When your husband's depressed...

It makes it extra difficult to work on a marriage when one or both parties suffers from depression. We sort of take turns here in this household...one of us down, the other just up enough or more to carry the weight for the other. And, occasionally, we both slide. Never good.

Right now, it's my husband's turn, and he's feeling pretty despondent about everything in his life: us, parenthood, work, friendships, family. All of it. Last night, when we had our Sunday Talk, he noted that he feels like a failure as a father. He doesn't think his son likes him. He doesn't think I like him. Sure, he says he knows we love him...but he doesn't think we like who he is. He asked me when and and how he became so unlikable. He doesn't hang out with too many people either, so that just seemed like more proof to him.

All I could do was listen. But, in the back of my mind, I was thinking, "How on earth are we supposed to go about fixing a marriage when he needs to fix his own soul first?"

The thing is (and I can't tell him this, or he'll get upset), he puts a lot of pressure on me to dig him out of these holes. Our relationship is central to him, so he believes that if it's going well, everything else is, too. And if it's crap, so's the rest of his life. In a roundabout way, that then makes his current situation my fault. If I were a better wife, and he, therefore, a happier husband...he'd be motivated to do more around the house, be more productive at work, be a better father, and have a better social life. When I put it in writing, it seems absurd to put all of that on me. He hasn't come right out and said it like that. BUT...the implications are there, between the lines.

I'll say this - it's hard sometimes to get up and be motivated to keep trying to fix this marriage. But, at the core of my being, I love him. And I want our marriage to be healthy and happy.

I asked him if he wanted to go back to our counselor (my current counselor), but he said he didn't like him...that the counselor had basically told him he was wrong for feeling the way he did. I don't remember it that way, but somehow, he made my husband feel like the asshole. Actually, I think my husband made himself feel like the asshole, but...again...I'm keeping my mouth shut about that.

Keeping my opinions to myself is a new skill I'm picking up.

Anyhow, that's where we are today. I'm up super early to go to work (parent/teacher conferences). He's off today and spending it with our son, since there's no school for students. He was up until probably 3 a.m., burying his sorrows in a video game. That's what he does when he can't face the world anymore. I escape into a book; he shoots stuff.

He'll sleep in, putter around the house a bit, take the boy trick-or-treating, and still be in a bad mood when I come home. I'll have to somehow have a smile on my face, and be there for him, because in our house, that's what we do for each other. We carry each other when we've lost the strength to stand on our own. Right now, he needs that. And he needs me to keep trying.

Imperfectly yours,