My husband has ADHD, something that was actually one of the things that made him unique, energetic and fun to be around with especially when you are 20 years old, have unrealistic dreams and love to be overwhelmed and swept of your feet. He was on Ritalin as a child for many years.

But even before marriage there was small warning signs. Irrational, emotional, sarcastic and unfair fights and blow outs that would irrupt out of nowhere and always when we were alone, leaving me numb with pain, just to hear the next moment I am the best person and that he loves me so much. The suttle manipulation was not obvious from the first moment but it became more clear as years past. Most times I was so shocked about, how is it possible that some one can get angry so fast and say such hurtful stuff just to adore you the next moment and tell you that you are the world to him. So much so that I considered the fact that I am perhaps making to much of the anger and arguments and so I ignored what was in front of me, because I really could see the amazing man he really is.

And so we got married, and we have fought ever since. He has been running his own business now for 12 years and we have been together since the first day and married for 10 years of them. We have two little girls, 5 and 2.

I feel terrible for looking backward and being consumed by the past but for the past 2 years I have become so drained that I just cannot stay positive anymore. I just have no proof that the next 10, 20 or 30 years will be any different. I have lost myself and all my energy in this marriage and have cannot be a good wife or mother to my children this way. We have been through emotional and financial roller coasters on a daily ride and somewhere along the line I climbed out.

I worked for him for several years, and then for myself the past 5, I have no steady income, I am 32 years old and totally dependant of him, something that he would also throw in my face when we should argue about money and him buying impulsively stuff we do not need, but I lately realized that his controlling behavior and jealousy has really channeled me in such a way that I am where he wants me to be, close enough to him not to loose me and in fact, he is loosing me. I have given up my own personality, my dreams and goals to understand him and make him feel safe and loved and adored. I always thought that this is the best way to treat him with his condition and that this would be the best thing for our marriage. But in fact I was doing the wrong thing.

Our house is a mess, our finances are a mess and we bankrupt, our emotions are a mess and everything seems uncontrollable. He acts on impulse, buying expensive stuff we cannot afford so much so that I do not even buy anything small for myself because I feel guilty to spend. It seems that he always has to bump his head before he learns, and it feels like he is a child in the house. He even bought a house without viewing the property from the inside. A house he now lost to the bank together with an expensive vechile. Stuff I pleaded with him to reconsider not to buy.

The past was filled with arguments and lies, below the belt fights and name calling and I am disgusted with myself that I even fought back the way I did, then I started to ignore him, which also did not work, and then I started writing down all the things he would say to me during fights so that he can read it the next day to remember, because of his ADHD he has a way of forget what he say during heat full arguments. He was of course shocked and as many times he would promise me the world, tell me how stunning person I am and how ambitions I am, just to say the next day I am useless. But the next day he would confront me for not making any money and contributing to the household when bills arrived – but he forgot the fact that I was working for him, with no salary. I never had a day maternity leave in my life, and would come out of hospital straight back to my home office table in front of the pc because I wanted to keep up with his rapid pace always thinking that was excepted of me because he lacked a empathy with me or with me taking care of two kids.

Before I fell pregnant with our first child, I wrote him a letter saying that I want to divorce him if he does not seek help. The psychiatrist called me in after 2 sessions, explaining to me how his head work, but that there is no excuse for the verbal abuse. She tried to help me cope in situations and I can say that things got slightly better. He was prescribed medication but he stopped using it because it made him feel without energy.

But the arguments came back, even the pinching under the table when no one can see, when he would shake me, or made me cry or break me emotionally before we would visit my family and friends. So much so that I did not want to visit them anymore because the way to there homes was just to draining. Almost like the way to church, or away weekend with the kids.

So I started to adapt to his behavior, and started surrounding me with people and things he felt safe and happy with. Surroundings that would cause less friction or outbursts. We had our first child and I remember many heated fights with the little baby in my arms and him shouting in my face, calling me names, calling my family names. The worse one was the evening before our first girl’s christening, I am clinching her body and he is swearing in my face, and the next day we stood in church and I felt so betrayed and fake when he Christened her. Useless hurtful stuff making me numb with pain and sadness. He would go out and drink with his friend, telling me he is working late, and I would drive around searching for him at night, worried sick, just to be so mad at him when he eventually comes home drunk and fighting with me for being upset. He would change around the whole situation that at the end I don’t know what we are fighting about.

He cannot be at home for a long while then he needs to leave again, always driving somewhere or wanting people around him, but he needs me to give him constant attention, but when I need it sometimes he would easily brush me away, saying not now, or he is not ready for me now. In many ways I feel used.

He is extremely jealous and always wants to know who I am phoning, who I email or sms and who I speak to on a daily basis. When I go out on a Saturday afternoon (which now happens once every 3 months) then he would phone me several times wanting to know when I come home, where I am and what I am doing. We both work from home, we see each other during the day more then any other couple, I never go out without him, and still he is keeping me so boxed in that I am going mad. The kids are my priority, according to him a woman’s job. There was nights that I would sit in the passage, with both kids crying and he upset because I am not in bed with him. When he goes to bed, then he would call me non stop or put of the tv off until I do so as well, I never read anything ever, and books were always my passion, but reading means that I am neglecting him.

