My relationship feels like it's collapsing and I don't know what to do
Warning at the outset: This is mostly an unstructured rant, so no claims are made as to coherency or clarity. I am as much trying to get things off my chest as I am asking for advice.
I met my fiancée (let's call her B—) almost two years ago, and we connected immediately. Our values align closely, we have a lot of common experiences (having kids young; growing up as a middle child in a middle class family; both having come to queerness late in life being chief among them), and we were both absolutely dedicated to being silly and carefree with each other. B— calls it the "yes and," and it's something we're quite good at generally. I moved into B—'s place about 8 months after meeting, and 4 months after that we were engaged. We're due to be married in May this year. In general, it's been pretty smooth sailing, but the past four months or so have been increasingly stressful, and are making me feel like the relationship is falling apart.
The stressors in detail (TL;DR — Our jobs, our children, our house, our car, our wedding, our finances)
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Our jobs. Neither of us is particularly happy with the job that we each have. Mine is a nightmare of micromanagement and having every minute of my time tracked, with cryptic expectations, and labyrinthine processes to follow with exacting precision. B—'s is a charity job where she is required to do all sorts of tasks over and above her actual job description, including (but not limited to) dealing with her colleagues' tech support issues, despite the organisation having IT support, and B— not actually being an IT person; and constructing a whole-ass database for the team to use instead of paper records. We are both underpaid, and thoroughly overworked. The job market sucks, and it's increasingly difficult to find the energy to apply for a new position anyway.
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Our children. We have three kids from former relationships(14F, 12NB, 8F), all of whom are pretty definitively on the neurodivergent spectrum (as are we). 12 is the only one with any formal diagnoses (AuDHD), and the two girls are distinctly autistic, though with very different presentations. We adore our children, but we are also exhausted by them. The list of acceptable foods that they'll eat is such that I can't go a week without repeating a meal. We can't leave 12 alone with 8 otherwise they'll fight. 14 has absolutely no filter, and just wants to chat constantly, but refuses to do it with her (step-) siblings. All three of them are completely obsessed with video games or screentime in general, but cannot ever agree on anything to do together, so they will all just sit on their own devices. And when they've reached their screentime limit for the day, they all become listless and have apparently zero idea of how to entertain themselves without one or both parents coming up with something to do. Getting them all into bed takes at least two hours every night, no matter what we try to do. The children's respective co-parents are dreadfully difficult to work with, to cap it all off, and most of the actual parenting is falling to us.
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Our house. We live in a three-bedroom house that B— bought her former partner out of when their relationship ended. It is not large enough for the size of family that we have. There is too much stuff in the house, and never enough time to actually sort it out. Every room is a dump, beyond full to bursting with stuff. There isn't a single surface that doesn't require decluttering to be able to actually use, including the parts of the kitchen where we eat, or make food. I won't pretend that I'm completely innocent of contributing to this, but as the person in the house with the fewest possessions, I am far from the worst offender. The children all just drop whatever they're playing with wherever they stand. B— amasses new knitting/crochet projects like they're going out of fashion, but has yet to finish more than three in the time that I've known her. There is not a single place I can go in the house that I can feel peaceful in, because every room presents a massive list of chores wherever I look.
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Our car. We bought a seven-seater vehicle in July last year, and to say it has been a comedy of errors ever since is putting it mildly. The TL;DR of this particular saga is that we did not check the reputation of the place we bought from thoroughly enough, and we spent £8000 on a lemon. The car has been in and out of various garages for months, rendering us a one-car house (with all the additional stress that causes), and is looking like it will cost at least half as much as we paid in the first place to get it fixed up. The place we bought from has declared bankruptcy and stopped trading last week, so there is absolutely no chance of recouping any of our loss here. Money is tight enough already, and we are now faced with paying an enormous sum to repair the car, or to scrap it and get a new one. Neither option is palatable, since we took out a loan to buy it, and we will be stuck paying that off for the next 4 years.
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Our wedding. We opted for a smaller-scale, pseudo-elopement to Scotland, where it's legal to get married outdoors — something we both had on our wishlist. This is a small ceremony with our children, parents, and a witness each. We are also having a not-a-reception party the week after, closer to home and with a larger number of people as a celebration of the marriage. We have mostly arranged the Scotland portion now, payments notwithstanding. But the party portion is almost completely unplanned, and it's looking like we won't be able to afford it anyway, depending how the car situation pans out. Both sides of our family are coming to us with demands and requests to accommodate their own schedules and wants for the wedding, and it's feeling less and less like we have any say in the matter whatsoever.
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Our finances. Our budget feels very tight. The cost of just being alive (let alone having three children) is skyrocketing, and our salaries are not keeping pace. We are squeaking through each month, but that is fully paycheque to paycheque and if either one of us loses our job we will be utterly fucked. We've blown through most of our savings, and each have a credit card and a loan that we're in the process of paying off to the tune of about £10k between us. When there are no surprises, things feel stable and secure, but the moment we have an unexpected expense (such as having to get the roof repaired last year), we burn through all of our savings and are right back at square one. There's barely ever any headroom or safety net. Both of us keep saying this will be sorted when we get better jobs, but neither of us seems likely to get one any time soon.
