[osb]

Fwiw I have a (very newbie) perspective on this as a doc (though not psych); my mixed-up MLC H is a physician too. And since this broke, god knows I've seen my share of docs...

Two days after BD - I was working in the ICU, palpitating madly through rounds and generally a sub-clinical basket case (fine timing, H!!) - so called the local docs-at-risk line. First psych I spoke with described MLC as "childhood chickens coming home to roost". But really he attributed the problem to full-blown, life-long narcissism on H's part, sent me off to read about personality disorders, and had me half convinced that I was a complete idiot and doormat for not seeing this 20 years ago. ...Eventually I found another psych. Current doc equates MLC to a mental health crisis, for which depression may be the root cause (and in which narcissism and passive-aggression may appear, but are not previous hallmarks of the MLCer's character). I can live with this definition! The MLCer's behaviours and coping mechanisms are similar to those of an alcoholic; and therefore she recommended the same coping mechs for me as she would for someone living with an alcoholic.

My H is from a dysfunctional, highly judgemental family. He was non-confrontational and therefore avoidant. Surely a number of Ericksonian stages had been left unresolved. But perhaps that laid the grounds for poor coping mechs. I've read about FOO issues from many of your stories, seems to be a theme.

I do think my H's precipitating problem was dysthymia, maybe depression - disturbed sleep, anger, anhedonia, lot of the psychomotor signs. He tried to self-medicate by "chasing the dragon" - more and more risky activity, hunting for endorphins to provide that happy feeling, drown out the emptiness. For the past year, he's been cycling with greater frequency, and if the fix didn't work (no "high", body didn't let him summit the mountain, etc), crashed into rage. Being a doc and therefore pig-headed (!), he refused to consider this might be a mental health issue. Then the crisis....

So generalizing sadly from my little experience, I wonder if many of the risk-taking behaviours in MLC fall into the self-medication category (including OM/OW in this). Brain serotonin deficiency, though critical, seems too global a word; individual neurons may have deficient transmitters, but it's the connections and how they're managed that are important, not just the act of neurotransmission. Too fine a process to turn up on any scan. Antidepressants are like using a mallet to turn a screw (they work sort of, but...). I don't know that there's a good scientific (or pharmacological) handle on this. As usual, the best answers come from psychology, not psychiatry.

[toughtimes]

So dramatically low serotonin is the reason for the depression in the crisis? Is this the covert and the overt phase of the crisis? Would the infatuation hormones create surges of energy that "distract the brain" from the lower serotonin?
I am taking ssri, still not sleeping well though which is so frustrating because when I get a good sleep my mood feels 100 times better. I have often thought that my Post Natal Depression reminds a little of the way my H is possibly feeling. I blamed my R on why I felt so low, and saw my Hs faults over and above anything else. It's so sad that as my PND lifted his MLC kicked in like no tomorrow and he left! Would the low serotonin in pnd account for the accessing of negative memories more easily than positive ones? Well having said that for the two years after I had my D2 I felt low and was treated for pnd but my H was starting his MLC and treating me appallingly, staying out 3 or 4 nights a week, BD when D six months old, telling me he had nothing to come back to etc...... So it's hardly surprising I was seeing my Hs faults above everything else!
Such a confusing time 

[underpressure]

I want to weigh in on this too, TT, that my H put on weight as I did over the pregnancy, and sort of had the same cycle as I did while pregnant and after pregnancy...My mood dictated his. And I hardly noticed. There is something to it I am sure.

[NewAttitude]

How much does low T or in a woman the fluctuating hormonal changes make to MLC or depression? 

Maybe my theory is wrong but perhaps the stress of raising kids or bringing home the dough and not really having fun anymore causes people to just lose interest in what they have in their marriage and their family.   They just want to start with a clean slate.  (What do you all think?) 

Maybe emotionally and psychologically, we are not wired to have longtime committed relationships?

I'm just throwing out these ideas because I am not really grasping this MLC yet--whether it is happening in my family or not.  I just don't understand some of the Erickson or Jungian theory yet.  (I am reading the info as fast as I can but I am just not sure and it makes me dwell.) 

[Anjae]

Thanks for your input, OSB.

Current doc equates MLC to a mental health crisis, for which depression may be the root cause (and in which narcissism and passive-aggression may appear, but are not previous hallmarks of the MLCer's character). I can live with this definition! The MLCer's behaviours and coping mechanisms are similar to those of an alcoholic; and therefore she recommended the same coping mechs for me as she would for someone living with an alcoholic.

Think this make sense and fits into what we observe in our MLCers. Wich are the mechanisms for someone living with and alcoholic?

I do think my H's precipitating problem was dysthymia, maybe depression - disturbed sleep, anger, anhedonia, lot of the psychomotor signs. He tried to self-medicate by "chasing the dragon" - more and more risky activity, hunting for endorphins to provide that happy feeling, drown out the emptiness.