I have no friends, because he was jealous when I go out on coffee breaks or anything. We know many people, and everybody loves him, because in fact he is an extremely great guy. He seems social but still when we visit people he would be nervous and fight before we go there. He sometimes make up things that certain people or friends do not like him when I know for a fact they adore him. Nobody know about what we go through or about the mess our lives are in.

I love my husband but not as in the beginning and I am emotionally detached from him. I need to help myself now so that I can be the best mom I can be for my children. I have been thinking of walking away. Many times I would get in my parents car and just want to drive away never to be found.

He knows how I feel these days because I have been talking about divorce. His words of course, if he can’t have me, no one will. I am not looking for another person in my life to be with! I am looking for myself, I need to get back in control of my own thoughts and emotions. I cannot carry him emotionally and encourage and motivate him to be the best he can be, he needs to do that for himself now.

This past few weeks he have been sending me constant text messages about how he loves me and will change etc and this is irritating me extremely. I don’t want any promises, I want out. I want a new beginning. I cannot see my childrens faces anymore when we fitght so bad, We are breaking our little girls hearts.

And so what he feared actually happened. I met a lady friend, and we had an affair. As he said we would. My whole family knows now, I am consumed with guilt and shame, and identity crisis and have to go with sleeping pills to get to the next day. He has been hurt terribly about my behavior and ironically enough he only remember the past year, nothing about the past 9 we have been emotionally struggling. Him almost losing me has opened his eyes and now he is smothering me to repair the damage AND interrogating me on a daily basis about the affair, just to say the next moment but he have forgiven me. He is back on medication, twice daily. Without this I cannot even communicate with him, because he seems anxious and irrational.

And the best of everything is that he is a very very good man and the girls love him so so much! He just has the terrible anger and ADHD disorder that is overshadowing all his good points. This a man that I would have defended with my life a few years back but now cannot anymore, because I am not whole anymore, I am broken, irrational, unsure, unhappy, unsuccessful, uninspired and living only for my 2 little girls.

The most positive thing out of this whole ordeal is that he now has a much better relationship with our daughters.

I have cracked, slowly but surely. I do not even want advice anymore, I just want somebody to say to me, it is okay if you leave him, things will get better, your children will one day understand and not blame me and that I should not feel so guilty for giving up.

It felt like we have fitted in 40 years of marriage in 10 years.

This is my first time ever writing to a forum. This will be a long, long post. It may not even be allowed.
 

I am so grateful for this site. I have been reading for about six months; you cannot know how valuable all of your sharing has been to me. I am writing because I am earnestly seeking sound advice on a situation in my life.
 

Almost two years ago, during the course of my job I met a charming and wonderful man. It turned out we had many shared acquaintances, We had a lot in common, including the fact we were both in AA.  

As time went by his actions to me were those of a man falling in love. He said the most amazing complimentary things to me, gave me hugs, kissed my hand, thanking me for taking care of his mother. These hugs grew warmer and more prolonged, the compliments more tender with each encounter between us. My heart was singing. But I am shy and have been hurt in the past so I guarded my feelings, yet all the time thinking, “This is who I have been waiting all these years for!” I give the appearance of poise and quietness. He would call me the love of his life, say what an incredible person I was (yes, I have read it all here on this site). I am old enough and wise enough to have realized this was a bit overboard, but I knew he was impulsive. However, the oddest thing was that he never actually asked me out. I put this down to the fact that I was at work and he did not want to jeopardize my job. This went on for six months. 

Crisis arose one day and my job was over. As I left that day, he grabbed my arm with what seemed like such love and said “I’ll call you.” Of course he was going to call me! Two weeks went by and I never heard from him. I decided to attend his home group meeting one night to see if I could see him. When I entered, he spotted me from the other side of hall and almost jumped (I mean literally) over chairs to reach me. He grabbed me in the biggest, deepest hug yet, kept kissing each side of my face, kept stroking my face, told me how happy he was that I was there. He put his arm around me and directed me towards people, introducing me to his sponsor, “This is __________ who I told you about!” He introduced me to other people in the group as his really good friend, teased me about my computer knowledge (I do free lance work at home), etc. etc. However, as the evening went by, I was in shock because I saw him treating other women in much the same manner, perhaps not to the extreme as with me. He hugged, stroked and made declarations of love to other women. I sat through that meeting in a fog, the pain was unbelievable. When I went to leave, he pursued me out the door to hug and kiss me again. Had I perhaps overreacted to a little affection on his part to other women? I continued to attend some meetings where he was (I couldn’t seem to help myself) He always seemed to be waiting for me with a look of love on his face, embracing me warmly.
 

