Hello ADHD Marriage. I really hope you allow this to post. I'm in a great deal of emotional pain. I need others to know what it's like being a non ADHD. I'm not blaming. I know I have work to do. Yet, I am experiencing some hard times.
I have a friend and business partner who has ADHD. I've known him for 23 years. We are in business together and we cannot separate the business for financial reasons.
Rare is it for psychologists to examine the complexity of how the non ADHD is left cleaning up after the ADHD partner's mistakes, literally and figuratively. Put aside the oft ADHD's instigating behavior, the blaming, the denial of doing something that causes themselves or others damage. The books I've read will tell the non ADHD persons not to enable those with ADHD, not to fix their mistakes, to be patient, calm, encouraging, yet the inattentive type ADHD that will not change is, well, not going to change.
1. My business partner and friend, aka BPF, eats my food from refrigerator, stove, counter, pantry. I've asked him to stop many times. I've worked with him ad nauseam with notes, agreements, counseling, kudos; he is 68 years old. He still does it and offers defensive excuses each time, projects and I go from victim to him crying victim. Nuff said.
Here's my NEW proven tactic THAT WORKS with him and my food. Last week he ate my food, a half of a pot of cooked white rice on stove intended for my sick dog. I calmly announced to him that if he did that again, as much as I DO NOT want to, that I would mirror his food behavior back him, so that he could feel what I feel. I told him that I did NOT want to resort to this tactic, but that I thought I had better be honest with him to let him know what was on my mind and that I'm at the end of my rope with him eating my food. I told him this is the best I can do, considering all other tactics have failed.
Well...
Sure as the sun rises, he did it again a week later. So rather than get upset, I was finally able to mirror his behavior and it felt great! I emptied a gallon of his milk down the drain. I told him about it. He became angry at me. (this was a safe calculated risk by the way. I wouldn't try this with someone unstable). He was upset, and I reminded him of my warning. I simply told him that "when you mess with my food, then I will mess with yours." Yes. He was mad at me for awhile. Though it was a powerful turning point. I have begun mirroring him on incorrigible behavior and its working to his inconvenience, and to my resolution, to a point where is is now REMEMBERING to NOT eat my food, hence the consequence.
Folks, this is but a small condolence to me. Compared to the other major oil spills I still clean up after him on a weekly basis. Come on and give us non ADHD persons a little love. It's not all- ways about the one with ADHD. For me and my BPF, its like living with a bull in a china shop. He has his good sides, though, I'm really trying to cope too. If I seem angry and bitter, its because I am! 23 years of fixing his mistakes. This is akin a student driver in a car and the teacher having to grab the steering wheel of the car to prevent the student from driving in to a tree. We non ADHD's cannot always stand back to let ADHD inattentive's wreck the car. It's just NOT that easy.
2. BPF dumped a bowl of un-popped corn kernels in the dishwasher. I did not enable him, but asked him to clean them out of the dishwasher cavity. He did. He then squirted Dawn dishwasher soap in the dishwasher to scrub it. Then he ran it. Then the dishwasher suds all over the kitchen floor. Then he cleaned that up. But with inattentive ADHD, they NEVER really clean it up. About everything he does in the physical world is inattentive, and so that means very little attention to detail. Sticky soap suds were all over the floor, the cavity had to be flushed by me, because he argues it was "fine". To some inattentive ADHD standards, a tornado ravaged town swept with a push broom is "fine". Try to laugh here, please?
3. Yet another time, he drained the transmission fluid from the company truck. Then he drove the truck down hill and back up until the transmission seized because he did not fully replace the transmission fluid.
4. Yet another time, he backed into a car in the parking lot. Video has him on camera getting out to look at the damage to the other car and his. Then he gets back into his car and drives away and does not report it. A month later the damaged party's insurance company and local police call him about a hit and run. You see a witness took video and pictures of my BPF's truck and face driving away!!! Ah ha! This explains why he was using Bondo and spray paint on the truck tailgate and side quarter panel. Both the transmission and the hit and run cost him $7,600. To the day before he saw the video, he denied hitting a car. Then we showed him the video. He became enraged and blamed everyone for over reacting.
As bad as I sound advocating for calculated consequences to ADHD inattentive, for me its the only thing that works to get my BPF to sit up straight and gets me out of being victimized again and again.
As for the accident, it goes on his record and he now has to pay the increase in our insurance. He had to pay for the seized transmission. He's not allowed to work on the truck any longer. I had my reservations about letting him work on the truck. But I followed the psychologists advice and I was told NOT to enable or rescue him and to let him learn and do things on his own. Hmmm. Me thinks the psychologists are not in the thick of it to understand the advice that is given.
The professionals can give all the advice they want. It's not until they actually live with the person that has inattentive ADHD for three to six months that they will TRULY GET THE BIG PICTURE.