Both B— and I are in some way neurodivergent, though neither of us has a formal diagnosis. She has all the classic symptoms of ADHD, and I am very confident that I am autistic. Our needs often feel diametrically opposed, and it's putting a massive strain on the relationship. Our house is in constant disarray, and B— apportions this chaos to "just part of having kids" and "and inevitable cycle," while leaving out the fact that she does little and less to actually contribute to the smooth running of the place. The only time she will make a meal is if I'm not actually present to do so. And her capacity for cleaning up is to do approximately half a chore every few days. Meanwhile I am tasked with doing all of the cooking and meal-planning for everyone, all of the shopping to fill the cupboards, and all of the cleaning after every mealtime to ensure that there is a clean and tidy enough kitchen for the next one. B— is so consumed by stress and shame that she becomes immediately paralysed by the prospect of any task that is not for her own specific edification. I feel like I am waging a lone war against a building that is not fit for purpose, against combatants who will with absurd immediacy undo any progress I actually make.
And I think that stress and shame is one of the core problems. We both feel it, and we both handle it in unhealthy ways. My habit is to take on the lion's share of the responsibility with a view to keeping the peace, and while sublimating my own need for rest, recuperation, and solitude. B— on the other hand will meet anything that could be construed as criticism by completely shutting down and refusing to engage with any discussion. Case in point, last night in a conversation where we were trying to figure out how best to repair our relationship, I made the point that I feel unsupported in doing the housework on top of parenting and my job, and she said "fine," and immediately stalked off. Nothing was discussed. No strategies for how to find an equitable solution. Just an immediate termination of the conversation, after I had already let her talk about my own failings vis-a-vis prioritising togetherness, and accepted that I need to take steps to change my behaviour. We haven't spoken a word since, and likely won't until there is a blow-up argument about it at some stage this weekend (a familiar pattern). These conversations can and do go fine, so long as B— is able to externalise the fault: it's work, it's Christmas, it's the car, it's the wedding, it's the kids, etc. If I say anything that challenges this and suggests that her own actions are making me feel dismissed or unloved (and I am always very clear in my use of "when you do __, I feel __" language) then the conversation just stops dead.
We are both stressed up to the eyeballs, and both recognise that we're dropping the ball in terms of keeping our relationship healthy and maintained. We described it last night as "dropping the spinning plate that is our relationship." At this stage, it simply feels like we are diametrically opposed in how we want to pick the plate back up. The time we have to simply be a couple is very limited by our being parents. Invariably it's after 21:00 that the children are abed, and we can squeak out some time for ourselves. But lately this time after the kids are in bed is compressed dramatically by having to do chores that went ignored from before bedtime, or a lengthy discussion over the current thing that is at the forefront of our minds that we are stressing about. B— in particular really feels the need to get into a topic, and what feels like it should be a brief discussion over "what's the plan with the car" turns into a 90-minute epic with B—'s anxieties tumbling out one by one.
And I am struggling to meet those anxieties with patience and love, because the way these conversations are phrased is such that the only way that B— can not feel anxious is for her to have her own way. Which makes me feel less like a romantic partner and soon-to-be wife, and more a subordinate being asked to get on board with whatever the management team have decided. I want her to feel safe and like she can express what she's going through, but it is completely endless. One anxiety begets another, and before we know it it's 23:00 and we either have to get ready for bed ourselves, or else push through beyond midnight to gain any semblance of downtime. I love her so much, but at the moment it feels like so much of the relationship (as well as my own actions) is being driven forward by her anxieties and stresses about any given thing. I feel like I am buckling under the weight of all B—'s worries and stresses, and the accommodations that need to be made. She feels paralysed by all of the stressors we have in our lives, and so these stressors compound because she gets "stuck" and cannot do anything about them. Dishes pile up. The laundry basket overflows. Surfaces become cluttered. The children need feeding. At every turn there is another responsibility that it feels like B— is heaping onto me because she is so exhausted by constantly living in her anxiety and stress that she is rendered unable to do much beyond doomscroll on her phone. Meanwhile I am operating with the assumption that the only way out of the stress is to actually deal with the thing that's stressing me out: tidy up, clean the kitchen, do the laundry, plan the week's meals, have the conversation. But at each turn I am the one left to do the job. And I had better do it cheerfully and with a smile on my face, because B— experiences another shame spiral if she perceives someone to be cleaning around her in a bad mood.
I don't know where I'm going with this. I don't know what to do. I don't know if this relationship is sustainable in the long-term without some serious outside help. I don't know if we can afford that help. I don't know if I can continue to operate in this cycle of stress-paralysis without losing some sense of who I am. I don't know if B— still loves me. I just want to go back to when this felt easy. Our bedroom is all but dead. We don't "yes and" any more. The honeymoon period ended a long time ago, and I'm afraid that what we're left with is just an unhealthily attached relationship where neither of us feels able to lean on the other or to communicate our needs in a safe way. I'm terrified that I'm going to lose her and my step-children. We feel completely stuck in this rut, and I don't know the way out. I feel like I can't come to B— with problems, because she won't engage with them if there is any onus on her to work on herself. I miss the woman I asked to marry me.
Update: 03/02/26 (DD/MM/YY)
Thanks for all the replies everyone, it's been very helpful to read so much support! If I haven't replied to you directly, know that it's not out of anything other than mild overwhelm and feeling like I couldn't do justice to each of your comments.
