I have one recurring thought about honesty and am trying to make sense of it. The problem with my ex-husband now, is that I feel he hasn't been emotionally and intellectually honest. Irrespective of ADHD/non status, isn't honesty a basic form of respect that we owe our life partner and ourselves?
Ok if a partner can't do what they promised. Ok if they forget, are distracted, disappoint in general. But always pretending? Masking true emotions, opinions and preferences?
It's painful that my ex-husband was never on the same page as me, but I was led to believe otherwise. Was the Jekyll-Hyde horror just truth showing briefly through pretence? I was under the impression that we lived according to agreements we'd made. In the end he declared he hadn't agreed when he'd said yes. None of the agreements were valid.
I believed him when he reassured me. When I tried to convince him of things with verbal acuity he seemed to accept and confirm my opinion. Only in retrospect he said I had been verbally bashing him into submission.
He also masked his deep depression and anxiety for years before diagnosis. Apparently it has a name: smiling depression. Strange as it may seem, for years I had no idea he was in such a bad state. I felt unhappy and insecure but couldn't understand why.
Of course it's easy to feel compassion for him since he's suffered so much and clearly been quite helpless. But then he threw all that in my face. He said he wished he'd left me long ago. He used up my years, pretending.
When his disability made things too difficult for him, he changed the narrative to fit him better. This I'm sure we all do to some degree, but what I witnessed was far beyond anything I've seen before.
I have a hard time forgiving him for this. I'm brought up with a strong sense of integrity and feel it's necessary to communicate beliefs and needs in a healthy way to our closest relations. Also to be intellectually honest.
In some threads non partners who haven't left their relationships soon enough are criticized and blamed for having poor boundaries. What about those who worked under false pretenses?
What are your thoughts of honesty in ADHD/non-relationships?