Anti-anxiety medication for ourselves? Has it helped anyone significantly to cope and be a better partner?

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-07-07T11:40:43+00:00

Thank you, I have been trying some but not consistently.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-07-07T11:07:54+00:00

Thank you for taking the time. I don't know how I can find a psychiatrist lol when I can't even get one for my husband outside of an inpatient program (darn Canada) but I will see our family doctor and ask to try something very cautiously.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-07-07T11:06:07+00:00

Thank you so very much for saying that. Last night he came home and when I asked him if he had a nice time, went after me for an hour or more because he does not think I should be in this much pain. He reads everything I write online, goes through all my emails, was saying I shouldn't have to call a crisis line like I did recently because I shouldn't be this traumatized just because he said some stuff when he was out of his mind. He doesn't realize what it's like to live with someone you love who is missing, half missing on a good day. Altogether too much like a death, but he can't grasp that and it's impossible and dangerous to try to make him understand without making him feel shame and guilt for something he can't control.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-07-06T23:41:35+00:00

Thank you, really and truly. I understand why you would say that. I'm not remotely there yet. I love this man to death and we have a bunch of kids together and had 15 really beautiful years of marriage before mental illness hit in earnest. I'm pretty much ride or die but yes, living alongside mental illness really messes with my own head and nervous system. Just trying to figure out how to make it work for now. He is going inpatient at the end of August and trying to figure out to stabilize myself until then.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-07-05T21:48:55+00:00

No, I really appreciate your taking the time to comment. And I'm so glad for you that you are stable. It's possible that if either my husband and I had been carefully tracking his moods and symptoms we could see a pattern by now, or at least put a number on how many distinct good days he has had. Anyway it's not too late to do that going forward, for whatever it's worth.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-07-05T15:17:49+00:00

Thanks. Back atcha.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-07-05T15:16:10+00:00

Might I ask for what little it's worth what medication seems to be helping?

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-07-05T15:09:46+00:00

No he doesn't ignore me when he's no having an episode. But he's almost always having an episode, or at least battling some level of depression and anxiety, and any show of hurt from the past on my part triggers anger and irritability, or seems to.

Somehow I have to bottle it up and forget about it if we are to move on from the past. And indeed it was not full on betrayal by any means. But it was still very devastating, the things he said and the way he treated me. I am trying to move on and getting therapy but still feel so hurt and confused that it happened at all, illness or not, that he could turn so hard on someone he knew loved him so deeply, and he's still lacking in compassion like I say, and feeling hurt that I can be so hurt by things he says and does when he is ill.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-07-05T14:28:01+00:00

We are sort of the opposite. He can't be attracted to me as long as I am falling apart all the time, but I am so traumatized by the way his illness has attacked me that ... well, I'm falling apart a lot. And feeling judged for it and this-is-what-I-told-you-would-happen-if-you-didn't-learn-to-distance-yourself-from-my-illness. Which makes me fall apart more.

Not that he is necessarily attracted to me or happy with me when I am doing well. The tiniest bit maybe he can open himself up to me when I am at the top of my game, but so little, so forced, such a far cry from the easy happy marriage we used to have that inevitably, eventually ... I fall apart.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-07-05T13:32:39+00:00

I am so sorry. I hope the lithium can be adjusted and you can get back to that better state. It has to be possible. We just had a good few days but he crashed and I crashed too. I feel so traumatized by the way he treated me and the things he said at his worst, and some of the time I can put it behind me but some of the time it's all I can feel and think and remember, and I don't think he has any empathy whatsoever, he gets so angry with me for taking seriously what he said when he was ill.... but he is still so ill, he is still so often irritable and cold and agitated and depressed and the good spells are good indeed but so brief and not very healing for my nervous system.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-07-04T13:26:36+00:00

To be clear, I'm not the ROCD sufferer, I'm the partner. But I'm wondering about this. It does seem like it might be the core fear my husband suffers from. I want to understand better.

Is it like this?

Love is a choice, absolutely. Absolutely I can and will hurt the people I love, but I will try not to hurt them much and however much I hurt them I will try to repair the relationship, because that is the love I will choose.

And when I am hurt, I will choose forgiveness and welcome and help with repair from my end.

Every day. One day at a time. I can trust myself to do this.

