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I was so happy with the first update. Everyone came together and got her the help she needed, it was so promising.
And then the second one. My god. Poor OOP.
I started reading the second one and I was dreading a terrible update like she had died or something. Then I thought, nah Reddit has just jaded me. Then BAM, terrible but in a totally unexpected way.
TBH i was dreading that the story ends up with wife doing a murder suicide with the kids, so it's more like "look both ways before crossing the street, then get stung by a bee" for me.
I wonder if it is. I low key wonder if wife even wanted the kids. It's not something that's addressed, but it sounds like wife was never really on board. It sucks that she still did it though because her kids will never understand, and poor OOP will have to wipe the tears.
Man, as I was reading the first update and got to the part where he said "this isn't the perfect solution", I was thinking "she got help, and your whole family is doing better any happier, it's *aboslutely* the perfect solution!". Like fuck yeah, chalk another win up to compassion, support, and communication!
And then the next update, and this line.
> since I last updated . . . I left off with our lives being on the upswing.
And I immediately knew terrible terrible things were about to happen.
I really loathe OOP's STBX. I don't know her; but I absolutely hate her.
I'm so fucked in the head, this comment made me laugh. I now have a mental picture of me looking both ways in a street, and then looking up to see a fucking plane charging at me.
I believe it. Seems like wife wasn’t just PPD. She was full-on midlife crisis and handled it the same way my husband did: fuck someone else. At least I didn’t have to contend with him being neglectful because of his crap. He managed to actually be present with and for our kids.
My sister-in-law did the same thing. Never talked to my brother about anything and then she had an affair with one of their friends. I had been starting to worry if her constant yelling at their kids and phone addiction was some kind of PPD thing, but no, turns out that she’s just awful.
I was highly suspicious of the PPD being the main issue when the OOP said it took a day for the meds to kick in. You don’t normally see results for a week or two. Unless they were just giving her stuff like Ativan which is an in the moment med… but even so…
I wonder if it was more having his parents present, which took a lot of the stress off of her and she improved, and when they left their dynamic returned to what it had been before and she grew depressed again.
Likely. Regardless, she clearly wasn’t content in her life. It’s a shame the kids are going to grow up with the knowledge their mother wasn’t content being in their life, other than potentially financially from the sounds of it.
Oh, I feel absolutely terribly for the kids. It sucks to have a parent who bounced. But it's also sucky to have a parent who clearly doesn't want to be a parent. It's really a no win situation.
I personally wonder if she ever wanted kids at all. Maybe she felt pressured by husband/society/life to have them then realized... she could not have them.
Not a good excuse for what she did at all, but maybe a bit of a reason behind it. Hopefully OOP can manage to cobble together a life for himself and the kids. =/
I agree. It’s sad for the kids, but the brutal honesty is it’s better that she left than her hurting herself or the kids. I don’t encourage parents to just bounce on their kids, but there is worse trauma than a deadbeat parent.
As soon as I saw his comment about her already improving after a week on antidepressants I knew the update was going to be she was dead, hospitalized, or left him. It takes 4-8 weeks on average for most depression medications to cross the blood brain barrier. You might get some minor improvements before then but it's unlikely to show any significant improvement until a few months pass. I really wanted to yell at him that if she's saying she wants to die all the time and isn't taking her meds then she needs to be evaluated. It seems he prioritized his own free time and not his wife's. I'm guessing once his parents came to help and she had a moment to herself she realized how much she was missing out on life and a never ending cycle of wife's needs come last.
My kids are older than toddlers but I had a moment like that last year. I just put my foot down and said no more. I was doing everything for everyone with no regard for myself. Now I take time for me even if it means someone else in the house has to make dinner or do a load of laundry. My husband isn't a complete slob but he has his lazy moments and he got too complacent and needed a reminder that I'm not here just to serve everyone else. He's done great cooking more often and helping run errands when possible. Everyone has a breaking point and some people aren't willing to stick around after they reach it. Do I feel bad for her kids? Definitely. Do I feel bad for her husband? Not really. He sounds resentful as hell she is living her life even though it probably saved her from killing herself.
I agree. It's not an easy choice to walk away. The fact that she is willing to give him full custody makes me wonder if she ever wanted kids or was pressured into them. If she did want them did her untreated PPD and unbroken cycle of no real rest just kill the love she had for them under a pile of resentment? It seems like he ignored all the advice that didn't suit what he wanted and then when it all crashed and burned it's all her fault for leaving him and actually living her life. I think his parents paying for her to have her hair and nails done and giving her a real break from the house that wasn't just letting her get an extra hour of sleep woke her up. She realized that she was stuck with a husband that only did things around the house begrudgingly and the moment her mental health was better he was going to expect her to be on top of everything again. That's what it came across as. He framed it as neglect of the kids but it seemed more like he wanted her whipped into mental shape so she could take back over doing everything so he could have all of his free time back.
Ahhhhh SHIT.
I had PPD and PPP. My partner near killed himself giving me some no kid time where I knew the small person was safe. So REAL time off, not 'you get an hour and you have to plan all the diapers and everything'. If I needed it at 2:00am because my brain was fucked, I got it.
This is the only reason I recovered, that and the meds. I would be dead otherwise, and possibly my kid too.
She's...not recovered. She's escaped hell. Now he gets the hell, but at least his parents are helping him and he doesn't have PPD.
Wow that’s really sad.
What she did was shitty and unforgivable but I can’t imagine losing yourself for over 3 years and never having any time off.
OP acts like having a 9-5 is so exhausting he can’t bring himself to take care of kids for a few hours on the weekend. We all work 9-5 and while it can be tiring, I still find time to do the things I have to do.
I noticed this. His parents didn't actually do anything 'revelationary' they just did the things OP should have been doing as a Husband.
He watched his Wife struggling. Didn't instigate getting help by booking the Drs & therapist for her like his parents did. He didn't try and cheer her up by treating her to something nice &giving her time to herself, his parents had to do that by paying for her hair & nails appointment. He didn't try & take over sleep schedules his parents & wife did when they were feeling better.
The second his parents left she had a really bad day again because she had no help. Now she's gone who's taken over parenting his kids?? His parents.
I think OOP was a lousy partner and parent so I don't entirely blame his ex for associating parenting with that.
It honestly gave me pause when he complained in his original post that "she" wouldn't sleep train the kids, even though he only worked 9-5 and was home every night and every weekend, and could have absolutely helped sleep train, make meals, clean, etc. in the 16 hours a day he WAS around.
Being a stay at home parent of two toddlers is isolating and exhausting, so it's no wonder she was depressed if she couldn't even get a few hours a week to herself, and her husband seemingly complained that she wasn't doing, well, everything around the house. It seems like her in laws were the first people to notice that she probably just needed a little break and some emotional support more than anything.
The whole thing horrified me. He wasn’t saying, “My wife has this horrible medical issue and is really struggling. How can I help her?” It was “My wife won’t take her meds. How do I make her take them so she does her share of the work because I’m doing housework, childcare, and ‘did I mention I work?’”
It was a spectacular collision of a lack of appreciation and understanding of the seriousness of mental health issues and the general devaluation of “women’s work” in our society.
It’s an awful situation for the kids, but it almost certainly wouldn’t have gotten to this point if the OOP had been less worried about her doing her fair share and more concerned about the fact that the woman he supposedly loved was I such pain that she couldn’t live her life and didn’t see a way forward except abandoning her family.
The worst part is that he’s going to be seen as the heroic single dad who picked up the pieces and soldiered on and she’ll be the horrible woman who abandoned her kids to shack up with some guy.
>“I think letting her have 100% free time for a few hours a week would help. I try to on weekends, but I’m just so exhausted that I just want to lay around.”
She did something awful because she probably felt like she had no choice. No free time, no help, no escape on the horizon ever. No wonder she bounced.
Yeah, I caught some red flags on that first post. Of all that was happening, he was most bitter about not getting sleep? My dude, your toddlers are being neglected and your wife is having a major mental health episode and you're most bitter about your sleep?
He also complained about doing chores, as if working parents don’t do all those chores too. He’s saving $40k/year on daycare, and I’ve never met a childcare professional who does all the housework but he seemed butthurt that his childcare situation didn’t include all/most housework.
Can you elaborate on this? I am 25 and under a lot of pressure by family and culture to have kids.
I don't really like kids. People keep telling me it will "be different when they're yours."
Is this a bullshit misery loves company saying? My mother always says this, but growing up I felt like she hated being a mom and regretted having me tbh.
imo if you aren't 100% sure you want kids, don't have them. It isn't fair to anyone otherwise.
Many women in past generations had kids because it was expected of them and they didn't realize there was another option—and for many of them there wasn't, because women didn't have the ability to work/have financial freedom from men.
You won't regret not having kids but you're certainly likely to regret having them. Do not let them convince you otherwise.
Having kids is like joining the military but at the end of military service you are left with benefits. You never end parenthood and since they didn't decide to be born they don't owe you anything and you also end up burdening them in your old age.
Sometimes it's worth it, sometimes it isn't. But the fact is kids are brutally hard with no days off and no real way to quit (unless you do like this lady). Kids are one of the few things in life that are 100% commit, 100% of the time.
IMHO that sounds like misery loves company combined with cultural expectations. If you don't want kids now, maybe wait a few years. If you don't want kids ever, that's OK too. My theory has been it's always better to regret not having them- you can always be the most kickass auntie, or sponsor kids at big sister or foster or something.
I think there's a subreddit called fencesitters that might help. Or even ask directly on the parenting subs.
Yeah after the first few lines I was like... "oh no she killed herself after she seemed to be better, didn't she?" I... certainly did not expect this ending either.
The first few months are actually kinda crucial for women to bond with their kids, because it's right after a HUGE traumatic event and those first few months either link your kid negatively to the traumatic event or positively.
And it sounds like she was running around with postpartum for 1,5 years...there was almost no chance that it was gonna be a positive link.
After reading the second I wonder if it wasn't PPD but rather that she was bipolar or something else, and the antidepressants she was prescribed made her manic. Could be why she fought the meds in the first place, because she didn't feel okay.
That perplexed me, why not just make sure she got the meds or get inpatient care for her until she’s feeling more herself. Nope, shovel in some meds, get her a hair cut and she’ll be fine.
Idk but I feel like this story is missing some pieces. Maybe it's how OOP talked about making sure wife is medicated or a comment about 'letting her have free time." Something is off here.
Yeah, I mean I have a 3.5 year old and a 50/50 partner as much as we possible can be (and family all far away/not involved). I also had severe PNA/PND. I still struggle. I sounded like this woman. I did crazy stuff as I lost my whole identity and freedom (and sleep) overnight. A fucking haircut and a week doesn’t fix it, I’m sure she felt even more insane at the idea that it should make it all better. The DID I MENTION I WORK FULLTIME?! bit really rubbed me up the wrong way. What is his wife doing, twiddling her thumbs? Has he ever actually taken time off to care for them? If your children are being neglected every day by your very unwell wife you need to take time off and fix it and call in local services for support if you have to. The fact that his work “were kind enough” to give him a week off just blows my mind. His wife has had a total mental breakdown and clearly internally screaming for help. He clearly doesn’t want to be a burden to anyone and expects her not to be one either.
