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Posted 10/21/2008 3:43 PM (GMT 0)
was diagnosed with severe depression in which i'll be taking meds for the rest of my life.  after 17 years of marriage, i made a choice that hammered in the final nail.  lost the respect and love of my 14 y/o son, lost a great paying job by my own accord.  out of 5 borhters and sisters, only one seems to genuinely care and outside of work, i have no friends.  i've come to the conclusion that i love my wife eventhough for years i questioned that, but most of all i want her to be happy something i didn't provide for many years.  and with all the other failures and selfish acts i created, i don't want to be here anymore.  i just want the pain to go away.  the pain i've caused and the pain i carry with me.  i'm working on changing the type of person i've become.  i've looked for support groups to attend, but either i'm looking in the wrong spot or they don't exist.  please help!!!   

       

Posted 10/21/2008 3:53 PM (GMT 0)
No_lust_4_life,

Your story touched me, and I feel bad for you. I, too, have little lust for life at times. Although I am on medication for depression, I can still get depressed.

Please keep in touch with this forum; perhaps it will help both us. I just joined myself last night.
Posted 10/25/2008 1:20 AM (GMT 0)

no_lust_4_life

Welcome to HealingWell.  I am sorry you are in a bad spot right now.  Could you provide a bit more info.  When you say you want your wife to be happy are you planning on leaving her so that she can be happy?

You said you don't want to be there anymore so are you planning on moving on by yourself and working on changing you?

There are many group therapy opportunties out there.  Your physician should be able to find one for you to attend.  It would do you good to be able to talk with others and learn how to deal with your depression.

There is no shame in being told you will have depression for the rest of your life, I have been told that too but that does not mean you cannot learn to cope and learn to love you first. You can only change you and I sense that is what you want to do.

Keep on talking to us.  It is the weekend and sometimes it is a bit quiet here on the weekend.

Take care

Kitt

Posted 10/25/2008 1:49 PM (GMT 0)
hi kitt,

sorry for the misinformation but when i wrote it, my mind was buzzing with all sorts of things to say and i didn't want to divulge to much information. because of my stupidity, she filed for divorce in which we both agreed upon...that becomes final later this week. have been out of the house since june and the only way i know she will find happiness again is for me to be out of her life as a husband. we have 2 wonderful children in which we work together so that they are taken care of.

as for me not wanting to be here, i'm referring to ending it all. suicidal thoughts run through my head daily. over the years i've hurt a lot of people..my family, her family, my children and especially my wife. the emotional pain i've caused and feel is unbearable. but i'm smart enough to know suicide is not the answer, but the thoughts never leave.

my philosophy is it's my mess i need to clean it up. so through the years i've never asked for help with anything, guess it's a pride thing or stubborness. i did go to a counselor told him the same thing, he basically said there is no shame in asking for help. took a couple of weeks but i did finally ask. not only have i asked for help, i decided to look into support groups and that's how i ended up here. i even asked my wife to look into or ask her doctors (she's a pysch nurse at the hospital) if there are support groups for depression. maybe there is one, if not, i'll continue here. hope this clarifies for you.
Posted 10/25/2008 2:24 PM (GMT 0)
Hi No_lust_for_life,

I am Karen, I am happy that you have found us. This is a wonderful place to be able to talk about things, being we are all anonymous, it makes it easier to open up.

I think group therapy would be good for you. Do you have any one on one therapy at this time? It is so helpful. Just to have an objective person to open up to that you can trust helps.

I hope that you have a good day. Keep posting and let us know how you are doing.