This is what it seems to happen with many of the MLCers.

So generalizing sadly from my little experience, I wonder if many of the risk-taking behaviours in MLC fall into the self-medication category (including OM/OW in this). Brain serotonin deficiency, though critical, seems too global a word; individual neurons may have deficient transmitters, but it's the connections and how they're managed that are important, not just the act of neurotransmission.

Would say so, many of the risk-taking behaviours in MLC are self-medication. And they always end up falling. But wouldn’t the connections and how they are managed been messed up with the imbalanced levels plus the hunt for endorphins, and the rest of the lot? Any idea why some MLCers can last many years in Replay? It is exhausting yet, there they remain…


Hi, New Attitude

How much does low T or in a woman the fluctuating hormonal changes make to MLC or depression? 

They may play a part but I don’t think they are the only factor. Other may have a different view.

Maybe my theory is wrong but perhaps the stress of raising kids or bringing home the dough and not really having fun anymore causes people to just lose interest in what they have in their marriage and their family.   They just want to start with a clean slate.  (What do you all think?) 

No, your theory is not wrong. They feel stressed and burden by their obligations. Even the one without kids and have a life with more than enough fun. Single people also have MLC and for those I think it is feeling tied to a job, a lifestyle they think tied them down. Problem is, once they are in crisis they attached themselves to a lot of new things and still have all the old issues to solve. Their freedom is an illusion.

Maybe emotionally and psychologically, we are not wired to have longtime committed relationships?

I think we are wired to longtime committed relationships. In pre-history that was what allow us to survive. If in those times we keept jumping from person to person there would had not be any humans left. It is true humsn lived far less than now in pre-historic times. Even a few decades ago life spam expectancy was much lower.

I just don't understand some of the Erickson or Jungian theory yet.  (I am reading the info as fast as I can but I am just not sure and it makes me dwell.)

The theories are complex. They are a guideline but we don’t have to understand them at once. We don’t even have to understand the whole theories themselves, if we managed to get the basic we get what is going on in a MLC. I find Erickson far too complicated and can’t get it that well. Jung is simpler. At least for me. 

[toughtimes]

How much does low T or in a woman the fluctuating hormonal changes make to MLC or depression?

From my experience hormonal changes have a huge impact on depression. But having said that latest research says it's low serotonin which I seem to suffer with too. I do know my own body though and feel that hormones have played a huge part in the depressive symptoms I have experienced. I just need to do more research.

Low T in my MLCer doesn't seem to be the thing. I don't know much about it but I know that he is having the time of his life in the bedroom department with his new 25 yr. old ow, and I think low T would have the opposite effect. Some of you may know more than me, I think I read that somewhere???

He is very stressed with work and I would have thought that would have an impact on his MLC and his neurological balance. Over the past two years he has become more and more obsessed with his business, less and less available for us in the family and consequently our R was like a battle ground sometimes with me trying to say I missed him and that we needed him at home and him saying I was a nag and that he didn't have anything to come home to. He has been saying he's changing and becoming the man he always should have been but that person wasn't someone he liked because it was taking him away from his kids. So, STRESS with work and confusion about who they are and what they believe in must have a huge on brain balance chemically or does the chemical imbalance come first?

I need to know more and read more.

[calamity]

TT

I don't know much about it but I know that he is having the time of his life in the bedroom department with his new 25 yr. old ow

HA!!!!  They lie about everything...

[xyzcf]

TT..my husband has always been devoted to work but it became worse as work took over his whole life. He never shuts it off, doesn't take much vacation time and travels on weekends to get to the next meeting. He's 58 and has done amazingly well in his career but it is never enough.

There is no balance in his life...as far as I can see he has no outside interests or friends other than work people.

There was nothing I could do about it and if I dared to ask for some time and attention...well, I do think that one of the reasons for BD was I didn't want to prolong our assignment in Asia and he was loving it..so I had to go...but he didn't get to stay there either...was sent to South America.....I worry about his health but I guess that it is only through his work that somehow his ego gets stroked enough to enable him to feel good about himself...yet what I see is that he has not felt good about himself for a very long time.

[toughtimes]

t I guess that it is only through his work that somehow his ego gets stroked enough to enable him to feel good about himself...yet what I see is that he has not felt good about himself for a very long time.


Yes this is my feelings about my H. He became pumped up with self confidence more and more from the conception of his business. He complained relentlessly that I didn't support him, I wasn't like other wives who support their H, that I never took any interest in his work and generally how awful I was. His ow was stroking his ego and boosting his self confidence as I was being told I was horrid and unsupportive. I knackered looking after two kids, working a job I don't like and suspecting my H was having an affair ..... I can see how she looks the more attractive force!

[calamity]

Lecture:  TT everything he has said to you was out of guilt & rationalization.  He was already with ow or depressed & looking for a scapegoat--you were it.  Listen to none of what they say & 50% of what they do.