I'm not doing well. On the Wednesday night before Thanksgiving I read an inappropriate email from my husband to a coworker. I told him I didn't think he should go back to work there. I told him that he can't expect to return to his job and continue to have a life with me. I suggested that he could take the three weeks off that he has to use before the end of the year, now, and look for another job. He told me he'd rather I leave than he quit his job. Mind you, he hates his job. I went to see my landlady and told her what was going on. She told me that she would wait until I got a job to pay the rent if I stayed, and not to go anywhere without talking to her first. She hugged me and prayed for me. My current income is not enough to live on. So I knew I'd need a supplemental job, or two, if I were to be on my own and, I think he realized by then that he is leaving here and not me, as he has the money to do so and I don't. The next night I found two more emails, worse ones. He's managed to desecrate everything I loved and held sacred, including himself. Then on each subsequent day, just when I thought I was doing alright under the circumstances, some new ugliness would come bubbling up to the surface to sicken me again. I can't even bring myself to type my husband's name with a capital letter anymore because I've lost all respect and admiration for him.

On the previous Tuesday I had made a doctor's appointment for the following Monday, about another matter. I wasn't sure if I was going to keep it, but I did and they drew some blood. I could barely make it home from the doctor's that morning and I just collapsed in a chair. I've never felt so weak before in my life. Ever. The next day I couldn't stand in the shower or hold my arms up to wash my hair. Awhile later I felt well enough to do a little job hunting never-the-less and I have a pretty good lead on a job close by that I can walk to. On Wednesday the doctor's office called me and scheduled another blood test in two weeks, because I have an elevated white blood cell count. Hence the exhaustion. A high white cell count could be due to a virus or infection (I haven't had one), extreme trauma or stress (Bingo) or Leukemia (Not very likely under the circumstances).

I really don't want to go back on an antidepressant if I can at all avoid it. I had gotten off of them some time ago, and amazingly, I haven't felt the need to take them again through any of this. I find that during the day when my husband's not here I feel somewhat better, but when he's home, it's a nightmare. I can't stand him. He makes my skin crawl. I dread him going to work and I dread him coming home even more. He said all week he wouldn't do any overtime and every night he's been 3 and 4 and even 8 hours late getting back. He's told so many lies about whether the coworker is there or not that it's to the point of absurdity. He said he would go to a doctor or a counselor last Friday to see if he should return to his job on Sunday, but he's managed to successfully postpone an appointment until after his vacation starts. I'm sick of his lies. I want him to leave, but I don't know how to make him leave since he has a key and his name is on the rent receipts. He also told me that by reading the Marriage Builders website I'm making myself sick. He doesn't know about the blood test though, or the job for that matter, as he specifically didn't want me working for this particular employer in the past.

The job I'm looking at requires physical labor, standing and repetitive movement. So I really need to build up my strength and endurance for it and a high white cell count due to stress isn't helping. I think it'll actually be beneficial for me to work there because I'd be out of the house when my husband comes home and I'll rarely have to see him, if at all, since he's the cause of my trauma. Is there any way I can build up my strength without going back on antidepressants? Are there any foods that help even out red / white blood cells? I'm already taking multi-vitamins and an extra iron supplement. My lower back and sternum are killing me though, which is being caused by the high white cell count. Can anyone suggest some exercises to alleviate that and or strengthen back muscles? This has taken more out of me than I thought.

Actually there is an easy thing you can do to help relieve the sternum pain...I get that to and it is very painful. Stand in a door way..put your hands on the sides of the outer part of the door..like on the trim and push your chest forward putting your weight on your hands. This helps so much. Also I have used something called Theragesic cream...like Ben Gay but better. Also at times an ice pack can help. I like the door one best.

I felt the same way for a few weeks after discovering my HA. It literally took me a week before I could get my den cleaned up. To walk across the room required so much effort...it gets better. Hang in there! You sound like a go getter..on top of things..you have a plan.

Are you sure you want your H to leave or for you two to get a divorce? I am reading How To Survive An Affair..if you even slightly have thought about a reconciliation I would strongly recommend this book. It is helping so much.

