Relationship Issues after partners relapse

Hi @SleepyDad

I read a number of articles a few years ago in relation to marriage and mental health as I had no intention of bailing out on Mr Darcy when he was so unwell. I needed to learn how to handle things better.

I was quite upset when a registrar suggested I review our 30+ year relationship which I understood meant to consider leaving. The stats for marriage until death do us part & MI are the exception rather than the rule (this is not a criticism of anyone, am just being factual) and I know I had to be quite firm with the counselors I saw about my intentions of staying.

Our marriage has survived - we did have some of the mitigating features that are said to make a difference, married pre diagnosis, faith, a willingness for Mr Darcy to stay in treatment and for him to allow me to be part of that. A major component was me learning about MI, appropriate care giving and self care. There is focused family therapy which has been shown to significantly reduce relapse rates.

Even without MI, it is hard but not impossible for relationships to survive affairs, however I believe that firm boundaries would need to be put in place. Trust would need to be earned. Mr Darcy has not cheated on me that I know of (and I told him I don't want to know if he did) nor does he self medicate.

Marriage counseling can help but can at times be problematic when our partners are unwell.

I will tag you in a couple of other threads which might help you.

https://psychcentral.com/lib/when-mental-illness-strikes-tips-for-couples/

@SleepyDad thank you for your bravery in sharing your story. Even as I'm sitting on my own worried about my bipolar partner who has been erupting with anger all day and stormed out of our house, reading your story gave me a level of comfort. Today has been one of those days it's been hard not to take the anger personally and feeling like maybe I'm losing my mind. Somehow sharing the burden takes some stress away so again, I thank you!

Hi @Jay-e , @Former-Member , @Shaz51 and everyone,

Sorry again for the delay in updates. I feel much better when I get a chance to write up my thoughts here. I just don't get the opportunity as often as I like. It help's me putting words down. Something about writing it out and knowing it will be read makes me think it over in different ways then if I were to just bottle it up in my own head.

@Jay-e I think you are allowed to take it personal, it's just how you let it affect your response that matters. I hope it's calmed down for you and things are better between you two now.

Here is my latest brain dump for the last couple weeks:

So we've both been to our follow up appointments seperately as well as our first couple session. Mixed bag of results as you can expect between 3 psychologists all seeing different parts of the puzzle. It's good to have different points of view but troubling when there are contradictions etc.

Holiday season, social/work commitments and the kids have us a bit wired. Went to Mrs.Sleepys xmas work function and that brought about some uncomfortable situations. I was her +1 at her work dinner so straight of the bat I knew I was going to be left out of most of the conversations and probably be put in the corner holding handbag and coats with all the other partners. Keeping that in mind it was still a pleasant evening till Mrs.Sleepy and one of her work friends decide to "crash" another function going on in the same venue. So Mrs.Sleepy and her friend up and leave for 3/4 of an hour with me left to fend for myself. Zero insight from Mrs.S that what she did was less then nice thing to do and an angry silence from her when I bring it up on the way home. This set the tone for the weekend and I was left feeling wrung out for days after.

Big thing I need from Mrs.Sleepy is to feel that she is doing everything possible to stop us going through this again but she just doesn't seem capable of recognising warning signs and even acknowledge bad behaiour.

She talks about taking up new hobbies now that she isn't doing martial arts and she casually talks about taking up a new hobbie with one of the men she works with. This man is our age and is part of her work circle but not someone I know. There was not a single sign from her that she could see me having any concerns with this. Now I hate the idea of controlling who she can and cant talk to but I would have thought she'd at least ask if I was ok with the idea of her hanging out with another man socially.

Recently I looked at some of her computer accounts that she has shared with me and I found out she added and messaged a guy on social media who I suspected she had been having an affair with 5 years ago with her first spate of cheating. He was my brothers housemate but otherwise completely outside our circle, she denied it and we moved on . Now I found these messages(which were quite tame, just comments about the guys photography and maybe puchasing a print) and they were dated a year ago so not super recent but not exactly ancient history. I brought them to her attention and she sees absolutely nothing wrong with the contact. I sat down with her and asked how she thought there could be nothing wrong with sending messages to a man I had confronted her about having an affair with and she tried to argue with me that it was innocent and it was just because she liked his pictures... She has zero interest in photography and even if she did why him of all bloody people.

I feel like her lack of insight is killing our relationships chances, how am I meant to feel safe when she cant own up to such obvious issues even when directly confronted? My psychologist tells me I need to accept that I am going to have to police these things for years if not forever till she figures it out herself.

Still hanging in there,

SleepyDad

@SleepyDad this from your post: "Big thing I need from Mrs.Sleepy is to feel that she is doing everything possible to stop us going through this again but she just doesn't seem capable of recognising warning signs and even acknowledge bad behaiour." I feel like I could have written it myself!!! It's tiring though isn't it?? Feeling like you're the one policing things all the time 😥

Things have calmed down here, though there's the inevitable depressive crash after an episode that we're just wading through at the moment. But we had a lovely date night over the weekend and I guess the small things like that keep me going!

Hey @Jay-e , Yeah it's pretty hard to get a break when you have to be constantly be on the lookout.

Mrs.Sleepy doesnt always seem to have a crash immediately after a high(unless there is obvious fallout from her bahviour) she tends to mellow for a while after and then next time may be a high or a low without any real consistency. Good job on fitting a date night in, so important to still do couple stuff when you can