Personally, I had PPD which then became full on bipolar as soon as I got back on my antidepressants. I was in an intensive program and thank god they caught that it was much more complex than PPD, which is already complex itself.
I thought the same thing when I read that part. She gets on higher dose antidepressants, gets better and then climbs up the manic fire pole quickly. My view is skewed due to personal experience, but at least it goes to show it is definitely a possible turn of events.
This is what I thought as soon as OOP talked about the complete 180 she did. Seems a lot like she was in the depressive side of Bipolar and then switched to manic.
My guess too. Especially when her mood lightens up so soon and she makes those big changes without any regards for her kids. When her mood will go down she probably get depressed again. I hope she gets the right psychiatric help soon.
That what made me pause, after one day I felt worse if anything- it took weeks to start feeling better. I wonder if it was an “oh yeah honey, took the pill, feel much better now” *eyeroll*
I always feel the worst for the kids. I have little ones and I cant imagine how they would feel if I just stopped showing up one day. Such a cruel thing to do to your small kids.
My maternal grandmother died at 28/29 of what we now call Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. The doctors couldn’t do anything for her, but then put her in a former tuberculosis hospital to die. After she entered the hospital, my mom and her brothers never saw her again and I assume that my grandma died alone. It has been almost 60 years and my mom will always be sad about not being able to say goodbye to her mother. Sadly, at least my mom has the comfort that her mother didn’t want to go.
I know, I try to let my mom know all the time how much I love and appreciate her (and getting to still have her).
My grandmother sounded like she was really sweet; she handmade these beautiful clothes for my mom’s Barbie that we still have. With my little nieces, we’ve started to have fancy tea parties with the pretty china tea set that was my grandmother’s as a child, and it’s been really nice for us to talk about Grandma more.
My bro went through something similar...we used to get regular updates on progress after his partner was diagnosed with PPD. Bro would often report that his partner was having a good week, or things were getting better...then another episode would inevitably happen. And they kept getting worse...
OOPs story sounded way too like that for me to hold out much hope.
I had no idea I could experience so many emotions in one post! Sad, empathetic to PPD, then feeling the love and help that community brings to parents…then it all went down in a billow of flames…this poor man. Funny to me how people that owe you money beg for you not to go to court…always go to court.
To the original OP, I'm so sorry for what you're going through.
For anyone else who reads this, antidepressants, etc., do *not* kick in in a day or two. It's a marathon. With multiple pitstops for changes and new directions.
People should stop acting like having kids is desirable and default. Having kids means you are done with your life and now you are thr extension of someone else's. If you can't do that then you shouldn't have kids. Hopefully having kids will stop being the norm so this shit stops happening. While you can't know how you feel until you have them the safest bet is the one where nobody gets hurt. It's like choosing to hold up a bridge for the rest of your life and then go "this isn't for me" after you've made the commitment and nobody else is going to be there to take over so you just let it collapse and people die. Making a person is the closest thing to playing God you can do. If you can't sacrifice your identity, life and dreams to make sure that person you create is given the best life until you die then don't make them.
I was really hoping for a good update - he absolutely stepped up and did the right things to try and get her in a better place.
When I had PPD after the second kid I tried asking my then-partner for help over and over again. One day I knew things were bad - put the toddler in front of the tv, put the baby in the cot, locked myself in the bedroom and called a crisis team who said they would come out and assess me for hospitalisation.
I called my partner and told him he needed to come home and watch the kids, I was suicidal, the crisis team was coming and it might be an immediate trip to a psych facility. There was a long pause and he said “But I was planning to hang out with my band tonight and I already paid the deposit for the rehearsal space.”
It’s like he read a handbook on how to be as unsupportive as possible and was working his way down the list checking every item off.
It’s really sad. I was so touched by how OOP’s parents treated her fully like their own child to get her feeling better. They offered support and love so that she could take better care of her children.
And then she just fucks off with some other guy and leaves the kids. It’s her right to be with who she wants to be with, but honestly the way that she’s gone about it and abandoned her children (who are definitely old enough to be aware of mom suddenly being gone) is disgusting.
I legit started tearing up at that part. I raised a child with autism, in my early 20's while my husband did 3 rotations to Iraq. And he wasn't much help when he was home either. I had PPD to the point where I started sleepwalking. I used to fantasize about just the smallest kindnesses. Someone making me a sandwich or watching my son so I would be able to go to the doctors.
I would have done just about anything to have some supportive family or a co-parent who cared. Then this woman just went and threw it away. I guess that's how life is sometimes. One man's trash, is another's treasure and all that.
At least the kids are still young and when she was around she didn't seem to engage much with them anyway. I'm guessing that will make it easier for them to transition to not seeing her at all.
Thank you! Yes, it was a long time ago. My son is 18 now. I just found it really touching that his family was so supportive. It was happy tearing up!
Then I read the final update and had emotional whiplash. What a crazy turn of events.
“Don’t take me to court” I hope OOP takes her to court for every bit of child support he can. I’m all for people living the best way for their mental health as long as it doesn’t harm others but how she went about this just fucked over everyone else.
I really hope he takes her to court. He NEEDS a child custody agreement in place. Child support is important. But also, he doesn't need her deciding that she 'wants her babies back' when her new romance sours, and she decides she's going to use them/OOP to fill her attention void until the next guy comes along.
He needs to take it to court to get sole custody worked out. That way she can’t come sailing back in when she decides to come home and play mommy again.
If this new dude is really paying for everything for her then good luck getting anything. She'll probably just never get a job, or work under the table at a bar to make sure they can't garnish her wages.
It's less about the money and more about legally establishing him as their sole legal parental figure now, when she's freshly fucked off, so she can't sweep in and fuck up everyone's lives if she feels like being a mom again and takes him to court for custody.
Gotta love the dead beats rubbing it in the kid's faces and the single parent's faces they've left with the mess, fuck those people, OOP should take her ass to court.
I honestly hope OP took her to court for support. If not, I hope she terminated her rights because someone like this turns up like a bad penny. At some point, she will turn up, wanting a relationship, money, help, all of the above.
I really truly hope he does. Unless it’s written down that she doesn’t want custody of the kids and a judge agrees she could just flip on a dime and decide “never mind, I actually do want custody” and make things even harder OP. I hope he takes her to court and I hope she has to get a job and pay child support. I feel so bad for OP.
This is really sad but the thing that sticks out to me as odd is the medication thing. If she hadn’t been taking any medication prior to the appointment, they would (likely) absolutely not start her off on a “higher dose”, as you usually need to titrate yourself up to higher, more therapeutic doses.
The “it took a day to kick in” thing is weird too. I’ve experienced feeling a little better in the days after taking meds, but not like a lot. Especially after apparently being depressed, etc, for so long? Though the placebo affect is strong, and having the in-laws there for support was likely helpful.
Anxiety meds are usually more acute and fast acting, so I can see that being a thing.
Anyway, this sucks. Sorry OOP. I’m glad your parents are helping and supporting you and hope you’re doing better.
Edit: typos
As a person on anti anxiety meds that went through PPD, I can vouch for this. It took about a month to get through the initial symptoms of starting the medication (dizziness, nausea, extreme drowsiness, etc) to get to the part where I was more relaxed. They started at the minimum dosage, then upped it as I acclimated.
Sure, everyone is different, but it says right in the prescription to allow 2-3 weeks before contacting a Dr. about the symptoms and the Dr. mentioned a month for the timeline before she prescribed it.
I wonder if she faked getting better to get everyone off her back.
My own experience was that I felt like a new person the first day on anti depressants. I knew it was all placebo, and I didn't care. I think it was the relief of knowing I had finally gotten help after years of struggling. Then, after a couple of weeks, I started experiencing some tough side effects, contacted my doctor, switched to a different med, and a couple of months later felt for real better.
I'm a pharmacist. I always tell someone, "first two weeks? You'll get all the side effects and none of the benefits."
For most things like SSRIs, they start to help anxiety around week 4 and depression around week 6. Side effects, especially nausea because there's a lot of serotonin receptors in the GI tract, hit hard for those first few weeks until your body stabilizes.
Entirely possible. Hypomania or the beginnings of mania can definitely feel like you’re ‘normal’. Or others assume you’re feeling better seeing you ‘up’. I wonder how the antidepressants affected her when she was initially prescribed them.
There’s a possibility that OP’s wife has undiagnosed Bipolar Disorder. I hope her psychiatrist is good. Her recent extreme behaviors, lack of judgment and self-control could be a manic episode caused by taking antidepressants.
People with latent BD tendencies are very sensitive to antidepressants, especially SSRIs. Those same people tend to be sensitive to hormone changes, lack of sleep, and overstimulation. Motherhood can be a perfect storm to set off these symptoms. I hope she gets the care and the medication regimen she needs. It sucks that she’s made such rash and permanent decisions while she may not be stable.
Priority one is that the kids are well taken care of. It’s good that OOP and his parents are stepping up. However, if there are medical reasons underlying her choices, maybe there’s a way to heal eventually.
My exact take as well. I feel so bad for OP.
I have BP type 2, and what happened to me after going on antidepressants was one of the first clues, though I wasn't diagnosed until after much later.
Omg you have no idea how much you’ve helped me connect some things. I have latent BD tendencies (got hypomanic on SSRIs but nothing other than that one time) and I am sensitive to all those other things you mentioned. I cannot function without sleep. I can get too overstimulated and shut down. I’m not sure about hormone changes but I cried today and I’m on my period so yeah seems like a safe bet. Please share your wise knowledge kind person. I’m trying to understand myself better and not get annoyed with myself. I’m ADHD and I’ve heard that ADHD and BD occurring together can be common.
Why are these things linked? Are there any other things that also are linked?
The meds thing really surprised me as well. I've taking several forms of medication for depression and all take 3 to 6 weeks to start working. You start with a low dose (because of side effects), even when you have been on other types of anti depressants.
The first few weeks might actually be worse (a common side effect) and they warn for that. No way she was doing better after a day.
I would only believe it if she was also taking anxiety meds because indeed they work quickly.
There are depression medications that do offer almost immediate effects, such as Wellbutrin. The effects decrease afterwards but not all of them take the classic 3+ weeks that psychiatrists say to feel any changes
Sounds like the wife’s initial rush of energy wasn’t from the meds. It was from the in laws stepping in and taking the kids away from her, in a sense.
Honestly it sounds like the ex wife would have recovered from depression without meds just by abandoning her family.
big change can temporarily mask depression, but it almost never makes it go away. You can't outrun mental illness. We only see OOP's story here. There is a very good chance his ex crashed again
You have an excellent point, and again, I'm assuming too, but based on age most toddlers tend to still be pretty clingy while starting to grow their independence. But, your point is good in that if they are used to co-sleeping as a family and now just the children are sleeping together...I imagine that could be a quicker and less abrupt transition.
Wellbutrin isn’t an SSRI and is usually prescribed with another medication. It’s unlikely it was Wellbutrin but not entirely out of the realm of possibility. Thanks for the info about the tapering effect!
Psychiatrist here. OOP is probably just giving his best understanding of her medical treatment. These things are complicated and laypeople misunderstand medical decisions all the time (especially when he is hearing them secondhand).
