OK, now that you are all under the impression that I’m some super-human caregiver who adores her husband through all, never getting angry or frustrated, I’m going to shatter that perfect image you have. Today, I am mad – not just hot under the collar but seething, breathing fire.

Yes, his bipolar mood swings are under control, but his Attention Deficit Disorder symptoms are alive and well, not as well as before this last med change but well enough that I’ve taken notice – and in his world, I’m the last person he hopes to take notice because I won’t turn a blind eye and let it go for long.

He was called back to the factory to work on Tuesday, and there’s always a bit of a bumpy transition for him when coming off a shut-down period to an in-production period. Usually, the trouble with transitioning comes out as a mood swing, but since he’s so stable right now, it’s been unusually quiet around here. Apparently too quiet.

As it always seems to go with him, the “good life” can’t go on for too long before he feels the need to change it up. It’s like he has two identities: one that desperately wants to live an ordinary, calm life; and the other that desperately wants adventure and everything novel and that seems to despise an easy, carefree life. (I guess you could say Depression is a third identity, but Mania is more just the second identity amped way up.) And only one identity can be functioning at any one time.

His stimulant does wonders for his cognitive functioning during the day, but at the edges – the early mornings and after about 8 p.m. – the effects fall off rapidly. And that’s when he’s been getting home lately.

As the lack of H in the acronym, ADD, implies, his type of deficit is predominantly inattention. The past couple days, he’s said some wildly inappropriate things for the situation, forgotten things as soon as I have said them, looked absolutely bewildered and alternately annoyed when I voice my impatience or upset, forgotten to keep the checking account register up to date when he writes a check, and spaced-off important activities with the kids such as giving one her medicine and leaving the baby, who has recently learned to roll over, on the edge of the bed.

And the final straw, this morning: Although he left for work 15 minutes early, he didn’t bother to clean up any of the mess he left in the kitchen. And this is no ordinary mess. To someone else, it would look that he’s deliberately trying to irritate me with kitchen mess; he’s like a tornado, using way more utensils and dishes than is necessary, never throwing anything away, spilling great chunks of sticky food and seemingly to spray crumbs all over the counters and the floor, and leaving every horizontal surface of the room covered in a great, overwhelming mess. And, when I bring up the subject of perhaps cleaning it up, he complains that it is indeed too overwhelming and asks, can’t I help out? After all, it is a household rule that generally everyone helps out with cleaning the house, because we all live here and it’s just the price you pay to live here.

But I find his kitchen messes to be pushing that household rule a little far; if you didn’t like to clean, and you would like help doing so, it seems to me to be most prudent to make sure you kept your mess at a minimum, as a courtesy to the other members of the household. Obviously, that’s not what my husband is thinking.

Leaving the rolling baby on the bed incited my anger, and his ADD response was something along the lines of “I’m sorry I didn’t do it to your specifications.” Grrr. If this attitude continues, cleaning up the kitchen is going to lead to an all-out fight. I’m stubborn…I cleared off the table and two of the three counters, I’ll even sweep the floor, but I will not be washing that mound of gross dishes with the unnecessary pieces of food cemented on or be taking out the overflowing mountain of trash. And we are going to have to address this recent increase in ADD symptoms at some point.

This guy thrives on structure, so it’s my belief that the trouble we’re having is mostly due to the change in structure. There was a time of transition when the factory shut down, because he was used to the super structure provided by the work day and not used to the big chunks of free time at home. And then he got used to being at home. Now, that he’s back to work, his focus has shifted to trying to get back into the work routine, and all else – such as the kitchen – has gone by the wayside. But he seems to be lacking some insight to his behaviors, which means it’s up to me to bring it up and that won’t likely be a pleasant, entirely rational discussion.

The good thing is, this is nothing new, there shouldn’t be any surprises or moments of stepping into the unknown, as we’ve been through this before.

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    Last reviewed: 8 Dec 2011