Hello all, I have a quick question for you: if your spouse's annoying habit is a diagnosed disorder that cannot be eliminated by simply changing one's mindset, what is the best solution?

Background:
- DH was diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder about 15 years ago
- DH has seen several psychiatrists who prescribed various meds, ultimately behavioral therapy worked best for him. Still sees psychologist.
- We've been together for 16 years, married for 8 years; have 2 young children aged 3.5 and 1.5
- Both reading Love Busters and His Needs, Her Needs--DH is on board with MP principles. Our marriage is not in a bad place, but with 2 young children we both agree that our marriage has taken a back seat and we want to make it better. We both think that our marriage is "good", but we want to be great.

DH's OCD has gotten worse since having kids (worrying about kids = anxiety = more OCD behaviors). He still employs the behavioral therapy techniques from the past, but he's not always successful in keeping his anxiety at bay. My frustration with the OCD has gotten worse since having kids because it results in making my life more difficult. I change all diapers, bathe and dress the kids, etc. because his anxiety over hurting them makes it very difficult for him to do those things. And if one of them gets hurt doing normal kid things, I'm having to calm the whole darn family.

I'd like to think this is not a dealbreaker for me because my husband is a truly wonderful husband and father, but I'm just not sure what to do about it. What's worse is that I tend to DJ him when he does it, so it's a wonderful cycle that won't stop.

OCD cannot really be described as an annoying habit because it is not something that we can change. It is not like leaving your socks on the floor.

Actually low levels of OCD are very helpful because they are what drives people to make good work excellent. All geniuses have some measure of OCD. Better to regard this as part of the package that is your wonderful husband.

But you are right to spot the connection between anxiety and OCD. OCD is actually a coping mechanism, the underlying condition is anxiety. You can help. H needs to talk about what is making him anxious and you need to listen. DJs will send his anxiety to the moon.

Young children is the time of most stress for relationships. Start caring for one another. You are so right to be doing MB. A romantic marriage will alleviate his anxiety better than anything else can.

Wife_Loving, this is an interesting question to those of us who study MB - and I don't know the answer.

I think the answer is to try harder until the problem is eliminated, using the behavioural techniques (and medication to, if necessary). I think you must also ensure that the marriage does not take a back seat to the kids, so UA time must be rigorously adhered to. I should think that UA time would have the benefit of relaxing your H and reducing his anxieties.

But really, I think you should put this question directly to Dr Harley. I think he would love to answer it, and ideally, to talk to your husband (and you). Please email him at the radio show.

OCD behaviours are very much something we can change, but it is very hard to practice the techniques devotedly until the behaviours are eliminated. The behavioural techniques that the poster mentioned are standard forms of intervention. I'm not a doctor, but I've seen enough medical documentaries to know that much!

This. If his techniques/ self-calming techniques aren't working then he needs medication. Your goal is that he is calm and relaxed when he is with you. That is why UA time (away from stressors like kids) is so important. Work on creating an enjoyable life. Find ways to simplify and outsource as much as is financially possible.

Just some thoughts...
Don't calm him. Be calm and caring, but you might need to remove yourself when he is emotionally outbursting. He needs to be responsible for calming himself. It will be difficult for him because of the repetitive thoughts, but he needs to focus on his actions instead of his thoughts.

Of course, hearing Dr. Harley's perspective via the radio show is the best idea.

I am sure I've heard Dr H say that anxiety in a husband is very hard on a wife and strategic techniques are needed to handle that dynamic. I'd definitely email him.

Thank you all, this is very helpful. I will definitely email Dr. H about it. It is actually a relief that this is a bit of conundrum to you veterans because it's the honestly been the only part of the MB program that I've had a hard time addressing.

A couple of notes after reading the replies:

1. I agree that it's not an annoying habit because it's not a true habit--it's a disorder. But it also feels like a LB and AH was the closest classification. It's just tricky for me since changing this behavior is much more difficult than changing a bad habit and I truly want to help. Hopefully Dr. H can help me.

2. I oscillate between trying to be calm, caring and listening when he's struggling with anxiety (more like SugarCane's/LivingWell's suggestions) to being completely detached when he's having an episode of anxiety so that he is forced to calm himself (more like DidntQuit's suggestion). I'm not the coddling type by nature, so it feels healthier for me to detach, but DH feels much more supported when I listen and am supportive. My fear is that talking about his "bad thoughts" is part of his compulsion, so I've worried that being supportive is not supportive of my DH, but supportive of his OCD. This is why I need Dr. H's help--I need to figure out what is best for my DH and do that regardless of how I feel about it. I definitely need to stop DJing when he tics, that is wrong.

3. Livingwell, you are right that this is "part of the package" with my DH. He is a brilliant mathematician and I respect and admire him a great deal. I need to take the bad with the good, just do my part to make sure I can help eliminate the "bad" parts as much as possible.

4. UA time is very important to both of us and I admit that it is difficult with a young family, but we've taken steps to ensure we have 15 hours a week alone together. We spend evenings together after tucking our girls into bed (+ they both still nap, which is additional time together on the weekends). We've also outsourced the lawn care/landscaping and hired a house cleaner so we're doing fewer chores on weekends which results in more family time or more alone time. Plus we now have a regular date night which we both love.

5. Indiegirl, anxiety in a husband is honestly very hard on a wife. It forces the wife to be the "rock" in the relationship.

