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Lexxy17
Contributor

My husband endured a few months of drug induced psychosis

Hi, I'm not sure if anyone can help me. My husband endured a few months of drug induced phychosis 12 months ago which ended with us having him hospitalised in a mental health facility. He was very paranoid and was seeing a lot of weird stuff. He was placed on an involuntary treatment order but refused to believe there was anything wrong with him. We have been happily married for 25 yrs and some of the thinks he thinks I have done just breaks my heart. We moved away from the town and from all of my friends.
He refused to take the medication because of the bed wetting and nightmares but now I am really worried as it has been 12 months but he still believes all the things he seen really happened. We live in a very isolated area and while I don't believe he would ever hurt me he is starting to have more episodes where he becomes very angry. I think he may have other issues maybe bipolar but if I even suggest seeing a doctor he loses it. I don't want to have him placed on another involuntary treatment order as this is one thing he resents me doing and always throws in my face. I know he needs help but how can I get him to understand this.
Cheers

33 REPLIES 33

Re: My husband endured a few months of drug induced psychosis

Hi @Lexxy17

Welcome to the Forums, although I wish it was under better circumstances.

I have moved your post to create a new discussion, so you get responses specifically to your questions.

I also wanted to let you know that tomorrow night we are hosting a Topic Tuesday session from 7pm AEST about caring for men who won't seek help.

You can find it here

Again, welcome to the forums. I'm glad you found us.

Nik

Re: My husband endured a few months of drug induced psychosis

Thanks Nik
I have never used a forum before but I am at my wits end.

Re: My husband endured a few months of drug induced psychosis

Hi @Lexxy17 and welcome to the forums.

I have a husband with a hidden eating disorder. Although it wasn't drug induced and he hasn't suffered psychosis, we have had episodes of delusional thinking, and he switches in and out of being emotionally abusive. He underwent a personality change 8 years ago when this form of eating disorder, I believe is a complex form of anorexia, set in following a dramatic and rapid weight loss of 79kg ..... at which point the dr told him to put 5kg back on.

Since then a punishing and rigid regimen of diet and exercise has ruled all our lives, and he became controlling to the point of micromanagement ..... but part of that control includes "endowing" us with lavish generosity. ....

It's really messed up, but presented to the outside world as an immensely successful life change, and I looked like an unappreciative wife, jealous of his "successful" life change and "amazing results". Now done cracks are starting to show ..... 8 years later :face_with_rolling_eyes:😱😡 !!! .... with our youngest son taken into the care of a psychiatrist with social anxiety and a collapse of his self-confidence.

The pdoc, rapidly and unexpectedly, diagnosed my hubby with ocpd ..... so now we have the "driver" of the eating disorder exposed, but not yet the eating disorder itself. In our state privacy laws prevent me from speaking with most doctors without my husband present, and mine, as with yours, is suffering what is medically termed as Anosognosia ..... a complete lack of insight into being unwell.

Looking up ocpd, one part of the description really stood out. It is often only the breakdown of their marriage and their spouse leaving that will send them to seeking treatment. My hubby still uses anger to try to control us, althoughbejng shocked by this diagnosis, he is trying really hard to control his need to control .... nonetheless, that sort of temper is sonethkng to take seriously. To leave, I will need to have a very strong exit plan that puts us all out of his reach before he even knows we have left, which takes an awful lot of forward planning - my hubby's control extends to cameras, phone and vehicle tracking, and restricted access to finances.

Think about it carefully, and I recommend you seek counselling, but I'm thinking that things are not going to be able to change for you without a similar decisive action - having him committed - which I can't do with my hubby but you can - and taking the action to leave him at the same time, laying the ultimatum that without a commitment to ongoing treatment, and a breaching of his lack of awareness, you will not return.

Had I known that my hubby has ocpd -- and the pdoc diagnosed that it is familial for him (his other family members are clearly like that, but it has now been triggered in my WH , Wayward Husband) - I think so would have left, or more likely, would be leaving now. I had to get my youngest through High School first, and other major family events. We passed all those milestones last year.

With this part-diagnosis in place, I am hanging around at the moment to see whether the eating disorder is discovered, but WH's lack of awareness makes this very tricky to approach. We have been recommended for family counselling, but I have been advised by support people that this is psychologically (and perhaps physically) dangerous for all of us .... so at the moment I am at a loss as to how to proceed with that. I may have to turn up to those counselling sessions but refuse to speak, and see what they do with me after that .... hopefully 1:1 counselling where I can speak up, or I may be able to direct them to the psychologist I have been seeing for 2 years, and the eating disorders counsellor I found this year.

