KeepDancingContributor
Stuck
Hi Everyone
Im new to this forum and am grateful to have found it.
I sit here trying to think of ways to explain my story and how to ask for the guidance that I so depserately need. ... My husband of 13 years has depression and with it a strong focus on suicide. He is an alcoholic (he uses alcohol to 'cope' with his darkeness - he is in denial that he has an addiction). I have walked alongside him and tried to care for him for the past 9 years. I am weary.
We separated for 12months as I felt the children and I were unsafe. It seemed to finally trigger some small shuffling steps forward towards a brighter future so I moved back in. He went to detox a few times. His biggest stretch of being sober was 6 weeks. He unfortuantely has no insight into the damage that his illness and subsequent drinking and behaviours have had on me. He could therefore not understand why if he was sober that his 'wife' didnt miraculously return. I have tried to explain to him, that I have un/conconsiously built up a wall to protect myself emotionally. If I didnt, the kids would be left with no one stable. I have tried to explain that I need time to heal. That he needs to be sober and get well for that to begin to happen.
That was 12 months ago. Since moving back, he has continued to shuffle forward and take giant leaps backwards. Its the shuffling forwards that keeps me here. He has had overnight hospital admissions because of suicide threats. He had a 4 day involuntary stay late last year which finally lead to him being on medication. Anti-pyschotic meds have helped keep the suicidology at bay, but he now falls into week long depressions where he just sleeps and drinks. It goes week in, week out. He was hospitalised early this year with pancreatitis because of his drinking. So he now drinks until he gets a few symptoms and then stays sober for a week and then falls back down again.
I have regaular contact with a counsellor. She has helped keep me sane (if you can call where Iam at sane!). But I am lost. My husband is lost. He cant find his way and I am too tired to help anymore. I swing between being angry and resentful that he wont accept the help thats right infront of him, to feeling sorry for him and finding compassion to understand. Im on this continual rollercoaster ride with him. I am emotionally detached in lots of ways, but then I swing back in to feeling guilty that I cant dig deeper to help him. But when I do dig deeper, I just fall down again when he does. When I try to explain to him how I am struggling, it just makes him feel worse. We are stuck.
Some weeks my wall is impenetrable and I am 100% carer and can cope. Other weeks, like this week, I get sucked back into the guilt and the disolusion that if I dig deeper I can encourage him to get help. Then the anger will come because he doesnt meet my expectaions. Then another layer is added to my wall and I will be fortefied again. And it goes on and on and on. I want it to stop, but I do not feel like its time to end our relationship for good. A part of me is hanging on to the hope that if I hang in here long enough, it will work out. Another part of me that hangs on is the one that says I need to stick by his side because he is my husabnd, he is unwell, is is not his fault. And the other part that hangs on is the one that says its better for the kids to be together. My husband is not violent. He is not abusive to the children. He is a great father. He is trying in his shuffling steps to move forward. But keeps hitting a brick wall. It makes it all the harder that he is not a horrible man. I would leave again in a heartbeat if I felt unsafe. But I dont. So I stay on the ride and day in day out, and lose pieces of myself. I am stuck.
Apologies for the long story. But its actually helped me just sitting here putting it all out there.
Thank you for your time. I think you are all amazing and I wish you all the best on your difficult journeys.