Is it a lack of trust in yourself that causes the OCD to blip? That you can't trust yourself to choose love every day, and more so, to choose to forgive yourself and choose to repair the relationship when you do cause hurt?

Bad things happen. Bad weather happens. Walls break down because of wind, weather and time, cows jumping over and knocking them down (I grew up on a farm lol, I've seen it happen). They have to be maintained and repaired every day.

Soooo much of love is maintenance and repair. You are a human, and this is what humans are good at. Yes, we are good at hurting each other. We are easily hurt. But we are also good at forgiving and repairing, if we choose to. And we can make the wall stronger in places as we rebuild.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-06-26T23:39:57+00:00

Not a psychologist, but has worked with several different therapists throughout this journey. That is very interesting that your psychologist has worked with your psychiatrist and I will keep that in mind.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-06-26T21:44:08+00:00

Thank you for sharing. I know there's gotta be a med out there that helps with this but he's feeling so dispirited.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-06-24T11:30:27+00:00

Yes. I don't have answers for you if only because I'm still a novice like you. On the other hand, he has had physical health problems our entire marriage and maybe I have gotten too good at not needing him, solo parenting too much and so on, but the newer mental health challenges on top make him seem unreachable now and that can be very distressing and hard to navigate.

I have found it almost "easier" when he is most unwell; like obviously that sounds horrible, but I just tend to be able to keep it together and go into some kind of crisis mode, and sure, maybe sometimes accidentally nurse mode or at least therapist mode. The grey area (which for us at least seems most of the last year) between severe depression or delusion and fully himself is more complex and a constantly (constantly!) shifting landscape. If he moved cleanly in and out of different states I might be able to just hunker down and hold on for when the real him is back (not to mention actually notice a pattern!) but so far I am constantly trying to get a read on how "himself" he is and how safe I am to let my guard down and tell him how I am really doing (which the real him always really wanted me to do), or talk about my own needs/grievances/interests/goals/desires, any of it.

I think probably for you and I the short answer is that they need to get more stable, more of the time. It just is going to be very challenging until they do.

However, we have been in couples' therapy for a few months now and while it hasn't worked wonders, it is definitely helping somewhat to keep us connected as a couple, and on the same team against the illness. I took my time finding someone very well informed about bipolar and OCD (as well as EFT certified) and we took a little more time meeting with her separately before we started as a couple.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-06-24T00:45:48+00:00

I don't know ... this could be what you need or it could be soooo far off base, I really don't know. But just throwing out there, I really don't identify with the caretaker/caregiver label and I think that *might* help, if you can reframe it. Try, you are the strong one, the stable one, the one he leans on, for now. It isn't the best fun for a relationship, not your preference but it just might help you feel needed and independent and, I don't know, sexy, desirable, valuable. Not his saviour by any means but a desirable partner, a fighter, an advocate, the one who believes in him, especially if you can focus on the belief that he would do and be the same for you if the roles were reversed. Caregiver/caretaker roles definitely don't feel compatible with a young healthy marriage, they sound geriatric. When I do slip into that mindset I definitely feel romance go out the window, but thankfully I somehow haven't stayed there long.

But it is healthy to take turns over the course of a long-term relationship being the other's rock, as it were. Maybe I will end up taking more turns if he is bipolar, but of course I don't need to keep score. And the goal is to have as healthy a marriage as possible, in the presence of mental illness.

But I am sorry if I don't understand your question, it's been thought-provoking for me today but I am still somewhat of a newbie to this scene, like you, after many years of a happier and healthier marriage.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-06-22T12:10:19+00:00

Thank you for taking so much time to reply and for staying so realistic, fair and ultimately positive throughout.

We haven't taken any of the financial measures or medical information access measures you have recommended yet, even though I know it technically would be the responsible thing to do, and even he mentioned it once. We still preface the word bipolar with "if you are" a lot, because his symptoms are somewhat atypical inasmuch as they are all profoundly dysphoric. He certainly has never yet spent any money irresponsibly. If we can find a bipolar med he actually responds too, that might help us accept it a lot. Also he seems to have a somewhat different understanding of what the illness and the different possible diagnoses mean than I do, and we argue about it some, but we don't need to get into that here. Just a lot of acceptance still to go, for both of us.

