My ex-wife showed almost everyone of the classic Adhd symptoms in adult women. Always misplacing things, house a mess, clothes in piles, money randomly placed around house, empty cigarette cartons in different of clothes drawers,curling irons left on consistantly. I could go on & on regarding her symptoms. After doing lots of research on this subject, i finally realized what our issues were caused from in our marriage of 8 years. We were madly in love the first couple of years. Then after having 2 children starting 1 year after our marriage things started to change. My - ex would always say to me that she just couldn't keep up. I began to carry a lot more of the household chores & so on. I began to resent her laying around so much especially on weekends saying that she cleaned the house all day but would never do the cleaning. Problems worsened & it just seemed that we just couldn't communicate. I never brought up these issues to her & as i look back i should of. I just thought i needed to suck it up and be the best non- complaining husband i could be. After our divorce just 4 months ago i still feel there is hope for us to get back together again. I love her so much still & i feel she really cares for me also. We still call each other babe & honey on some occasions. Now my 7 year old son has been diagnosed with inattentive add. My ex-wife is still in denial after my sons diagnosis. I haven't pressed her at all regarding seeing a Dr. I think if she gets a diagnosis it would turn her life around. She is such a loving person & means so well. Any input on what i could do are should do if anything ?
Denial from my adhd ex-wife
Submitted by atrain79 on 04/19/2016.
I hear you...
Submitted by wrinkles on
Hi Atrain - I can relate to where you are coming from on some levels. I'm a non-ADHD wife w/ an ADHD husband and an ADHD 5 year old son. My son was actually the 1st one diagnosed with ADHD. It was in doing all the research about this disability that I realized how it fit my husband as well as our marriage to a T. My husband always knew he was a little different and things were harder for him on some levels than other people but accepted it and managed to do well career-wise. At the same time, our marriage was failing and now I realize it was because more of his ADHD symptoms were coming out at home, esp. as he was trying to cope with them more and more at work. It was tough to approach him about being tested after our son was diagnosed because he was in denial and assumed ADHD was just something hyper kids had. I knew I had to approach it with him armed with information but that it would be a tough situation because I didn't want him to get defensive and just turn away from this whole thing.
I read Ned Hallowell's Driven to Distraction and it convinced me more than ever that my H has ADHD and that it has impacted our marriage immensely. I began to read him some of the sections of the book I found that were exact experiences we had endured. I also began to tell him that I could only help our son so much from the "sidelines". I will be by our son's side for the long haul with his ADHD (and likely other learning disabilities) but that I could only understand so much without having insight into how his mind works. I suggested that if my husband got tested and diagnosed with ADHD, it would be extremely beneficial to helping our son because my husband could relate to him and help explain to me how best to work through his symptoms and get through to him when traditional methods didn't work. After weeks of discussing this off and on, my H finally agreed to get tested. To no one's surprised, he and our son have the same type of ADHD.
While I thought this was the beginning of a long but positive road towards improving, things haven't exactly worked out that way. While my H does help here and there with our son and his ADHD, AND he's also happy that he finally understands WHY he feels differently than other people, he's in denial about needing treatment. He thinks because he's made it this far in life, that he can make it the rest of the way and also doesn't understand why I am exploring so many treatment options for our son.
Sorry this has been a long roundabout way to try and offer some advice but it's actually sending 2 messages to you... 1. try to persuade your wife to get evaluated and diagnosed from the perspective of being able to help your son (if she seems open to that). This method worked really well for me as it took the emphasis off of me pushing my H just to prove (in his mind) that there was actually "something wrong with him" and changed it to show he can be helpful in a way that I can't. However... here's my 2nd point - don't just assume that with a diagnosis that your wife will be open to treatment. I hope for your sake and your family's that she is but it might be an uphill battle.
My H and I are currently enrolled in Melissa Orlov's weekly phone ADHD marriage seminar. So far it is going well and I am learning a tremendous amount, however, one of the major themes of the course is that we're in this marriage and course together. My H needs to be as openly accepting of his ADHD diagnosis, symptoms and treatment as I need to accept the way I've approached handling the ADHD in our marriage (before we knew what it was) was more harmful to him and us than helpful. This course is my last hope... if it doesn't work and my H doesn't finally decide to take responsibility for his ADHD and get treatment, I think i'm done. I need to focus all my love and energy towards my son w/ ADHD and our 2 daughters.
Best of luck to you!! I hope you have an easier time with this than I did.
So what happened...
Submitted by Will It Get Better on
I also have a spouse who has been diagnosed three separate times for ADHD. Three times because she'd get disenchanted after three or four months with her current medication regime and stop taking her meds without telling me. When I found out several weeks later that she dropped her meds, we'd discuss the current chaos and reconcile to finding a new and more experienced ADHD doctor. This occurred twice and we'd gone up to the top of the ADHD medical food chain. She has remained on her meds for nine months now (at least I believe she has). One of the biggest issues is that she gets VERY upset and defensive if I ever ask about how she thinks she is doing with her current levels of medication ('Stop trying to fix me!') so medication can only be discussed in an oblique way when a symptom expands unexpectedly. We also took Melissa's course and it concisely presented a possible method of working together to have a happy marriage with ADHD. My wife seemed overwhelmed by the breadth of the symptoms and the impact on others. She talks about working on a single symptom at a time, for example, getting more sleep. She'll go to bed half an hour earlier sporadically over a couple of weeks but then the motivation dissipates and she returns to original state. I am at a loss to 'move forward' successfully. How did it eventually work out for your family?
Ex-wife denial
Submitted by atrain79 on
Here we are in the spring of 2019. My ex- wife finally received a Adhd diagnosis last fall . She told me that she stated taking meds at that point. She also told me that her dad age 68 was diagnosed with adhd also. She says the meds are helping her concentrate. This is the extent of which i see any improvement in her. I do not think she is getting any coaching at this point. She still gets our 2 kids late to practices, some times late for school. She has a volatile temper & many if not more of the symptoms previously discussed. She is just not self aware as one of my counselors explains. She still does not recognize the impact of her non diagnosed adhd that we had in our marriage. I no now my response to her adhd was not the approach one should take. I started to resent her not doing her part in our marriage which drifted us even father apart. We share 50/50 custody with our 2 children so its hard for me when she does so many things that effects our kids negatively. I no i cant control the way she handles our kids. I'm very nervous of what the future holds for our family. I still care for her greatly. I discussed our situation with a adhd counselor & she said that we need to get back under the same roof. She said that now that i understand the dynamic that took place in our relationship or the" Adhd Effect" which drew us apart, could help mend the pain we endured. My ex still says she lost trust in us. I'm trying to find a way to get her to realize through either going to an adhd counselor or another professional who understand the dynamic that takes place in non diagnosed Adhd marriage, that what happened to us was not either one of our faults. It feels so much like we were cheated as a couple! If we would of gotten more education & her a diagnosis i know we would be in a thriving & happy marriage today. What to do? How would you approach this situation? Thanks