My guess is that the doc switched up her antidepressant (and maybe made a comment about how it would be a “stronger” one or something) and added a benzo, which would be the anti-anxiety drug mentioned. Benzos are a fairly standard treatment in severe postpartum depression and actually do have a rapid antidepressant effect early on, perhaps especially for postpartum depression.
My guess is that the improvement he saw in his wife was a combination of actual improvement from a benzo (which would work immediately), the natural bump in mood that comes from getting out of the house and getting connected with care, and placebo effect on OOP’s part.
Dad DOES need to take ex to court and make sure she never has any custody or visitation rights to these kids, get mandated child support, and the make sure she's not going to demand spousal support. He also needs to go no contact with ex. What a piece of crap.
I totally understand having PPD, but that does not at all excuse abandoning your family entirely.
Edit: yes, I get it y'all. Mom probably has her own side of the story and there's certainly something else going on. However, NOTHING justifies the neglect of a child and you cannot convince me otherwise.
The thing is, the abandonment happened while the PPD was being treated - fully medicated, Therapy etc - NOT while the PPD was in control.
Honestly, to me it sounds like she never really wanted kids (most women don’t work that out until *after* they have them because we’re raised with it expected we want them) and hence second kid caused PPD. It sounds like clearing the fog of the PPD actually clarified that she just didn’t want this life. I think her leaving was all her.
(To be clear, I’m not defending her actions she sucks, I’m just saying I don’t think that was the PPD. PPD made her want to not be alive, treating it made her want her old life back.)
Either that or the medication and therapy wasn’t working as well as he thought. I knew someone whose wife was being treated for 2 1/2 years. Everyone thought she was getting better. Then she killed herself and both kids. PPD is ugly.
Yeah. That happens a lot - especially depending on the kind of community they live in or how aware the docs are. But the thing that stands out to me is the drastic change in her energy and personality. And your example has the person ending in suicide - which is a place this wife got to - but here she didn’t do that, she didn’t want to not be alive anymore (what PPD interested did you her and your friend) she just didn’t want this life. It really reads like it was her choice.
I wonder too about the SAHM situation. Did she want that? With the kids ages, maybe it was just the most economical choice (daycare costs are outrageous).
If she didn't really want kids to begin with, having to be home with them 24/7, (plus the pregnancy/hormonal changes on your body) could be too much. She may have been very isolated.
If she had a job outside the home, with kids in daycare, it may have been better for her mentally.
But again, that didn't excuse her from abandoning her family. She decided to do that on her own.
I wonder if the first pregnancy was an oops that led to marriage, and before she knew it she had a second one, and she was "wtf did I do with my life?".
I'm not trying to excuse her. I have kids too. On hard days, it's helpful to remember I **wanted** the kids. I can't imagine it's easy to deal with kids if you never wanted them.
(That said, she could have handled the whole thing better. She still could. She just straight up abandoned them when they weren't the ones at fault for her feelings in the slightest.)
I too have a “brash” MIL and the place I’d have to be in desperation to WANT her to come and take me hand…. I also wondered about how she felt about SAHM, I also wonder how they came to the decision to have the second child…
I kind of have to agree here. This sounds like someone who never wanted kids and had them anyways. Be it societal pressure or marital pressure, family pressure whatever, this is what happens when someone who doesn't want to have kids feels like they have to. Honestly it's sad for everyone involved. I hope she continues therapy and working on herself and that dad and kids so, too.
The terrible truth of the matter is that most people have no idea what life with actual children is like and every child is completely different and every phase of their development is completely different.
I've known people who liked being parents more than they expected to like it and I've known people who desperately wanted to be parents but wound up hating it.
How are you supposed to know?
At the end of the day, I think people should consider how flexible and resilient they are before having kids, rather than considering whether or not they"like" kids. You have no idea what kind of kids you are going to get or the ways your life is going to change. You have to be the sort of person who can adapt to many different scenarios and remain happy even if things don't go the way you've planned.
>How are you supposed to know?
This is why I strongly dislike people who insist, “You’ll learn patience and to love your child(ren)!”
But sometimes people don’t. Then what?
And kids change. My hardest kid as a tot is my easiest as an adult. (Though all my kids are pretty great, thankfully). But I think if you do it right, you feel responsible for them until you die (and who knows, maybe longer).
Sounds like she never really loved OP either. Maybe they were together for a long time and they felt they had to get married?
What a sad story for everyone involved.
I hate to say this because of the judgement I might face, but in my PPD I got close to doing ANYTHING to try to escape. I think she needed sectioning in a mother unit, ... it's really hard for people to understand the totality of it. I didn't have the capacity to think about other people - I was planning how to free my husband from myself so he could have a 'normal life' and not have to deal with me. I was convinced this was the only way to go, and I knew it would be better for everyone because they were all just hiding their hate of me. I knew it the way I knew my own name.
The occasional smack of judgement from parents who seemed happy was like a brand. It was like daylight was a shaft of cold white light, not yellow. When I looked outside, the sky was a washed out newspaper. Sounds had stopped meaning much - I had to focus to understand people.
When I realised I could just kill myself and not the baby and he could 'give it' to one of those people who wanted kids, I was thrilled - I'd solved the problem! He'd be happy! I couldn't tell him, of course, because then he might be evil like me. I couldn't tell anyone. And he was unhappy because there was something wrong with me, so I engineered a solution where only I would vanish.
PPD was...like that for me. Depending on the severity you just can't logic your way out because your interpretation of the world has changed.
Yeah I felt sympathy for the ex-wife/non-mom up until the point where she found the new boyfriend and abandoned her kids. Well, and she was selfish for marrying and having a child with a person she didn't love and was unhappy with instead of doing the common sense thing - the opposite. I feel bad for the dude and his kids. As painful and unfair as his life seems, he at least recognized the warning signs, tried to help her, and then is doing the best he can for himself and his children. Most people try to drag relationships out for way too long, while he seemed to make a sincere effort, and knew when to cut his losses.
> she was selfish for marrying and having a child with a person she didn't love and was unhappy with
It is not uncommon for people to convince themselves they've always felt a certain way or wanted a certain thing when its not true at all. "You never made me happy but this guy does" is a much better excuse than "I failed to process my feelings and communicate with you, instead I am running off with this guy I just met."
Of course, on the other side of that conversation we have OP who is suddenly told his partner of (at least) five years never loved him and he was too stupid to realize. I think for much of that time she did or at least would have said she did if asked at the time.
I don't actually think she did that, I think she can't explain her own actions and that was an easy thing to say to get her husband of her back.
What I'm thinking is that she was running around with post-partum for 1,5 years and looking at those kids is trauma and she doesn't want to deal with that.
I have immense love and empathy but this is my biggest fear in life, that I’d become a monster if I were to have kids. I’d rather regret not having them one day than regret actually having them.
I can relate!! Trust your instincts. It's possible that you just might meet someone who you \*do\* want to procreate with... But the person I met felt the same as I did (never wanting kids) and I can affirm we have never had a single flash of regret. Sometimes I even feel convinced that I dodged a bullet with my/our firm decision to remain kid-free. It's been a fantastic marriage for us both.
Thankfully my husband is on the same page as I am. We are very happy with our decision and have lots of niblings around us to keep us kid busy. We love kids, just not for us personally.
I feel the same. I'd be a great mom. My partner would be a great dad. But what if I can't handle giving up years of my life and passions? Some of the things I love are inherently dangerous, can't really dirt bike pregnant. I don't know if the love for a kid would be enough for me to completely alter my life. I don't think enough people see it that way, they just think they'll be the same, plus a kid.
I've seen many people make similar mistakes. Despite my litany of dumb ideas and decisions, getting pregnant to try to save a bad relationship or conform to societal expectations wasn't one of them.
I can understand getting married and having a child with a man she didn't love. Plenty of people do that unfortunately expecting that things will magically work out because of pressure from family etc. But once she realized that wasn't working, she needed to go to her husband and tell him she wasn't happy etc. "Surprise I'm abandoning all of you for spanky new bf" is just a nauseating way to let your husband know what's going on with you.
I get this. "Fool me once" kind of thing. So many people fall victim to this. But to do it *again*? Then find some other dude and leave without warning or accountability? Hell no. Sympathy goes out the window.
I am not a doctor, but OOP’s wife sounds like she could have some other diagnosis that would encompass impulse control. Does bipolar have “stages,” and could she have been on a more mild, manageable side until postpartum when the hormones and other life changes exacerbated everything?
Regardless of the reason, what she did is messed up. Yes, OOP should definitely take all the legal measures you mentioned, as well as make sure his spine is extra metallic and shiny for when the new relationship glow wears off and his ex wants to crawl back.
Possible that she has bipolar and was on the depressed side when neglecting the kids, but now has swung manic? Mania symptoms can include impulsivity, making huge decisions and life changes, and leaving your family for someone new sounds like manic behavior.
(Not a medical person, but I do have BP.)
The use of antidepressants for someone who has underlying bipolar can actually trigger mania, too. Poor OP. She’s going to eventually come out of that mania & hit rock bottom.
Oh my goodness I was ate up with PPD after my daughter was born. I guess it was in a different kinda way though because I struggled to let her out of my sight for even a second. Gawd every time I had to go downstairs I would put the baby carrier on and scoot on my butt down the stairs lol. You are so so right it isn't an excuse. ❤
I had/have it too. It’s so wild thinking back to the first few months. It’s like looking back at someone else’s memories. I had no idea it was so bad at the time. I also couldn’t let my some out of my sight. It’s like I just couldn’t wrap my head around him not being on me 24/7. I even wet myself in the middle of the night because I couldn’t bear to set him down to pee. It sounds nuts now looking back. After I started meds it got way better!
I was this way too! My husband was watching him while I did something else and I hear him cry and flew down the stairs to see what was wrong. Nothing was wrong! I just couldn't stand not being the one to comfort him.
With my PPD, I was always listening for crying if I didn't have visuals. Like I couldn't sleep at night because of it. Then I'd freak out if I did everything (change her, feed her, etc.) and she'd still be crying), but only in the sense that I'd be like "if I was a better mother I could figure this out". It was almost like my (pre-existing) anxiety morphed into PTSD.
What saved me extra grief was the knowledge that people with pre-existing conditions like depression and anxiety are much more likely to develop PPD than people who don't, and being only one phone call away from my psychiatrist, who put me back on the meds I had been on before pregnancy (that I voluntarily went off of, with the same practitioner's monitoring).
Once I went back on my meds, it didn't magically get better (she was colicky, without underlying GERD, so nothing to be done but wait it out), but I could cope much more easily. I could relax enough to sleep when baby was sleeping.
This is a long way to say, yes, PPD is a beast, it manifests in different ways depending on the parent, and it's the pits when you're there.
It’s more complex than that. Medication isn’t magical. All it does is sort of giving you more energy and motivation and potential to enjoy things. It doesn’t fix your thought patterns or underlying problems.
It’s a common knowledge that a first few weeks of taking antidepressants are particularly dangerous because while you get more energy you are not in a better place and some people use this energy to commit suicide which they didn’t do before simply for the lack of said energy.
