Me again . . . sorry.

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-03-2003
Me again . . . sorry.
2
Wed, 08-04-2004 - 8:12am
I'm sorry to take up room on your board when I'm not depressed though my fiance is. The drinking continues . . . He asks me if the unhappiness or the depression came first and compares it to which came first . . . the chicken or the egg. He's stuck on that question. Does it really matter?

He actually didn't have anything to drink yesterday and only had a couple the night before because he said that if he started drinking he didn't think he'd stop. He says he's just so stressed out. He says he doesn't think it's good for his son to be around him because of the kind of person he is. I think he's equating actions/behavior with who he is as a person? Make sense? He said he's spent his life trying not to hurt people but that's what wound up happening.

He said he's disappointed in life and that he just doesn't feel happy. He expects me to leave him. He said that the only reason he gets out of bed in the morning is because our dog starts barking when I leave for work. He said he just doesn't feel like he's giving me what I need. Is it wrong for me to lower my needs right now to let him take care of him? I guess the thing is that he really doesn't seem to be taking care of himself though - not emotionally anyway.

At one point, he started voluntarily taking his medication and reading about depression. Why has that stopped? Everything he talks about is included in the books we have. He just doesn't think there's any hope. I've read "I don't want to talk about it", "Undoing depression", "Overcoming depression", and "depression fallout". We also have the "Feel Good handbook" and "Learned optimism" as well as "Breaking the pattern of depression". I still feel though like I don't have any answers. I mean I understand the process and everything but . . . I guess they would just offer a way on how to make him feel better. I know he has to want it though.


iVillage Member
Registered: 04-09-2003
Thu, 08-05-2004 - 9:11pm
The effort you have made with your SO is really admirable. You have done everything you possible could. But as they say, you can lead a horse to water. The fact is that he might decide to take charge of his life or he might not. Many of us on this board have stories of mates who have stuck with us through the hard times. My dh did and I am eternally grateful for it. He always told me during that time that I was "the happiest depressed person" he had ever known. I know I was generally able to be there for him for his needs.

I think that I told you in another post that my ex husband was depressed. I was there for him and tried to help him. I was busy supporting him, taking care of the house, and taking care of myself. In the end he told me that he didn't want to work to take care of himself. So a couple of months later I decided that I couldn't keep trying to buck him up with no results and no promise for results. He'd even yell at me for reading him things out of books.

The last I heard he was living with his parents again (where he was when I met him) and unable to keep a job for very long. It had been three years since we split, but he was still blaming his problems on me. Since then I've been glad that I left.

Only you will know if you have the energy to keep going with him or not. There's no way to know if he'll take control of his life or not. In the meantime, the best you can do is keep encouraging him take his medication and go to therapy. As the books tell you, those are the best ways to move forward.

Perhaps you can ask him if he's willing to keep being miserable or do the two simple things that will give him some relief. Unfortunately, motivation is the first thing to go with depression. But I for one found getting out of the pain the most motivating thing of all. And it has worked for me.

Good Luck,

MariaC

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-24-2003
Mon, 08-09-2004 - 2:25am
Sparkles,

You really have yourself in a hard situation, and I will have too admit that I am not sure if I am really the one that can help you right now but I want too try. The reason I am not sure is because I am the one in my husband's and my relationship that is suffering from depression; so I am not sure exactly how it must feel to be the supportive person in the relationship. But I can tell you things that my husband has been able to do for me that have helped me, that might be able to try with your fiance.

First off, my husband constantly would try and get me to leave the house. To take walks right before the sun sets, to parties, what ever really just out of the house. But no matter how hard he suggested it I didn't want too. Heck I never wanted to get out of bed in the mornings, my daughter was my motive for getting up early. So my husband started waking my daughter up before he left for work, and bring her to me forcing me to wake up. He doesn't know that I know he wakes her up, but he knows that it gets me out of bed in the mornings.

My husband helps me out A LOT around the house, at first I let him do it all. I didn't care about it being a mess and if he did then he could clean it. Then after awhile I started feeling guilty "Hey, he does all the cleaning around here and has a job, what do I do?" So I tried too make an effort to clean stuff up before he got a chance to do it.

Now that I am helping around the house more, he will come to me and ask me "Beautiful (he always calls me that, if you haven't maybe even thinking of a really complementative nick name for your fiance will help cheer him up, I know that Beautiful cheers me up well most times any ways) what do you want me to do?" I know he knows what needs too be done with our daughter, the house or the yard, but it means a lot to me that he asks me. It then forces me to think "ok what does need to be done around here" and it gets me in the mood to do more productive things.

But out of all these things though, I think the thing that helps me the most is that when he knows that I am having a REALLY REALLY depressing moment and want to sleep or just simply be alone, he allows me that time and space. Cause there are times where I feel that it is wonderful of him to try and motivate me to get going with life and not sleep it away but there are sometimes that I simply need to sleep.

It sounds like you have been doing a lot of researching on how to help your fiance, which I really applaude you for. If you are looking for another one that is good, try "You can't afford the luxury of a negative thought" by Peter McWilliams. I listened to it on the cassette tapes and the reader REALLY helps to make bad things seem funny or really stupid to be depressed about.

I have made this too long and I am sorry about that, but good luck with everything and let me know if there is anything else you think I can help you with.

Alisha