Divorce Support Forums: now it's hitting the fan...maybe it's started

Now be careful not to trash your wife, but do explain that youv'e been more & more worried about her health as she smokes more, has fallen several times, the docs can't find anything but she keeps gonig back for pain medications and then saves them up to double up on the dosage, goes through entirely unmedicated times just so she can get the over-medicated opportunities. Explain that you're at your wit's end, wishing she'd just TRY, and you're doing all the working, earning, shopping, and caring for her... and as a full time caregiver AND full time breadwinner you'd sure love it if some of her family could make take the burden off from tiem to time.

Explain that you don't want ot say bad thingsa bout her, but you're at your wit's end frustrated and worried about her heath, and this paranoid stuff like inviting HER over for a week without telling you, it's kind of worrysome. I mean, you didn't even have the chance to clean or ... well, you've got workmen coming over & such.

And if your wife doesn't find a way to contribute something you see no way out other than to separate for good.

Tell her to watch her daughter & see for herself, the smoking, the refusal do help even in tiny ways around the house, the stockpiling of pills so she can get intoxicated half the time rather than simply lower her pain all of the time. And explain that you're not sure you are ready to do anything about it right now, but any suggestions would be welcome. At the moment, though, all you can think of is a trial separation... you've not had enough time or space to think about it, so that's waht you've come up with as the only reasonable option that you can envision. But of course the longer this goes on, the worse it gets, you feel like you're living in prision and at some point you're just going to want OUT.

Explain that you loved her so much at one point that it is killing you to watch her like this, but you have come to realize that you are not the right person to fix her, and you don't know what the solution is, but sitting here at home is not the solution.

I know you might not have this kind of relationship with your mother in law, but it's possible if you have your last ditch effort to save the marriage and make it bearable with her knowledge, at least she won't try to help her daughter pull AS MANY dirty tricks once the divore gets underway.

My husband's former inlaws all can't stand his ex, but he never explained to them what was going on, so when he finally left, she was able to blame the whole weirdness and nastiness that she'd shown for the past 2 decades all on him... and they bought it rather than admit that their own flesh & blood is really that nasty. Now, over time, the brothers & sisters have started to remember that the woman was ALWAYS like this, even before she met my husband, and they'd grown up with her acting nasty & weird... but the mother, she will probably never admit that her baby is like this becasue she raised her this way, so it's ALWAYS going to be my h usband's fault.

NOW, if he'd taken advantage of the fact that they kind of liked him better than her, before the separation, and had talked to them & explained stuff like it's not the way they raised her, it's the way she turned out NOW... and no one's fault, etc., etc... well, he'd hav ehad a chance.

It's important that the mother not think it has anything to do with the way she was raised... and nothing to do with anything you did to her... but that you're trying to HELP resolve the issues that were created by outside forces several years ago, and it's not working.

It might work, if she's not totally poisoned them against you.

What happened to my husband for not innoculating them against this, is that they all started conspiring to help his ex do hte wrong thing, they talked about divorce issues in front of the kids as i fit was all Dad's fault, for exmaple, and they told neighbors & acquaintances what a jerk he was... being at the wrong end of a nasty gossip campaign is NOT fun! and things ended up happening that in the end made his position not so good.

Don't let this happen to you. EVEN if you don't have this kind of relationship with the mother-in-law, consider finding a way to communicate this stuff to her.

NOTHING about the money... EVERYTHING about the pressure, the pain, the stress, the not having a day off and finally having to TAKE a day off from caretaking just to go find friends & do something other than watch TV all the time... EVERYTHING about how you feel so bad that she's always in pain but frustrated that you can't do anything about it and she doesn't even try, and EVERYTHING about how it's all the fault of some nasty event that no one could ahve prevented and ertainly Mama is not to blame. NOTHING about the money! OK?