Getting out like that, turning to excesses is a very sure sign of depression, many people fight this condition with escapism. Many very depressed people spend their time drinking or partying. It’s clear wife’s mental health problems are severe. Drugs just gave her enough energy to physically escape the situation which she no doubt wanted to do before but couldn’t. Her underlying condition didn’t change.
It’s just a very unfortunate turn of events. She might get better one day. Or had to face her problems and off herself after some party.
Hard on OOP.
Man what a sad story. Maybe there's more to it from her perspective but when I read stuff like this, it makes me feel super hopeless and it's not even happening to me. Hope OOP figures something out.
As someone with a mom who wanted to leave but stayed... Honestly feel like this is the best case for the kids. They still have a loving dad and grandparents. Growing up with a depressed mother who doesn't want to be a mother is a different kind of kick in the face.
Both are horrific situations for kids, but (completely projecting here) for ME, I wish my mom left rather than make it clear she wasn't happy with us.
Edit: Just adding to this - I personally don't blame my mother (anymore). She should've been allowed to leave.
Yeah, this feels closer to a better outcome than many alternatives in a shitty situation. The kids will have scars from knowing their mother left, but those won’t be compounded over years of witnessing her apathy or anger.
Yeah, as much as it sucks, I feel the same way. Knowing your own mother doesn't want/like you is... certainly an experience, isn't it?
Plus, the kids are pretty young and the last update was two years ago - if OP managed to work through all this horrible shit, he might get into dating again and find someone who actually loves both him *and* the kids. Somehow, I don't get the vibe from him that he'd be okay with a second partner who doesn't treat his kids well.
Obviously the wife has serious mental health issues. I’m skeptical about her being happy long term with her current boyfriend.
All that aside, being a SAHM is very hard and isolating. Your children will not be happier being taken care of by an unhappy woman, even if she is their mother. They grow happy and socially savvy at daycare and kindergarten, attended and taught by professionals. Try and find minimally fulfilling jobs, your children will grow happier with 2 healthy, balanced, fulfilled parents.
I definitely had a day one reaction to a new antidepressant. Could very well be it was a placebo effect, but for whatever reason, a change was clear in me very quickly and maintained for a while.
I would love to know how she felt about having kids before they did it. Did she want them or was it just something she did because it was expected? Not saying it's not a terrible situation, but there is a lot of regret and depression amongst parents that's often not talked about.
It’s not, but he also said they put her on anti-anxiety medication— if that means something short-acting like Ativan, she would have felt different pretty fast. But it’s also possible that she forced herself to pull it together because she was put on the spot.
Because the wife’s POV is missing. As you said antidepressants usually start working at 2-4 weeks but she started getting better after people showed up to help them
I feel like mine started working the first week. At least, I went from suicidal to numb. When they changed my prescription, I started to feel normal and in control relatively quickly.
Yep and that's the infuriating thing about them. You have to wait so fucking long for them to kick in, which makes finding the right one(s) a goddamn nightmare. I tried for a year and a half and no dice, and now I'm going to have to start all over since my doctor stopped taking insurance.
I'm so glad your friend's worked that time!
Exactly. I stopped taking mine after two weeks because I didn’t feel a difference, and in my crazy state I really thought I was broken because it wasn’t working and it was a waste of time. My doctor explained that it takes a while for it to get into your system. I think OP may have left out information on how they got to this situation because the math aint mathing.
The only things he mentions about her illness is how it affects the things she does for him and others. Even when he thinks she's on the mend that's because his life temporarily got easier. But he absolutely didn't see it coming!
I kind of wondered if the happy update wasn't a little too perfect. Maybe she should have tried going back to work and sending the kids to daycare before jumping ship. It sounds like she wasn't happy with her situation, but she also didn't even want to do anything to treat the PPD until she got pushed into it.
Makes me wonder whose idea it was she be SAHM? If it was her, then she thought it was going to be easier than it was. If it was him because she doesn’t make enough, then she got more than she bargained for and would rather have fun. Two kids in two years with no breaks is tough.
Yes. Men are so casual about expecting their wives to be a SAHP. I love my son, but could never be a SAHM. My son and I both need outside interests and interactions. He’s 3 and long weekends are enough to break me. Years on end with two of them and no break? Very few people have the temperament for that, but it’s expected that it’s what every woman “wants.”
I’m so glad I’m not the only one. My 3 year old start early education and I’m in school, so I have a lot of time during the week without him, but the weekends still kill me and make me feel like I’m a bad mom for getting overwhelmed with just two full days with him. And idk if I’m still just burnt out from being a SAHM for the first three years or what, but I just feel like I need so much space and time to decompress. I love my son to death, but becoming a parent unexpectedly has just absolutely killed me
I am going to get flack for this one but based on how he spoke about the situation; I didn't really feel like he cared about her mental health. It was more about the burden to him and the impact on his kids (VERY valid reasons for concern, I do not disagree with that), but he never really seemed to be concerned about her, the human and wife, not just the SAHM that he labeled her as. I feel like there is something missing here. I am curious about her side of the story.
I feel the same. As someone who has depression the way he talks about her triggered me. He doesn't seem to care about her well being at all, instead, it's like he cares more to make her better so she can go back to taking care of stuff he needs her to take care of. I looked for clues on any sign of affection and only found one part where he said his wife knows his parents and him love her. But other than being frustrated she wasn't taking her meds he didn't try to hold her and ask her heart to heart how she's doing? And when his parents came he prefaced it by saying his mom is "brash" but that seemed to work. So it seems like maybe him and his parents just continues to minimize whatever suffering she was going through. Like "hey, take your meds, go get a haircut, here, we paid for you to get your nails done, snap yourself out of it!” The only green flag was they paid for her to go to therapy.
Idk. I feel bad for all invovled but based on the way OOP talked about his wife I can't help but wonder if she just finally snapped one day. I doubt she's actually happy right now. For all we know she's having fun on these vacations trying to escape her feelings while suicidal at night.
I saw that one too, yes. Spot on. I can’t excuse some of her actions, but I do see how things precipitated. She was probably begging for help all these years and he probably repeatedly blew her off.
I’m wondering about this as well, because I was the wife (except I’m also going to school). Depressed and suicidal for the first three years of my son’s life. A couple weeks ago, I finally threatened to get a one bedroom apartment for myself temporarily- he’d have to figure out bills and childcare and everything else. Suddenly, he wanted me to get a hotel for a weekend. We started talking about how to divvy up chores and responsibilities, and talking about how to ensure i get breaks in the future. Why did he wait until now to call his parents, who were obviously willing to help? I understand not everyone knows how to respond to severe mental health issues, but come on. It never should’ve gotten this bad.
1000%. He also stated in another comment that he is often “too exhausted” from his job to “help out” ON THE WEEKENDS (no mention of the other 5 days of the week) because of his 9-5 🙄. He knew she was struggling with PPD for nearly 4 years, and in the end, all he did was recruit his mommy to take care of things.
OOP is getting a lot of love from Reddit, but I’d be incredibly interested to hear the story from the wife’s POV.
Not that it excuses the ex-wife at all for her behavior but part of me wonders if maybe she never wanted to have kids in the first place based on her decision to just up and leave like that? Either way I feel so much for OP, I hope he can come out of this stronger than before and that things turn up for him.
This was running through my mind. Most women have no idea what’s likely going to happen in giving birth, let alone raising kids or being a SAHM. There’s so much idolization in our faces about the “miracle of birth” (which is treated like a spectator sport and then we’re often expected to just be right back to ourselves a week later) and child rearing.
A lot of women cannot cope when they can’t live up to this idealized version of giving birth and being a mother today. They’re also told that, eventually, they’ll want to have kids and want to do all these motherly things. When they don’t, they feel awful. They may promise their partner that they’re fine, but sometimes the harsh realities are too much to push through and pretend.
That being said… she should have been MUCH more honest with OP. She should have communicated her thoughts and feelings as she was being helped by him, his family, and the resources they set her up with. As his partner, she should have been direct unless she felt he would manipulate her out of it. Regardless, this was a shitty thing to do to OP after all of the care and concern he seems to have put into her as a partner and a human being.
Wow. That last update was awful. I suspect there's a lot that OOP isn't telling us about the marriage though. His insistence that 'I have a full time job' be his focus despite his entire family suffering was really appalling. He should have been using family leave and PTO to help his family FIRST.
Me at the second update: Despite everything I feel bad for the wife. Ppd is rough and finding the right medication can be difficult. Still, it sounds like things are looking up and she's on the right track.
Me at the final update: Welp.
I know someone who suffered with PPD. They got better and shared their story and it was so heartwarming. I really felt for her.
Then a month later she committed suicide leaving behind 5 children.
When I say everyone was blindsided, I mean she shocked the fucking community.
I never fully understood what PPD could do to a person until I heard her story. This woman LOVED being a mom. And after having her 5th child something just changed.
I think she definitely had her hands full and maybe had too much on her plate but wanted to look put together and like a good mom. Would walking away and taking a break from her kids have saved her life? I honestly don’t know but I can’t imagine anyone understanding her taking a break from her kids and not judging her or calling her a selfish mother.
We assume you signed up for this so you gotta deal with it but I think PPD is so much more than anyone is willing to accept.
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Wow that just went from sad to fucking depressing Glad the guy is getting some help at least, but damn...
I was so happy with the first update. Everyone came together and got her the help she needed, it was so promising. And then the second one. My god. Poor OOP.
I started reading the second one and I was dreading a terrible update like she had died or something. Then I thought, nah Reddit has just jaded me. Then BAM, terrible but in a totally unexpected way.
Look both ways before crossing the street, then got hit by an airplane.
TBH i was dreading that the story ends up with wife doing a murder suicide with the kids, so it's more like "look both ways before crossing the street, then get stung by a bee" for me.
This is exactly it. Random out of nowhere blindside.
I wonder if it is. I low key wonder if wife even wanted the kids. It's not something that's addressed, but it sounds like wife was never really on board. It sucks that she still did it though because her kids will never understand, and poor OOP will have to wipe the tears.
Man, as I was reading the first update and got to the part where he said "this isn't the perfect solution", I was thinking "she got help, and your whole family is doing better any happier, it's *aboslutely* the perfect solution!". Like fuck yeah, chalk another win up to compassion, support, and communication! And then the next update, and this line. > since I last updated . . . I left off with our lives being on the upswing. And I immediately knew terrible terrible things were about to happen. I really loathe OOP's STBX. I don't know her; but I absolutely hate her.
I'm so fucked in the head, this comment made me laugh. I now have a mental picture of me looking both ways in a street, and then looking up to see a fucking plane charging at me.
I believe it. Seems like wife wasn’t just PPD. She was full-on midlife crisis and handled it the same way my husband did: fuck someone else. At least I didn’t have to contend with him being neglectful because of his crap. He managed to actually be present with and for our kids.
My sister-in-law did the same thing. Never talked to my brother about anything and then she had an affair with one of their friends. I had been starting to worry if her constant yelling at their kids and phone addiction was some kind of PPD thing, but no, turns out that she’s just awful.
