Hi,<p>My WS is very depressed. He has moved away from the OW, but still gets together with the OW. He also has talked, visited and been around me the BS more.<p>We do see a C together and are due to go this week. A lot has happened since our last visit.<p>My question is how can I help with the depression? I'm afraid that he will decide that maybe ending it all would be the easiest way out. When this first started, I was the one who considered sucide as a way out. He went to the C with me and told the C that he would feel guilty if I did choose suicide.<p>How can I get him to come home and work on the marriage? I have tried not to put any pressure on him. I'm afraid that he feels that I no longer care!! The rollercoaster goes up and down and round and round!!<p>Please help and pray for us. I have been praying daily and have seen some answers from God. I now feel that I need help with praying for the right things. [img]images/icons/confused.gif" border="0[/img] [img]images/icons/confused.gif" border="0[/img] <p>We have been married for 34 years and I love my H very much. I know that 50% of this situation is my fault!! [img]images/icons/shocked.gif" border="0[/img] [img]images/icons/shocked.gif" border="0[/img]

Oh God how my heart goes out to you. This must be very hard for you. <p>I can so relate to your desperation in a different way. I too have contmeplated suicide on 2 different occasions, and landed in a hospital both times. The last time, I went to a doctor and admitted my feelings and was put into a hospital for 2 weeks for my own 'protection'. I went into a depression that lasted 14 months. After several meds and counslers, I am med free thanks to God's intervention. I didn't suddenly get healed or anything, I just continually yeilded myself to Him on a daily, sometimes minute by minute basis, and He did the rest. He supplied me with a job. He continued to heal me from the inside out. He constantly loved me no matter what I did or how I felt. And now I am free of the oppression of depression. I still get depressed, but not to that extreme. And it all stemmed from my neediness in my relationship with my husband. I had an unhealthy desire to make him someone he wasn't and when that didn't work, I did some really stupid things that just made matter worse. We ended up being thrown out of a church, lossing many friends and we almost broke up due to my neediness for my husbands attention. What God has taught me is that NOT ANY MAN can fill the void inside me. No one but Jesus can give me the peace and joy in my spirit that I so desperatly sought in the flesh. It was a hard lesson to learn, but God finnally brought me to a place of acceptance and understanding. I still struggle with my own neediness, but not near as much and for not near as long. The peace that surpasses all understanding resides in me and no one can take that away. I can give it away if I am not careful, but no one can take it away.<p>I am so sorry to hear about your husband. He is making choices that are out of your control. After being together so long I can see why going on with out him might seem impossible. It is tough. I will pray for you and for your husband to begin to make better choices in God's will.<p>I hope that something I have written about my own experience may help. I truely am sorry for what you are going through. May God bless you and keep you.

Hi Always and Forever,<p>It is a roller coaster, dealing with infidelity, that is for sure. <p>You have been at this place that husband is in, depression. How can you help him? I think, of course the first thing is to pray for him, and no-lovebusters. You can't take the pain away that he is feeling, and he has his own process to go through - that he needs to go through to grow and learn. What he doesn't realize is that when he has contact with OW it deepens the pain and pro-longs the process.<p>So, keep him in prayer, realize that you cannot control or fix it, and don't add to his pain with lovebusters. Keep coming back to MB for support! Be good to yourself as best as you can - hot baths, good sleep, constant prayer, and get in the Word.<p>(((always and forever)))

My H also suffers from depression among other things. He doesn't have a formal diagnosis because he's refused treatment for a long time. We went to marriage counselling together briefly last year. I went for a whole year, but the C observed depression symptoms in him while he was there. <p>Not only does he refuse treatment, but he's doing a terrible job just taking care of personal grooming. I used to take charge of his haircuts, for example. Over the course of two years, I stepped back from shouldering responsibilities that belonged to him. When his haircuts became his own responsibility, he went EIGHT months without a haircut! It just about killed me to see him look so scruffy. This is just one example. <p>Sometimes what you need to do is nothing. A very dear woman I met here told me to stop lugging around baggage that doesn't belong to me. If the suitcase sits unattended, well, let it be unattended until the person it belongs to decides to pick it up. It's the same message my counselor gave me in a memorable session. <p>She said there's only one circumstance where a person can be treated for mental health without the patient's permission. That's when the person is a danger to himself or others. Otherwise, it's up to the individual to seek and accept mental health counselling. She said to take any suggestion of suicide seriously. She suggested that I ask my H how he would do it, and if he had a plan in mind, it's a huge red flag. Personally, I'm not comfortable with that at all. First of all, my H's words deny any suicidal thoughts, but his artwork tells another story. He did say once he would be dead by his birthday. I couldn't imagine saying, oh, how are you going to do it? Yikes!! I would agree, though, that a statement like "I'm going to jump off a bridge" is a lot more worrisome than "I wish I were dead." My C strongly recommended that I call 911 if I believed he was in imminent danger of hurting himself. Along with that phone call would be my commitment to insist that he's a danger to himself when the police or ambulance arrive. He can be taken for evaluation without his permission in that circumstance. <p>More important, his choices are his own. It is his choice and his choice only that will lead to treatment for depression. Mental health professionals have rules and procedures to follow, and they are not ALLOWED to provide treatment unless there's danger. The burden is placed squarely on the shoulders of the patient. <p>I was very grateful for the lesson that day. My H's mental health was a burden I took on my own shoulders, and it's not where the burden belonged. All I could do is pray and leave the rest to my H and God.