Treatment for Addiction: Is My Husband Bipolar, Abusive, or Both?!?

Question by All We Need Is: Is My Husband Bipolar, Abusive, or both?!?
Let me go back about 4 years here. My husband was a sweet guy when I met him, but smoked pot, and was divorced, with a young child, for only one year. I was a very young widow who had lost her late husband to his 2nd bought of cancer and yes, was lonely.
I should have seen the red flags back then, but had never been involved with a man with children before, much less a stoner.
I believed his act, he was a manager and had been a salesman (yeah), in the past. I did not know so many things about his past with his ex, until lately. He had “moved out” of the family home (which he and I and a young baby do have possession of now since the ex decided to remarry and move out).
He had failed to pay anything to his 3 year old son when he moved out, for almost 9 months and was “able” to date, make an expensive car payment, etc… ( ex had to file motion finally for support).
Anyways, a year ago, I was pregnant and he lost his job within a few weeks. He had to quit smoking pot too, for the first time since his teens. He grew angrier and angrier as time went by. Was the pot making his moods mellow???
Whatever, I walk on eggshells with him. He snaps at everything. One day he is the sweetest, then a few days later ” we are over”, and he wants to live alone. (you made two kids???) What kind of a man would just bail on their family out of the blue? One day we are all he has, the next, he wants his “own” place as he is miserable.
He is on Paxil, yet it is the SAME dosage he has took for TWENTY years and he refuses to admit that he has an anger problem and that his moods are all over the place. IF I say anything, he “stomps” off and does the silent treatment, locks himself in the bedroom or flat out yells at me and tells me, “You need help”….?!
I don’t know what to do. Honestly, if the baby were not here, he would have been eating my dust after the crappy way he has treated me the past year.
He claims he is always tired (try being a mom, 24/7), and that HIS home is not “his home anymore.”
Welcome to the world of employment and children, right??? He has a new job this past month but omg is it awful and he is paid about half of what he used to make in the past.
I try everything to make him happy, rub his back, cook, clean, laundry, shop, ( I have a part-time job at home so I put in over a grand a month). AND take care of a very active baby.
What is this? He acts like one person in “public”, and a monster to me, behind closed doors and does not even see the mood variations.
I am looking for advice (besides divorce, obviously) on what to do. Is there a way to ignore him when he is home? Can I persuade him to see his anger and mood problems? Why the “twisting” of it back on me? He has zero empathy, no remorse for his past and continues to justify his ebay addiction.
” I can’t do anything for MYself! ” (quote from him). Like I do?!
~ Thanks in advance, as you can tell, I am at a loss here.
Thanks. His ex-wife and I are actually good friends now as we are both mature enough to realize that our kids are siblings and need to stay close. My husband did a grand job keeping her at bay, away from me for a long, long time.

Should I just call it quits and take this all to court? I’ve never been through a divorce. All he cares about it seems are his CD’s, this house, and his precious car … I “could” tell him, ” IF you want a divorce than find a small apartment and leave me the house for our baby”. Other than that, I’ll call his bluff and will refuse to sign anything. I’m pretty sure he will never go file though. He thinks it hurts me when he says this and takes off his wedding band…. (yeah, immature much)?

Best answer:

Answer by Kathleen
What do you expect from someone dependent upon illegal drugs and who also takes medication for his depression?

Don’t expect him to change or even be able to see what you see. Don’t even try to “rescue” him. He doesn’t want it.

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