B— and I hashed some stuff out on Friday, and it got heated. We argued for most of the evening and into Saturday morning, but we've taken some steps to try and reduce our stress load and take some time to work on ourselves:
- This coming weekend, B—'s parents are going to be looking after 8 & 12, while 14 is going to be with her other parent. We are deliberately not filling this free time (the first kid-free weekend since I moved in!) with things to do, and are going to just focus on connecting and being together. We've also made low-key plans for Valentine's Day to get a takeaway after the kids are in bed. These are both small things, but we're both finding that it's helpful to have time as a couple in our immediate future to be looking forward to, and we're going to try and make a point to schedule more things like this into our lives.
- We are going to actively pursue relationship counseling. Our argument on Friday evening showed that both of us need to do some work on communication with the other. I am not blameless, and I have a tendency to bottle things up and let them get to the point of anger before expressing them, which is not conducive to a healthy relationship. So the plan is to create some flex in the budget for counseling. I have a job interview tomorrow which will be bringing in a good bit more money than I make now, so hopefully the money stresses will be reduced.
- We got news back about the car and the damage is not as bad as we'd feared. It's still an expensive fix, but far more affordable than trying to find a replacement vehicle that we trust. It'll be out for a while yet while it's getting fixed, but that just gives us a bit longer to squirrel away money for the repair. Knowing that it's going to be back in good, safe, working order is incredibly relieving, and both of us have commented that it feels like a burden lifting. Getting back to being a two-car household will be another point to find some relief.
- B— and I are talking about cancelling, postponing, or reducing the scope of our wedding party. To clarify, we're aiming to marry on a shoestring anyway, but it's becoming apparent that the party portion is not really as affordable as we'd like. This is still in active consideration, but it's probable that we'll pivot to something closer to a garden party at one of our parents' homes than anything more intensive than that, and possibly a meal out with friends somewhere. The knowledge that we might not have to plan (and account for) this party is very refreshing, but we're trying to balance our sense of exhaustion against our possible future regrets.
So all in all, things are shifting in a more positive direction. I don't think I'm naïve enough to consider our problems solved; life has a way of finding new ones. But it does feel like we're mostly out of a very dark patch. There's work to do, both on ourselves, and in our lives. But I'm an insufferable optimist, as B— would say, and I think now that some of the fog of stress has cleared we're in a much stronger position to deal with what comes our way.
First, I want to say, I'm sorry your going through this. It's hard, and you are working hard to make it through.
Second, I want to acknowledge that the rest of my post is framed in terms of how I have worked to sustain my relationship with (maybe) similar problems. I didn't touch at all the idea that this might not be healthy or safe for you. I do feel like that leaving needs to be acknowledged as a legitimate option. That said, the end of your post made it seem that you really want this to continue, so I am speaking into that frame.
For context my wife has ADHD and I am neurotypical, but we have many of the relationship patterns that you have described, though maybe with fewer stressors because we only have one child and a less tight financial situation.
So much of what you wrote about navigating your partner's anxieties resonates with me. That feeling of being captive to the endless anxiety processing, the feeling of being the one to push things forward and make decisions, the messy house that feels endless. I feel it all.
A few years ago, I was the stay-at-home dad, and I had reached a point where I felt like I was just operating to keep the status quo, but there was nothing there in the relationship anymore. I didn't feel like we were equal partners and parenting or taking care of the house or making decisions.
Since then, we have come back from that and really turned a corner in terms of being able to work together. She is still limited in many ways by her anxiety and her ADHD, but I'm limited by other things, so I tried to keep it in perspective.
The thing that really helped us was to find a couples therapist who had ADHD herself. (Though I know with the budget tight and so many demands on your schedule, that may not be an option for you.) The therapist was able to help me understand what it's like from the inside and have more empathy. She was also able to articulate to my wife the challenges that I was feeling and acknowledge those as real. I think it helped both of us see the other person more clearly.
The thing to know about therapy, in relationships in general in my view is that the only person that you can make change is yourself. So you can go to therapy with an eye toward expanding your communication and finding tools to navigate the issues between you, but it's not going to "fix" you or your partner.
I do want to acknowledge that though things are good now in general, many of those patterns still exist. Our house is still chaos. I still have to push forward a lot of the major decisions. There are times when we are centered in my wife's anxiety. But overall I feel like I have a framework for talking to her about it, and we have reached a place where we are genuinely working together. The difference to me is that before I felt alone, and it felt like she was part of the problem. Now it feels like something we are facing together. One of the metaphors is "rowing in the same direction". So I hope that is something you can find with your partner.
A couple of other unconnected thoughts:
If you haven't, you might want to read up on rejection sensitive dysphoria. It sounds like what you may be dealing with with B. Sometimes, giving something an external framing can help navigate it (I find) because it's not like your problem or her problem but it's a problem that people commonly have, and you can talk about it in that framing.
As far as the kids, and maybe the stressors around life in general, it sounds to me like you need a community to support you. I know you just can't manufacture one by snapping your fingers, but I think the way families are generally "on their own" is one of the hardest things about raising kids in modern society. We've connected with a couple of families from my daughter's school, and that has helped a lot. There are times when my daughter is at our house with other kids, which really changes the dynamic since they are occupied with their friends. Then there are times when she's at their house, and we have time to ourselves. I realize that's harder to do with three, but it might make a big difference, even if it's just a few hours a week. Maybe you could start by trying to meet the parents of their friends, or by looking for community events that are aligned with your needs and values.
