something else from his Dr.  It's Adderall, so it helps in some ways, but he becomes over focused and it's hard for him to break away from what he's doing.

I don’t have any friends to talk to and my family, especially my mother, is so burned out with their own issues that I know if I try to seek support I would be stressing them out further.  I made an appointment with a therapist to work out my stress and find ways to cope in my relationship, but it isn't going to be fore a few more days.  I can't stand that my kids are feeling the stress, too.  My boys, 9, 7, and 4 are acting out and rolling their eyes at me more.  I'm a disappointment and I am surely fighting depression.  I can tell they're thinking, "Emotional and Depressed Mommy can't do anything fun because she's tired or stressed out."  "Don't lose your shoes or Mommy will lose her mind."  "Great, I'm getting the 'don't make me repeat myself lecture', AGAIN."  I'm so cranky that I'm a ticking time bomb around the kids.  Living with me right now is not fun for anyone.  What will become of me if my husband and I have another freak out session?!  I think I might explode into a puff of smoke and cease to exist.

Not sure where this should go... 

My husband (adhd-er) never wants to do anything that involves leaving the house.  I either give up, or I force him to do it and he's moody about it at first before eventually having fun.  I don't ask him to do things that he won't enjoy doing, unless it is an obligation that we cannot get out of (family responsibilities mostly), because i cannot deal with the way he behaves if he's bored, disinterested, etc.  I understand that his behavior when he's bored/disinterested is because of the ADHD, but is his hesitation to do anything outside of our house also a symptom? Recently he's been saying that he thinks it is, and he knows that once he's out somewhere he has fun 95% of the time, but it still has to almost get to the point of an argument before I can get him to go.  He will also agree to do something ahead of time, and then the day of, 10 minutes before we are supposed to leave he will flake out on it.  This has happened in situations from tailgating before a football game to going to my parent's to visit for the weekend.  I hate telling people that he'll be somewhere and then feel like I have to make excuses for him when he's not and I don't have the time to convince him.

So, symptom, or something else?

Thanks!