Friends, Family & Carers Forum

[mountain]

Hi,

I have a partner who is bi-polar he can have short bursts of mania, a few days and then very long depressive periods.  He is on meds and I am one of the lucky ones in the he does recognise that he is bi-polar and he needs his meds.  Unfortunately for the last 6mths he has also been smoking dope and it is escalating.  We are seeing a counsellor about our issues and about the dope issue.  He does understand that if he doesn't give up the dope our relationship is over and I do understand that this in itself stresses him and would drive him to want to smoke more.  I have asked for a date with the counsellors approval on when he it will stop and he has told me it will be his new years resolution.  Part of me is screaming inside it is not soon enough I don't know that I can do another 3 wks of his behaviour on dope.

We have been together for 4 yrs and it has been a very rocky road.  His meds wheren't working properly so at the beginning of a fairly new relationship (6mths) he started on dope this drove me to move out until he was willing to seek proper medical assistance and go back to his counsellor.  So we had to go through the whole withdrawal from one drug and the build up of the new drugs which didn't work for him.  During this time we also found a more appropriate house for the two of us and his foster mother (will call her FM from now on) who was living with him to move into.  This of course plummented him into a deep depression with me having to cope with moving two households into one and also helping him cope (which I wasn't very good at due not to understanding the full implications of his illness) and work at the same time. Once we moved and as the new drugs weren't working for him he became suicidal.  With the help of his doctor we got the mental health team on board.  So at the end of our 1st year together we went through another round of withdrawal from one drug to another, the team told me it would take at least 6-8mths before he would be fully stablised.  It turned out to be nearly a year before he stabilised andit was a hard year.   

After only about 6mths of relatively good times I got sick from multiple tick bites and could not work as I would have good days and bad and I had to deal with FM. During this time FM's behaviour and health began getting worse, she has a form of dementia and also physical illnesses and I became her carer.  As my health got better, we had the opportunity to buy the house we were renting and as I could not go out to work I set up a small seedling business at home and sold at them at the local markets to improve our chances of purchasing the house.   As FM's behaviour became worse she would not accept there was anything wrong with her brain so she would not see the specialists and counsellors she needed. This then caused my partners behaviour to begin to get worse and I could not get him to see his counsellor or go back to the mental health team.  I went to the counsellor myself as I was becoming increasingly angry, frustrated, stressed and tired as both were cognitive enough that I could not insist/force medical intervention of any sort for either of them.

Unfortunately as things got worse what I did do is lose myself in the seedling business, I drove myself to work long hours so that I could simply crash into bed at night and sleep and not have to see or think of or deal with the emotions I was experiencing.  My excuse to myself was " I am securing my partner's and my future," so we have a home of our own.  I stopped seeing the counsellor as it wasn't changing things at home for me.  I would try all the things suggested and it just didn't work.  I stopped feeling compassion for FM and started becoming angry with my partner because I could see he needed medical help but he just wouldn't  get it.  I can see how this probably drove my partner to dope as he felt I wasn't there for him.  The more he smoked and his behaviour changed the more frustrated I got the harder I worked and the tired I got so I could sleep the sleep of the dead.  The less time I had for him as I didn't like the druggy him,  the more he turned to pot, the more his behaviour became unacceptable and he still would not see his counsellor and doctor, so the frustration built to more anger.   A nice vicious cycle.  I saw the counsellor by myself again as I was at breaking point and she told me I was suffering from carers fatigue. 

Things have changed, we now own the house and FM is no longer with us as of two months ago.  I had hoped it would improve things between my partner and I but it hasn't it has actually got worse.  As mentioned we are seeing the counsellor together to work through our problems but because of the dope he is just doesn't seem to care.  He is not keeping his end of agreements made, he would rather get stoned.

I don't mean for this to sound horrible but after reading numerous posts here and seeing what others are going through and for how long they have been going through them I have lost hope.  I can't see a future were this won't be repeated over and over.  In 4 years I have had a total of about 1 yr of happiness and joy with him.   I want peace and calm.

So I would like to ask for some stories of adversity over come and long periods of life were there is joy or links to such stories please.  I desparately need hope to get me through the next 3 wks. 

 The mountain is crumbling

[NikNik]

Hi @mountain 

I have seen you here & there around the forums, but I don't think I've actually said hi to you yet.