Thanks for such a considered reply! I definitely don't want to end things if I can avoid it. I love B— so much, and I adore my step-kids as well. It would be heartbreaking to bail now, and I want to do everything I can to get things working again.
This sounds like something that would be really beneficial for us. I've read a lot about ADHD, and in less strained times B— and I have been able to have productive conversations about her own experience of it. I could do with it reiterating I am sure. I don't really feel like B— understands the emotions and challenges I am experiencing, but that belief could be down to my exhaustion and compassion fatigue. Absent any couples therapy, I wonder if trying to have a conversation that starts with us framing each other's perspective might be helpful.
This is something I'm painfully aware of. I feel a little burned right now, and so my capacity to trust that she wants or thinks she needs to change is quite low. I'm worried that it will end up with the onus being entirely on me to shift my behaviour, without any effort from B— to make changes. I think that all comes from a place of negativity and worry, and on a different day I think I'd be expressing something more optimistic about it.
How did you find that reframing? It feels kind of like there's this expectation for me to just acquiesce to her anxiety and buy in all the way, without any kind of... I don't want to say pushback, but do you know what I mean? I get the impression that I'm supposed to just agree, and that she expects nothing but validation.
I'm not saying I don't want to support my fiancée when she's feeling anxious, and I certainly don't want to try to make out she's wrong. I think I'm struggling to find the balance between "I love and support you, and your worries about this thing are valid, and I agree wholeheartedly" and "I don't think getting this worked up over something so inconsequential is productive." Obviously neither response is ideal, as it completely sublimates one partner's feelings. I don't have a way to tell her that her feelings are valid but that I don't think she needs to spend the next week worrying that (for example) a letter is going to arrive in the post from an insurance company about her having possibly maybe slightly reversed into someone's car a tiny bit at 2mph. I understand that ADHD lends itself to catastrophising, and her particularly active imagination means that she does it extraordinarily well. I think I just don't know how to respond in a way that makes her feel comforted, but that protects my own peace.
I feel this very strongly. I've been musing on the phrase "it takes a village" a lot lately, after I realised that I have basically no village. Part of that is a distinct sense of social anxiety, and a good deal of difficulty in making new friends. But we do both definitely recognise the need for it, and it's something that I'd like to put more effort into... When the spoons allow.
I know you're in love with them and they must love you a lot as well. One possiblity: do not live together.
My family and I have our own mix of neurodivergences / alphaghetti soup mix of diagnoses. Sometimes being our best selves mean having a little dragon's den/rabbit warren of unsightliness that no one has to see, that only I have to live with, that no one needs to clean up, and that I cannot inconvenience another by taking care of myself. Maybe we meet in a neutral place where I have enough mental strength to present myself at my best before coming back to the den/warren to collapse into primordial ooze.
Maybe you move next door to B--, so that when you visit you are a guest and you eat out of paper plates and sit on Amazon boxes and everyone feels 1000% OK. When she visits your place, she kicks back or even have the resources to help out because she's not obligated to.
That's how the ancient emperors maintain peace in their court: each of the wives have their own palaces and they're invited to visit the emperor overnight. Rich European couples in the 1800s had servants, as well as their own bedrooms. Some physical space as a trade off for emotional intimacy might be beneficial here.
Sharing our lives and our most intimate selves doesn't necessarily mean sharing the exact same spaces 24/7. Hopefully, you guys can get back to Yes And when there's a bit more breathing room.
(Responding to this whole bit of your message, but not quoting all of it)
There were a couple of pieces to it (and probably more that I'm not thinking of):
That turned out to be a lot more than I started to write! But it is nice to get it on paper too, and see how the work is going. I hope it helps some!
Hey there, you're not alone in what you're going through.
I don't want to offer specific advice because it would be tainted by the lens which I'm viewing the world through right now, but I can offer my deepest sympathies and understanding.
I also moved very quickly in my relationship, before the honeymoon wore off. I firmly believe that was a mistake now.
This ties in with the parenting aspect, something I also deal with. Especially with ND children it can be difficult to establish and maintain the routines needed to keep things clean/tidy. In my case (and apparently yours?) the parenting support isn't there to maintain those routines. I try with my son, but with the stepdaughters I get called controlling and nitpicky. How is it handled for you?
The comment about it being a part of "just having kids" and "inevitable" hits so close to home for me it's absurd. Those are the exact same things I was told.
Oh lordy this is a make or break - at this point having the ability to manage finances is non negotiable for me in a relationship. How do you feel about a future like this?
Same. It's exhausting - doing all this on top of being the one expected to plan and make meals, do the necessary shopping, make sure bills get paid on time and that we actually have money for them, have lunches packed and ready for the family every day, as well as making breakfasts in the morning, cleaning the house...
It's a never ending list and if you're not feeling supported then it's going to grind you into little pieces. Especially if you ever put in the effort to really clean up and then watch it immediately get undone in a matter of moments without a care.
Same in my situation - every conversation was a dead end, every discussion terminated with a lack of introspection or self reflection. It took me too long to realize they would never change without being able to consider their own strategies. I was always met with "what do you want me to say?"