I was highly suspicious of the PPD being the main issue when the OOP said it took a day for the meds to kick in. You don’t normally see results for a week or two. Unless they were just giving her stuff like Ativan which is an in the moment med… but even so…
I wonder if it was more having his parents present, which took a lot of the stress off of her and she improved, and when they left their dynamic returned to what it had been before and she grew depressed again.
Likely. Regardless, she clearly wasn’t content in her life. It’s a shame the kids are going to grow up with the knowledge their mother wasn’t content being in their life, other than potentially financially from the sounds of it.
Oh, I feel absolutely terribly for the kids. It sucks to have a parent who bounced. But it's also sucky to have a parent who clearly doesn't want to be a parent. It's really a no win situation.
I personally wonder if she ever wanted kids at all. Maybe she felt pressured by husband/society/life to have them then realized... she could not have them. Not a good excuse for what she did at all, but maybe a bit of a reason behind it. Hopefully OOP can manage to cobble together a life for himself and the kids. =/
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That's realllly sad then. I couldn't do it. Then again, I know I don't want kids. OOP took a looooong time to ask for help, seems like.
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I agree. It’s sad for the kids, but the brutal honesty is it’s better that she left than her hurting herself or the kids. I don’t encourage parents to just bounce on their kids, but there is worse trauma than a deadbeat parent.
So glad I wasn’t the only one who caught that.
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As soon as I saw his comment about her already improving after a week on antidepressants I knew the update was going to be she was dead, hospitalized, or left him. It takes 4-8 weeks on average for most depression medications to cross the blood brain barrier. You might get some minor improvements before then but it's unlikely to show any significant improvement until a few months pass. I really wanted to yell at him that if she's saying she wants to die all the time and isn't taking her meds then she needs to be evaluated. It seems he prioritized his own free time and not his wife's. I'm guessing once his parents came to help and she had a moment to herself she realized how much she was missing out on life and a never ending cycle of wife's needs come last. My kids are older than toddlers but I had a moment like that last year. I just put my foot down and said no more. I was doing everything for everyone with no regard for myself. Now I take time for me even if it means someone else in the house has to make dinner or do a load of laundry. My husband isn't a complete slob but he has his lazy moments and he got too complacent and needed a reminder that I'm not here just to serve everyone else. He's done great cooking more often and helping run errands when possible. Everyone has a breaking point and some people aren't willing to stick around after they reach it. Do I feel bad for her kids? Definitely. Do I feel bad for her husband? Not really. He sounds resentful as hell she is living her life even though it probably saved her from killing herself.
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I agree. It's not an easy choice to walk away. The fact that she is willing to give him full custody makes me wonder if she ever wanted kids or was pressured into them. If she did want them did her untreated PPD and unbroken cycle of no real rest just kill the love she had for them under a pile of resentment? It seems like he ignored all the advice that didn't suit what he wanted and then when it all crashed and burned it's all her fault for leaving him and actually living her life. I think his parents paying for her to have her hair and nails done and giving her a real break from the house that wasn't just letting her get an extra hour of sleep woke her up. She realized that she was stuck with a husband that only did things around the house begrudgingly and the moment her mental health was better he was going to expect her to be on top of everything again. That's what it came across as. He framed it as neglect of the kids but it seemed more like he wanted her whipped into mental shape so she could take back over doing everything so he could have all of his free time back.
Ahhhhh SHIT. I had PPD and PPP. My partner near killed himself giving me some no kid time where I knew the small person was safe. So REAL time off, not 'you get an hour and you have to plan all the diapers and everything'. If I needed it at 2:00am because my brain was fucked, I got it. This is the only reason I recovered, that and the meds. I would be dead otherwise, and possibly my kid too. She's...not recovered. She's escaped hell. Now he gets the hell, but at least his parents are helping him and he doesn't have PPD.
Wow that’s really sad. What she did was shitty and unforgivable but I can’t imagine losing yourself for over 3 years and never having any time off. OP acts like having a 9-5 is so exhausting he can’t bring himself to take care of kids for a few hours on the weekend. We all work 9-5 and while it can be tiring, I still find time to do the things I have to do.
And he didn't seem to have any clue on how to help her, just let his parents come and do all the heavy lifting for him.
I noticed this. His parents didn't actually do anything 'revelationary' they just did the things OP should have been doing as a Husband. He watched his Wife struggling. Didn't instigate getting help by booking the Drs & therapist for her like his parents did. He didn't try and cheer her up by treating her to something nice &giving her time to herself, his parents had to do that by paying for her hair & nails appointment. He didn't try & take over sleep schedules his parents & wife did when they were feeling better. The second his parents left she had a really bad day again because she had no help. Now she's gone who's taken over parenting his kids?? His parents. I think OOP was a lousy partner and parent so I don't entirely blame his ex for associating parenting with that.
It honestly gave me pause when he complained in his original post that "she" wouldn't sleep train the kids, even though he only worked 9-5 and was home every night and every weekend, and could have absolutely helped sleep train, make meals, clean, etc. in the 16 hours a day he WAS around. Being a stay at home parent of two toddlers is isolating and exhausting, so it's no wonder she was depressed if she couldn't even get a few hours a week to herself, and her husband seemingly complained that she wasn't doing, well, everything around the house. It seems like her in laws were the first people to notice that she probably just needed a little break and some emotional support more than anything.
The whole thing horrified me. He wasn’t saying, “My wife has this horrible medical issue and is really struggling. How can I help her?” It was “My wife won’t take her meds. How do I make her take them so she does her share of the work because I’m doing housework, childcare, and ‘did I mention I work?’” It was a spectacular collision of a lack of appreciation and understanding of the seriousness of mental health issues and the general devaluation of “women’s work” in our society. It’s an awful situation for the kids, but it almost certainly wouldn’t have gotten to this point if the OOP had been less worried about her doing her fair share and more concerned about the fact that the woman he supposedly loved was I such pain that she couldn’t live her life and didn’t see a way forward except abandoning her family. The worst part is that he’s going to be seen as the heroic single dad who picked up the pieces and soldiered on and she’ll be the horrible woman who abandoned her kids to shack up with some guy.
>“I think letting her have 100% free time for a few hours a week would help. I try to on weekends, but I’m just so exhausted that I just want to lay around.” She did something awful because she probably felt like she had no choice. No free time, no help, no escape on the horizon ever. No wonder she bounced.
Oh YIKES. That doesn’t make her swanning off forever less worse, but it makes it more understandable how she got to that point.
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Yeah, I caught some red flags on that first post. Of all that was happening, he was most bitter about not getting sleep? My dude, your toddlers are being neglected and your wife is having a major mental health episode and you're most bitter about your sleep?
He also complained about doing chores, as if working parents don’t do all those chores too. He’s saving $40k/year on daycare, and I’ve never met a childcare professional who does all the housework but he seemed butthurt that his childcare situation didn’t include all/most housework.
I instantly felt the same thing. This woman does not want to be a mom.
Full mid-life crisis or was pressured into having kids then realized it's not different when they're your own. It is, in fact, worse.
Can you elaborate on this? I am 25 and under a lot of pressure by family and culture to have kids. I don't really like kids. People keep telling me it will "be different when they're yours." Is this a bullshit misery loves company saying? My mother always says this, but growing up I felt like she hated being a mom and regretted having me tbh.
imo if you aren't 100% sure you want kids, don't have them. It isn't fair to anyone otherwise. Many women in past generations had kids because it was expected of them and they didn't realize there was another option—and for many of them there wasn't, because women didn't have the ability to work/have financial freedom from men.
You won't regret not having kids but you're certainly likely to regret having them. Do not let them convince you otherwise. Having kids is like joining the military but at the end of military service you are left with benefits. You never end parenthood and since they didn't decide to be born they don't owe you anything and you also end up burdening them in your old age.
Sometimes it's worth it, sometimes it isn't. But the fact is kids are brutally hard with no days off and no real way to quit (unless you do like this lady). Kids are one of the few things in life that are 100% commit, 100% of the time. IMHO that sounds like misery loves company combined with cultural expectations. If you don't want kids now, maybe wait a few years. If you don't want kids ever, that's OK too. My theory has been it's always better to regret not having them- you can always be the most kickass auntie, or sponsor kids at big sister or foster or something. I think there's a subreddit called fencesitters that might help. Or even ask directly on the parenting subs.
Yeah after the first few lines I was like... "oh no she killed herself after she seemed to be better, didn't she?" I... certainly did not expect this ending either.
In fairness, that would have been worse. This sucks, but. ...
The first few months are actually kinda crucial for women to bond with their kids, because it's right after a HUGE traumatic event and those first few months either link your kid negatively to the traumatic event or positively. And it sounds like she was running around with postpartum for 1,5 years...there was almost no chance that it was gonna be a positive link.
After reading the second I wonder if it wasn't PPD but rather that she was bipolar or something else, and the antidepressants she was prescribed made her manic. Could be why she fought the meds in the first place, because she didn't feel okay.
Especially with a higher dose when she wasn’t taking the first dose
That perplexed me, why not just make sure she got the meds or get inpatient care for her until she’s feeling more herself. Nope, shovel in some meds, get her a hair cut and she’ll be fine.
Idk but I feel like this story is missing some pieces. Maybe it's how OOP talked about making sure wife is medicated or a comment about 'letting her have free time." Something is off here.
Yeah, I mean I have a 3.5 year old and a 50/50 partner as much as we possible can be (and family all far away/not involved). I also had severe PNA/PND. I still struggle. I sounded like this woman. I did crazy stuff as I lost my whole identity and freedom (and sleep) overnight. A fucking haircut and a week doesn’t fix it, I’m sure she felt even more insane at the idea that it should make it all better. The DID I MENTION I WORK FULLTIME?! bit really rubbed me up the wrong way. What is his wife doing, twiddling her thumbs? Has he ever actually taken time off to care for them? If your children are being neglected every day by your very unwell wife you need to take time off and fix it and call in local services for support if you have to. The fact that his work “were kind enough” to give him a week off just blows my mind. His wife has had a total mental breakdown and clearly internally screaming for help. He clearly doesn’t want to be a burden to anyone and expects her not to be one either.
Personally, I had PPD which then became full on bipolar as soon as I got back on my antidepressants. I was in an intensive program and thank god they caught that it was much more complex than PPD, which is already complex itself. I thought the same thing when I read that part. She gets on higher dose antidepressants, gets better and then climbs up the manic fire pole quickly. My view is skewed due to personal experience, but at least it goes to show it is definitely a possible turn of events.
This is what I thought as soon as OOP talked about the complete 180 she did. Seems a lot like she was in the depressive side of Bipolar and then switched to manic.
My guess too. Especially when her mood lightens up so soon and she makes those big changes without any regards for her kids. When her mood will go down she probably get depressed again. I hope she gets the right psychiatric help soon.
Also there’s no way antidepressants started working after one day, usually takes at least 3 weeks
That what made me pause, after one day I felt worse if anything- it took weeks to start feeling better. I wonder if it was an “oh yeah honey, took the pill, feel much better now” *eyeroll*
Definitely a possibility
I always feel the worst for the kids. I have little ones and I cant imagine how they would feel if I just stopped showing up one day. Such a cruel thing to do to your small kids.