I'm really glad you posted. As you probably have seen around the place, we are all going through tricky situations with the person we care for. It's not uncommon to lose hope and for things to get really stressful.

Have you seen @Jacob101 's post about his partner who has bipolar? Your stories have similarities. Maybe @Jacob101  could offer some advice?

We have a wonderful member @Uggbootdiva who is open about her bipolar and talks about how she works with her family to manage her bipolar. @Uggbootdiva , I know your situation isn't exactly the same, but by the sounds of it, you have a positive relationship with your family - can you share any insights for @mountain ?

While these forums aren't the answer to everything, I hope you continue to come and use this as a place to let off some steam.

Nik

[Uggbootdiva]

@mountain I am so sorry for your situation. It sounds unbelievably difficult. I am in awe of your ability to keep going to Care for his FM, to care for him, too care for yourself. To start up your own business to look after yourself. you are amazing.

Light at the end of the tunnel?? nope can't promise you that. wish I could. MI never seems to go away. it is always there just sometimes more or less present.

I am sure your counselor talked to you about it, but you have top decide what is it I like about this person? The part of the person that you love is always there. Sometimes hidden by the bipolar but always there some of the members of this forum have a different take on things so this is just my view --> you have to ask, is the part of him you love worth the pain? there will have good times and bad times like any relationship. I would def. agree that dope is a big deal breaker. Because we all KNOW it doesn't help with the MI. It will take time to work out what he can use to comfort and cope instead of the dope but I would think he MUST make that commitment not to you but to himself and the relationship to stop taking it.

I sound like a heartless bitch but people with bipolar can make choices and do have some control over what we do. granted I think making good choices is much harder for us but we can do it.

If he is willing to give up dope for himself (not for you cause then you are the badguy( that's an awesome start. With the counselor set up some reasonable goals and guidelines around choices and behaviour for you both in the relationship.

it CAN work. It CAN get better. But like anything it it sometimes just a big mess.

sending virtual respect and hope and hugs your way. I sincerely hope it goes well with you - whatever happens.

@kristin - any thoughts - you are very wise about these sorts of things.

[Alessandra1992]

Hey @mountain, welcome aboard! You know I have reread your post several times over..I reread it to really get a clear understanding of what is going on..
What came across to me, is that you have been the driving force in this relationship. You have pushed on and started your own business. You have pushed on and purchased a house. You have persisted in getting help. You have pushed on and cared for the FM, and then supported FM moving out..
So here is my observation..where is the opportunity for your partner to take a lead? You know, that it is an equal journey together?
I hear your frustration but maybe the only thing your partner has felt he has any autonomy over is his decision to smoke.
Which may be for reasons other than you think.
Sometimes people smoke to distract their attention from their own thoughts. Yes we all know dope smoking is often not helpful in our mental health, but from what I hear, it can slow down your mind and take the edge off certain feelings..
Perhaps your partner is grieving the change in his FM, and perhaps missing her company?
I really have no idea but have you asked him about why is his dope usage increasing?
Its a shitty time of year to be facing this kind of deal breaker behaviour, but maybe as @Uggbootdiva stated..you need to have the conversation around what are your deal breakers..
I do understand the need to drown yourself in work to cope with caring, but now it might be time to show your vulnerable side and ask your partner to support you. That you need to rest, to laugh, to love to enjoy each other's company again..
It might be scary, painful and sound harsh..but change is heading your way as you have clearly had enough of the current situation...
Take the step and talk about your feelings, as I think you have been bottling up yours for a long time..so not to pop them all out at once, but focus on one..Like missing the sense of calm..or scared of losing all fun in the relationship..
Or I could be totally off track..take care..you have invested 4 years the both of you, I do hope your relationship improves..keep talking to your counsellor..

[mountain]

Thank you uggbootdiva, your message did give me hope.   It is not the bi-polar part that is hard at the moment, it is what the dope is doing to him.  What I want is the bi-polar man I met and loved back, if we can get through those very hard times with the med changes etc and I still felt love and care for him I am sure we can work it out. 

It is the drug influenced person now living with me that I want gone.  I can't work things out with this person, I don't like this person.  We go to counselling make agreements and then he just breaks them, lies, steals and is verbally abusive and edging towards voilence.