You bring up serious outside help. Would your partner be open to that? Would they act on the ideas brought up? These comments here, in this quote, are almost word for word my feelings towards the end and I felt so bent to breaking.
I've since made my choice. I don't know if my post here will help at all for you, I wanted to be able to chime in, provide commiseration, and my own perspective as someone who went through (is still going through) an incredibly similar situation.
I'm so sorry, I wish you luck.
I was thinking about your post as well while I read OP's. Obviously every couple is different and circumstances are never the same. But things are very difficult if one isn't wanting to talk.
Thanks for your reply! I remember reading your post and seeing a lot of myself reflected back in it. It sounds callous to say that I'm glad I'm not alone: I wouldn't wish this upon anyone. But I hope you understand what I mean by it!
I'm increasingly of this opinion too: we were slower than some lesbian couples I could mention, out of caution for our kids, but it was still pretty rapid as these things go. I don't think we had enough chance to get to know each other's ins and outs before locking in for cohabitation and for marriage, and that's definitely coming back to bite us now.
Similarly, although I've not been called either of those. But I have been told that I need to let more things go, and relax my insistence on certain things like table manners and bedtime routines (for examples). It's kind of like she has an aversion to my putting boundaries into place. The difficulty is, she also has a problem with the state that the kids leave the house in, and their refusal to even attempt to behave themselves at the table. But it's like she won't actually do anything about those things, but doesn't want me to either. I dunno, I find it very confusing.
The budget is not as hellish as it first appears every time I look at it. We're managing to squirrel away enough to pay for the wedding, clothes, kids clubs, gym memberships, etc. I think for me it's just the cadence of regular crises. The dishwasher and washing machines both died within months of each other, the roof started leaking, we had to replace 12's PE kit multiple times in one month because they kept losing it, the boiler broke down, the extraction fan in the bathroom stopped working, there's mould around some of the windows... All of which need money to fix/replace. We are actually quite good at sitting down with the budget open and figuring things out. I think the stress comes more from the inability to build up any kind of buffer, and always feeling on the back foot. I don't think that's necessarily an us problem, but it does feel challenging every time there's a new financial crisis. I think part of that is my reflecting B—'s anxiety back to them. I do have a bad habit of modifying my personality to match the ones I am with (definitely a neurodivergent trait!), even though personally I'm quite laid back about those sorts of things. For B—, each one gets treated like the end of the world, and I find myself treating things the same way. It's kind of like I feel like I'm doing her a disservice to not be treating it with the same level of urgency as she does, y'know?
For real, it makes me just not want to bother with cleaning up. What's the point, when in less than half a day it's already an absolute state again? But I can't live like that, I can't compartmentalise or ignore the chaos completely. It's always there in the back of my mind. And I do accept that to some degree having kids is a cluttered, chaotic, messy affair. But I see my siblings' homes, or the homes of friends who also have kids, and the difference is stark. I don't think it's a given for a house with kids to be a disaster area, but it needs continued, consistent buy-in from both their parents to make the home one that's nice to live in.
That is her precise refrain as well. I come with good intentions, wanting to try to problem solve together ("us against the problem") and I get met with stony silence and that exact phrase. It's exhausting, and I'm beginning to realise that the chances of that changing are vanishingly small. And I think this, more than anything else, is what is likely to be the death knell. I cannot spend the remainder of my time on this earth being unable to have difficult conversations about the state of my relationship with my partner.
I don't know, it's something that we mentioned briefly before moving in together; not to fix any problems, but to prepare us for them. It would be remiss of me to not bring it up when given the opportunity, and I don't expect her to be completely against it (she's mentioned having therapy in the past), but like everything else it's down to money, time, and childcare, and that's where things get tricky.
At the bare minimum, I think her response to seriously discussing it would be valuable information. One of the bigger warning signs that I didn't notice until after-the-fact with my failed marriage was my wife's repeated refusal to engage with me when I tried to discuss solutions and professional health. Granted, we didn't have kids and prior to the divorce were doing pretty well financially, so we didn't have the same barriers, but a willingness to work together on fixing the relationship, even if finding a suitable professional is not easy, is paramount in this type of situation -- especially as a sign of whether your wife is still invested in and committed to the relationship. I find that's the more practical, concrete version of the much more wishy-washy question of whether she still loves you.
In my (failed) relationship, I definitely was the one more like your wife. I can try to offer insight from that perspective (and as an AuDHD person who crochets myself, I do have some suggestions on that front specifically) but that perspective is obviously going to be very limited by the fact that different people are different people. Working with her directly is best, and having a professional to help mediate to prevent things from falling apart too quickly when you try to address issues seems like it would really help in your case.
Ultimately it was better for my mental health that my wife left me when she did. But we'd already been married for four years and living together for longer, so there was a lot of time for resentment to build unaddressed and a lot of time where the relationship was still probably salvageable. I think the patterns of communication you have aren't exactly healthy, but I think fighting about your stressors may be easier for a professional to help turn into healthy communication than the complete avoidance we had in our case, even if avoidance results in "not fighting". The divorcee in me is definitely cringing at how fast you took things, but what's done is done there. Take advantage of the fact that you're identifying these issues relatively early on and before you're married. Dig into them as much as you can now, because whether the relationship continues or not, earlier is better imo.