I feel for you...But your asking for it, by staying.....:)
Submitted by c ur self on
You say your in "great emotional pain" But, you can't do anything about it....Well it's like many of us who are married to a spouse who has the same type behaviors, we just haven't experienced enough pain yet...Many of us here can sympathize with you, we live it, not just in business, but, 24/7, 7 days a week..:)
Your eye for an eye tactic is one way to get their attention, but, like you experienced, they will become the victim...Only THEY should be able to use others for their benefit....You might run him off, now that he's having to pay a price for his thoughtless and inconsiderate ways....
Usually people like your talking about will move on, when the bed of roses they have with a spouse or business partner ends, and they find out all of a sudden they have to be accountable for their actions and behaviors...If they can't be carried in life, they want have much use for you. :) :).....(Speaking here of chronic users of others of course)
Good luck going forward, I hope you can continue to force accountability in all phases of your business by forming boundaries and sticking to them....Tough Love!
c
Thank you for your thoughts.
Submitted by ADHDWE on
Thank you for your thoughts. Well, my business partner friend, aka, BPF has alienated just about all in his life. He's not a happy camper to begin with. His son has estranged him. Two wives and two girlfriends have left him, one literally at the curb. Today he was screaming at his computer and then demanded that I get the Dell Pro Support phone number. I told him that I cannot help him until he calms down and to re approach me in 15 minutes with a better attitude. He gets mad when I say that, to which I tell him that he's on his own because he's losing his temper. He's 14 years old in a grown mans body. He has co morbid narcissism and rejection sensitive dysphoria, both may be present with ADHD. After 23 years, I'm handling him the way I should have all along. Much better for me these days. He consciously and unconsciously instigates sarcasm and jabs, and I just tell him that I don't have the time and walk away. It really pisses him off. And ya know what, I'm liberated by it. After 23 years and only the last five finally figuring out what 's been going on, I can say he's on his own without my feeling like a bad person. In the 23 years, I've had very good boundaries, though I wore down like the frog slowly boiling in a pot of water. I lost myself along the way of the fits and starts with his ADHD. Yes. Of course it's my fault too for not getting out. I choose to stay because I've worked too hard to let go of the business. It is after all, my self employment. It's not that easy to leave at age 57. I choose to stay and I have a way to cope (now) by LOTS of distance and mini vacations, composing piano melodies, art, hiking, making NEW friends. Its the business that held me there and this man has walked over everyone. Not but a few friends. Lonely is he. Most of all, he WILL NOT GET HELP for his ADHD, and Lord knows I've tried to help him on that trajectory too. No more Miss Nice Gal getting walked upon. Just getting myself back has been a task. Feels so good to write down my frustrations, my pains, my strategies and liberate! And by the way: He has not messed with my food! Additionally, I now have a big gray box bin to collect all the stuff he leaves around the mutual office floor space. I put all of his items in the big box and out in the garage. Should he retaliate, then I told him (nicely) that we will need to get separate offices and pay for it from the Partnership account. Oh no, as he recoils! Then he straightens out and cleans up after himself. It's odd the maturity level of reaction sometimes from adult ADHD; almost childlike. This works with dirty dishes left in the kitchen sink as well. Heck, I learned that trick from my mother when she did it to my teenage brother and sister back in the 1980's. All dishes went in a laundry basket on their beds; stacks of stinky, dirty, crusty dishes until they were forced to clean them. My mom just temporarily and happily resigned herself to use paper plates, plastic forks, knives, and paper cups for herself, my dad and me. When they rebelled and gripped, she LOVINGLY told them that she would have to stop doing their laundry! She referenced to suspended their allowance. She referenced to stop driving them to their social galas. Hilarious. And it worked while they cried in their pubescent bowls of cereal. Not much different with ADHD. CONSEQUENCES folks. Consequences like we use wth our children. Get creative with your consequences. They need not be as severe as mine. Just get creative with "how" you know your ADHD partner. Most of all, DO IT WITH A SMILE and not mean spirited. That's where the satisfaction of self control comes in. When you are the adult about warning them of consequences and clearly set the boundary, then you are clean. Don't blind-side your ADHD partner, otherwise it's punishment and that's cause for fighting.
You're beyond right!
Submitted by Mizeeyore on
You have my utmost sympathy.
Submitted by ADHDWE on
You have my utmost sympathy. Imagine the cortisol levels in our bodies? I hope someday you find an exit strategy. I know its not easy to leave even when others tell us that it is. There's entrenchment and personal investment, psychologically, financially, tax consequences, health issues, insurance and more (like children) in our relationships. If it were that straight forward we'd be leaving in droves. All humans have characteristics that can sometimes make change quite difficult, even in the most difficult situations that tell us to run for the hills. Its the crazy dance of two. I really get it. I'm with you on all that you wrote.