Where do I begin.......<BR> Well here goes , I was in a marriage for 18 years that produced two wondeful children and two basket case parents. Throughout the relationship I realize now , that I have been verbally abusive omy spouse , being on some occasions down right nasty . She asked for a divorce in early August and I have spent the majority of the time between whining , crying and in general keeping up more of the behavior that pushed her away to begin with. All the signs were there , and I chose not to see her unhappiness because I was a little to wrapped up fighting the demons in my head.....<BR> Oh , let me tell you about the demons in my head. For years my throat has been tender and sore , I could never sleep , and had a constant headache , over the past couple of years I really went downhill with tremors , muscle weakness and the inability to stay awake past 3 , with no motivation. My family Dr's chalked all of this up to depression or stress, or the ever popular sinus infection. Those pinheads had bloodtests which clearly showed my thyroid was out of wack , they ignored it and now a specialist has discovered this problem , as well as a possible brain tumor ( find out on Monday ).<BR> When this was diagnosed two shrinks , and two preists told me we need to sit down and have a family meeting wt he kids , to explain your illness and what it has done to your personality. My wife flatly refuses to be part of this , she has gone as far as telling the kids its not the truth , and they are being lied to. My kids hve suffered with my mood swings and although my wife has nothing left to give , they will always be my children and I think as a family they need to be told. My kids have never bee old anything about why Mom and Dad are getting divorced ( actually wy Mom wants a divorce ) and both of them have been left to form a oppinnion of this by " overhearing " phone calls their Mother has describing my actions and irrationality. I have had no contact with her for almost 10 days ( Plan A ) except for trying to tell her what my mental health folks say...and she flat out refuses to listen. Even is threatening to get a protection order if I don'tdrop the subject............<P> A preist says it looks like guilt , two shrinks say it looks like guilt , whats it look like to you guys ?

Hello Gary,<P>We all feel guilt from time to time. Even if we are the betrayed spouse, we feel responsible for what happened to us. <P>Sure you might be feeling guilty, thats normal. I knew someone with a thyroid problem too and it does mess up your mood. I'm not sure of the medical reasons why, but once she was diagnosed, she was a much happier person. <P>If your too pushy with your wife, it may push her away. Holiday's are coming. She will already be stressed out, I don't care who you are, its tough to go thru holidays when your missing your spouse for the first year.<P>Plan A and hang in there, it might take a while, and if Plan A doesn't work, you'll learn how to work thru that also. This is a great place for support.<P>Happy holidays,Dana<BR>

Gary,<P>I don't know how to answer your question but I do know about thyroid problems.<P>My mother has hypthyroidism. She was diagnosed about 7 years ago. She had the same symptoms that you describe. Before they found out what was wrong with her, she was suicidal. She would have periods where she couldn't sleep and then periods where she slept all the time. And talk about being a grouch!!! At the time, she had 4 grandchildren that she normally adored. But before she started her medication, she couldn't stand for them to be around. She became aggitated very easily. It also affected her and my father's marriage. She was ready to pack up and move out. But thank God, the doctor finally figured it out and things are good now. She takes Synthroid now and has to go regularly to get blood work done. And when she doesn't take her medication, you can really tell a difference in her personality.<P>Good luck to you!!<BR>Mitzi

Thanx Mitzi/Dana ,<P> Yep it's a real dilema , I know my wife still has some feelings left for me somewhere . But she has found a ex-boyfriend ( confidant ) that she basically has been leaning on for the emotional support that I should have been giving her all along. As long as he's in the picture ( the dreaded fog ) I don't think any of thisis going to matter.<BR> As far as my medical problem I have several rare disorders , one is Hashimoto's thyroiditis , and the other is Addison's disease , they are both autoimmune diseases where the body " turns on itself " one tells my adrenaline function not to shut down , and the other tells it to shut off...problemi ti can sometimes happen in a 24 hour period I can go from Hyper to Hypo in a matter of hours and it real mimics the symptoms of manic depression .<BR> I'm on syntroid now , low dosage . But they will increase dosages on 12/05 and the changes I have already expeiriencd should be better. But they need to find out first if this is being caused by a brain tumor and I go for the MRI on Monday of next week.<BR> Men aren't supposed to get this disease , less than .005 % of all thyroid problems happen to men . And my wife hs several friends with thyroid problems who were diagnosed early and never had the severe mood swings that I have had , and thats her frame of reference to judge the symptoms by.<BR> As long as her emotional attachment is elsewhere , she'll never recognize this , and I feel ( could be wrong here though ) the reason she oesn't want the kids or anyone else to know. Is that it could possibly paint her in a bad light , I've been a real [censored] , and hurt her and the kids too....don't know why she needs to go full speed ahead , and not allow a couple of months to let this sort its self out....

Gary,<P>Here I am again with the "direct approach". And again I have had similar circumstances in my life and the life of some of my friends. I truly believe that honesty to your children should be your top priority. True there are some things that children don't need to know, but things such as your medical condition and you marital situation directly effects them and in my opinion they NEED to know.<P>Certain things were "hidden" from me growing up - things I knew I could have handled. Same is true for several of my friends. It is unfair to keep children in the dark about circumstances that directly effect them. What is seen as protection, I don't believe holds much weight.<P>For whatever reason your wife has for not telling them, I think it is up to you to fill them in on what is going on. Be sure you are not trying to "get them on your side" or anything like that. Make sure you are only telling them so they understand and know what is going on. Work to get your wife's support on this, but if she still refuses, then you may need to do it on your own.<P>It is a tough situation in the fact that your wife does not support this, and for that I pray for God's wisdom and love to surround you in this time of need.<P>God Bless.<BR>Mike

Thanx Mike,<BR> At the risk of pissing her off further I think I'll forward thisthred to her when we it reaches the end. Kinda hope she comes in here to lurk , this whole site has helped more than anything I've done so far...net to syntroid !!!