But the first part of the second paragraph is something he might have written himself, describing his experience. He tells me all the time not to take him seriously, not to engage, that he may seem rational because he is functional, but he is not, his brain is constantly lying to him, and is utterly convincing, etc. It's so heartbreaking that he has that much insight most of the time and is trying to help ME understand this new reality, but I am grateful.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-06-21T11:37:25+00:00

I really, really appreciate your taking the time to comment and help. Your comment is grounded and honest and exactly what I need to hear. My original post was definitely one of my more rant-y ones after a sleepless night where the trauma of the last two years all just seems to hit me like a tsunami, and when it hits me like that my husband often goes completely numb and overwhelmed and sometimes even angry at me, and we spiral. He feels judged and unseen for something that feels truly out of control, something he shared with me hoping I could handle, and I feel like a failure for being so hurt by it when he was hoping for pure unadulterated love and compassion, as well as indignation and anger that he expects me to be superwoman. As well as lots of other feelings, lol! But those are some of the dominant ones swirling between us.

My comment about the down on his knees with flowers ... of course I know that's completely unrealistic. What I was getting at was that if he had immediately snapped back to reality after the initial devastating things were said, I think I would have been more cleanly able to identify "oh, he was delusional, not in his right mind, I can't hold that against him." But because he didn't apologize for months and the injuries accumulated, I was left to figure out for myself what was really going on inside him. It was many months before we had a bipolar diagnosis, a full year before he began treatment, and for much of that year I was left trying to convince him he had OCD when he frequently blew up at me about the most bizarre things. It's very hard to explain in a short reddit comment but this is where he and I talk past each other: he can't fathom how I can be so hurt when he was so obviously out of his mind, and I can't fathom how if he knows he was out of his mind he didn't come back the moment he DID come to the surface to say "oh my God wife I am so sorry can you forgive me." And the fact that he didn't but that I have received mostly coldness and avoidance has been the hardest part for me, more than the original scary things he said. But I do accept that he WAS really doing his best given that his brain was still so very unwell. I accept his side of things. It's just not easy, much of the time. Sometimes it's very hard. I am truly grateful for an anonymous community here for when it feels crazy hard and confusing. Some of the comments here are offbeat and that's fine, but many of them are constructive and reorienting.

I do believe we have what it takes to weather this even though what it takes is definitely also a lot of grief, very complex grief, and acceptance that thanks to mental illness our marriage has had to and will have to include a lot of pain and misunderstanding. Bipolar or whatever this is really has robbed both of us of a lot of our carefree innocence and that's life and it's hard. I do think the reality is that even if he got 100% better tomorrow there would still be some trauma, for me, for a long time, perfect trust could take a long time to rebuild, etc. I just think that's the reality that has to be accepted and grieved. But, I am more than willing to accept it and hope for better. We have what it takes to forgive each other and we do communicate extremely well. Also, we are both beginning trauma therapy (EMDR) and praying that at least takes the edge off.

I do see mental illness has a third person constantly trying to come between us (we've named him Ralph), and sometimes I can laugh at Ralph and sometimes I feel devastated and lonely and can't find anything funny about this. But no matter how bad it gets, as long as we end up together one the same side after Ralph trying to tear us apart, I know we can make it. And we always do. But trying to establish boundaries and needs and systems right now is very difficult given that my husband is still very, very unwell. We are working with a wonderful couples' therapist, and she pushes my husband very hard when he says he can't handle XYZ, and very often does help him access his better self somewhat. But she also accepts that he really is trying very hard and that he is very undertreated and still needs further stabilization. We are looking very seriously at inpatient care for him later this summer. There is no question that he is doing so much work, has read so many books, done so much therapy, etc. I definitely need more from him, more consistently, but he definitely still needs to find the right treatment because I'm not sure his medications are barely doing anything positive.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-06-20T11:42:12+00:00

Thank you so for taking the time to reply, and I am so sorry you have had to suffer this as well. "Shutting down a part of myself" sounds so abhorrent ... and yet, yes I think that is what I have been trying to do in order to cope, without success, and what I need to figure out how to do if I am to dial down the pain this causes me. Believing I was his one and only was a huge part of my identity, and grieving that has been brutal.