Thank you for sharing, I feel for you, and this is a bit overwhelming for me, so I can't imagine what it's like for you. Here are some thoughts I had while reading. Take them for what they are and don't put too much weight on them, I'm just a stranger on the internet:
Also autistic with an adhd partner, but no kids
What worked for us is that instead of using my energy to do the chores, I use my energy to set up a structure such that the important chores are split fairly.
My partner seems to have the same troubles as yours, they often:
And I seem to have the same troubles as you
I identified important chores:
The pattern here leans on each of our strengths, I can stay organized and make sure things get done, and since they don’t have to think about what needs to get done they can just do it. Partner doesn’t need to decide whats for dinner. We’re having chilli. It was planned days ago. They know all the steps. Ez pz. If I had to do both, Id burn myself out, but I can handle this.
Edit: my partner is also actually a hoarder. They were living in a very bad situation when we met and I helped them get out of it. I wont include that whole process here and it probably doesn’t apply to your situation with so many people in a small space but its a success story and matches the steps of a lot of other success stories from people Ive talked to with hoarding issues. I could elaborate if anyone seems interested.
I am interested as this is the biggest issue I have with my current partner.
In the beginning very much of the house was uninhabitable, all of the rooms were 100% full of stuff, pouring out into the hallway, with a small path to the master bedroom bed and bathroom. Partner had moved out of this house and into an apartment because the house had been damaged and had no power, and power couldn't be restored until the house was fixed, and the house couldn't be fixed cause no one could get into it to work. It was hard to get in through the front door because the space right next to the door was full of mail that would sometimes fall over, blocking the door. Partner would get the mail from the mailbox, and then not go through it, instead setting it aside. They did this for years.
The first step is to help the household while building trust. You can't throw anything away or get rid of anything. Instead, start with a room. Organize everything you can, keep in your head what should be given or thrown away. Start a pile of those things as you organize. When you're done, present the room, and the piles to your partner. Let them go through it. They will now go through this smaller, more manageable task that has one goal.
If you're starting in a room where a majority of the stuff in the room never had a place that it goes to begin with, invest in some cheap bins from the hardware store, and label them with painters tape as you go. Once the bins are full, and your partner has decided they're keeping everything in them, you can stash them away, corner of the room, attic, garage, whatever. Months go by, you go hey, partner, lets go through this one bin today, you forgot it even existed.
It took us about five years of this process to get the old house to a state where moving to a new house was something that could actually happen. So we went ahead and did that. And partner moved what's rest of the horde over to the new house and for some reason unpacked everything in the bins. I've started the processes over since then, putting everything back into bins as I organize.
You're never really done with managing their illness for them. If they won't get help themselves, it's up to you. It's either worth it or its not. I decided years and years ago that it's worth it for me because of what my partner brings to the table in the relationship. Now that we're in a new house with more space that started out livable, it's pretty easy for me to manage.
That's a tough situation to be in. The only advice I can give you is to seek out couples therapy. It seems like they have a difficult time accepting any criticism from you as it makes them feel judged and they become defensive and shut down. I think having an objective third party might help with this. If your observations are validated by a third party they might be more responsive to actually engaging with them and also some self reflection. You might learn some things about your behavior that you have been unconsciously unwilling to see.
To piggy-back on this a little - if the idea of proposing couples therapy seems daunting, you could also try framing it as "premarital counseling". I don't know how common this is outside of the evangelical circles I grew up in, but when I got married it was very common for engaged couples to receive premarital counseling - in fact the minister that married my wife and me required it for any weddings he was asked to perform. I have left behind a lot of the things that I was taught/learned in evangelical churches, but the premarital counseling we went through was one of the most helpful things I've ever done - mine involved a lot of talk about expectations, balancing workload around the home, and conflict management - all of which have been really beneficial.
I am sorry to say that you need something that wont be easy to afford, in terms of time, money, and possibly emotional commitment.
Marital Counselling.
My wife is similar to yours (self proclaimed pack rat, anxious about many things, avoids many household chores, reacts very poorly to criticism)
My wife is also very different to yours (does the kids laundry, doom reads long form articles, handles the kids school stuff, attacks angrily when feeling criticised)
I've also been going through very similar challenges to you (dead bedroom, overwhelmed from too much clutter, frustrated from too much anxiety driven insistence that everything be done her way)
But I also have the good fortune to have private insurance that largely pays for marital counselling.
Here is what I have learned.
You do need marital counselling, but it will only help a little, and it takes forever to help and that is really, really expensive even with insurance that helps.
Marital counselling helps with communication, understanding, respect, remembering who we married and refocusing on doing more "yes, and..."
Marital counselling can also help us identify areas we want to change. My wife is much less angry, I am much more careful.
Marital counselling won't fundamentally change anyone. My wife will always be a pack rat, she will always insist that her way is the only way. I will always trigger my wife with things that sounds like criticism, or by living life with a reckless disregard for safety and thereby being a terrible role model. Then she will always trigger me, by criticising me with what to me feel like complete misrepresentations of the truth.
Marital counselling is more about helping you to help yourself. What do I really want? What can I live with. What can't I live with? How can I communicate more effectively? How can we repair the damage after a conflict?
But like I say, it takes forever. Each hour costs a lot of money, and each hour just focuses on one narrow issue.
