I've hit a wall.. Now what?

[flowmom]

Talia, I'm also trying to figure out a WAH situation. I'm curious how different the WAH/WAW psychologies are?

I went through some depression in my 20s (which caused the only other major crisis in our relationship), and now my H has been apparently depressed for a few years, so I've seen it from both sides. H still has a lot of anger about the experience of living with me when I was depressed. And I've been on the receiving end of a depressed H who can see anything positive about anything, including me or our marriage. I think that it's important for you to realize that, as painful as depression was for you, it may have been as painful for your H and he may have a lot of baggage about that. Esp a person who hasn't taken the time to understand depression and its effects may feel that "life's too short" to live with a depressed person and not recognize the role that depression is playing.

My H lost 2 brothers early in our R, and that cast a long shadow too. Of course it affected him, but not in the standard ways of expressing grief. It was and is hard for me to make the link of whether his (unresolved in his case) grief was affecting our M.

It's great that you're working on yourself and dealing with the painful events that you've faced. I would encourage you to be really honest with yourself about whether you are still depressed (do you think that other people see you laugh and have fun?). I have regrets about only doing IC when I was depressed, and not getting pharmaceutical help with jumpstarting positive changes. Once you're in a depression, it can create a deep rut and take a long time to climb out of.

I'm new to DBing so I don't have specific advice from you unfortunately. Except that, as permanent and inviolable as marriage is, it pales in comparison to the commitment of having children -- an act which binds parents together forever. Be double, triple, extra sure that he is the right guy for you if you are thinking about a future that involves children. Children only add to the stress on a M, stress that our M has faltered under.