Spouse of (potentially, but most likely) ADHD son and husband

[Anonymous]

Help!! It’s looking like my 4 year old is most likely adhd (which was suspected from a very young age) and we’re now taking steps to get a diagnosis for him. However, in all the research I’ve been doing I am convinced that my husband is adhd as well (inattentive type). Our relationship is very strained and the research I’ve done has almost validated all of the feelingsof doubt, depression, self blame that I’ve been having for about 5 years now. He’s always been forgetful, leaving cell phone, or computer at home when he leaves for work etc. However, lately it’s getting really dangerous, for example, he’s leaving the stove burners on and oven on, the front door wide open, the car running, several times a week.

2 questions: 1) Any one out there feeling the same way? 2) what is the best way to gently encourage my husband to be open minded to testing for adhd for himself. I should mention that I made the mistake of opening up to his mother about this and she completely shut down the idea. So I’m worried she’s going to interfear with the diagnosis process which relies heavily on one’s childhood.

Any advice would be very much appreciated!

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[jpsimard]

Hello Greta,

It is entirely possible that your husband might have ADD/ADHD, just from what you’ve described. That being said, I’m a professional musician, and not a psychiatrist. I’d like to take a stab at answering your questions, at least from my own limited experience.

1) There has to be people out there feeling the same way. I wouldn’t doubt that AT ALL.

2) Your second question is more of an (un-stated) two parter. Given the stigma that “mental illness” has, I wouldn’t be too surprised if your mother in law is entirely biased against it. Why would someone want to think that their child has a “defect”. (I disagree, and feel it is a gift, not a defect!)

As for approaching your husband on this…. this is delicate, and hard, and if it is anything like what happened to me… it’s going to be difficult. My girlfriend (of eight years) approached me TWICE on the subject of getting evaluated. The first time I said flat out “No!” and I was -incredibly- upset that she could possibly think that I have this “defect.” The second time… she was so earnest, almost heart breakingly so, that I said that I would -consider- it. I then forgot about it (COMMON ADD/ADHD PROBLEM!) until one night, I was channel surfing and my curiosity alighted me on ADD and LOVING IT?! From that, I took the test on this site… and the rest is history. I should also add that this all occured within the last three months or so.

So my advice to you, based only on MY LIMITED EXPERIENCE would be to work on your relationship with your husband. After five years of obvious strain, any approach you would make MIGHT seem like an attack on him. (Based on my own bias, here). The only reason I was able to hear what my girlfriend had to say is that we were actively working on improving our relationship. I’d HIGHLY RECOMMEND that you follow Dr. Ned’s advice from this blog post:

http://totallyadd.com/20-marriage-tips-from-dr-ned-hallowell/

NOW. All of that being said, with my add rant complete… I think the easiest way to approach your husband is through your son. I’m not saying that you use your son as a pawn, but you might want to talk to your family physician about your son, and about your concerns about him. If the process leads to a diagnosis you’ll be saving your son a whole lifetime worth of “issues”, and as a part of the assessment process, they’ll want to talk to your husband. Every parent loves their child without question, and I feel like that MIGHT be a good way to get him at least to open his mind about it.

That being said, we ADDers are an observant bunch with a brain that runs like a Ferrari. Approach this as honestly as you can, and I’d start by working on the marriage.

Love,

Justin

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[Anonymous]

Thank you Justin, SO MUCH, for your advice and personal story. I appreciate it more than you know. I’m so happy I found this site! I already feel at least a sense of direction, whereas before, I felt confused and had no idea where to start. Interestingly, due to the mother in law’s reaction, I totally backed off from talking to my husband about himself and have started focusing on asking him to get involved in adhd education for our son. I just showed him the intro to this site and asked him that he go on in to learn about strategies for dealing with our son. Hopefully in the process he’ll start warming up to the idea that he might be adhd as well.

I agree with you Justin, I believe it’s a gift, once it’s understood and I’m so optimistic for my son’s future. Unfortunately, at the moment my husband has spent 37 years undiagnosed and consequently (I believe) he has many years of poor self esteem built up which has lead to many side effects like alcohol abuse and smoking, along with extremely poor communication skills. Still, I remain hopeful that things can change.

For now, I will focus on my son as well as educating myself to try and help with my marriage and hope that along the way my husband will seek help voluntarily.

Thanks again Justin!

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[jpsimard]

Greta,

Glad I helped! At least that I helped you feel better, which is really the best first step.

The self esteem issue, if your hubby does have ADD is pretty heavy. I’m just about to turn 32 and was diagnosed just over a month ago, so I feel his main there. Keep at it, and keep us posted?

