Wife checked my email and found my PPD concerns

I'm new here, so Hi!
Reading this forum over the past couple of years has really helped me deal with a lot of the issues I'm going through, but because of recent developments, I've finally signed up to take part in discussion myself.

I have been with my wife for six years now and we have a five year old daughter. For most of our relationship I've thought she had a problem, but it's only when we moved in with her parents a couple of years ago I came across PPD, and the common traits seem to match her perfectly. It's only based on my observations, as she refuses to go to a doctor.

The moment I found out about PPD, it was like a huge weight off my mind (oh, THAT explains why she was like that back then, etc.). I have talked to her parents about it - they thought she may be schizophrenic or bipolar - and I have mentioned it to some of the teachers at our daughter's kindergarten as it has caused huge disruption there.

Last month, I finally got around to telling my sister about my concerns, by email. And that very weekend, it is apparent my wife checked my mobile phone, found the email and forwarded it to herself, and since then things have been utterly dreadful. My wife will not let me lay a finger on her now. Any effort to find intimacy is met with a deathly glare, and she insists I am making fun of her behind her back. It's going to take an inordinate amount of effort to get back to what we had before, which wasn't even ideal in the first place, but I'm worried I may never be able to get back to that state, as one of the traits of PPD is the bearing of grudges.

Now that my wife is fully aware I think she has PPD, could this be an opportunity to embrace that, convince her I love her for who she is, and that we can deal with it together, as long as she trusts me and tried to find professional help together? I think her biggest fear is that she would be put into a mental hospital, because there is such a hospital close by to where we live. But honestly, I would never let that happen. I am just not sure if I would be able to convince her about my feelings, given that she now thinks I've been doing this behind her back.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

Hi hotbot and welcome to the forum.

I'm a random person on the internet. I know very little, and nothing at all about PPD. So, your own common sense totally and always overrides anything I could suggest.

I sympathise with her in so far as you talked to MANY people about it. And didn't talk to her directly. No-one wants to be discussed behind their back, especially outside the family. Not to mention how much it ties into the disorder into the first place. You've justified her suspicions. It's not that she thinks you've been doing things behind her back. You have!

Have you apologised for that? PPD, or issues that may look like it, aren't at all easy to deal with. I can see things must've been hard for you to have come to this idea in the first place. I don't think you can start rebuilding broken trust by putting the blame on her, though. Since she's already defensive about her behaviour patterns. That's not going to help in any way.

Once you've done that honestly. And perhaps backed away to give her a few days to process it. Then it might be time to discuss what happens next. With her directly. If you need to talk to other people about it, then please consider limiting that. Perhaps to someone close, who will support you emotionally. And perhaps your doctor, if you want a professional support. Involving many others will just feed into this "talking behind her back" concern. And, it probably isn't how you want to do things anyway. You want her to be an active partner in tackling whatever the issues are. If her family were suspecting bipolar or schizophrenia, then there are obviously some problems there to be looked at.

Her doctor, or a therapist, would be a good starting point for her to take control of looking into the possibility of making changes. They'd be able to explain what the grounds for involuntary committal would be. Mostly, it's very unlikely unless a person is an immediate danger to themselves or others. If that's the case, then I hope she'd act in the best interests of your daughter.

Finally I don't think your relationship will get back to where it was before. That would involve "forgetting" which isn't likely. But I do hope it can develop new strength and that you continue to grow together. And support each other. The relationship is valuable, and I hope that she recognises that, over and above everything negative that she's feeling / expressing at the moment.

Hi Ada,

Thanks for your reply. I appreciate your frankness.
I didn't want to write a grandiose post, especially as a self-introduction, so there may be a few key details that were missing. I don't blame my wife for anything. I'm sorry if it sounded like I do. You are indeed correct to state that I went behind my wife's back in telling people about this, and believe me, I feel terrible about it.

