Hello all. ADHD spouse here. My challenges have destroyed my marriage, and my life. My wife is leaving and taking our 3 kids with her. When we talked she told me about how she couldn't trust me anymore because of all the times before, that I said I'd do this better or do that better and whatever efforts I had put forward weren't enough or didn't last. I just hope all of you understand that when you say you're done, and your spouse says they'll do better, it's BECAUSE they care about you and don't want to lose you. And in that moment, them doing better is all they want in the world. So we start trying to, with everything that we have, because there's a threat to something very important to us, looming large. I like to compare ADHD (please try to imagine this) to having 20 channels all on (think picture in picture style) at the same time, with all of the sound coming out simultaneously at the same volume, and having to just make do with that to experience life. You, the non-ADHD spouse, might be able to change to the "laundry" channel for as long as you need, and change to the "kitchen" channel after. If "doing better" entails taking care of half the housework, without you having to make a list, and it's one day after you've told me you're leaving me, I am locking in on the "housework" channels and trying to tune out all others while they're still on. But I have 6 housework channels that I'm trying to stay locked in on, and 14 other channels on the same screen, at the same volume. I'm scared, and hurting, so my mind is saying "HOUSEWORK CHANNELS DUDE" and I'm using everything I have in me to stay on those only. EVERYTHING I have. Every now and then, the video game channel gets a glance, the baseball channel gets a glance, but my fear of losing the person I love so much locks me back on housework. In glancing at those other channels however briefly, or even in just trying to focus on 6 housework channels at once, I may have gotten all of the rooms picked up and the dishes started and the laundry switched over, but forgotten to empty one trash can (we have 5) and to put away the dishes. I can do that for a couple weeks, a month, and the fact that I'm trying resonates with you, and you start to relax. Once you relax, then you start telling me I'm not trying enough or I don't care enough because there were 2 or 3 things I forgot.  then things start getting hairy. I'm already mentally drained from spending this seemingly unending amount of time trying to tune out everything else, I have been literally giving it my all, and you tell me i don't care or I'm lazy because I missed something. What I hear is "nothing you've done has meant anything, because you didn't do this" and my sense of pride in doing what you wanted and showing you I care is completely blown away. Like a house of cards in a hurricane. So you go off and do your thing, and I'm sitting there looking at all 20 channels, and I focus on the housework channels for a minute but I'm deflated and have lost a lot of hope. So the erotic channel or the hobby channel or the new subject channel all seem like they'll be much better able to provide me some comfort and some feeling of fulfillment. I start focusing on those. The whole Time, the housework channels are still on, still just as loud, still reminding me that once again I wasn't  good enough for you. So I'm focused on the stuff that doesn't hurt as much, but aware that I'm not focused on what you asked from me. That makes me feel guilty, and worthless. So what does my brain do? "Housework channels hurt" and locks in even tighter on hobby channels. Before you know it, we're right back where we started.