Originally Posted by
wildrosejmj 
Thanks for your thoughts, Teatree. Yes, he does have a counselor, who I thought I had a good relationship with up until Jan., when she turned on me and told me that this was all his response to me "treating him like a child" and, "beating him down all these years."
I hate the term "beating someone down," but if you're like me, you have totally been treating him like a child. Partly because he ACTS like a child, and partly because that's just what we co-dependents do. However, even if we ARE treating our qualifiers like children, their reactions to that are theirs alone, and trying to pass the buck on to someone else isn't doing your AH any favors.
Originally Posted by
wildrosejmj He's never struck me as depressed, just increasingly not caring about anything or about what other people think. He has a good appetite when I give him his food, he just won't bother to get something if I don't hand it do him - or if he does it's just peanut butter bread or cereal.
These actually are signs of depression, in my opinion. Sometimes society associates "depression" with someone who can't even get out of bed or function, who is constantly crying, etc. But a doctor once described moderate depression to me as "the joy of life is just missing." He eats if you give him food, but he does not have the emotional fortitude to do any of that stuff for himself. However...the unfortunate reality is that even if he IS depressed (or has any other illness that can sometimes be misdiagnosed as depression), and a properly qualified medical professional diagnosed him as such and recommended anti-depressants (or other medications), there is nothing anybody can do to force him to take them or take an active role in reporting what is or isn't working for him, or force him to approach therapy in a way that is designed to work on the issues that may be contributing to the depression.