We had a breakthrough I think tonight.  He broke a simple agreement worked out with the counsellor to help heal the relationship and it has nothing to do with drugs. If he didn't do what was agreed upon there was to be a consquence. He broke it, when I asked him why the first time he said he forgot, so I asked how could I help him remember, gave him what he needed and he still did not follow through. He tried charming and wheedling his way out of the coming consquence but I told him this was the line in the sand for me, it is a simple request and if he can't do this to begin the healing then there wasn't much hope for us.  He experienced the consquence today, he sulked and then became abusive and I simply reminded him that he had made a choice and he knew what the consquence was.  He stormed off and went out for sometime but when he came back he had totally changed his attitude to the whole thing.  He is still not happy but I think he understands that he made a decision and I am not about to budge and that this truly is a make or break point in our relationship.  This has given me some hope as well.

Moutain

[Alessandra1992]

Good on you mountain! These are hard conversations to have but being very clear about your line in the sand is a blessing..it clarifies what your relationship stands on..
Mind you, as a consumer myself, I find it hard at times to learn new ways of communicating when I was unwell. It had an impact that meant I was very focussed on myself..all the time..but we got through it with the patience and tolerance and I am still happily married many years later..relationships of mutual respect and shared understanding are worth it!
Hugs to you and your partner!!!

[mountain]

Hi Alessandra1992,

Thank you so much for your response and questions, they are all good and it gives me lots of things to think about.

Re - my partner taking a lead.  He was the one to push me to start the business, I knew how much time it would take to establish and the amount of work required, so I was reluctant to do it.  He also told me he in no way wanted to be involved or do any work expect helping at the markets.  Over time he did decided that he would like to grow the seedlings up to pot size.  This became his project and his sole responsiblity, then he decided after some time he was over it and basically walked away from it.  Same with the house  I tried to involve him he would simply say not my problem you handle it.  There are so many things that he just goes you handle it or if I leave it to him to deal with it simply doesn't get done, so I think I tend to handle everything and then he doesn't get the opportunity to take the lead.  His favorite saying is "man was not designed to work but to live", he also came from a very wealthy family where you did business but you most definitely did not work.  He is artistic with a very good eye for placement of things, I have left it up to him to place paintings and decorations in the house, so far since owning the house (6mths) he has done nothing to the general house.  He has created a little cave for himself in the house for his own excuslive use with his own very special things and that is fine by me, I am delighted he has done so.  I am not delighted that he has also taken things that aren't his and they are special to me because he wanted them and that the part of the house that we share he has done nothing with.  This was done while on dope so it really bought out his, me, me, me, side.  We lopped some trees down and he wanted them left tall so he could totem pole them, nothing.  He likes to garden so I have left him to design garden beds and then we are to talk together about suitable plants. He has done a couple and then nothing. 

Yes, I can see how with the pot smoking it could be part of the autonomy thing and I do believe you have hit the nail part way on the head.  I have asked him with the counsellor present why he is smoking and why it is increasing.  His answer is simply I enjoy it, it expands the mind, you can see so much and I am not smoking anywhere near as much as I use to before I met you.  I also feel it is that with the people he smokes with he can behave like a child.  They have actually told me he is "such a child".  I spoke with the counsellor privately about it and she said that is what he wants, no responsibilty, he hates it when I consult with him and want his feedback opinion, etc, yet at the same time he resents it when he leaves all the decisions to me and I make them.  I do expect adult behaviour from him as he is 56yrs old he is not a little boy.  The counsellor feels I may expect to much from him in this regard.  It puts me between a rock and a hard place as how do I know that when I do x it is controlling but then I shouldn't consult with him over z because it is too much for him.  Hmm this has got me thinking maybe I should simply ask him - "do you want me to consult with you over x or do you just want me to make a decision"

Yes, we have gone through the grieving process with the counsellor sometime ago at the beginning of FM's illness and maybe he is still grieving over the change in FM and that she did finally leave, which is what he use to tell me he wanted.  His behaviour towards her was what finally instigated her moving out.  Maybe the increase is a way to escape the fact that she finally could not tolerate his behaviour and she finally drew a line in the sand and would not forgive him.  Unfortunately in the time I had known them she accepted and allowed some, what I consider horrendous behaviour and abuse and I would be constantly intervening before it escalated into something truly nasty, I don't know if it had been like this previously.  Many a time though she would delibrately push his buttons to get a reaction, I do believe this was part of her own emontional and mental issues.  So by rights the stress of her not being here should help but maybe he feels abandoned because she did finally leave.