Hi, Gary. Happy Day Before Thanksgiving!<P>Your situation is very sad. Since I myself came from a relationship where my stbxH was verbally abusive and had a bad temper, I can understand your W's refusal to listen to you anymore. I'll be blunt. She has been crushed too many times, and now she has found someone who is not crushing her. <P>HOWEVER, I must agree that your children need to know what is going on. I do not know their ages or how much they will understand, but I would guess they're not babies anymore. They need to be told in simple, layman's terms that a medical doctor told you that you had a disease that CONTRIBUTED to your mood swings. It is called "XYZ" and it can be helped "ABC" medicine. In there, you also need to tell them you are sorry for all the time it took you to find this out and for all the hurt you caused them too, but since you are very honest with yourself, I'm sure you know you need to do that. <P>Last but not least, they need to know why you and your W are splitting up, in as non-judgemental a way as you can put it. For example, "Mom and Dad are not going to be together. Mom has decided that it hurt her too much to live with me anymore. I feel sad about that, and sorry. But I will still always be your Dad, and my feelings for you have not changed a bit." The temptation will be to blame everything on your medical condition and blame your W for "quitting", but try to avoid that and try to communicate that you know some of this was caused by you.<P>It's a really hard pill to swallow, but you can do it. Regarding your W refusing to accept you medical condition, I have a great idea. What if you got a copy of your diagnosis from your doctor (maybe with additional symptoms and medical indications) as well as getting a copy of your prescription and gave them to your priest? My thought is, she may be a little more willing to listen to the priest than you, and I know the priest isn't a doctor, but he should be able to tell if the condition is "real" or "made up." <P>You are in my thoughts and prayers, <P>CJ<P>------------------<BR>Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.

Hi Gary,<P>Sorry to hear about all the medical problems. How do you get all that diagnosed?? Some of that describes the way I feel lately, you have me wondering.<P>I agree that when a spouse has emotional attatchment elsewhere, its very hard to get thru to them. I think emotional is worse than physical personally.<P>All you can do is learn all you can in the meantime and you WILL become a better person out of this all no matter what the outcome. We all have and there are a lot of great guys on this site that have really learned a lot about themselves thru MB. You will find that these principles carry thru in life not only with a spouse, but even in other relationships around you .<P>Take time to take care of yourself right now. You need to be well to give 100% and Plan A can be exhausting. (I wish I took my own advice sometimes!) <P>Good luck,<BR>Dana<BR>

Thanks again to all ,<BR> I was just shoveling a ton of snow from here Mom's roof and we talked for a bit , her Mother says she close to a nervous breakdown , so I guess I'll really keep my distance and have my lawyer submit our " plan" for a equittable split of property....<BR> I love that Woman sososo much , too friggin bad I was such a wretch and could never show it.....<BR> Dana , diagnosis is easy once you find a Dr. to listen , I would recomend a Endocronologist and have them run a COMPLETE thyroid screening , includin virus scans , it will show up inthe blood tests , but most MD's won't run a complete test as the expense is really high , bite the bullet and pay for the complete thyroid panel.<BR> How in the hell could I be such a [censored].....

Gary,<P>Don't even go down that road! You are a human being who made some mistakes. You maybe didn't show how you felt. But, you're not an [censored]. Part of your behavior was quite literally caused my a chemical, medical condition. So lighten up on yourself!!<P>{{{{{Gary}}}}}<P>CJ<P>------------------<BR>Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.

Faithful Baby.......<P> Well got my pretesting done for my Brain MRI today , kind of spooky turns out that because ( in a previous life ) I was a welder they had to X-ray my eyes to make sure there are no metal particles in them . Because when you put a big magnet near your brain it will pull all metal to it....and right through your eyeballs ( this is not a good thing ) so , for two and a half hours they scraped my eyes to make sure there were no metal particles in them......big fun huh... Kinda depressed today , really really down on myself.......But tommorow gotta go back to work and tuesday its off to the lawyer ......life goes on I guess Hope your T-day went well....mine sure did !!!<P>------------------<BR>Yesterday is history , tommorrows a mystery , and the present is a gift , thats why its a present

Gary, <BR>I told you--I'm not your baby, I'm a chick! (haha) <P>Anyway, this is a tough time for you. So often we tend to struggle to avoid the hard times and avoid the "suffering", but I would say, embrace the suffering. I know, it's kinda wierd advice, but if you walk with it a while and get to know it, you will not feel like you have to work so hard to avoid it. <P>Oddly enough suffering is good. It teaches you. It purifies. Sometimes, it even shows you what is important and what is not. <P>So if you feel scared about your MRI (I know I do), accept that and learn from it. For example, I have prayed about it, and I realize that it is truly in God's hands. There is not one darn thing that my worrying will affect. HOWEVER, the part I can affect is making sure you know that you are not alone, that I feel scared too, that you are important to us all and to me. These things, I can do something about. So if it turns out you have a brain tumor, then medicine will do it's very best to cure you, your friends will be here to support you, and we will all lift you up in prayer and in our thoughts.<P>Yes, it's true. At times it is depressing and you feel too tired to continue trying. So once again, accept it. If you feel sad, feel sad. If I feel sadness coming on, I give myself some time to feel it (I call it, "wallow in it"), but not forever indefinately. I feel sad for about an hour and I REALLY feel it, and then I try to pull it together and do something for someone else. Nothing pulls you out of a funk like helping someone else. If you feel guilt or regret, feel it--but not forever, indefinately. <P>Well, hugs to you today. I'll be praying for you, and let me know how your MRI turns out.<P>{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{Gary}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}<P>CJ <P><P>------------------<BR>Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.