That sounds like such a stupid question out loud, but I mean it. Husband of 5 years has been suffering from depression since the start of COVID and has newly developed severe anxiety and panic. He's starting to develop agoraphobia.
It's fucking tough to watch him sink into it all. I want to support him and be there for him. Genuinely.
I'm struggling with balancing supporting him and holding firm on boundaries about his behavior.
When he's very anxious/stressed, he's terse and short-tempered. He's quick to yell at me or the kids. He's gotten better about the outright yelling, but still has a strong angry tone. He will often say hurtful things when he's stressed but later say he didn't say that or will say what he did was fine and I'm being dramatic.
This is literally only when he's having anxiety or panic.
As someone with an anxiety disorder myself, I feel for him. I know how anxiety makes your frontal lobe turn to complete mush. But I've always had a mind to apologise later if I stepped out of line.
His mental health is taking a toll on our house. Hes either too depressed to do anything like run or take walks or he's too anxious to function logically.
I told him today that I want to support him however I can, but that he needs to prioritize getting his emotional regulation and anxiety under control.
So, my question... How I do support him but maintain my boundaries about his behavior? Especially when he refuses sometimes to even acknowledge that his behavior is a problem?
TL;DR Husband's mental health is causing strain. How do I support while keeping personal boundaries?
Submitted October 11, 2021 at 09:08AM by theaustener https://ift.tt/2YEcDbW
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