Shortly thereafter I began to notice I would always see his car wherever I went. He lives on the other side of our town, yet I would see him in my neighborhood. He always seemed to be popping up at the library/grocery store, etc, places I had never seen him before. I knew he was seriously interested. But he never made a move. I would always catch him looking at me. During the course of AA talks or discussions, he would often bring my name up, or deliberately direct the discussion to me out of sequence, as if he wanted to hear my thoughts or my voice. At EVERY meeting he would always catch me before I left to say goodbye. People would tell me what nice things he had to say about me. I was in emotional turmoil. Why didn’t things move forward? Why didn’t any of our conversations make sense, I would always think afterwards “We never got to the point here, what happened?”
 

I had occasions to call him, he would promise to call back/stop by, but never did. I began to realize he really did not remember promising things. I continued to watch. He was extremely fidgety, could not concentrate, jumped from topic to topic, surprised me with some of his inappropriate/tactless remarks. Yet, he was charming, compassionate to other people, funny, funny, funny, kind and good. And especially, seemed to continue to send signals of caring for me.
 

Fast forward to today. I had begun researching things on the internet (like “love shyness”, “men in love”, etc. etc) it makes me laugh with embarrassment now. But I didn’t know what I didn’t know. I knew nothing about ADHD, with only the layman’s assumption it was a hyperactivity/attention/dyslexic thing. Needless to say, my researching led me to ADHD and all of its ensuing psychological problems and comorbidities, etc. I have literally received an education through all of this. (he has it all, former alcohol/cocaine abuse, OCD, gambling, hyperactivity, impulsivity, self-loathing, anger, car accidents—he is the proverbial poster child). As far as I can tell, he had been diagnosed. He appears to be addressing it. He does take an anti-depressant, exercises religiously, is in counseling, drinks gallons of coffee. Well, the hyperfocus is over, with all of its accompanying pain and hurt that so many of you have described so well on this site. It was like watching the unstoppable tide turn and go out. The only advantage I had over some of you was that I knew through my reading it was going to come. (And I give him credit; I think he has gone through this before and knew it was coming, too, hence the inaction on his part) I never once said “I love you” back to him. I was cautious. I have suffered agonies of self-flagellation over that, perhaps I should have, I just couldn’t ever make up my mind. I have removed myself from him for three months now and can see that I will go on. I don’t even think at this point he even has noticed I am not around. I weep only on occasion now.

Now my problem. Two women who I know in AA have each approached me separately, asking about him (they think he and I were really friends). Sort of little puppies trying to sniff something out. From what they have each told me, they are interpreting his overly demonstrative attentions to them as real love interest on his part. I do not share my experience with them. I do not counsel them. My heart aches for them. I tell them “Oh, that is so-and-so, he’s like that with all the women.” A heart seeking love, especially a newly sober alcoholic woman with her low self-esteem, is extremely vulnerable and wishful. (so is that of the woman now 32 years sober!).
 

Now my question: I have prayerfully written him a letter, sharing my experience with him and suggesting that he moderate his behavior, most particularly his words. He tells these women impulsively that he “loves them madly”, they are “the love of his life” etc. etc. I feel so sad for them. I have couched the letter in the most loving of terms, making sure that I let him know what is so admirable about him, but he should consider carefully what he is actually doing to some women. I know he has a great sense of responsibility to other recovering alcoholics (as do I) and that point is what will mean the most to him. Besides possibly seriously warning these women, do I have the right to bring all of this to his attention, is it even my business, should I mail this letter? I am concerned. I covet you advice and will wait for your input. Thanks to you all for being here.

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

Ok, my first question is, is ADHD a genetically transfered condition?  For instance, my father just got out of prison about a month ago and my mom keeps saying, i just cannot believe how much alike you two are.  Well, we found out that i have adhd about a month or two ago and well, every thing makes since.  Plus every simpton that help guide listed, well, my mom said "baby, that describes you to a tee."  And that's what I thought, well I was like, holy s*** that's me!  And I guess you could look up adhd symtoms and helpguide, well ok it says ahda in child ren but its also for adults: http://helpguide.org/mental/adhd_add_signs_symptoms.htm  Anyways, i have every sympton they list or at least all but one i really cant remember, so where was i oh yeah, now it seems me and my dad are well, if you could occupy two places at once, y'all get it right?  so is it a genetically transferable condition, also my mom's dad (he is my grandpa I just needed to clarify)  also, my grandpa told me that he had a brother that was just like me.  So it would seem that i got a few realatives here and there that have it, and we're talkin blood relatives.  Ok so agin, is it genetic?

Second:  my mom and dad had there first fight since he got out.  Well, from what i gathered from listening to my dad talk, and like me, or should I say like him, well at any rate we both talk and talk and talk, etc.  Now i was sitting there patiently listening to him, i listened to mom's side and well I knew exactly what he was doing and i was trying to explain it to my mom that since i'm him, i guess when someone talks the way she did, she got mad and told him well why don't you go to sleep then, and he said fine so anyways, i tryed to tell her, look, he just doesn't wanna talk right now you gotta give him time to cool.  so any advice.

ok third question:  I seem to have trouble with relationships myself, and well, I guess its because of my inherited adhd, any thoughts or advice?