What I learned from H's MLC

[AliSuddenly]

My bf's crisis spanned 5 years - from the year his Dad went into a coma and died.. he had unresolved issues about his dad, who he loved, but his Dad had had depressopn for 20+ years and wasnt really a father to him..and yet he had to care for him in his final 3 years, which he struggled with. His Mum was depressed for the first 8 years of his life. He has had very masked depression himself all his adult life.

2005 his father died and he just went in on himself from that point on. He insisted he had grieved, when in fact his grieving hadnt begun as he was stuck with unresolved feelings of guilt toward his father.. and the mask he wore to hide his depression slipped and its true.. they just do go a bit mad! They are not themselves, they act out of charactger, drink too much, get into debt, lose touch with old friends, make new friends, notice unsuitable woman at work and eventually.. walk out.

What I learnt was to be forgiving, he wasnt doing this maliciously or even making any healthy choices for himself, so it was easy to be forgiving. I was compassionate and kind and ALWAYS there for him (didnt follow the DB rule of accept 3 out of 5 invites and dont always answer the phone etc).. I was CONSISTENT. I didnt put ANY pressure on him, I never asked him what was going on or why he left (once I started DBing).I hugged him back when he hugged me. I respected his space (didnt pursue and tried every day to not initiate any contact and only did rarely if too many days went by not hearing from him).

He is now on a good AD and the ow is history and we are fine with a new R, better than the 9 years we had before. If anyone had told me he would have walked out, so brutally, I never would have believed it. He was the LAST person to behave as he did. He says now, he cannot fathom why he behaved the way he did, it was like he was insane and he feels that in fact he had a breakdown. He DID keep his job going which confuses some people, but he knew he had to do that else he really would be at rock bottom, so he managed to struggle through depression but keep his job.

He cant really explain what happened or why, he says he literally cant put his mind into his mind as it was then and understand his behaviour or choices.

MLC often goes hand in hand with depression and some pretty odd 'out of character' behaviour. Men in MLC also typically are dreadfully unhappy deep down. My bf did have issues from his childhood and being bought up by 2 depressed parents that seemed to give rise to the MLC, triggered early in him by the death of his Dad. Before the bomb he made reference to being "half the age my Dad was when he died" and seemed VERY aware of ageing.

I read all the resources here and posted every single day getting help from this wonderful community.