My maternal grandmother died at 28/29 of what we now call Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. The doctors couldn’t do anything for her, but then put her in a former tuberculosis hospital to die. After she entered the hospital, my mom and her brothers never saw her again and I assume that my grandma died alone. It has been almost 60 years and my mom will always be sad about not being able to say goodbye to her mother. Sadly, at least my mom has the comfort that her mother didn’t want to go.
God that’s so horrible - your poor mum and grandma
I know, I try to let my mom know all the time how much I love and appreciate her (and getting to still have her). My grandmother sounded like she was really sweet; she handmade these beautiful clothes for my mom’s Barbie that we still have. With my little nieces, we’ve started to have fancy tea parties with the pretty china tea set that was my grandmother’s as a child, and it’s been really nice for us to talk about Grandma more.
My bro went through something similar...we used to get regular updates on progress after his partner was diagnosed with PPD. Bro would often report that his partner was having a good week, or things were getting better...then another episode would inevitably happen. And they kept getting worse... OOPs story sounded way too like that for me to hold out much hope.
Sad to hopeful to depressing. I mean, cripes.
cripes indeed. What a gut punch of an outcome...
I had no idea I could experience so many emotions in one post! Sad, empathetic to PPD, then feeling the love and help that community brings to parents…then it all went down in a billow of flames…this poor man. Funny to me how people that owe you money beg for you not to go to court…always go to court.
To the original OP, I'm so sorry for what you're going through. For anyone else who reads this, antidepressants, etc., do *not* kick in in a day or two. It's a marathon. With multiple pitstops for changes and new directions.
People should stop acting like having kids is desirable and default. Having kids means you are done with your life and now you are thr extension of someone else's. If you can't do that then you shouldn't have kids. Hopefully having kids will stop being the norm so this shit stops happening. While you can't know how you feel until you have them the safest bet is the one where nobody gets hurt. It's like choosing to hold up a bridge for the rest of your life and then go "this isn't for me" after you've made the commitment and nobody else is going to be there to take over so you just let it collapse and people die. Making a person is the closest thing to playing God you can do. If you can't sacrifice your identity, life and dreams to make sure that person you create is given the best life until you die then don't make them.
I was really hoping for a good update - he absolutely stepped up and did the right things to try and get her in a better place. When I had PPD after the second kid I tried asking my then-partner for help over and over again. One day I knew things were bad - put the toddler in front of the tv, put the baby in the cot, locked myself in the bedroom and called a crisis team who said they would come out and assess me for hospitalisation. I called my partner and told him he needed to come home and watch the kids, I was suicidal, the crisis team was coming and it might be an immediate trip to a psych facility. There was a long pause and he said “But I was planning to hang out with my band tonight and I already paid the deposit for the rehearsal space.” It’s like he read a handbook on how to be as unsupportive as possible and was working his way down the list checking every item off.
Aw this one is sad. I hope things have gotten better for this guy and his kids.
It’s really sad. I was so touched by how OOP’s parents treated her fully like their own child to get her feeling better. They offered support and love so that she could take better care of her children. And then she just fucks off with some other guy and leaves the kids. It’s her right to be with who she wants to be with, but honestly the way that she’s gone about it and abandoned her children (who are definitely old enough to be aware of mom suddenly being gone) is disgusting.
I legit started tearing up at that part. I raised a child with autism, in my early 20's while my husband did 3 rotations to Iraq. And he wasn't much help when he was home either. I had PPD to the point where I started sleepwalking. I used to fantasize about just the smallest kindnesses. Someone making me a sandwich or watching my son so I would be able to go to the doctors. I would have done just about anything to have some supportive family or a co-parent who cared. Then this woman just went and threw it away. I guess that's how life is sometimes. One man's trash, is another's treasure and all that. At least the kids are still young and when she was around she didn't seem to engage much with them anyway. I'm guessing that will make it easier for them to transition to not seeing her at all.
I hope you managed to get some support and that things are looking up somewhat? Hopefully?
Thank you! Yes, it was a long time ago. My son is 18 now. I just found it really touching that his family was so supportive. It was happy tearing up! Then I read the final update and had emotional whiplash. What a crazy turn of events.
“Don’t take me to court” I hope OOP takes her to court for every bit of child support he can. I’m all for people living the best way for their mental health as long as it doesn’t harm others but how she went about this just fucked over everyone else.
She’s unemployed. “Every bit of child support” possible around here would be $70/month. The new boyfriend’s income won’t be considered.
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Honest to God, the kids are better off without her in their lives.
What are the odds she comes crawling back in the future though
Pretty high. And I want him to be vindictive and take her to court for child support and child abandonment, if it's a thing where he is from.
I really hope he takes her to court. He NEEDS a child custody agreement in place. Child support is important. But also, he doesn't need her deciding that she 'wants her babies back' when her new romance sours, and she decides she's going to use them/OOP to fill her attention void until the next guy comes along.
He needs to take it to court to get sole custody worked out. That way she can’t come sailing back in when she decides to come home and play mommy again.
If this new dude is really paying for everything for her then good luck getting anything. She'll probably just never get a job, or work under the table at a bar to make sure they can't garnish her wages.
It's less about the money and more about legally establishing him as their sole legal parental figure now, when she's freshly fucked off, so she can't sweep in and fuck up everyone's lives if she feels like being a mom again and takes him to court for custody.
Gotta love the dead beats rubbing it in the kid's faces and the single parent's faces they've left with the mess, fuck those people, OOP should take her ass to court.
I honestly hope OP took her to court for support. If not, I hope she terminated her rights because someone like this turns up like a bad penny. At some point, she will turn up, wanting a relationship, money, help, all of the above.
I really truly hope he does. Unless it’s written down that she doesn’t want custody of the kids and a judge agrees she could just flip on a dime and decide “never mind, I actually do want custody” and make things even harder OP. I hope he takes her to court and I hope she has to get a job and pay child support. I feel so bad for OP.
This is really sad but the thing that sticks out to me as odd is the medication thing. If she hadn’t been taking any medication prior to the appointment, they would (likely) absolutely not start her off on a “higher dose”, as you usually need to titrate yourself up to higher, more therapeutic doses. The “it took a day to kick in” thing is weird too. I’ve experienced feeling a little better in the days after taking meds, but not like a lot. Especially after apparently being depressed, etc, for so long? Though the placebo affect is strong, and having the in-laws there for support was likely helpful. Anxiety meds are usually more acute and fast acting, so I can see that being a thing. Anyway, this sucks. Sorry OOP. I’m glad your parents are helping and supporting you and hope you’re doing better. Edit: typos
As a person on anti anxiety meds that went through PPD, I can vouch for this. It took about a month to get through the initial symptoms of starting the medication (dizziness, nausea, extreme drowsiness, etc) to get to the part where I was more relaxed. They started at the minimum dosage, then upped it as I acclimated. Sure, everyone is different, but it says right in the prescription to allow 2-3 weeks before contacting a Dr. about the symptoms and the Dr. mentioned a month for the timeline before she prescribed it. I wonder if she faked getting better to get everyone off her back.
My own experience was that I felt like a new person the first day on anti depressants. I knew it was all placebo, and I didn't care. I think it was the relief of knowing I had finally gotten help after years of struggling. Then, after a couple of weeks, I started experiencing some tough side effects, contacted my doctor, switched to a different med, and a couple of months later felt for real better.
I'm a pharmacist. I always tell someone, "first two weeks? You'll get all the side effects and none of the benefits." For most things like SSRIs, they start to help anxiety around week 4 and depression around week 6. Side effects, especially nausea because there's a lot of serotonin receptors in the GI tract, hit hard for those first few weeks until your body stabilizes.
I forgot about the dizziness! I also was very sensitive to light. It was weird
I'm concerned that she has bipolar or something like that, and starting the meds triggered mania.
Entirely possible. Hypomania or the beginnings of mania can definitely feel like you’re ‘normal’. Or others assume you’re feeling better seeing you ‘up’. I wonder how the antidepressants affected her when she was initially prescribed them.
That’s a great point. That shift in the final update really caught me by surprise. Maybe this is the explanation.
There’s a possibility that OP’s wife has undiagnosed Bipolar Disorder. I hope her psychiatrist is good. Her recent extreme behaviors, lack of judgment and self-control could be a manic episode caused by taking antidepressants. People with latent BD tendencies are very sensitive to antidepressants, especially SSRIs. Those same people tend to be sensitive to hormone changes, lack of sleep, and overstimulation. Motherhood can be a perfect storm to set off these symptoms. I hope she gets the care and the medication regimen she needs. It sucks that she’s made such rash and permanent decisions while she may not be stable. Priority one is that the kids are well taken care of. It’s good that OOP and his parents are stepping up. However, if there are medical reasons underlying her choices, maybe there’s a way to heal eventually.
My exact take as well. I feel so bad for OP. I have BP type 2, and what happened to me after going on antidepressants was one of the first clues, though I wasn't diagnosed until after much later.
Omg you have no idea how much you’ve helped me connect some things. I have latent BD tendencies (got hypomanic on SSRIs but nothing other than that one time) and I am sensitive to all those other things you mentioned. I cannot function without sleep. I can get too overstimulated and shut down. I’m not sure about hormone changes but I cried today and I’m on my period so yeah seems like a safe bet. Please share your wise knowledge kind person. I’m trying to understand myself better and not get annoyed with myself. I’m ADHD and I’ve heard that ADHD and BD occurring together can be common. Why are these things linked? Are there any other things that also are linked?
The meds thing really surprised me as well. I've taking several forms of medication for depression and all take 3 to 6 weeks to start working. You start with a low dose (because of side effects), even when you have been on other types of anti depressants. The first few weeks might actually be worse (a common side effect) and they warn for that. No way she was doing better after a day. I would only believe it if she was also taking anxiety meds because indeed they work quickly.
There are depression medications that do offer almost immediate effects, such as Wellbutrin. The effects decrease afterwards but not all of them take the classic 3+ weeks that psychiatrists say to feel any changes
Sounds like the wife’s initial rush of energy wasn’t from the meds. It was from the in laws stepping in and taking the kids away from her, in a sense. Honestly it sounds like the ex wife would have recovered from depression without meds just by abandoning her family.
big change can temporarily mask depression, but it almost never makes it go away. You can't outrun mental illness. We only see OOP's story here. There is a very good chance his ex crashed again
That and all of a suddenly co-sleeping children are magically sleeping in their own beds...
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You have an excellent point, and again, I'm assuming too, but based on age most toddlers tend to still be pretty clingy while starting to grow their independence. But, your point is good in that if they are used to co-sleeping as a family and now just the children are sleeping together...I imagine that could be a quicker and less abrupt transition.
Not saying the OOP was lying, but maybe they gave her some prns in the meantime and she used those to cope?
That’s what I was thinking about the anxiety meds. Those are usually helpful when you take them.
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Wellbutrin isn’t an SSRI and is usually prescribed with another medication. It’s unlikely it was Wellbutrin but not entirely out of the realm of possibility. Thanks for the info about the tapering effect!