Hugs, Karen
Posted 10/27/2008 6:13 AM (GMT 0)
shakehead   shakehead shakehead I was where you are at in jan. if you want to talk to someone just click on my E-Mail envelope next to my user name.I tryed to send one to you but it did not work. shakehead shakehead shakehead
Posted 10/31/2008 2:44 AM (GMT 0)
i am such a schmuck!!! not only am i depressed due to all my failures and pain i've caused others, my 5 y/o daughter i believe is starting to feel the effects of the divorce because of my infidelity. something else to throw onto my guilt. and to top that off, my ex-wife picks up the pieces because i'm out of the house. bless her heart for that...though it is putting a strain on her. we both ask our daughter what's bothering her, but she replies nothing. but we know...it's all my doing!!!! jeez this world doesn't need someone like me here.
Posted 10/31/2008 4:34 AM (GMT 0)
Stop feeling guilty and you start picking up the pieces of your life. You can't change what you did, but you can start changing who you are. So take those thoughts of guilt and kick them to the curb right now. You can do this.

hugs, Karen
Posted 10/31/2008 3:31 PM (GMT 0)
Hi No_lust_for_life,

Thank you for your clarification. You have posted "it's all my doing!!!!".  Hey no fair giving yourself so much power. When I got divorced many years ago I did some not so bright things to and I would tell people that the divorce was 99% my fault and my ex had to accept 1%.

I was in therapy in January and when I made the statement, the therapist just looked at me and said "No Way". I was putting myself down and accepting all the horrible things people were saying to me and just believing that I must be a bad person.

We talked it through and I found so many things that were not may fault and that I needed to work on my self esteem. We can only change ourselves and yes, guilt is a wasted emotion.

Remember, the world is a better place because you live and serve within it.

Take care

Kitt

Posted 10/31/2008 7:24 PM (GMT 0)
not this time kitt, over the 17 years we were married, the things i've done were unexcusable. sure there may have been things said but as the saying goes "actions speak louder than words" and she by no means created the mess.

and just to clarify, according to the dr.'s, i've been suffering from depression for quite some time. guess i finally accepted the fact that i am. up until a few months ago, i knew i was and have been since junior high (late 70's) but it progressivly got worse. i never accepted the fact, though i have admitted i was just a little. truthfully i was dead inside. well now that i've accepted the fact i suffer from depression, i've decided to start the transformation to feeling better. i've started on wellbutrin, i talk with one of sisters and i've found this site. not only am i doing it for me, i'm doing it for my kids. only thing missing from the formula is the physical pressence? of a person. i don't have friends to buddy around with or talk to. so for starters i'm going to continue to come here.
Posted 10/31/2008 7:33 PM (GMT 0)
Hi Life,

I am happy that you are getting help. But you do have to put the past where it belongs, in the past. You may have made mistakes, but you are paying for them. You have to give yourself a break. Admit what you did to yourself, acknowledge it, then put it behind you and start fresh like you are doing. You can't change the past, but you have suffered enough. Now work on you. You can do this, you are off to a good start.

I hope that you do consider counseling. I think that you need the support right now. And remember that we are here to help you get through this the best that we can. We are not professionals, but we can try to point you in the right direction. Stay with us, we are here for you.

Hugs, Karen
Posted 11/5/2008 6:55 PM (GMT 0)
Hi there,

I identified with your story.  Not from your side, but because I've lived through that.  I was with my ex-husband for 9 years and something similar happened with us.  What struck me is that my ex seems to have some of the same guilt.  BUT...he isn't doing anything about it.  YOU are doing something about it.  You are getting help.  And I commend you for it.

I understand feeling guilty.  When we do things that are wrong, then consequences are natural.  So the things you see happening with your kids, and the sadness you feel for your ex-wife...this is a normal course of event.  Not good, no.  But normal.

What I would say to you is...first you have to forgive yourself.  That is the biggest step.  I long ago forgave my ex-husband for what he did, but the consequences of his actions still came.  And they continue to come because he cannot forgive himself nor deal with the guilt in a healthful way.  He is just creating more of a mess for himself now.

So forgive yourself.  Give yourself permission to feel guilty, but also give yourself permission to move forward in your life.  You can't change what you did, and you can't change the consequences of it.  But you CAN control how you live from this day forward.  And what you did does NOT have to define you.  You define yourself by how you are NOW, TODAY.  Not by what you have done in your past.  To help illustrate this...when I was early in my marriage, my ex-husband was a good man.  His past didn't matter, his future didn't matter.  What made him a good man was how he was AT THAT TIME.  Then, he messed up.  And continued to mess up.  And CONTINUES to mess up, and this is what is defining him today.  If he made a decision to forgive himself, move forward, etc...then he could be defined as a good man (who simply has now made some mistakes in life, as we al do) just as he was defined as a good man before it all happened.

