Recent forum posts (all topics)

In the Fashion & Style section of the NYT there is a forum called Modern Love that offers up personal narratives and advice on marriage. Last Thursday's guest writer for the Modern Love column opined on endurance and marriage in a piece called "The Wedding Toast I'll Never Give."  She is young and I wish I could take her aside and gently introduce the subject of ADHD. The beginning of the article reads as if it it were lifted from this very forum: 

I'm hoping I can get some advice from families with small children. We have a 5 year old and a 6 year old who have both experienced the explosive anger from my husband. If I ever go out for dinner with a friend and my husband puts the kids to bed, I come back to crying scared children because daddy got so angry over something small.

Yet again I feel we are back where we started. We took and completed the couples seminar from here and I honestly thought we were both working hard to keep our marriage on track and were being open an honest with ourselves. Yet here I sit after Dh decided to unleash a torrent of how bad I am, how I don't like or love him, how he feels I control all aspects of how we live. So I ask ok what exactly am I stopping or controlling anything we do? No answer!! I ask and check in every couple of weeks if he is feeling good about us, I respectfully say At the time if he's being distracted or rude.

Just needed to put this out here today. I'm just tired. Tired of having to hold it all together 99.9% of the time. Tired of having a spouse that just can't allow me to be the weak one. There are times, as a human being, when I need to bitch, I need to be upset, I need to vent and let things go, but as the non-ADHD spouse, if I bitch and complain or vent too much, it just brings him further and further down. He turns into the angry one, the one who needs to vent, the one who is having the issues.

This is my first time properly posting here, but I have been reading through thread after thread for a while now and I cannot even begin to express how helpful this has all been. I feel like I am on my way to better understanding my ADHD husband’s reactions and triggers and feel as though there is hope for us and that there are things we can work on to improve our relationship, which had started to seem like it was doomed. But I’m still struggling with trying to figure out how to react and cope with my husband’s short temper and rages, which is what brings me to actually post. 

Anyone else have problems with the hyperactivity portion of ADHD? I feel like sometimes my husband's energy is so high and he gets overly focused and passionate about some things and can't like pull himself away...this is when he's off medicine too!

My wife and I know each other for over 12 years, started dating 11 years ago and we been married for 9 years. While our relationship has never been perfect I do love my wife. I have to tell the story for the beginning since I think there were some unresolved issues that probably I dealt with since we started dating. I was married when my wife and I started dating, she knew about, my previous marriage was pretty much over and I was just waiting for my wife to move out the apartment since it was on my name so I can move out too.

After 21 years of marriage my husband finally admitted that he is never going to have an intimate and caring relationship with me. He's never even going to try. He finally admitted that his priorities are going to be pursuing wealth, high adrenaline hobbies and sports competitions. And of course he wants to maintain a sexual relationship. This was not a heated argument with yelling and insults. It was a very calm discussion that he had put much thought into. 

My husband's dose of adderall was increased in May, along with a few other new drugs, for anxiety, blood pressure, etc. This past week we brought home my 4 1/2 year old nephew, for good ( my parents have been raising him, my sister is a drug addict, and we are taking him in, forever :)  ).