You can see how fraught with difficulty it all is, but I am so glad you have found us here, and there will be a way forward for you too.

💜🌷
F&H

Re: My husband endured a few months of drug induced psychosis

Hi @faithandhope
It is great to finally be able to talk about this to someone. My husband was put onto medication for the psychosis but took himself off it as it was causing terrible side effects. Which I am still not sure was from the medication or from the drug withdrawals. Even though he has been clean for 9 months the anger episodes seem to be getting more frequent. And he keeps mentioning about these other life forms such as aliens and ghosts out there. Once upon a time he would laugh at me if I mentioned anything like that.
Please don't get me wrong I don't want to leave him as I love home with all my heart. We were childhood sweethearts and still are soulmates but I somehow feel responsible because I didn't make him keep taking the medication. I thought that if we moved away and started a fresh life that I could fix him. I now know that I was naive to think that.
Even if I threaten to leave to try to scare him into seeking help he thinks that this is all part of the plan and I can then go and rejoin my circus friends in my secret sexual world where everybody is involved, even our daughter and the mental health nurse who was helping us out( this is what he sees in his mind anyway) some of it is so bizarre you could make a movie about it.
But the only other person who know that he isn't better is our daughter and I don't like to burden her because she has a three year old and another one due in November. My husband tells me every week that our three year old is the only thing keeping him alive. If it wasn't for her he would have ended it long ago.
That is unless I just tell him the truth about all this crazy stuff he thinks I have done. I have never even been unfaithful once in 30 yrs. It is so frustrating we just go round and round the same circle all the time.
He explodes and causes me, threatening to take his life if I don't tell him the truth. Then after a day or so he is so loving but never apologises for the anger.
I reassure him that I love Gina no things can get better if he just gets help then he whispers to me - things will get better if you just tell me the truth. I tell you I feel like such a heartless person sometimes because I can't even cry anymore I have no tears left and I just seem to get angry and one day I am scared I will push him too far.
Cheers for the ears ❤️

Re: My husband endured a few months of drug induced psychosis

Hi Lexxy17

I have been recommended a book by Xavier Amador "I am Not Sick, I Do Not Need Help"
His focus is how to get a patient to accept help when they cannot see or accept they have a mental health problem.

I have not read the book but have watched his lectures on YouTube and others might find his approach helpful.

Part 1:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lstn6WNnCRc

Part 2:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=VxiBgq5G-cI

This is a coping method that the Qld mental health resources for carers website suggests.

http://mhr4c.com.au/coping-strategies/the-leap-approach/


Here is a short 15 min talk gives 4 good strategies to help when MI enters family and how to communicate symptoms.

https://youtu.be/NRO0-JXuFMY

Re: My husband endured a few months of drug induced psychosis

@Lexxy17 - did not tag you properly in the previous message.

It is important to make note of side effects.
If there is a need, it is good to know that there are many antipsychotics and each has a different side effect profile, tolerability is a key factor in getting a patient to remain on medication and the docs are happy to help with this.

This information is readily available on the internet.

Re: My husband endured a few months of drug induced psychosis

Thanks Darcy I will look at all of the references you suggest. Yes I think if the medication hadn't caused bed wetting and bad nightmares it may have been easier to keep him on them. He already was feeling degraded by some of the things he had done during psychosis and bed wetting wasn't helping. Then he started to think that I was drugging him with them so that I could sneak out at night and take part in these wierd orgies. He even thought the police were part of it. They were watching him so they could let me know when it was safe for me to sneak off. I tell you what it's lucky I have a sense of humour or I would be the one being hospitalised now lol

Re: My husband endured a few months of drug induced psychosis

I love my husband too @Lexxy17 and don't want to leave him, and we have been married a long time from a young age too, but your and your daughter's physical and psychological safety need to be your highest
priority here. If they are compromised, you need to leave and / or seek help.

This situation will not get better on its own.

We are here to listen and support you any time, and although we may make suggestions, we are mindful that the choices are your own to make ......

💜

Re: My husband endured a few months of drug induced psychosis

Yes at the moment @ faith-and-hope he promises he would never hurt me but I know he is not himself during these episodes. I guess you have told me what I really wanted to hear-
Things will not get better on their own
So now I have to work on a strategy to get him to want to get help.
Thank you sooooo much I feel better all ready knowing that I am heading in the right direction. I need to arm myself with as much knowledge as I can on the subject. I am looking forward to tonight's group topic, that's if I can sneak on without him knowing.
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