There are a couple of things that don't require as much money, that are immensely helpful, but still require time and focus...
The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work by Gottman. You would both need to read it. The local library surely has a copy. The third chapter is focused solely on talking about the importance of being more "yes, and..."
I suggest you read this before you decide if marital counselling would work for you... https://couplesinstitutecounseling.com/how-to-get-the-most-from-your-couples-therapy/ and while I am not sure, I suspect there are many alternatives to paying for one on two recurring marital counselling such as teaching clinics, faith based counseling, group based counseling, self guided tools like gottman.com.
I use LLM's in addition to therapy. There is no substitute for marital counselling. But it helps me think more clearly about what I really want and then communicate more effectively. I use a Tor Browser, with a throwaway email with a throwaway LLM account. I set it to not share any conversations. I know nothing is truly anonymous on the internet. I am still taking the risk, as to me, the benefit outweighs the cost.
Both you and I are particularly challenged. I can't communicate without inducing shame induced rage. You can't communicate without inducing shame induced depression. Yet if you look closely at the link above, it will hopefully help you understand that not communicating is not an option. There are tools that will help. What do you aspire to be? What does your wife aspire to be? How can you help each other get there?
FYI: I am using an old, now throwaway account.
Obviously B— shares the blame, but fundamentally we can’t change other people, so I’m going to mostly focus on you and your actions. Not because you deserve it more, but because you’re the one asking and you can only affect what you do and how you feel, not her. Before any of that, though:
What changed?
It’s no surprise that a huge part of the stress in your relationship is finances. For better or for worse, your financial issues seem partly self-inflicted. I think you guys are biting off more than you can chew. You’ve blown through most of your savings, have 10k in debt, and yet you’re planning a pseudoelopement and an afterparty?
Respectfully, your youngest is 8, and your other two kids are teens (or close enough). This is crazy. I have a feeling that whatever’s going on here might not be causing all of the stress itself, but is probably emblematic of the broader issues. What’s going on? Why do kids this old need help going to bed - much less so much help that it takes two hours?
I completely understand why you feel this way. Even so, I think you need to change your mindset here. These are tasks that need to get done. B— isn’t heaping them onto you, they’re part of life. It’s unfortunate that you don’t have a partner who can share the load, but you’d need to feed the kids anyway. Laundry needs to get done anyway. The house needs to be tidied anyway. Doing this things is part of being an adult — and by the sound of things, you’re the only adult in this family (and probably always have been). To that point…
Look. Just as only you can change how you feel, only B— can change how she feels. If she’s too paralyzed by anxiety to do any of the housework/finances/etc and you’ve chosen to accept that because of what else she brings to the table, fine! But that means she doesn’t get to dictate how you do the housework/finances/etc.
I think you both could benefit from some kind of support. I don't know that down that might take Perhaps therapy for either or both of you, plus couples therapy to address your joint issues. Perhaps ADHD and autism support groups, or support groups for parents. Perhaps mindfulness and relaxation classes to take some of the stress away and the recognize when you're becoming stressed/overwhelmed. You may be able to get some counseling at a local university (graduate students need practice patients), support groups are often free and can be online, there's a bunch of meditation and relaxation stuff on YouTube.
I know finances are tight, but the kids are definitely old enough that they can do age-appropriate chores. For example, perhaps the 8 year old can collect laundry and take out the garbage, the 12 year old can be in charge of cleaning and putting away the dishes, and the 14 year old can do the laundry or clean the bathrooms or something. [I'm not suggesting the 14yo keep the living room clean because then it becomes something the others can weaponize against her, deliberately making that room messy when they're having arguments.] That gets the adults more leeway in your lives, gets the kids away from their screens and also gives them some life skills.
In fact, I'd suggest that the kids as a group be in charge of making one meal a week. The 8 year old can clear and set the table, the 12yo can help prepare and assist, and the 14yo can cook. It doesn't have to be anything fancy - macaroni and cheese, baked potatoes, fish sticks, steamed or roasted vegetables, whatever. Maybe change things around with the difficulty of the dishes - maybe the 8yo can boil hot dogs and bake some fries. But again, this frees both of you up one night a week, and gives the kids some life skills.
To OP, that sounds like a tough situation and there's some excellent advice that I've seen here.
To Tildes, I'd really like to run a poll for users here that asks:
From there, we'd examine whether people on a tiny, backwater forum in a small corner of the internet are just... The same person?? I'm seeing a lot of trends in the responses here, ones that are all too familiar in my life.
It seems obvious that a lot of the comments in response to someone talking about their partner's particular problems are going to be people whose partners have similar problems, so I think your sample is skewed from the outset. You will almost certainly get a different impression in the comments on a thread about someone who's struggling with a partner who berates them for not cleaning properly than you will in the comments on a thread about someone struggling with a partner who isn't doing their fair share of the housework, because even the same users would respond differently and bring up different experiences of their own in response to those different topics.
To go into a more statistical mindset, both anxiety (in terms of an anxiety disorder, at least, which is what I assume you mean) and fibercrafts as a hobby are also things that are more common among women than men, which will impact your results based on the gender and sexuality ratios of the surveyed population (and while there are lots of lgbt people here on Tildes, I'm under the impression we still have a skew towards straight men even if it's not reddit-level uneven). I'm also not particularly convinced self-reporting whether you're more neat/tidy than your partner is super valid when you only have one party in the relationship participating. I suspect we'd see pretty big differences between relationships where both parties agree on which of them is messier and relationships in which both parties think the other is.
