Vows

We stood together on our wedding day, as any couple does, looking each other in the eyes as we recited our vows.

"In sickness and in health."

I didn't say those words exactly, but I said similar words. I was vowing to be my husband's partner through healthy days and ill days.

There are some days, still, when I am plagued by the guilt of not standing by that vow, by those words, by my promise to be with him through everything.

I know this is a feeling shared by many who have tried, but not succeeded, to maintain a relationship with someone who struggles with mental illness.

We constantly wonder if we could have done more. We constantly wonder if it was OUR problem, if it was something wrong with US, this inability to constantly put up with the slings and arrows of an unstable mind. 

Could I have done more?

I tried. I tried so fucking hard.

If I had known the full picture on my wedding day, my vows would have been much different. They would not have been lofty promises to make my husband laugh every day or to hold his hand when we were old and wrinkly.

If I had known everything I know now, all the knowledge I accumulated over 10 years, my words would have been much different.

I have a new vow I say in my head.

"Chris, I stand here before you on this day, surrounded by all of our friends and family, unsure of this promise I am making. Because I know you struggle with deep depression, I know your depression manifests itself as alcoholism, as gambling, as throwing objects and slamming doors, as insomnia, as agoraphobia, as a distance and a worry that will be felt every day of my life. 

Chris, I know I will ask you to get help, and you will refuse to. I know I will beg you to stop drinking, and you will refuse to. I know I will cry to you about our bills, about our inability to afford the new truck you will buy on a whim, and it won't matter. I know you will run away from me when you don't want to talk, or don't want to deal, or don't want to do what is being asked of you. I know our life together will be a life led by your mental illness, by your impulsivity, by your inability to cope. I know our life together will be a life built around the darkness that plagues you, and that I will always be worried and anxious about what comes next.

Chris, I stand here before you knowing that you have tried to commit suicide at least three times before, and that the chances of that happening again are acute. I know there is a good chance that if things do not go well, you will not be able to accept things the way a person normally accepts things, and you will try to kill yourself again, and that will leave me alone, a single parent, responsible for all aspects of our children's lives, and that scares the shit out of me. I don't think I can do that to myself, to them.

Chris, I just want love. I just want safety. I just want stability. I just want to care about someone who will care about me. I just want love without constant worry. I want love without a constant need to protect myself from that same love. I don't think I can love the way you will need me to love, if I can stop myself from internalizing your hurt and pain as my own hurt and pain. I don't know if I have enough armor to survive this love. And while I understand you need love and safety and care, I am human. I also need those things.

I don't know if I can do this, Chris. I don't know if I can be a lifelong partner to a person who is mentally ill, who will not get help, whose mental illness will color every aspect of our shared life, of my life. I think perhaps this is asking too much of me, and I don't know if I can vow to be your wife."