How to break DID to your spouse?

SOHank wrote:Okay, this is pretty bad. Sounds like he has his own issues... I hear controlling more than caring. He will have to change his ways for this to work long term IMHO.

I thought some of the others were being pretty harsh from the first post, but as is often the case, it seems they picked up on something I missed.

You know there's a lot of truth to this. MY wife is very "type A" and "commanding" - goes with her personality AND her career of almost 28 years... BUT this is a whole different level.

He will HAVE TO CHANGE to accept you as you are before ANYTHING can get better.

IainEtc wrote:WTF!

Talk to your T about this. It's getting time to do something. I hope Women's Aid is like getting out of there.

Colin & Iain

Womens aid have a refuge the trouble is its a one time deal, if I take us and daughter there and Grace runs back to husband then social work WILL take away our daughter. So I have to get Grace on side first....

Amythyst wrote:

p.s. you (and likely Grace) may not see that stuff as abusive and manipulative. We get that - our previous host didn't see our family as manipulative and exploitive. Hosts kinda don't I think? Hosts just do 'the job', do what's required of them, and the uncomfortable stuff gets blocked out or pushed away.

Yeah my bad. I was the one that got us into this relationship. until the book burning day I only got the highlights. I think I lost control that day because I was mentally exhausted from running away from home the year before. I knew I was loosing track of time but I put it down to the stress of having to deal with the fall out from that, I couldn't understand why I was piling my stuff onto the bonfire. Sometimes I am angry at grace for enabling H. Mostly I am cross at myself. I should have noticed something before but I was so busy running from the $#%^ I grew up in that I didn't want to see flaws.

I was the host and grace was the other - absorbing the stuff I couldn't/didn't want to know and then I abandoned her and she did the only thing she knew how to do. Appease and keep on appeasing until we got to the mess we are in now. Grace thinks everything is her fault even stuff out of her control (like poor tv reception) so she takes the blame and thinks she is the bad wife for burdening H. I didn't see it, she still doesn't.

Don't know about DID but H had a schizophrenic uncle. Sigh.

We have 2 therapists. A therapist therapist who grace sees once a month. She is the one who has got Womens Aid on speed dial. We have a psychologist therapist who was the one to diagnose DID we (all parts that want to) see him once a fortnight. I'm going to ask him to write a letter to H.

"for better for worse" goes both ways I can't expect him to help my DID and in the same breath run away from his behavior if there is a chance his behavior is due to fear or his own mental health.

I guess we'll find out once the letter arrives.

I know it is clutching at straws but I am hoping that the guy I fell in love with is in there somewhere.

Good luck to you. I hope it works out in the best way possible.keep writing here if you want/need to.

keep your fingers and toes crossed we are seeing the T tomorrow and I'm going to ask him to spill the DID beans.

If you don't hear from me in a fortnight I'm either halfway to Botswana or 6 feet under.

MeMyselfMaureen wrote:keep your fingers and toes crossed we are seeing the T tomorrow and I'm going to ask him to spill the DID beans.

If you don't hear from me in a fortnight I'm either halfway to Botswana or 6 feet under.

Having the T help is a good idea. Someone else present, who can also answer difficult questions, is a good thing.

We'll hope for neither of those outcomes. Botswana is hot this time of year... and 6 feet down you'll have horrible internet connectivity.

On a serious note, we will keep you in our thoughts and prayers here... Won't be able to POST much since we'll be on the phone all week, but we will be able to read these forums while we're gone when it's quiet and if we can force/make some alone time.

Tell your husband to listen to your unnamed one and have them come out. Have a dinner and talk as well as you can and explain what's happening i
With your psychologist. As well as what the unnamed one really wants to do. Tell him that your parts need to be themselves. And if he can't accept that see if this forum might help him

Thanks guys.

H didn't turn up. So we spent the time working on peters issues instead. new meeting booked for the end of September.

I just wish this was over.

The unknown response is tormenting me.

Your husband needs to man up and get this done.

Colin

I feel like slapping myself for being so stupid. But hey hindsight right?

So yesterday H came with us to the T and grace was fronting and she was a mess and T was explaining and explaining tiptoing round the edge to test how H would react I guess. Then out comes peter and back come grace and T decides to go all or nothing .

I had been so angry just waiting for a chance to air my mind when H said "Oh ok knowledge is power I guess" and T said "no not power, your role is going to change from caretaker to husband because by the end of this therapy that more assertive part is going to be out so often and so seamlessly that all the stuff the other parts can't do will get done with out you having to steer life."

The relief on H's face... like this burden had been lifted. So I came out and told him as diplomatically as I could that he had to stop choosing which behaviors to repress stop telling us who the real us is, what the real us should think because by dictating who we are he was reinforcing the depressive needy emotionally unstable part at the expense of the rest of us.

So far so good it's almost 24 hours and he hasn't run away screaming! Looks like he's been living with scared husband syndrome the last 10 years and that can't have been nice.

There are going to be ups and downs but fingers crossed we are on our way to a happier life.

Mo

MeMyselfMaureen wrote:I feel like slapping myself for being so stupid. But hey hindsight right?
Mo

Why do you feel stupid?

It sounds like it went reasonably well. Maybe even better than that. It takes a bit to sink in that the person you thought you knew isn't quite who you thought THEY were.

For me, the diagnosis made things make more sense about SF. It was also a relief for me as I had been emotional support for SF for years (depression, panic, and anxiety), and here was someone saying things that made sense and saying they could help! HUGE RELIEF!!! Perhaps it is the same for him?? I'm hoping so.