Oh this absolutely feels like a "who is dating neurodivergent women" thing mostly.
I really like your posts, sparks.
Extremely this. Though I do think it would be very amusing to see the skew: "wow! tildes has the neatest population ever -- not a single one of these people is the messy one in the relationship!"
I’m 75% the messier one in my relationship!
But also that’s mostly because my idea of when things are “dirty” and need cleaned is definitely when things are further along on the dirtiness/messiness scale than my wife’s. And it’s challenging because she has anxiety & adhd, and struggles to work in a messy environment.
Yeah, fair enough. Frankly, I was mostly curious about what people's partners tendencies say about Tiles posters. I don't think that I specified women in an effort to see whether these things crossed the divide.
Offside on my part - I probably shouldn't have been so casual in my curiousity in a thread where the topic is pretty serious.
Lesson learned.
Yes
No, but I do
No
Yes
Formerly. I still do both.
Yes
If I understand correctly you mention that you're confident everyone in your home is neurodivergent. Perhaps getting a bunch of diagnosis would help, as some of those issues can be treated.
Your life sounds like a lot, so it's understandable that you're having issues with your relationship. I don't really have a solution for that because that is so much stress I'm a little scared just reading it. You shouldn't feel bad, most people would be barely functional and you seem to manage somewhat.
I would probably want to postpone the wedding in those circumstance, but I don't know how that works for you emotionally. That is another expense and clearly another source of stress right now.
Marital counselling might help and I would say it's urgent too.
Good luck!
Thanks for sharing your story - it sounds like you are going through a lot, and I can totally see why you feel burnt out and needing to vent!
As an outsider, there are a couple of things about your situation that stand out to me. I think the biggest one is B's untreated ADHD. A good friend of mine was recently diagnosed as an adult, and it allowed her to understand and have much greater control of her life and her habits. It sounds like B currently isn't "in good working order", and needing hours to vent about her anxieties to you makes you more of her therapist than her partner, and puts even more pressure on you. I echo what others in this thread have said, and getting her to a supportive therapist specifically for ADHD might help a lot, especially if you can talk with B beforehand. Does she acknowledge that things right now feel impossible for both of you? Does she acknowledge how her anxiety is adding a ton of extra weight to your load? I don't want to sound accusatory, at all, but I think it's important to acknowledge when one's own issues are becoming a load for others (as I imagine many middle children do).
The other thing that stands out to me is communication and boundary setting. It sounds like you personally are holding the whole household together, doing chores, cooking, shopping, car management, etc. Do you take these on because you feel like that's the only way they'll get done? I totally understand the sentiment, but the issue then is that you've become the "doer" of all these things in your household, and no one needs to do anything differently to help you - you just make it happen. Some of these responsibilities, at least, need to be shared with the other members of your household. It isn't fair or healthy to have to carry that load alone.
If B reacts negatively to any perceived criticism in the moment, is it possible to write her a letter, telling her that you just feel overwhelmed, that you think you need a better balance of chores and household tasks? Can you make a plan together of who takes on which tasks? (I don't know how ADHD manifests for her, so I don't know the best way to approach it.) Is there a way to get your three kids on board? I feel like it's appropriate to expect kids to put their own projects and toys away, but B also needs to be on board with setting up structure and boundaries for the household - it can't be all just you, especially if she disagrees or starts waffling and nothing ends up actually changing. But I also don't think B will be able to "hear" you until she is out of panic mode and into a little bit of a more stable place internally. So - if at all possible, I echo the idea of therapy for B, relationship counseling for both of you, and someone with knowledge of neurodivergence and ADHD would probably help a lot, if you can swing it. But I encourage you to think of yourself as a member of your household, where a bunch of things need doing, and the load should be shared among the household's members - these are not solely your responsibilities, and it's unfair for you to have to do them all. (Can you also set a "timer" at night for B's venting? Just set up an alarm, give her 15 minutes, and you agree to stop once the timer dings? Starting to assert some space for yourself is going to be necessary, I think, and getting her to acknowledge that there's no space for you is going to be important. Even using an objective device like a timer might help her see just how much time she is taking from you without you having to say the words out loud.)
Lastly - in regards to the wedding afterparty and people telling you what has to be done and on their schedule - unless they're paying for it, the only people you really need to listen to are yourselves. If you find that people are making too many demands, or insisting that something must be done a certain way, you can politely ignore them, directly tell them no, or just skip the party completely...maybe have another get together some other time. But it sounds like you haven't gotten far in planning it, and so there won't be much harm done in postponing it indefinitely. Weddings can be exhausting and expensive, but if you're finding that the whole party aspect is becoming an additional stress, i think you're old enough to just say "nah, maybe later." You do not have to make everyone else happy! Do what you need to do for yourself and your family.
I'm sorry you're going through such a difficult time, but it's understandable to see how you got to this place. I think it's also possible to get back out together, but I think you need a little bit of help. I wish you all the best, and that you and B especially can find a way forward together.
I'm sorry you're going this. I think any relationship would be under a lot of strain in this situation. You might be able to work through some stuff if you can clear some of your stressors off your plate, even temporarily.