Re - asking my partner to support me, this almost makes me cry answering this.  Because at the start of the business I sat down with him and said "if I do this I am going to need your support, I am going to need you to take over certain areas of the household, can you do this and what are you willing to do".  He accepted this and told me what he felt he could do and then he would do it for awhile then not do it, we would talk, he would do it for a week or two, then stop.  We went to counselling, it was good for a short time then it was back to the same old.  I felt so let down, disappointed, hurt and unloved at this point.  I had tried everything I knew, did as the counsellor advised but still it didn't work.  Also at this time FM's behaviour really began to deteriorate both mentally and pshycially which would send my partner into a fury. I also began to notice that he seemed to be cycling into a period of depression which he denied when I asked him, he refused to go to counselling and have his drugs reviewed, from there things just got worse as per 1st email.    Aaahhh hah, just had a light bulb moment,  he took on as mentioned earlier potting seedlings up to bigger pots around this time.  Maybe just, maybe he saw how I could escape into my own world with the seedlings and how utterly focused and also happy it made me and he thought this would work for him and it didn't.  Between my dissappointment at his lack of support, FM button pushing and him not liking what he saw with her and now the stress of dealing with something he started that wasn't working for him and not wanting to continue but feeling he had too (which he has since told me he felt) what other escape could he have.  Yes, his old friend, dope, guaranteed to make him feel good.

Hmm, now mentioning fun - it just hit me like a tonne of bricks, you are so right Alessandra, on a few occassions my partner had said to me "you are no fun anymore"  unfortunately the times he choose to say it to me, I was tired and highly stressed about a multitude of things and I can clearly remember my response which was "neither are you".   Our counsellor had suggested we have more fun together but we had to take into account FM.  It could never be a spur of the moment thing as she would have a tantrum about not being invited if we did and my partner is a spur of the moment person.  I tried planning some fun things with advance warning to FM that it was our date day/night but it was rarely successful either he didn't want to do/go or he would have a hissy fit over something that would ruin it.  So I simply gave up.  On reflection I am beginning to wander if FM did/said something when I wasn't around to cause this. 

He knows what the deal breaker is - that is using dope as we went through this once before and I moved out of the old house very rapidly.  So I do understand why he has repeatedly lied to me about smoking, if I was in his position I would do the same.  I also think he didn't believe that because we have invested in a house together that I would be willing to break off the relationship.  At our last counselling session he got a rude shock as I told him I would be prefectly happy to do one of two things.  As the house has upstairs and downstairs living I told him if he didn't stop, he could live upstairs, multiple practical reasons for this and I explained why and I would live downstairs and we could live totally separate lives.  Or we sell the house that simple.  He said you wouldn't move you have your nursery here, not a problem I told everything in the nursery can be dismantled easily and moved easily. 

As mentioned in my response to uggbootdiva I think I had a breakthrough with him last night I drew a line in the sand over another simple issue that we had an agreement on and he didn't keep it.  He paid the agreed consquence and I think that he can now see that I am totally and utterly serious about give up the dope or it is over. 

Thank you for your response and apologies for such a long reply what this has done is help me clarify some things and in it's own way given me hope.

The mountain has stopped crumbling.

[Alessandra1992]

Good on you mountain..the mountain gas stopped crumbling so hope endures...

[Loopy]

mountain, loopy the name advice the game, If your flat mate is stupid enough to smoke dope on medication for MI they deserve just what they get. But they have to realise that their actions are detrimental to your health and well being and that is not a 50/50 partnership, as in FM, for the good of all especially you your FM has to be discouraged, somehow to cease the stupidity. I too read you piece many times and you do not deserve to be treated as you are being treated. Rather than repeating, I agree with Sandy.

Stick with it maybe your FM will see the light,

loopy

[Jo]

So sorry to hear your story. I can relate and can certainly relate to the cycle of hope then despair then hope again then despair again ad nauseum. I believe that not until your husband stops smoking  dope, do you have any hope of tackling the problem. The cannabis contains a chemical that triggers psychotic thinking and episodes which sabotages the effects of the medication and all the hard work you and the counsellor and doctors put into helping him.I do hope things come good for you soon. You need love and support and understanding to be able to continue. Do you have any family members or friends who can supply that?Carers suffer from burn-out more than any other members of our society.