I (30F) and my husband (30M) have been together 10 years and married for 2. For context, we had a baby a little over a year ago. I suffer from mental health issues (bipolar disorder), which I’ve been treating in regular therapy for 5 years and have never missed my meds nor stopped taking them. PPD wreaked havoc on me, and I fully admit that my suffering negatively impacted my husband greatly while we had our young son to care for. I ended up trying to delete myself twice during that first year, and I went into a treatment center and have made a great recovery.
I do my best to manage anxiety, but I struggle. My husband tells me often he wishes I had his brain because he is able to work through issues better since he doesn’t have any diagnosed mental health problems.
Things came to a head recently when I was expressing my feelings about being torn whether to have one kid or not (due to a lot of issues that I won’t post in this sub). I started crying because this is a heavy topic for us – the potential of having a family that isn’t what we envisioned – and while I was talking I noticed my husband was staring into the distance. I paused because I realized my anxiety spiral was affecting him. We sat in silence for a few minutes, then my husband asked if I wanted to watch tv. He didn’t have any response to what I’d said, and I asked him if I said anything wrong. He said no. I then expressed that I was hurt by him not saying anything at all, no attempt to console or talk more. Again, silence.
We part ways, and about 20 mins later he comes down and tells me that he’s desensitized to me because my bipolar has me too emotional all the time, and that he’s lost empathy for me. He admitted he’s been struggling mental health wise, but he won’t go to therapy.
I feel awful about myself knowing that I’ve pushed my husband away by airing out my feelings too often and anxiety making me hard to be around. And, I’m deeply hurt that he lacks empathy for me anymore. That part is what hurts the most. I don’t know how we can recover if a basic human emotion is lacking.