Quit picking on me!

Hi everyone,

Just joined the site this morning after a particularly grating interaction with my husband.  He was playing with a cat toy (like a tennis ball, but smaller) and started throwing it at me.  I was reading the news at the time, so of course I didn't catch it.  It hit my shin, which really hurt!  (I admit that I can be a wimp, but I think most would agree that a tennis ball to the shin is unpleasant.)  I told him that it hurt and tossed it off of me.  He picked the ball up and threw it at me again, saying that he was just trying to teach me to catch.  Again, it hurt, and I became visibly angry.  I asked him to stop throwing the ball at me.  He replied that he was tossing it at me, not throwing it.  To demonstrate his point, he then threw the ball across the room at the wall; it made a loud bang and ricocheted around.  Note that anything I said indicating that I would like him to stop was countered with some way to blame or dismiss me. 

He has a habit of picking on me and others in his family.  When we first got together I thought he was just playful- I've begun to feel more like he's a bully.  He says he's just playing around, but it often escalates to a point where the target has to pitch a fit to get him to stop.  He does this to his nieces and nephews & his brother, too.  He has a tendency to grab me roughly- when we first got up this morning he reached over and grabbed my leg close to my knee which was also quite painful.  Again, I might just be a wuss, but he's bigger than me.  Regardless, shouldn't he stop when I indicate that his actions are painful?  It seems like when I (or anyone else) indicates that what he's doing is bothersome, he just escalates.  It seems really gleeful, like he gets a kick out of getting a rise out of people.  He also grabs my breasts (or other locations) at random times; if our marriage were more amicable I wouldn't be so bothered by this.  I feel constantly disrespected, though, so it really bothers me when he just grabs my chest out of nowhere.  It's not done in a nice way, either- it's like he's a freaking ninja.  Please don't say that I should be flattered.  This is my body- I have a right to my space and respect. 

I know this was really just a little interaction, but I'm at my wits' end.  Is this something that others with ADHD partners have experienced?  What can I do?  We've gone to counseling but had little time for it in the past two to three months (we're both graduate students, which is a topic for another forum entirely).  He said then that he's just trying to get attention, so the counselor and I asked him to talk to me about it rather than picking on me to get a reaction.  For a while he did that, but he's back to his old ways.  I'm trying to be understanding, but I can't help feeling like he's a jerk for being this way- it's one thing to have a lot of energy, but to actually get a kick out of hitting me with things?  Seriously, what the hell?

It's not just physical, he often teases me and gives me a hard time.  Sometimes it's just playful, but often he picks on me for things we've have arguments about or things that I'm sensitive about.  I feel like certain things should be off limits; sometimes the comments really hurt.  I'll admit that I'm a pretty sensitive person; I don't think that relationships should be adversarial.  Shouldn't we be nice to one another?  Is my idea of marriage just unrealistic?  We both come from rough homes, so we don't really know what to reasonably expect from a healthy relationship.  Again, we're trying counseling, but our schedules are restrictive.  I'm looking to hear whether this is something I can attribute to the ADHD (or some other issue) or if this is a red flag.  How much "picking" can a relationship contain before it becomes unhealthy?  Am I being too sensitive or demanding?

I understand that a person with ADHD (he's diagnosed- takes Adderall during the week but not on weekends or on breaks.  Part of the issue is that his resting heart rate is really fast, even w/out the amphetamine.  Side topic: has anyone dealt with this?  Any advice?  Maybe beta blockers?) deserves understanding and a bit of slack.  My issue is that I'm not sure whether this is the ADHD or just him being a jerk.  I've been dealing with this with no one to really talk to for a while, so I've got a lot of pent up resentment.  My apologies if I sound unnecessarily snarky or harsh.  Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

J