# Separation/Possible Mental Illness



## littlefroggie1 (Jan 25, 2011)

I’ve been married for 5 years and have a 17 month old son. My husband was laid off the month after my son was born. I was out on leave for two months before I went back to work and my husband stayed home to watch our son. He had always been a heavy drinker (I was too when we first met), but prior to and directly after my son was born he started mixing drinking with muscle relaxers and pain killers (prescribed) and would sometimes be up all night long to get 3 or 4 hours of sleep and then get up to watch the baby. I tried to put my foot down about taking the medication (he would be slurring his speech without ever touching a drink) but he started to feel like I was “against” him and not supportive of the fact he had legitimate pain and there was a medical necessity for him to be taking prescription drugs. 
I never had evidence that was neglecting my son while he was watching him, but I became so sick and worried (I may have had postpartum depression too) about the situation and the possibility of something happening while I was at work that I ended up putting him in daycare. Our relationship deteriorated from there (he felt like there was no reason for him not to watch him and I was wasting our money on daycare) and there was a good year where we did nothing but scream at each other and call each other names, he would threaten to commit suicide and I would pack my son up and we’d leave for a few days then come back when the dust settled. At one point his physician actually sent the State Troopers to our house to evaluate him because I had called his Dr to tell him that I was afraid the combination of the antidepressants/muscle relaxers/painkillers was making him suicidal. 
His behavior was very strange, like he’d leave in the middle of the night or I’d wake up to find him still up from the night before, sleeping in his car, or he’d just not come home for days on end, but he refused to move out when I asked him to. He did stop taking prescription drugs for a few months after I threatened to leave him and things were ok for while. Then one night I came home to find a new bottle of muscle relaxers hidden in the bathroom and we had a huge argument about it and we just never got back on track. 
Three months ago after another argument with him threatening to kill himself, I lost it and threw my dinner plate against the wall because I was so frustrated and worn out from listening to him relentlessly describe the way he was going to do it and how happy I would be that I just couldn’t control myself any longer and just wanted to make it stop. I acknowledged how unhealthy this reaction was and how sick living in the same house with his constant negative droning had made me (you don’t love me, you’re only after money, you want someone else, you’d be happier if I was dead, etc). In the morning I packed some clothes before work and went to my parents’ house where I’ve been staying since. He seemed to go into a tailspin after that and stopped helping with bills (he stopped helping with utilities about 7 months ago and when I left he stopped paying everything). My house is in foreclosure and I’m currently in bankruptcy. I haven’t filed for separation or custody or child support because he’s on unemployment and to tell you the truth I feel terrible about leaving him while he needs me and I don’t know if that’s truly what I want. I love my son more than anything in the whole world and I was terrified that by staying in the same house with my husband that things would continue and it would start to affect my son negatively (and it was obviously affecting me). I do feel like he needs help with his depression/substance abuse issues, but he refuses to go to counseling. Obviously I do love him and I’m desperately hoping that he turns thing around for himself and he goes back work (which I think would tremendously with his self confidence and improve his depression). 
We’ve been separated for about 2.5 months now and he’s still living in our home and I’m staying with my parents with my son. We’ve gone back and forth from hating each other, to making plans to move back in together after our short sale is complete, to hating each other again. 
I feel like he’s rewriting things now that we have some space between us. We have these arguments that last for hours where I feel like he dominates the conversation and tells me this is all in my head, that I need professional help, what he did was not that bad, etc, etc. He feels like because he hasn’t cheated on me I have no reason to be upset, I’m just bailing because things are hard financially for us right now. If he can’t engage me in an argument then he sends me text messages for instance “It seems I’ve lost U forever. I will never bother u again.” When I don’t respond it escalates to “In reality I have only hurt myself. And I have yet to even begin. Consider me dead.” I’ll sometimes get 10-15 from him a day, and then he’ll shut his phone off so I can’t get in touch with him. I’ve tried talking to his parents, I brought him to counseling with me and he told me he doesn’t think I should go anymore because I’m just paying someone to be my friend and I’m wasting my money. 
I’m beginning to think he might have Borderline Personality Disorder; the last time I picked my son up he started with the threats to kill himself and followed me out to the car and was screaming at me from the backseat in telling me he was just going to end it and shoot himself. He refused to get out of the car and was in my face screaming so I punched him in the head. He was so shocked he got out of the car and I locked the doors. I called 911 and then hung up before the call completed and called his dad to tell him what was going on. I drove home after that and he called and went on a tirade about how I’m acting like a child and he can’t believe I hit him in front of his son. I told him he should file a police report against me and he said he won’t (probably because he knows that at this point he’s going to have to undergo psychiatric evaluation) and I need to make a decision about whether or not I’m going to end our relationship. 
My gut instinct tells me that once the craziness escalates to this point there is no going back, things will never be normal between us so I should move on, but, before things went bad I would have thought we were put on earth for each other and I have a child by this man so I’m stuck in indecision mode. 
Has anyone dealt with anything like this and turned it around? Sometimes I feel like maybe he’s right, maybe I’m the one with the mental illness, but then I feel like that’s what he wants me to believe? Somone please tell me what I'm doing wrong, I’m so lost right now.


----------



## Quaker (Feb 18, 2013)

His behavior seems manipulative to me. I would be considering what his behavior is doing to your child. Is this relationship showing your child how to have relationships later on? This how I finally made the move from a similar relationship.


----------



## Quaker (Feb 18, 2013)

Duh...just saw the date on this. Hope things are better for you now.


----------