Thanks again for all of the help! I'll update this thread once I've heard from Dr. H.

Wife_Loving_Life,

I strongly suspect that I could be diagnosed as obsessive compulsive.

What I have had to do is to very strictly follow Dr. Harley's rules for marriage. No matter how I FEEL about something, no matter how anxious, I MUST NOT become demanding, disrespectful, or angry with my wife about it.

That was a hard set of habits to break, but it is very doable. I had to follow Dr. Harley's treatment suggestions for anger management, which helped immensely.

I would see if you can get your husband to obsess about following the rules of this program. It worked for me!

Yes, Dr. Harley has commented that a man like this typically drives a woman nuts. He has referenced the fictional television show Monk and said that if you see how Monk usually drives women nuts, that's very realistic.

Everybody I know says I'm a lot like Monk, I'm afraid!

My feeling is that if such a man learns to not make demands of his wife, to not impose his anxiety on her, it can go a long way towards helping her to feel better. Just ask my wife.

HEY! Marriage Builders doesn't tell people how to feel!

Wife_Loving_Life, have you presented the Marriage Builders program to your husband? Shown him the Basic Concepts?

Does your husband ever become demanding, disrespectful, or angry?

Man, he needs to get that taken care of! I hated changing dirty diapers and such, too. The first time one of our children had a disastrous leaked diaper all over toys I thought I was going to die. But it turns out my hands can be washed afterward, toys can be cleaned up, I can bathe if necessary, and life goes on.

Repeated exposure is the only way to get over this, so I hope he dives in and starts doing it.


I would tell him you need him to not impose his anxiety on you. If he's having an outburst, he needs to go off by himself until he feels better. I would treat this as an angry outburst. You should not be subjected to it.

If he won't agree to that, I would tell him you can't accept that and separate from him until he decides to get help or do it on his own.

If your husband would follow the procedure Dr. Harley describes in this article, it would probably help a great deal:

How to negotiate when you are an emotional person

In particular, I'd say your husband absolutely needs to acquire a GSR meter or other biofeedback device and work with it.

Exactly.

A highly anxious husband is very hard on a wife. She shouldn't be told to just accept it.

If a man with OCD is dedicated to following the MB rules, you can be quite happy in a marriage with him. He's got to be obsessed with following the rules, though, and dedicated to not forcing you to pay the cost for his OCD.

I don't think stuff like that should be cited here unless you've actually heard Dr. Harley say it. Dr. Harley frequently disagrees with the mainstream and frequently doesn't agree with psychological diagnoses of conditions that supposedly can't be changed.


Very true!


I think the big problem here is that the burden of paying the costs for his anxiety should not be imposed on her. For example, he feels anxious changing dirty diapers, but that should not be made into her problem. She shouldn't have to be the helper that helps him cope with it.


There needs to be far more than just talking about it!

This is what I do. Markos really protects me from his anxiety/OCD right now, but occasionally it slips through. And when it does, I report it as a lovebuster -- it shakes me up, and I cannot live with it.

Please let us know when you hear back from Dr. Harley.

Yes, my husband is familiar with the MB principles as we have recently spent much of our UA time completing the worksheets that accompany His Needs, Her Needs and LoveBusters.

My husband has rarely been demanding, but definitely DJ's and has AOs. He rarely does either if we are not engaged in a fight and I do tend to do both of those things first, but we are both responsible for our own actions.

Also, to be fair, my husband does OFFER to change diapers/change clothes, etc., but I tell him I will do it because it's easier for both of us. If he does it, he is anxious and doing rituals the entire time, then often we have to talk about his fear that he hurt one of the children while doing the task. Then I get frustrated that a 30 second exercise has turned into a dramatic event. I am familiar with exposure therapy, but I honestly fear that if he's battling his anxiety while doing something with/for our kids, then our kids will start thinking THEY are the reason he is anxious because they are too young to truly understand a mental disorder. I suspect that part of a reason having an anxious husband is hard on a wife is because we see the behavior as "unhealthy" and want to protect our children from it.

I feel my husband does best when he is home alone with the girls so that he is forced to care for the girls without "backup". There was a death in my family recently where I needed to be away for a weekend and my husband did very well an enjoyed his time with the girls without discussing his anxieties when we chatted on the phone. Then a few weeks later I had a girls' night and he had a hard time getting our youngest's shirt off and called me panicked for fear he'd hurt her. In fact, I didn't pick up my phone so he called the restaurant so he could talk with me. So I never know when he will suffer a "bad" episode.

The anxiety being imposed on my is indirect, not direct. My husband tries to hide the tics/rituals from me because he is ashamed. He has stopped "talking through" his anxiety with me (per his psychologist's recommendation) unless it is a really bad (like the time he called the restaurant).

ETA: even when he called me during this episode, it wasn't because he needed me to calm him down, it's because he had a panic attach which scared our children and they were both crying. He was hoping I could calm THEM down, which made me incredibly angry (with him, for scaring our children) and incredibly sad (that our kids were scared) at the same time.

Thanks for the link to the article, markos--I read that a few days ago and printed it so we could read it together.

I have emailed Joyce/Dr. H and will report back what he instructs.

You shouldn't be protecting him from exposure therapy. Exposure is the only way he is ever going to be able to work through it.