Let me give you some more context.
I have asked her to seek help before; I have said I will go with her in fact. She went to the hospital by herself once, heard something she didn't want to hear (though has not told me what was said), and has refused to see a doctor ever since then. She is violent towards me, her father and her mother (we all live together), but not our daughter, to the best of my knowledge. Her violence comes in extreme circumstances, when she feels like she cannot control the person she is talking to in any other way.

I don't know the extremities of PPD, but given the chance, my wife will destroy the lives of all the family around her. In the last three years, my daughter has had to change nursery/kindergarten, four times. The reason I told the teachers about PPD is because my wife thinks all the other mothers are bullying her and deliberately leaving her out of group activities. She also thinks other mothers are stopping their children playing with our daughter. When my wife has periods of depression, my daughter doesn't want to go to kindergarten. I try to take her, but my wife stops me. During these periods, she has missed kindergarten for two-four week periods, and during the latest of these (still ongoing), we have had to withdraw her from her current kindergarten and are looking for a new one. These events alone are soul-crushing for me. I have a 9-5 office job, but it's extremely difficult to concentrate on my work when I am worried about my daughter not going to kindergarten, and wondering what she is doing at home while my wife is stuck in bed all day, so I have had to confide in my manager. I really try not to tell people unless I feel they are directly affected.

I am in a situation where my daughter is growing older and facing more and more difficulties at school, while my wife's condition is gradually worsening, and to top it all off, I have betrayed her by going behind her back. On many occasions I lose the will to keep living like this, and at those times, I think of my daughter and I can somehow pull myself together. But the rest of the time, I want to live as normally as possible and help my wife with this. If anything, I am desperately searching for a way for my wife to accept her condition, and that's why I have come to this forum.

As a 41 year old daughter of a mother who has PPD, you really need to protect your daughter 1st and foremost. My mom's PPD didn't become full blown until I was 13 and the trauma and emotional scars I have are numerous. I can not even imagine dealing with it at the age of 6. I know you love your wife. You are an adult who has free will to stay or to leave. Your daughter is defenseless. She has no choice about the situation. She can not become collateral damage while you try to appease your wife and make some kind of semblance of a marriage. You need to get your daughter into therapy at the very least if you insist on staying with your wife. A child does not understand mental illness. As she develops her own personality and challenges her mothers distorted views the more severe the emotional abuse will become. You need to read up on adult children of PPD parents. You must protect your daughter, you can not hope for the best.

My dad is still with my mom. He has a second house now to escape to. My mother has never changed. I love her -she has moments where she is a wonderful person -but she can also be unbelievable cruel, and now I understand her illness but it doesn't make it less painful.

My 17 year old daughter and my dad went on a trip to Europe this summer. Things like this are a huge trigger and I am left to look after her while he's gone as she is now elderly. My husband & I spent 4th of July with her. I no longer try to reason with her, or contradict her in anyway because its completely useless and just leads to rage. I spent the ride home in tears. She manages to stir up awful memories if I spend too much time with her. I become that child inside again. The child that was not acceptable, the betrayer, the black sheep, worthless, useless -always against her. We tried looking at family photos and she used it as an opportunity to point out all the things wrong with me and my dad.

Think really hard before you saddle your daughter to this kind of life. I know I sound harsh. I just can not imagine shuffling my daughter around to 4 kindergartens in one year and being left home for weeks at a time with a clinically depressed mom. That is just chaos in the mind of a small child. You brought her into this world, you need to protect her.

I just joined the forum and spent half an hour writing a comprehensive reply but when I tried to post it, the website lost it. It wore me out writing it because my wife has bad PPD and it is a nightmare. Sorry I can't write it again right now.