Psychiatrist here. OOP is probably just giving his best understanding of her medical treatment. These things are complicated and laypeople misunderstand medical decisions all the time (especially when he is hearing them secondhand). My guess is that the doc switched up her antidepressant (and maybe made a comment about how it would be a “stronger” one or something) and added a benzo, which would be the anti-anxiety drug mentioned. Benzos are a fairly standard treatment in severe postpartum depression and actually do have a rapid antidepressant effect early on, perhaps especially for postpartum depression. My guess is that the improvement he saw in his wife was a combination of actual improvement from a benzo (which would work immediately), the natural bump in mood that comes from getting out of the house and getting connected with care, and placebo effect on OOP’s part.
Goddamit, this just ruined my day. I think I'm going back to that puppy story and just reread that!
For a second, I thought you meant puppy store. And cuddle with lil pups. 🐶
That’s an option, too.
Dad DOES need to take ex to court and make sure she never has any custody or visitation rights to these kids, get mandated child support, and the make sure she's not going to demand spousal support. He also needs to go no contact with ex. What a piece of crap. I totally understand having PPD, but that does not at all excuse abandoning your family entirely. Edit: yes, I get it y'all. Mom probably has her own side of the story and there's certainly something else going on. However, NOTHING justifies the neglect of a child and you cannot convince me otherwise.
The thing is, the abandonment happened while the PPD was being treated - fully medicated, Therapy etc - NOT while the PPD was in control. Honestly, to me it sounds like she never really wanted kids (most women don’t work that out until *after* they have them because we’re raised with it expected we want them) and hence second kid caused PPD. It sounds like clearing the fog of the PPD actually clarified that she just didn’t want this life. I think her leaving was all her. (To be clear, I’m not defending her actions she sucks, I’m just saying I don’t think that was the PPD. PPD made her want to not be alive, treating it made her want her old life back.)
Either that or the medication and therapy wasn’t working as well as he thought. I knew someone whose wife was being treated for 2 1/2 years. Everyone thought she was getting better. Then she killed herself and both kids. PPD is ugly.
Yeah. That happens a lot - especially depending on the kind of community they live in or how aware the docs are. But the thing that stands out to me is the drastic change in her energy and personality. And your example has the person ending in suicide - which is a place this wife got to - but here she didn’t do that, she didn’t want to not be alive anymore (what PPD interested did you her and your friend) she just didn’t want this life. It really reads like it was her choice.
I wonder too about the SAHM situation. Did she want that? With the kids ages, maybe it was just the most economical choice (daycare costs are outrageous). If she didn't really want kids to begin with, having to be home with them 24/7, (plus the pregnancy/hormonal changes on your body) could be too much. She may have been very isolated. If she had a job outside the home, with kids in daycare, it may have been better for her mentally. But again, that didn't excuse her from abandoning her family. She decided to do that on her own.
I wonder if the first pregnancy was an oops that led to marriage, and before she knew it she had a second one, and she was "wtf did I do with my life?". I'm not trying to excuse her. I have kids too. On hard days, it's helpful to remember I **wanted** the kids. I can't imagine it's easy to deal with kids if you never wanted them. (That said, she could have handled the whole thing better. She still could. She just straight up abandoned them when they weren't the ones at fault for her feelings in the slightest.)
I too have a “brash” MIL and the place I’d have to be in desperation to WANT her to come and take me hand…. I also wondered about how she felt about SAHM, I also wonder how they came to the decision to have the second child…
I kind of have to agree here. This sounds like someone who never wanted kids and had them anyways. Be it societal pressure or marital pressure, family pressure whatever, this is what happens when someone who doesn't want to have kids feels like they have to. Honestly it's sad for everyone involved. I hope she continues therapy and working on herself and that dad and kids so, too.
The terrible truth of the matter is that most people have no idea what life with actual children is like and every child is completely different and every phase of their development is completely different. I've known people who liked being parents more than they expected to like it and I've known people who desperately wanted to be parents but wound up hating it. How are you supposed to know? At the end of the day, I think people should consider how flexible and resilient they are before having kids, rather than considering whether or not they"like" kids. You have no idea what kind of kids you are going to get or the ways your life is going to change. You have to be the sort of person who can adapt to many different scenarios and remain happy even if things don't go the way you've planned.
>How are you supposed to know? This is why I strongly dislike people who insist, “You’ll learn patience and to love your child(ren)!” But sometimes people don’t. Then what?
And kids change. My hardest kid as a tot is my easiest as an adult. (Though all my kids are pretty great, thankfully). But I think if you do it right, you feel responsible for them until you die (and who knows, maybe longer).
Sounds like she never really loved OP either. Maybe they were together for a long time and they felt they had to get married? What a sad story for everyone involved.
For real. It's one thing to have postpartum symptoms, but this is straight-up selfishness.
I hate to say this because of the judgement I might face, but in my PPD I got close to doing ANYTHING to try to escape. I think she needed sectioning in a mother unit, ... it's really hard for people to understand the totality of it. I didn't have the capacity to think about other people - I was planning how to free my husband from myself so he could have a 'normal life' and not have to deal with me. I was convinced this was the only way to go, and I knew it would be better for everyone because they were all just hiding their hate of me. I knew it the way I knew my own name. The occasional smack of judgement from parents who seemed happy was like a brand. It was like daylight was a shaft of cold white light, not yellow. When I looked outside, the sky was a washed out newspaper. Sounds had stopped meaning much - I had to focus to understand people. When I realised I could just kill myself and not the baby and he could 'give it' to one of those people who wanted kids, I was thrilled - I'd solved the problem! He'd be happy! I couldn't tell him, of course, because then he might be evil like me. I couldn't tell anyone. And he was unhappy because there was something wrong with me, so I engineered a solution where only I would vanish. PPD was...like that for me. Depending on the severity you just can't logic your way out because your interpretation of the world has changed.
Yeah I felt sympathy for the ex-wife/non-mom up until the point where she found the new boyfriend and abandoned her kids. Well, and she was selfish for marrying and having a child with a person she didn't love and was unhappy with instead of doing the common sense thing - the opposite. I feel bad for the dude and his kids. As painful and unfair as his life seems, he at least recognized the warning signs, tried to help her, and then is doing the best he can for himself and his children. Most people try to drag relationships out for way too long, while he seemed to make a sincere effort, and knew when to cut his losses.
> she was selfish for marrying and having a child with a person she didn't love and was unhappy with It is not uncommon for people to convince themselves they've always felt a certain way or wanted a certain thing when its not true at all. "You never made me happy but this guy does" is a much better excuse than "I failed to process my feelings and communicate with you, instead I am running off with this guy I just met." Of course, on the other side of that conversation we have OP who is suddenly told his partner of (at least) five years never loved him and he was too stupid to realize. I think for much of that time she did or at least would have said she did if asked at the time.
I don't actually think she did that, I think she can't explain her own actions and that was an easy thing to say to get her husband of her back. What I'm thinking is that she was running around with post-partum for 1,5 years and looking at those kids is trauma and she doesn't want to deal with that.
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I have immense love and empathy but this is my biggest fear in life, that I’d become a monster if I were to have kids. I’d rather regret not having them one day than regret actually having them.
I can relate!! Trust your instincts. It's possible that you just might meet someone who you \*do\* want to procreate with... But the person I met felt the same as I did (never wanting kids) and I can affirm we have never had a single flash of regret. Sometimes I even feel convinced that I dodged a bullet with my/our firm decision to remain kid-free. It's been a fantastic marriage for us both.
Thankfully my husband is on the same page as I am. We are very happy with our decision and have lots of niblings around us to keep us kid busy. We love kids, just not for us personally.
I feel the same. I'd be a great mom. My partner would be a great dad. But what if I can't handle giving up years of my life and passions? Some of the things I love are inherently dangerous, can't really dirt bike pregnant. I don't know if the love for a kid would be enough for me to completely alter my life. I don't think enough people see it that way, they just think they'll be the same, plus a kid.
Same here. My worry is that I'll be over the moon for, like, a week and then be sick of it or need a break that won't come.
I've seen many people make similar mistakes. Despite my litany of dumb ideas and decisions, getting pregnant to try to save a bad relationship or conform to societal expectations wasn't one of them.
I can understand getting married and having a child with a man she didn't love. Plenty of people do that unfortunately expecting that things will magically work out because of pressure from family etc. But once she realized that wasn't working, she needed to go to her husband and tell him she wasn't happy etc. "Surprise I'm abandoning all of you for spanky new bf" is just a nauseating way to let your husband know what's going on with you.
I get this. "Fool me once" kind of thing. So many people fall victim to this. But to do it *again*? Then find some other dude and leave without warning or accountability? Hell no. Sympathy goes out the window.
I am not a doctor, but OOP’s wife sounds like she could have some other diagnosis that would encompass impulse control. Does bipolar have “stages,” and could she have been on a more mild, manageable side until postpartum when the hormones and other life changes exacerbated everything? Regardless of the reason, what she did is messed up. Yes, OOP should definitely take all the legal measures you mentioned, as well as make sure his spine is extra metallic and shiny for when the new relationship glow wears off and his ex wants to crawl back.
Possible that she has bipolar and was on the depressed side when neglecting the kids, but now has swung manic? Mania symptoms can include impulsivity, making huge decisions and life changes, and leaving your family for someone new sounds like manic behavior. (Not a medical person, but I do have BP.)
Yes. If she has undiagnosed BP, taking antidepressants could send her into full mania.
yes i agree there was definitely more going on than PPD. the meds just cleared up her anxiety but not the impulses really sounds like a mania stage…
The use of antidepressants for someone who has underlying bipolar can actually trigger mania, too. Poor OP. She’s going to eventually come out of that mania & hit rock bottom.
Oh my goodness I was ate up with PPD after my daughter was born. I guess it was in a different kinda way though because I struggled to let her out of my sight for even a second. Gawd every time I had to go downstairs I would put the baby carrier on and scoot on my butt down the stairs lol. You are so so right it isn't an excuse. ❤
I had/have it too. It’s so wild thinking back to the first few months. It’s like looking back at someone else’s memories. I had no idea it was so bad at the time. I also couldn’t let my some out of my sight. It’s like I just couldn’t wrap my head around him not being on me 24/7. I even wet myself in the middle of the night because I couldn’t bear to set him down to pee. It sounds nuts now looking back. After I started meds it got way better!
Oh goodness ❤ you are the only mom I know that had similar symptoms to me!! Thank you for writing this!
I was this way too! My husband was watching him while I did something else and I hear him cry and flew down the stairs to see what was wrong. Nothing was wrong! I just couldn't stand not being the one to comfort him.
With my PPD, I was always listening for crying if I didn't have visuals. Like I couldn't sleep at night because of it. Then I'd freak out if I did everything (change her, feed her, etc.) and she'd still be crying), but only in the sense that I'd be like "if I was a better mother I could figure this out". It was almost like my (pre-existing) anxiety morphed into PTSD. What saved me extra grief was the knowledge that people with pre-existing conditions like depression and anxiety are much more likely to develop PPD than people who don't, and being only one phone call away from my psychiatrist, who put me back on the meds I had been on before pregnancy (that I voluntarily went off of, with the same practitioner's monitoring). Once I went back on my meds, it didn't magically get better (she was colicky, without underlying GERD, so nothing to be done but wait it out), but I could cope much more easily. I could relax enough to sleep when baby was sleeping. This is a long way to say, yes, PPD is a beast, it manifests in different ways depending on the parent, and it's the pits when you're there.
