Husband with ADHD support

[ADHDPartner]

Hi,

My husband was diagnosed with ADHD after a mental breakdown 2 years ago. He went to therapy and counselling until a few month ago because he felt it wasn't working. I thought things were getting better.

He is spiralling again, and I don't know what to do.

He remembers conversations much different then I do, forgets many things I told him, is constantly irritated with me and our children, questioning my every move (why did you use that, i would have done it this way, asking me questions where the answers are quite clear (I forgot to close the fridge and am sitting on the couch and he asks me if he can close it for example)

I try to just deal with it an not "call him out" on these things. When I do call him out I'm always told its not the right moment and he's in a "state". and we can discuss later.. but later is also not the right time

but its becoming too much and i'm starting to snap at him every time he does these things.

Do you have any suggestions? Support groups I can join to help me manage?

[CountryCelery]

I’m so sorry you’re going through all that.

This is sounding eerily familiar. I had a mental breakdown in January. I had already been building up to a crisis point, but multiple events caused me to finally break. The death of a beloved pet, losing my job, and then separating from my partner of 21 years – all that happened within ten days, followed immediately by a cross-country move.

I became my best friend’s full-time “job” for nearly three months as she helped me across the country, and then she helped me find new health insurance, a new place to live, and a mental health team. She even gave me freelance work to keep my mind engaged as I went through the worst of my mental health crisis. In a way, we became temporary spouses during those first few months.

What you describe as your husband’s behavior is nearly identical to my experience. I remembered conversations differently than my friend did, my memory was virtually non-existent, and I was constantly angry with her. There were even different parts of me that surfaced depending on the situation. Things got so bad that my friend and I wondered if I had developed DID or possible early-onset dementia.

We’re still waiting for neuro-psych test results to determine what, exactly, is going on with my brain and what additional tests we may need to run. What we know for sure is that I have severe ADHD (diagnosed in March of this year) and depression. I’ve also discovered that I have a LOT of unprocessed childhood and adolescent trauma that I kept stuffed down for most of my life. That trauma started unpacking itself after the losses I experienced in January.

I’m learning that unprocessed trauma can exacerbate ADHD symptoms and affect nearly every aspect of one’s mental health. I’m not a doctor, so I can’t offer any diagnoses, but it sounds like there might be more going on that is affecting your husband’s mental health.

Unfortunately, the outward manifestations of a mental health crisis impact everyone in the sufferer’s orbit. While you can’t force your husband to get help if he doesn’t want it, you can get support for yourself. In the U.S., one of the more well-known family support organizations is NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness). A quick Google search shows they have a sister organization in Canada (NAMI Family-to-Family Programs, Ontario - f2fontario.ca). Perhaps you can start with them.

I don’t know if that’s helpful, but I sure hope you’re able to find the resources to make it through. Holding space for a positive outcome...

[ADHDPartner in reply to CountryCelery]

Hi CountryCelery,

Thank you for your reply. It helps to know I'm not alone. its so hard to manage it and I don't want it to ruin my 10 year marriage.

Thanks for the link.

[CountryCelery in reply to ADHDPartner]

You are very welcome. As somebody who is experiencing what your husband is experiencing I completely understand where you’re coming from. I have been a witness to the damage I caused to my relationship with my best friend and it has horrified me.

I think you’re absolutely on the right track by seeking to get help for yourself. There’s an old Chinese proverb that says you can’t draw water from an empty well. Care for yourself first, then you are in a position to help your husband and to guide him to get the professional help he needs.

[STEM_Dad]

Like your husband, I got my ADHD diagnosis after going through a strenuous period in my life. (I don't refer to it as a mental breakdown, but it could be called that. I actually had a few emotional breakdowns over a few years, most due to work issues, and later due to marriage issues.)

My own ADHD diagnosis came from finally going to counseling for persistent anxiety that stayed with me after I finally left the job and the boss that caused me a few breakdowns. (I'd finally moved onto a better job, but my anxiety didn't go away, as I expected it to.)

• At that point, I had suspected for a few years that I have ADHD, and thanks the my counselor at the time, I finally got diagnosed.

{I was diagnosed in 2020 at age 45. My wife wasn't initially accepting of my ADHD diagnosis, plus we had other serious marital issues at the time. We divorced in early 2022, after almost 21 years of marriage.}

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First thing's first, I commend you on the fact that you are making the effort...for yourself as the spouse of someone with ADHD, for your husband, and for your marriage.

I understand that a mental breakdown is a form of trauma response. Trauma can be very difficult to overcome, often requiring more than one round of therapy. (I had to go through a few rounds of counseling in recent years.)

My treatment for ADHD has been responsible for at least half the recovery & improvement that I've made in the last 3 years since my ADHD diagnosis.

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When I was trying to save my marriage from ending, I delved into a lot of good relationship information. It was too late to save my marriage, but it might help yours. I suggest that you look into:

• the "Boundaries" books, by Henry Cloud and John Townsend (especially "Boundaries in Marriage")

• Anything by Dr. John Gottman and the Gottman Institute (over 40 years of research on marriage and relationships); including concepts such as "Turning towards, Turning away, and Turning against", "the 'magic' marriage ratio" (5 positive statements for every negative one), etc.

• The PIES (Physical, Emotional, Intellectual, and Spiritual areas of attraction) concept by father-daughter duo of relationship experts, Dr. Joe Beam and Kimberly Beam-Holmes (Founder and CEO of Marriage Helper International, respectively).

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For support, I can only give firsthand recommendations for the CHADD forums on this site and the HowToADHD Discord channel (which requires at least a one-time Patreon member payment to get access to).

A Google search yields a bunch, but I'm sure that several of them require payment of some sort to join.

But I do know that CHADD and other ADHD support organizations have information about support groups.

chadd.org/attention-article...

• I think these are no-cost to join, but I'm not certain.

add.org/adhd-support-groups/

• These require a paid subscription to have access.

[STEM_Dad in reply to STEM_Dad]

ADHDPartner , as for your husband, he has to get to a point where he's going to put in the work to make changes in himself.

I embraced my ADHD as soon as I had the diagnosis. I've improved in many ways. (Medication helps a lot, but so does learning about ADHD, getting some coaching, developing coping mechanisms, and improving my executive functioning skills in ways that I can.)

...I still struggle with a lot, so I've got to have patience with myself. But I've still come a long way in a relatively short time. I'm sure that your husband can, too.

He probably needs to know that you love and accept him for who he is, but also be intentional about noticing things that he does to try to improve himself. But don't be a doormat...set clear boundaries for yourself.

-----

Oh, and having beneficial, supportive relationships with friends and family. Aside from a support group, your own personal support group is the people who know and love you.

[Emsil21]

I don’t know where you are based, but in the U.K. you can request couples therapy, sometimes it takes a 3rd person to point out things before someone will address situations, but if a councillor can re iterate conversations that have been had he then might be more will to accept that you are not ‘lying’ when you say things are different to his perception, he is very lucky to have you, I’m the one with adhd but my husband has a lot more detrimental mental health and I’m constantly trying to help and support him, he never asks I willing go out of my way to help find the solutions but it has caused me to become quite resentful in ways - the reason I’m mentioning this is be aware of your own mental health when trying to help (ultimately we can’t help people who don’t want to be helped) good luck and I hope you get some help - I wonder if videos on line of people talking about their adhd might be a quick easy way to get the ball rolling without freaking him out x

[STEM_Dad in reply to Emsil21]

A video that's a good conversation starter is "ADD & Loving it?!"youtu.be/N49trzkqdTo(Not working as expected?)

(It's a bit longer and over a decade old, but it is a well-rounded production.)