You have my total sympathy, my wife has PPD and it is a nightmare. She started to see a counsellor several years ago about stress, mainly generated from a dreadful childhood with a draconian mother although it was still going on up until her mother died. The counsellor said he wanted to see us both so as to get the full picture - at this time I was unaware she had PPD. Eventually, as is the case with PPD she decided she didn't agree with the counsellor so we terminated the sessions.
At the end of the sessions the counsellor told me in confidence that my wife suffered from PPD. I looked it up and, as with you, suddenly I had an explanation for all the irrational and over the top actions of the past, including trashing my computer room and attacking me in the car whilst I was driving us to see the counsellor - I was doing 70 mph at the time and arrived at the counsellors with my face bleeding. I love her dearly but it is becoming almost intolerable to live with her yet the protective side of me still wants to look after her.
I have been accused of all sorts of things like 'fancying little girls', 'being a homosexual' and many other unsavoury things that have no shred of truth except in her mind and that is the problem. Seeing things that aren't there, unwarranted accusations and bearing grudges literally for ever are the worst.
Recently she brought up something I allegedly said FOUR years ago when she was diagnosed with a small breast cancer, which I knew just never happened and she said 'I hope you get cancer and don't expect me to look after you'. I was out of work at the time she was diagnosed and so was able to be fully supportive and fortunately the cancer was small and was totally removed with no reappearance. She works voluntarily in a local hospice once a week and has told me how dreadful the disease can be so I was poleaxed that she would say that to me. I have forgiven her everything before that but I am really struggling with that one
She used to be so caring and loving and we were so close but she hasn't told me she loves me in 4 years, despite the fact I I used to tell her several times a week but have not since that incident. I work away from home during the week so I am not subject to her outbursts and as I own my accomodation I can stay away from home, although I do not see it as home these days.
My wife just does her own thing when I go home weekends and I cannot remember the last time I had a cooked meal. She eats her breakfast away from me with the dog and can't even be bothered to say goodnight when she goes to bed, but if she wants something doing she is nice as pie, but can turn in an instant.
I try so very hard to be nice as I would like things to be different but invariably I get unwarranted grief. For example last time I was home I went to get a bottle of Maple Syrup from the larder to put on waffles and I noticed that there was a dried streak on the side of the bottle and merely made the observation that it must have been leaking. She took this as a criticism of how clean she kept the place and went off on one.
Since her son, his partner and our 4 year old Grandaughter have come back to live in the UK about 3 years ago, I am lowest on the list of priorities behind them, the dog and her living relatives yet we used to be so close. Her son and I get on really well, she brought him up by herself, deciding not to tell his father that he existed and did not get married until we met at age 43 so he is the most important thing in her life.
He wishes he could help the situation as he knows what she is like and has told me that he knows she is capable of hurting (not literally) herself to get at someone.
Unless you have had to live with PPD, you have no concept how difficult it is and that it is very destructive in relationships, my biggest fear has always been that she will see something that only exists in her mind, terminate the marriage and carry on until she dies, firmly convinced that she was right. I have to constantly think about what I am going to say, evaluate it thoroughly and if there is the slightest chance of it being misconstrued I just don't say it.
I went to see the counsellor recently to try and get my head together and he said he guarantees she will not change unless someone close can convince her she has the problem and needs to get help - it certainly could not come from me or the counsellor. No one like that exists, her son could tell her but it would show her that he and I talk about the problem and she would go ballistic, or her brother but he lives about 80 miles away and as we meet infrequently he would have to take my word for it, although I have expressed my concerns to him in the past, but yet again it would be obvious who was the source and WW3 would break out.
However, one of the things with PPD is the patient invariably begins to mistrust the counsellor.
Do I keep trying and look after her because I love her at the possible expense of my health or what ?
For better for worse has a whole new meaning with PPD. Any time we try to discuss things she just rakes up the past, real or imaginary, doesn't listen to me literally and it becomes a lecture.

Not asking for sympathy, a solution or complaining, just wanted to show my understanding and support for the originator of this discussion string and maybe give more people an idea of how dreadful PPD can be to live with. Both he and I have tough decisions to make - I am 65 and we have been together 22 years and married for 19.