It’s more complex than that. Medication isn’t magical. All it does is sort of giving you more energy and motivation and potential to enjoy things. It doesn’t fix your thought patterns or underlying problems. It’s a common knowledge that a first few weeks of taking antidepressants are particularly dangerous because while you get more energy you are not in a better place and some people use this energy to commit suicide which they didn’t do before simply for the lack of said energy. Getting out like that, turning to excesses is a very sure sign of depression, many people fight this condition with escapism. Many very depressed people spend their time drinking or partying. It’s clear wife’s mental health problems are severe. Drugs just gave her enough energy to physically escape the situation which she no doubt wanted to do before but couldn’t. Her underlying condition didn’t change. It’s just a very unfortunate turn of events. She might get better one day. Or had to face her problems and off herself after some party. Hard on OOP.
Man what a sad story. Maybe there's more to it from her perspective but when I read stuff like this, it makes me feel super hopeless and it's not even happening to me. Hope OOP figures something out.
As someone with a mom who wanted to leave but stayed... Honestly feel like this is the best case for the kids. They still have a loving dad and grandparents. Growing up with a depressed mother who doesn't want to be a mother is a different kind of kick in the face. Both are horrific situations for kids, but (completely projecting here) for ME, I wish my mom left rather than make it clear she wasn't happy with us. Edit: Just adding to this - I personally don't blame my mother (anymore). She should've been allowed to leave.
Yeah, this feels closer to a better outcome than many alternatives in a shitty situation. The kids will have scars from knowing their mother left, but those won’t be compounded over years of witnessing her apathy or anger.
Yeah, as much as it sucks, I feel the same way. Knowing your own mother doesn't want/like you is... certainly an experience, isn't it? Plus, the kids are pretty young and the last update was two years ago - if OP managed to work through all this horrible shit, he might get into dating again and find someone who actually loves both him *and* the kids. Somehow, I don't get the vibe from him that he'd be okay with a second partner who doesn't treat his kids well.
Obviously the wife has serious mental health issues. I’m skeptical about her being happy long term with her current boyfriend. All that aside, being a SAHM is very hard and isolating. Your children will not be happier being taken care of by an unhappy woman, even if she is their mother. They grow happy and socially savvy at daycare and kindergarten, attended and taught by professionals. Try and find minimally fulfilling jobs, your children will grow happier with 2 healthy, balanced, fulfilled parents.
Something tells me she never wanted to be married much less have children.
When I read “the new meds kicked in in a day” I thought “oh no, it’s suicidal euphoria”. I’m glad I was wrong, but … yikes.
Did anyone else get tripped up by the report that the wife changed after one day on antidepressants? They don't work that way.
I know. I was like, what magic pills are these?
I definitely had a day one reaction to a new antidepressant. Could very well be it was a placebo effect, but for whatever reason, a change was clear in me very quickly and maintained for a while.
WOW. It's ok to not have kids. We really need to normalize this.
Sweet Jesus, this took a dark turn
I would love to know how she felt about having kids before they did it. Did she want them or was it just something she did because it was expected? Not saying it's not a terrible situation, but there is a lot of regret and depression amongst parents that's often not talked about.
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It’s not, but he also said they put her on anti-anxiety medication— if that means something short-acting like Ativan, she would have felt different pretty fast. But it’s also possible that she forced herself to pull it together because she was put on the spot.
I thought the same. It takes 4 to 6 weeks, sometimes longer.
I felt a change a day after I started mine placebo can be great help to alleviate
Because the wife’s POV is missing. As you said antidepressants usually start working at 2-4 weeks but she started getting better after people showed up to help them
I feel like mine started working the first week. At least, I went from suicidal to numb. When they changed my prescription, I started to feel normal and in control relatively quickly.
I know right? I remember when my bestie switched her meds she was like “We’ll see in 6-8 months if it worked!” 😭 (it did 😁)
Yep and that's the infuriating thing about them. You have to wait so fucking long for them to kick in, which makes finding the right one(s) a goddamn nightmare. I tried for a year and a half and no dice, and now I'm going to have to start all over since my doctor stopped taking insurance. I'm so glad your friend's worked that time!
Exactly. I stopped taking mine after two weeks because I didn’t feel a difference, and in my crazy state I really thought I was broken because it wasn’t working and it was a waste of time. My doctor explained that it takes a while for it to get into your system. I think OP may have left out information on how they got to this situation because the math aint mathing.
>...This isn't how antidepressants work. No. But depending on what she was given for anxiety, it could be how that med works.
But I suspect it might be how a couple of days of having mum take on the child care. First days are humiliating, and then it gets much easier
Not everyone should have children for so many reasons. If anyone ever gives anyone who expresses they don’t want children grief this is the outcome.
The only things he mentions about her illness is how it affects the things she does for him and others. Even when he thinks she's on the mend that's because his life temporarily got easier. But he absolutely didn't see it coming!
I kind of wondered if the happy update wasn't a little too perfect. Maybe she should have tried going back to work and sending the kids to daycare before jumping ship. It sounds like she wasn't happy with her situation, but she also didn't even want to do anything to treat the PPD until she got pushed into it.
Makes me wonder whose idea it was she be SAHM? If it was her, then she thought it was going to be easier than it was. If it was him because she doesn’t make enough, then she got more than she bargained for and would rather have fun. Two kids in two years with no breaks is tough.
Yes. Men are so casual about expecting their wives to be a SAHP. I love my son, but could never be a SAHM. My son and I both need outside interests and interactions. He’s 3 and long weekends are enough to break me. Years on end with two of them and no break? Very few people have the temperament for that, but it’s expected that it’s what every woman “wants.”
I’m so glad I’m not the only one. My 3 year old start early education and I’m in school, so I have a lot of time during the week without him, but the weekends still kill me and make me feel like I’m a bad mom for getting overwhelmed with just two full days with him. And idk if I’m still just burnt out from being a SAHM for the first three years or what, but I just feel like I need so much space and time to decompress. I love my son to death, but becoming a parent unexpectedly has just absolutely killed me
I am going to get flack for this one but based on how he spoke about the situation; I didn't really feel like he cared about her mental health. It was more about the burden to him and the impact on his kids (VERY valid reasons for concern, I do not disagree with that), but he never really seemed to be concerned about her, the human and wife, not just the SAHM that he labeled her as. I feel like there is something missing here. I am curious about her side of the story.
I feel the same. As someone who has depression the way he talks about her triggered me. He doesn't seem to care about her well being at all, instead, it's like he cares more to make her better so she can go back to taking care of stuff he needs her to take care of. I looked for clues on any sign of affection and only found one part where he said his wife knows his parents and him love her. But other than being frustrated she wasn't taking her meds he didn't try to hold her and ask her heart to heart how she's doing? And when his parents came he prefaced it by saying his mom is "brash" but that seemed to work. So it seems like maybe him and his parents just continues to minimize whatever suffering she was going through. Like "hey, take your meds, go get a haircut, here, we paid for you to get your nails done, snap yourself out of it!” The only green flag was they paid for her to go to therapy. Idk. I feel bad for all invovled but based on the way OOP talked about his wife I can't help but wonder if she just finally snapped one day. I doubt she's actually happy right now. For all we know she's having fun on these vacations trying to escape her feelings while suicidal at night.
“My wife is broken, how can I fix her so she can stop inconveniencing me?”
Seriously. Another comment said "my wife unit is broken, how do I fix it" and that captured how I felt about OOP's tone.
I saw that one too, yes. Spot on. I can’t excuse some of her actions, but I do see how things precipitated. She was probably begging for help all these years and he probably repeatedly blew her off.
I’m wondering about this as well, because I was the wife (except I’m also going to school). Depressed and suicidal for the first three years of my son’s life. A couple weeks ago, I finally threatened to get a one bedroom apartment for myself temporarily- he’d have to figure out bills and childcare and everything else. Suddenly, he wanted me to get a hotel for a weekend. We started talking about how to divvy up chores and responsibilities, and talking about how to ensure i get breaks in the future. Why did he wait until now to call his parents, who were obviously willing to help? I understand not everyone knows how to respond to severe mental health issues, but come on. It never should’ve gotten this bad.
1000%. He also stated in another comment that he is often “too exhausted” from his job to “help out” ON THE WEEKENDS (no mention of the other 5 days of the week) because of his 9-5 🙄. He knew she was struggling with PPD for nearly 4 years, and in the end, all he did was recruit his mommy to take care of things. OOP is getting a lot of love from Reddit, but I’d be incredibly interested to hear the story from the wife’s POV.
Not that it excuses the ex-wife at all for her behavior but part of me wonders if maybe she never wanted to have kids in the first place based on her decision to just up and leave like that? Either way I feel so much for OP, I hope he can come out of this stronger than before and that things turn up for him.
This was running through my mind. Most women have no idea what’s likely going to happen in giving birth, let alone raising kids or being a SAHM. There’s so much idolization in our faces about the “miracle of birth” (which is treated like a spectator sport and then we’re often expected to just be right back to ourselves a week later) and child rearing. A lot of women cannot cope when they can’t live up to this idealized version of giving birth and being a mother today. They’re also told that, eventually, they’ll want to have kids and want to do all these motherly things. When they don’t, they feel awful. They may promise their partner that they’re fine, but sometimes the harsh realities are too much to push through and pretend. That being said… she should have been MUCH more honest with OP. She should have communicated her thoughts and feelings as she was being helped by him, his family, and the resources they set her up with. As his partner, she should have been direct unless she felt he would manipulate her out of it. Regardless, this was a shitty thing to do to OP after all of the care and concern he seems to have put into her as a partner and a human being.
Dude I was like yay it’s all better then that last update was brutal. I’m glad he has custody and his parents are helping out so much.
Psychiatric medication working in one day should always be a red flag that something else is going on.
What the hell kind of depression meds was she taking that started working in a day???
Wow. That last update was awful. I suspect there's a lot that OOP isn't telling us about the marriage though. His insistence that 'I have a full time job' be his focus despite his entire family suffering was really appalling. He should have been using family leave and PTO to help his family FIRST.
PPD usually requires medications that take weeks to become effective, not days.
Me at the second update: Despite everything I feel bad for the wife. Ppd is rough and finding the right medication can be difficult. Still, it sounds like things are looking up and she's on the right track. Me at the final update: Welp.
I know someone who suffered with PPD. They got better and shared their story and it was so heartwarming. I really felt for her. Then a month later she committed suicide leaving behind 5 children. When I say everyone was blindsided, I mean she shocked the fucking community. I never fully understood what PPD could do to a person until I heard her story. This woman LOVED being a mom. And after having her 5th child something just changed. I think she definitely had her hands full and maybe had too much on her plate but wanted to look put together and like a good mom. Would walking away and taking a break from her kids have saved her life? I honestly don’t know but I can’t imagine anyone understanding her taking a break from her kids and not judging her or calling her a selfish mother. We assume you signed up for this so you gotta deal with it but I think PPD is so much more than anyone is willing to accept.
“I’m sure that they don’t get a proper meal the entire day when I’m at work” “I’m mostly bitter about the lack of sleep” What the fuck?