Hi. I have been married to a man with ADHD for 23 years. Maybe a combination of kids starting to fly the nest, me trying to figure out who I am now, and who knows what else, but I am finding myself beyond exhausted and burnt out in dealing with my husband. In the last couple of months our marriage has literally tanked. He has no idea why I am upset, and he rants constantly about things he is upset about and has now issued an 'ultimatum'. I feel like my head is going to explode.
I have homeschooled 4 kids, 2 with pretty severe special needs, for the last 18 years. I handle the vast majority of all household chores, I do all the bills, banking, investments, house-related stuff, and everything to do with the kids. He works from home and has spent the last 20 years trying to build various businesses. We have had years with no income, gone thru all of the kids' college savings, as well as the majority of our retirement savings. There were a few years that things went well where he was making decent money, but far more where he wasn't. For years I begged him to just find a job and work on his businesses in the evenings or weekends, but he always felt 'but we are SO CLOSE'. I quit my career because of the kids' needs.
The business he is working on now is starting to make money and he wants me to be positive and encouraging and his cheerleader, telling him how great I think things are going, be super happy and excited, etc. I feel like i have been on a roller coaster of ups and downs in all his business efforts over the years and i have literally zero energy left to do any more of it. I certainly HOPE this business goes well, but I also know full well that it could just as easily disappear in a few months (b/c this is the reality we have lived for YEARS). If he has a good call where someone says something positive to him, he can literally ride that high for weeks and feel so enthusiastic and excited about his business whereas I see it as nothing more than a good call....for YEARS and in multiple businesses he has talked to me so excitedly about this fantastic call or that one and the vast majority never go anywhere but he somehow gets so excited about positive reinforcement and then gets disappointed, and now mad, when i don't hop on board that happy train with him.
This awful 'season' started when I texted him something important, later in the day texted him again to ask if he had read my original text, and when i didn't get responses on either of those, called him to say 'please make sure you read my texts'. He said he had. Then he did the exact opposite of what I had asked and when he told me that, i was very frustrated and said things like 'i have no idea how to communicate with you! If i text you, and text you again to remind you to read my texts, and call you to make sure, and you STILL don't do it, what is the point of me even communicating in the first place?' - or something along those lines. I am not a yeller, never have been, but i am certain my tone was extreme frustration b/c...well...i was extremely frustrated.
As with all situations like this, my issue (i don't know how to communicate with you) gets entirely dismissed (you KNOW my brain can't do that!! you KNOW that!!! I have no idea how many times i have to tell you that my brain doesn't work like that where i can keep track of a bunch of texts!!), and then it becomes a GINORMOUS diatribe of literally dozens of texts where he rants about how i never say anything positive about the business, i am not happy, I am always worried about something, he is sick and tired of constantly 'being in trouble' with me (I have asked him SO many times what that even means, and that i don't WANT to be a principal and him a 4th grader which is what that sounds like!! that if i get frustrated at something it means i am frustrated at something...why he takes it as 'i am always in trouble' i have no idea and i have no idea how to change that.
Anyways, that situation is what triggered where we are now. Since then it has been nothing but fights every time we interact. I have told him I am so tired of doing every single one of the not-fun-but-has-to-be-done jobs for our home/family/his businesses, and that I would like him to do ANY of that. He just doesn't and says things to me like 'well finding someone to fix my windshield (on HIS car, that has been broken for MONTHS) is going to take a long time b/c i have to find someone and make calls, and i would THINK you would want me focused on building the business since this is going to be our future!!). And I end up doing it. We were in 2 different states b/c he was with my son (in a rental i found, booked, etc) for something (the reason husband was there is b/c all he had to do was sit there and could work as long as he wanted vs at home there is constant driving kids, farm chores, lawn to mow, etc etc etc). One day the internet went out. He literally blew up my phone with texts and calls ranting about how i MUST understand what a big deal this is/the broken internet interrupted calls that sometimes take weeks to schedule/I HAD to understand how significant this was/he needed the internet fixed asap!. When I was able to get back to him i suggested he reach out to the actual airbnb owner whose name and number was likely somewhere in the house, vs reaching out to ME, in a different state, who had never even stepped foot in the house.
OK - i am writing a novel. If anyone is still reading this - thank you. It has just been one thing after another and he feels like he has been very wronged due to my lack of enthusiasm and encouragement, and positivity, and joy and has now issued an ultimatum....I need to fill out this app and list out all of the things i need to work on in our marriage or he 'is DONE'.
I am at my wits end b/c i feel like he has absolutely no idea how I feel in all of this b/c anytime i try to say any of it, he dismisses it and then everything turns to hours of texting diatribe about how he feels about my tone/being 'in trouble' all the time/etc.
Any advice or help would be greatly appreciated. I feel like we are speaking 2 entirely different languages. I replied to his ultimatum by saying i don't feel that is a way to move forward in a marriage and that i found a counselor and would like to meet with her together so we can have a 3rd party help us communicate. But my guess is that he has not, and will not, ever read that email.