Also, realize that your ex-wife will probably forgive you for what you did and that she may have already.  And that as long as you hold yourself in contempt, you won't be able to start to make things right and get your life back on track.

Just repeat this to yourself:  I am not a bad man, I am not a bad person.  I just messed up.  Maybe a lot!  But I messed up, and we all do it.  And I choose to learn from it.

Posted 11/11/2008 3:42 AM (GMT 0)

hi sweat,

thanks for the uplifting message.  since you posted several days ago i have started lexapro and continue with wellbutrin and those two seem to be working ( controlling my crying episodes and lifting my spirits).  unfortunately one of my bad characteristics is i tend to hold onto things, memories, emotions, etc. so me forgiving myself is a loooong way off.  as i stated before i do have a plan to better myself and so far it seems to be working.  my 14 y/o son, who absolutely wanted nothing to do with me, is slowly coming back and opening up to me and my ex-wife and i have a good open relationship.  i know she is still seething inside about my actions over the last 17 years, especially this past summer, but for the kids sake, we are doing things in a family atmosphere.  attend church together, dinner together, shop together etc.  and i still don't know how to show my appreciation to her for allowing me to spend as much time at the house and around the kids and her.  any other wife probably would have shut out the husband.  i do have a question, could i be going through a phase in which i still love my ex-wife because i'm now alone or could it be that eventhough we had a disinigrating marriage and several times i wanted to leave, that i do and still am in love her? confused   when i see her all i want to do is giver her a hug and not let go. i don't want to do that and ruin what we have now.  any suggestions as what i could be going through?

scott 

Posted 11/11/2008 2:54 PM (GMT 0)
Hi Scott,

Even when we are in a bad relationship, we still get use to that. You could be going through change and want to go back to what you were use to, or you could have just realized how much you actually did love her. I would take this slow, some people get along better as friends. So go one day at a time and see where that takes you.

Hugs, Karen
Posted 11/14/2008 3:59 PM (GMT 0)
Hi Scott,

Sorry for the delay in writing, the notification email got sent to my bulk folder.  Let me try to answer your question.

Love does not turn off like a light switch.  So yes, it is normal to still feel love sometimes.  It is also normal to feel that you want to give her a hug.  You have experienced a big loss and the natural thing is for us to make it want to go away.  And the easy way for the pain to stop is to run back.  But don't make the mistake of thinking that just beause you feel love, and feel sad, and miss her at times...that you should be with that person.

You said that you wanted to leave your marriage several times, and that it was disintegrating.  I think that is the key here.  Going back to that would produce the same results.  The pain would be lessened temporarily, but you would be back to this same place shortly thereafter.

While I commend you for spending so much time "as a family," in my opinion that is not the best way for you to heal.  You need some distance from your ex-wife.  Everytime you see her, it's going to be like opening that wound again.  You need to get to the point where the wound has healed enough that it won't bleed fresh everytime you see her.  Where the feelings of wanting to hug her, the feelings of loss, etc. won't return.

My suggestiion would be to try to find a way to stay just as involved w/ your son, but without maintaining the same level of involvement with your ex-wife.  I had to stay away from my ex-husband for several months after the split.  Just seeing him would produce those same feelings you feel.  But I knew it was the wrong thing.  A lot of times loneliness and loss produces in us feelings of longing and desperation, and I think that is what you are experiencing.

I commend you for your steps in healing.  I think you are doing a great job.  It is not an easy road, but you are making forward progress!  Feel free to write/vent anytime.

Posted 11/15/2008 3:10 AM (GMT 0)
scott,

how are you? im going through the same thing as you. how are you holding up? please email me if you need to. we need each other to hold us up during these times.

eli
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