<\/span><\/h2>\nI was no happier after I took anti-depressants for several months, and there was no improvement in our connection as a couple from that short-lived detour.<\/p>\n
We both stopped taking the medication, as it was rather expensive and didn\u2019t seem to be helping anything.<\/p>\n
But I clung to our diagnoses in my mind for a while, since we\u2019d already paid for those.<\/p>\n
I continued to focus on my husband\u2019s deficit and disorder during that dark time\u2026and I experienced him as lacking, and not very capable. Marriage was hard and lonely.<\/p>\n
That was a completely different experience from the way I felt about the quirky, wonderful guy I married. I felt lucky and excited to be with him back then.<\/p>\n
Of course, he was the same guy.<\/p>\n
I had been focused on how funny and smart and handsome he is back then. And that\u2019s how I experienced him.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s also how I experience him now.<\/p>\n
Our diagnoses also seem completely irrelevant now.<\/p>\n
So what changed?<\/p>\n
3. I was Focused on the Wrong Person<\/span><\/p>\nIt turns out we weren\u2019t defective\u2014just untrained.<\/p>\n
I was busy focusing on my husband and his problems, when the only person I can change is myself. Once I started to do that, the very problems we were trying to treat\u2014the conflict and disconnection in our marriage\u2014went away.<\/p>\n
Once I learned some skills that helped me refocus my view of John and restore respect and nurture intimacy, I saw a perspective that had eluded me. I was shocked to see how much of our problems were my contribution\u2014not his.<\/p>\n
If I had never discovered the Intimacy Skills, I might have gone on thinking that John had a disorder called ADD\u2026<\/p>\n
\u2026when the real problem was his fearful, controlling wife Laura.<\/p>\n
Looking back, it makes sense\u2014of course I was depressed: I didn\u2019t know how to express my feelings or desires. I didn\u2019t even know what they were. I didn\u2019t know how to be respectful instead of having a meltdown.<\/p>\n
Naturally my husband\u2019s confidence and capabilities were shaken by his wife\u2019s constant undermining and fault-finding.<\/p>\n
Now that I\u2019ve worked with thousands of women who were in similar counseling situations with similar diagnoses, that seems like a pretty natural consequence.<\/p>\n
When you focus on someone else, even if they have a serious mental condition, you lose your power to make things better.<\/p>\n
Even if there had been some kind of miracle diagnosis and medicine that made him into the best husband ever (like he is now), it wouldn\u2019t have helped save our marriage.<\/p>\n
I was in the habit of being miserable and complaining.<\/p>\n
I focused on things outside of me (his diagnosis, for example) instead of focusing on my own self.<\/p>\n
And because of those terrible habits, I rarely felt happy.<\/p>\n
That was what was really wrong.<\/p>\n
I needed training and skills on how to be happy, dignified, and respectful, and on how to honor my desires. I eventually got it from women who were happily married even though their husbands had at least the usual number of idiosyncrasies.<\/p>\n