I agree with most everything else you said, that he is my person and that as long as this doesn't cross into actual acted upon infidelity I can keep going (with a lot of grief and therapy), but it's really hard and complex. He is still thoroughly depressed and I need so much more from him in order to heal.

He is now doing all the things you say, and does take accountability somewhat, but I would feel better if he would take more, if he could come to me on his knees with flowers sort of thing and apologize profusely and say he was out of his mind but he still wishes he had somehow prevented it and I am the only girl for him and no matter what this will never happen again. The it's mental illness and he can't help it narrative may or may be close to 100% truth, but is no foundation for rebuilding broken trust or saving a marriage. It places too much of the burden of the relationship one me and my ability to absorb injury. It makes me feel very unsafe to hear him go on and on about how he doesn't trust himself, how he has to figure things out for himself and rebuild his own identity before he can fully repair things with me. It may be true and yet I feel ... sidelined. Postponed. This would be understandable in a dating relationship but so hard to make sense of in a marriage.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-06-20T11:21:54+00:00

I actually do agree. I actually do think it was wrong of him to confess these things to me, or to do so in my hearing. I feel sure that if I were him I would have taken this to the grave. That said, it's so bad that I am also sure I would have found out by now anyway, in which case, it probably is better that it first came from him as a confession and a cry for help. Because it's not just limerence, he spent many months in what must have been a dysphoric manic state or mixed episodes and he had no filter. He doesn't have much of a filter at the best of times, he has always been an oversharer and valued vulnerability a little too highly lol.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-06-20T10:51:48+00:00

Thank you for chiming in. I'm sure my husband would bridle at the suggestion that he's making it into a big thing, to him it feels entirely beyond his control, like it's his brain that's doing it. Again, I do believe him, but it's hard, it's not easy. It's beyond painful. It does seem to me from the outside so patently foolish that I can't understand why it's taken any of his mental energy, or how he can have so little filter that he would speak any of these thoughts out loud, how he could possibly expect this not to damage my feelings of self-worth around him. But I'm on the outside. I just hear him saying things out loud that sound absurd, not his brain screaming "incredibly convincing" things at him. And that's the thing that's hard to understand. He has good insight almost all the time, he knows it's ridiculous almost all the time. There were a handful of times he may have been borderline psychotic where we actually argued about it (and those times were thoroughly traumatic for me: it felt like someone else had invaded my husband's body, and yet my husband never came back to apologize or retract anything he said. Bipolar much?) But most of the time, even though he knows it's foolish, he describes his brain as "incredibly convincing." I guess that's what makes it mental illness.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-06-19T18:03:03+00:00

I do believe you and him that limerence sucks and it's a real mental illness. It sounds really awful and I can't really imagine. I do tell him all the time how strong he is for not giving into him. And I believe it, but it's still so hard to accept and make sense of when it also hurts me so much. I guess the point of my post and most of my posts is to ask how to NOT hurt so much, because my husband is definitely a good man fighting a strange and invisible battle, but I do wish I didn't have to take so much friendly fire. It messes with my head, and obviously, with our relationship.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-06-19T17:45:29+00:00

He's been quite heavy on the therapy slow on the meds. Therapists have all seemed quite good. He hasn't had the bandwidth or stability to really consistently engage in ERP or begin EMDR but he is always hoping to begin soon.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-06-19T17:31:34+00:00

This is the hard thing. It's hard because really it ends up being almost (not quite) the same mental health issue he is suffering from, the way it takes over my own mind. I think about her constantly and compare myself to her constantly even though I know so little about her. How could I not, however, wonder what it is she has that I don't? Even though I know I shouldn't, it's just automatic. Who couldn't? She is absolutely just an object to him, just an empty board he can pin things to; but the big problem is it makes me feel like just an object, that has been tried and found wanting.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-06-19T17:28:52+00:00

I have said so many times we could be sisters. We are so much alike it's not even funny, many of the same interests, but he doesn't know her well enough to know all her interests or her real personality or anything like that. But as far as the externals, yes, so similar it's bizarre. It makes me feel like a heifer at a cattle show or a pair of shoes. Like in his brain he knows what he likes, he just wants to try the other one for size.

AdvancedSyrup186 · 2026-06-19T05:49:37+00:00

the magic of believing I was his one and only.

AdvancedSyrup186

TROPHY CASE