How can I help?

[Ceecee]

Hello, this is my first post. 

My husband and I have been together 13 years and we have 3 beautiful children.

He struggles with his mental health daily and since the beginning I have taken the household load, I do all the chores and he does the dishes 1-2 times a week. I deal with all the financial stuff and organize everything for the kids. I do part time work and he is full time. We've had a hard time connecting lately due to a few different things but he told me he doesn't feel supported. My problem is that I'm burnt out, I already do 95% of the load. How can I support him more? 

I know I can be abrasive and unaffectionate but that's because by the time he finally gets home I'm at my overload point with 3 young kids and the chaos that comes with it. I get sensory overload. I also can't tell him how I'm feeling because I'm worried that'll be the last straw for his mental health and he won't cope. He also said that me working is hard on his mental health because I'm not here. Am I not meant to have a life? I don't go out socially and work is my only mental reprieve.. we do not have any other family for support. I also have an autoimmune disease which is worse when stressed. This stuff is hard. I never realized how hard having a partner with mental illness could be. I have 0 support for myself.. I feel selfish for needing support because I know he isn't capable of giving it. We are in the process of getting him help but these things always take time. Dosage adjustments etc.  he's never happy, yet he has so much to be grateful for. That's a hard pill to swallow. 

I want to be more supportive, how can I achieve this? What can I do that I'm not already doing? 

[therising]

Hi Ceecee

This is so much for you to be managing without support. I can understand if you feel you're reaching tipping point. On the scales that balance out joy and challenge in life, you have so many challenges. I feel deeply for you as you try so hard to manage all the challenges, especially on your own.

'Who cares for the carer of others?' or 'Who raises the raiser of others?' are a couple of key questions. A lack of care or a lack of being raised in a number of ways (through certain challenges) is not something that can be felt until it finally is felt. This is something that can come with so many mixed emotions, such as resentment, anger, sadness, a sense of hopelessness, despair etc. It's important someone cares for you and raises you (your spirits, consciousness etc). When it comes to the consciousness side of things, I've found certain revelations can help make some difference within overwhelming challenges. I'm wondering whether you've considered speaking to a counselor of some type, someone to offer you support and guidance and perhaps a few much needed revelations that will help shed light regarding the way forward.

It sounds like all you're doing is working. Working to serve your kids and your husband, working to manage the household, working to manage your own mental wellbeing, going out to work for an income and so on. The reason I mention this is based on being able to relate to it in some ways. For me, the scales tipped around the middle of 2022. While managing the ins and outs of depression was nothing new for me, ongoing anxiety suddenly became a first time experience. Something had to change. Being fortunate in being able to afford a year off from going out to work, the balance shifted. The one thing I finally had time for was myself. The free time also allowed me to spread all the challenges out a bit so I could cope better with them. Going from suffocating to a bit of breathing space made a difference. Btw, it doesn't seem fair that your 'break' from stress  involves you going out to work.

'The lack of gratitude' factor in depression is not unusual. This explains why some people who are depressed are encouraged to practice gratitude exercises. Not easy to do when depressing emotions tend to override all other emotions. To fully experience a certain emotion, we have to be able to feel it. It becomes about practicing feeling it. The down side of particular practices: If we're in the daily habit of practicing making everyone but our self happy, we become good at it, accepting not feeling happiness within our self. We can say 'When I get time, I'll make myself happy'. If there's never any time or we're too exhausted to make time, this can have depressing consequences. You deserve time to experience a sense of peace and happiness.