I’d really appreciate any advice or perspectives from lived experience navigating relationship conflict in the midst of grief. I’m struggling to figure out whether it is worth sticking it out, or whether grief has highlighted pre-existing problems that are unlikely to be resolved. This is a bit of a long read to provide context but I would really appreciate it anyone who sticks it out, because I am feeling so so lost.
My partner and I have been together for almost 3 years, we are in our mid-late twenties. Around 4 months ago he lost his father very suddenly to suicide.
For context, I have complex post-traumatic stress disorder, from a very complicated childhood family situation. I have been estranged from both my parents since junior school, and dealt with ongoing emotional abuse and neglect from the grandparent who raised me my whole life. Throughout our relationship I have been coming to terms with a lot of this — certain aspects of the relationship have been triggering but in a positive way I guess. Being in a comparatively supportive relationship has intensified certain pains and made me realise the ambiguous grief and feelings of loneliness I carry. But I’ve consistently been in counselling and finally have a decent psychologist who has helped a lot. Over the course of our relationship I can definitively say that I have grown immensely, and I’m now in a position to be advancing my career and moving to a more stable stage of life.
In contrast, my partner, even prior to his father’s death, has had increasing lack of motivation and periods of depression, and has generally felt stuck in life. It has become increasingly clear that my partner also has CPTSD and has been raised by emotionally harmful parents. My partner has come to acknowledge this.
There is a lot that has been good about our relationship — I consider him my best friend, we have an insane amount in common and I’ve enjoyed sharing these interests, and he can make me laugh like no one else can. But we also have had our fair share of conflict, usually stemming from miscommunication or clashes caused by us both being neurodivergent. Before his father’s passing, I would generally say that we were quite good at repairing — because of our family backgrounds we both have a compulsion to talk things out and make things right, we can’t let stuff sit weirdly. We have been decent at recognising how we have each contributed to conflict and apologised.
But, the way things have played out since his father’s passing has made me reflect on our relationship overall and see things in a different light, noticing pre-existing patterns that have been amplified by the stress of it all.
Since the day it happened, I have been as proactive as humanely possible in researching how to best support my partner, to understand what grief can look like for suicide bereavement specifically, to understand how it can impact relationships. I have prioritised just being there for him as much as I can, listening without judgement, holding space for any emotions, not putting a timeline on anything. I have tried to take as much load off as I can at home with domestic tasks. Unfortunately, this has all coincided with one of the most intense periods of my own life finishing up the final semester of my social work degree. A month after his father’s passing I had to go on placement for 6 weeks and have been drowning in assignments ever since. But I’ve tried as much as possible to do every thing I can within my capacity, and have been seeing my psychologist weekly to take care of myself.
My partner has been coping better than I expected to be honest, but is definitely quite depressed. He is still managing to go to work and to complete some basic tasks around the house, but spends most of his time otherwise playing video games to try and cope.
I have tried my best to just rely on my therapist and contain my emotions around my partner, not wanting to overload him when he already has no capacity. But I’m struggling with the loss of his presence and support (as imperfect as it used to be) more and more. There have been a few instances where I’ve cracked under the pressure and become upset around him, mostly just needing to cry a bit to get it out of my system, and move on. But this has resulted in some really ugly arguments, with him angry at me for being upset and essentially telling me a psychologist isn’t enough I need to see a psychiatrist and take a xanax because it’s too much for him.
And we’ve had some really awful other conflicts as well. He has blown small miscommunications completely out of proportion and it’s ended up with him lashing out with personal attacks against me.
I’m no saint, and can also lose my temper in frustration, but I have never attacked him personally in the way he was to me, never spoken with such ugliness. I understand that grief can cause increased irritability, frustration and misdirected anger. We’ve talked it out and I’ve expressed that while I understand this, there have been some comments that have really hurt me. In these conversations, I tried many times to encourage him to go to grief counselling (I had already found and spoken to a service that offers it for free). But he was incredibly resistant.
Finally, after I expressed some of the concerns I’ve outlined here (from a place of, I need to be honest that I am finding aspects of our relationship difficult, and I’m worried about how sustainable it is, and really think you would benefit from some additional support because I don’t know how else to help) he ultimately agreed to accept help to book some appointments. But first he got very upset, taking my words in bad faith and feeling that I was being impatient and asking him to magically better, when I was just asking that we take any tiny steps we can to help him and us.
I thought I would feel better once they were booked, but I’m still feeling stuck, combing over the patterns of our relationship. Before his dad’s death he said he was going to get help for his mental health problems so many times but would never do it. And when I think back on the conflicts we have had, so many of them seem to stem from him being overwhelmed by my emotions, or CPTSD episodes. Yet he never shows any interest in learning more about what is going on, or how he could help. Anytime I’ve tried to make suggestions, on the advice of my therapist, he seems to be off-put by the ‘therapy speak’ of it all. When I’ve had things happen that have triggered intense periods of grief and emotion with my own family stuff, he has really struggled to be empathetic, has been impatient and dismissive and struggled to just be there and hold me.
So, part of me feels the right thing to do is stick it out and see if maybe ADHD medication and therapy helps him with emotional regulation, reducing the nastiness in conflict and maybe facilitating more empathy.
But the other part of me feels like throughout the relationship I have been doing all of the work, on myself, and in conversation with him, to try and grow and make things healthier. I’m afraid that I’ve tolerated treatment during my tenderest moments that is much closer to the emotional neglect of my childhood than I’d like to admit. But I’m also aware that my view is coloured by how hard things are right now. I feel alone in the relationship and empty in my life. But maybe once I have finished my degree that could shift.
My therapist agrees that something needs to change and the way he has treated me in conflict is not ok. In theory, him getting treatment is that change. But I still feel so torn. Any insight you can offer would be so greatly appreciated, thank you.
