Friends, Family & Carers Forum

[Nicacado]

Hi everyone.

I just joined the forum and hoping to hear from anyone with similar experiences. My wife of over 10 years who I have 2 beautiful children with has been on downward spiral of anxiety and over the last few years and has turned to alcohol as a coping mechanism. We struggled to get her professional help but managed to make some progress last year when she checked into a rehab clinic, and started seeing a psychiatrist and a psychologist on a regular basis.

For a while things started looking better but she's slowly cut off the ties to those support services and seems to be struggling worse than ever. The challenge at the moment is that she doesn't want to re-engage with the process again because it "didn't work" before, and yet she's desperate for help and is quite debilitated at the moment. She's also managed to alienate herself from her family and friends, pretty much just leaving me as her support network. Having been down the path of getting help once before by starting with the GP, I'm a bit stumped about other places to reach out to, or how to convince her to give those professionals another try.

Would love to hear if anyone else has any experience getting someone to re-engage with mental health professionals when they feel they've tried but the system doesn't work for them.

[amber22]

Hey there @Nicacado 

Thank you so much for sharing what you and your wife are going through at the moment, it does sound really tough and I really hope she is okay. It can be really disheartening when the people we love and care for don't feel like the health care system has helped them in anyway. 

Does your wife have any informal supports (like family, friends, helplines etc) that she might feel more comfortable connecting with at all? Does she have any techniques or activities or things that she can engage with that help calm her down or give her a little bit of relief at all? If not, I would really encourage you to come up with a list together of things that might help (even really teeny tiny things) so that you can start integrating more of them into her everyday basis. 

I also think that it is important that you remember to take care of yourself, because caring for someone else with complex mental health can definitely take a toll on you. You're never alone. 

Sitting with you,

Amber22

[Nicacado]

Hi @amber22 ,

Unfortunately she's managed to isolate herself from family and friends. It's a good point about the activities that she enjoys though. She's super creative and loves drawing / creating. I'll sit down with her and try that approach. Thanks for the reply!

[tyme]

Hey @Nicacado ,

I'm sorry to hear how hard it is. 

One thing I found helpful for people to hear is that having treatment with one person is having treatment with ONE person. There are so many professionals out there. 

Just like when people call a crisis line. They may say, "it didn't help", but that doesn't mean we can generalise it to be the entire service. It's likely that the next 10 times you call will be a different person. 

It's good to focus on her protective factors. What are things that keep her going? Her children? Her love for creativity?

Empowering her and sharing hope is one of the greatest helps anyone can receive.

At the same time, I hope you have supports for yourself and your children.

Please take care.