Stay in touch...Be Strong!

Thanks for your reply.

It's been over four months now. I still don't have a job. I'm still trapped here. I don't have a car, so I'm severely limited as to job prospects. When I had a car I was never out of work. Now, however, if I go the public transportation route, which I likely will have to do, it will eliminate the prospect of a second job, and or overtime.. which I will need to be able to support myself. The last of the winter weather, and injuries, have held up my progress on the job front as well.. and lately the weather's been great, but because of my recent injuries I haven't even been able to do the one thing that's been the highlight of my days of late, that being hiking and working up to running again. Now spring is here though and I can probably begin that again. I need the endorphins.

My husband is gone. I mean, his mind is gone, and maybe even his soul. There's no mind there and no conscience. There's nothing there to reason with. I tried seeing a counselor myself, in December, who read his emails and told me she thought they looked like the manifestation of a manic episode, and that the coworker he was replying to was/is psychotic. The coworker (underage until recently) is currently under arrest for drug trafficing (again) and will now face an adult prison sentence. I'm not a professional in the psychiatry field, and until my husband is evaluated no one can know for sure what's going on with him, but I've always thought he was bipolar.. and he has a great deal of other issues as well. He has unresolved emotional issues from his past for one thing, and he's a drug addict, his drug of choice being pot, which is a depressant. That much I know. I'd hazard a guess, however, that if he were ever evaluated he'd be diagnosed with several other mental illnesses as well, including but not limited to, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder and Borderline Personality Disorder. That would be my guess, but again, no one can know for sure because he refuses to be evaluated, let alone medicated. I won't go into details here as to why I think he has these conditions. No point in it. Suffice it to say that his detachment from reality scared me so much last spring that I suggested to him that maybe he should give me power of attorney. He's 44 years old and while I always suspected he was bipolar, I've watched him become worse and worse with age. I've asked him to see a psychiatrist over the years, and more so in the past year than ever, but he's always postponed actually doing it. Meanwhile I just thought, I'll just have to be stronger. I'll have to work harder and do more. My neighbor's husband is in his 80s and has Alzheimer's but now it's gotten to the point that my husband's behavior is more irrational than his. My husband will do things like, put something in the oven, turn it on, then go to bed.. and that's just the tip of the iceberg as far as how bizarre and dangerous his behavior has become. I don't know how he's going to manage when I'm not here. I think he'll need to be in a group home at some point. On the other hand, right now he holds down a job, and he's well liked. Some people think he's a genius. He has a 129 IQ, which is not really a genius, but it is better than average. People love him. They tell me I'm so lucky to have him.. that I'll never do better than him. Well, they don't have to live with him. His mind is deteriorating at an ever increasing rate. The people who have known him well, who aren't many, but a few, don't even recognize him anymore.. as I don't.

My husband is away most of the time, so fortunately, I rarely see him. I usually see him for only a few seconds a day, when he comes home to sleep. He's pretty hard to ignore when he's in his dramatic moods, even for those few seconds of mayhem, but there's nothing I can do. As I said, there's nothing there to reach or reason with. His days off from work are a nightmare though.. and he has four of them coming up this week. I dread it. It's like something out of The Shining when he's here. This thing he's become is demonic. So you perhaps can imagine now, he has a great deal of issues to overcome. Any one of them would require a herculean, life-altering, effort on his part. Any ONE of them.. but he has many, many, issues and he's unwilling to be medicated, let alone even evaluated, for the mental illness/illnesses he has. There's nothing more I can do. The husband I knew is gone. I have no partner. I have a foe out of the Twilight Zone, who thinks I'm his mortal enemy. I have no marriage. I'm a widow.

Since I'm still technically, and only in the most superficial sense, married though, there is a divorce looming in my future, and a broken heart in my present. I'm surviving. I'm finding, somehow, that life is wonderful.. when I'm alone here and there are moments of peace. So, I know what I really need is independence, to be in control of my own destiny and make my own decisions.. and I need some sleep. I need my own income, my own insurance. I need to be able to make my own plans, and carry them out without constant subversion and interference. I have to move on. There's no other choice anymore.