– Justin

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[Anonymous]

Greta,

I’ve been with my ADD partner for 10 years. The first years were tough. He had already diagnosed himself with ADD but hadn’t had any counseling or treatment. His lateness, disorganization, forgetfulness–the classic stuff–wore me down after two years. I said we needed to see a counselor or risk our relationship ending. Fortunately, we found a good counselor. At first, Max resisted medication and then agreed to try it. (He’s still on medication.) We continued with counseling for two years and it was very beneficial. I’d say it saved our relationship. I learned a lot about myself as well as Max, and with the counselor we learned many strategies for communication, planning, just plain getting along. All this is to say that having a diagnosis of ADD does not by itself make everything better. Medication does not by itself make everything better. I also know that suggesting to someone that they have ADD is hard to do in a way that that person can really hear it. So you might consider starting with the issues and working on them. Are you at the point where you think you and your husband would benefit from counseling? If so, I urge you to find a counselor who works with those who have ADD. (Our counselor has ADD himself and his wife is an ADD coach.) As Justin suggested, in the course of getting treatment for your son, your husband may make the connection to himself. But that may take awhile. I’ve started a blog that talks about positive, constructive, practical strategies for partners of those who have ADD. http://www.survivingadd.wordpress.com. It’s just a beginning, but there’s so much negative stuff out there, I’d like to show that it’s possible to have a great relationship with someone who has ADD. If you have a chance to look at it, leave a comment to let me know if you think it’s worthwhile. Good luck.

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[Anonymous]

Hello! My wife and I are finally facing the impact of my ADD head on and it feels fantastic.

It has taken a LONG time to get here, but we may finally be able to get off the roller coaster and that is good news for us.

This has been a long road fwiw, and not something we are going to fix over night.

A book that opened my eyes to better communication with my wife is Difficult Conversations: Discuss What Matters. 💡

http://www.amazon.com/Difficult-Conversations-Discuss-What-Matters/dp/014028852X

One of the biggest gains I made from reading this is learning to forget about Right and/or Wrong or at least being Right or Wrong.

We are all Right when we say something and we are all right when we interprete some thing someone else said, but it doesn’t mean we interpreted what they said the way they meant it and it doesn’t mean we did a great job telling our story so as to be interpreted the way we intended. We also assume we understand the intentions of others. These assumptions coupled with our beliefs and experience can lead to a conclusion that “I am right and they are wrong”, this closes doors and ends conversations. By changing the I’m right or wrong thoughts and asking questions to better understand the intentions of the other person, the conversation keeps going and we can learn something by being curious rather than shutting everything out by being upset.

It was also important for me that my wife understood that for what ever I brought to this, she has a part to play as well. There were things that she didn’t see or understand in the beginning and because she didn’t understand she closed those doors. It was very frustrating as the message was clearly “you are wrong” and I am not. At least that was my interpretation. In reality it was I don’t know what you want, I don’t know what to do, I don’t understand. Having the Difficult Conversations and openly talking without placing any blame, we have started moving forward. When I feel the blame-thrower warming up, I force myself to switch to figuring out what I’m not understanding and figure out how to ask questions to better understand why I feel I need to place blame on someone. They didn’t see a problem so let me understand why I do and what I can do to provide them with what they need to move forward as well.

Yesterday she went to her first visit with a psychologist, it went well and had lots of good things to say about the conversations and questions she was asked. She has 2 follow up dates booked and is excited to figure out more.

As for my parents (I’m 41), my mom reacted like I told her I had purple skin and green hair. Oh, really, well.

I was prepared. She’s a retired elementary school teacher, ADD in the 70’s and 80’s was considered by most to be a parenting issue. Not enough rules or boundaries at home results in this behaviour, period. She also was in denial about my dad and his issues. Again, he choses to be a hermit and not have any close friends. Armed with this site and a few books I’ll let her make up her own mind and ask lots of questions as we go.

Good Luck!

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[Gregsnothere]

For me this is a touchy subject, my estranged wife would have a lot to say about this including ” I feel like I have 2 kids”

Somtimes research can be a bad thing, she diagnosed my father with ADD because he left a cupboard door open. “It is hereditary, you probably got it from him.”

I was diagnosed several years after my son was, it took a lot of prodding for her to get me to go. We had a lot of problems by then and they haven’t really improved, in part because it’s taken me a long time to make progress on treatment and in part because she has her own issues which make it especially tough to put up with TWO ADD’ers in the house.

I guess the bottom line is that you both need support to get through, you need to support each other and you need to have external supports as well. Maybe you could try sending him a link to the introduction video and see if it clicks for him.

Good luck

G

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[Wgreen]

Why not tell your husband to take your son to be tested? Make that his little errand.

There are countless instances of parents listening in during the testing and then thinking, “Hey, that sounds just like like me!” In fact, if memory serves, some ADD oracle once said that many adult ADDers see the light and eventually get diagnosed because they attended sessions with their ADD/ADHD kids.

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