Bipolar Disorder Community

You are in a very hard place. Someone has to want to get help in order to be helped. My husband is bi-polar. He used to drink a lot but he was mostly depressed all the time, with occasional hypo manic episodes. We have had a long difficult struggle with him trying to find the right medication and stablize.
Only you can decide if living with someone who is unwilling to get treatment for an illness they have is something that is damaging for either you or your kids. I can tell you just want him to get the help he needs so you can be a family again. Below I have listed a few places to go. Not sure they will be much of a help.
For help try www.nami.or or www.mentalhealthamerica.net
It is going to take a psychiatrist to find out what his issues are. The symptoms you describe fit both bipolar and Borderline personality disorder.
What you need to do is decide what is your rock bottom in the relationship. Hopefully, that rockbottom won't be abuse towards you or your kids. But you need to have a firm plan in the back of your mind on how to get out if you hit that rock bottom.
I had to tell my husband our marriage was over for him to stop drinking and get help. He still had a couple drinking relapses and only stopped for good when he realized his drinking was messing with his meds and making him feel worse.
It still has not been an easy road. My "rockbottom" was if he was ever abusive towards us and he wasn't. but my finances are destroy and my life is very hard because I didn't say or do something sooner.

Thank you. Yes I am in a very hard place and I really do love him and I hope we can work on things. I don't want him to think that I am just making excuses about what is wrong with him, because that is not at all what I am trying to do. I want to save our relationship before I get to the point where I can't handle it again. I have had people tell me in the past that they thought he had bipolar and when I finally looked it up, he has almost all of the symptoms of it. I don't think he would hurt our kids but his drinking is getting a lot worse. He does like to spend money like crazy too and not even think about it. One minute he will be the sweetest person to me and talk to me and the next he will be saying the opposite of what we talked about and getting mad about it. It can be so confusing and it hurts so bad sometimes. I know that he has been diagnosed with ADD in the past which i am sure doesn't help his situation. He travels a lot with his work so I don't see him a whole lot now, but he is still mad at me all the time lately and accusing me of cheating when I am with our kids 24/7. It can be very difficult and frustrating and I just don't know how to talk to him about it without him getting mad and thinking I am just saying that he has mental problems. It really depends on the mood he is in at the time which can be hard to tell at times. Thank you so much for your response and your support. It is nice to hear from people that have or are going through what I am going through now and have been for 8 years.

first things first. the alcohol needs to be gone before he can be diagnosed with anything. an alcoholic's behavior and mood swings can seem like bp.

but it has been like this way before the alcohol even started. The alcohol just makes it worse. I have been with him for 8 years and he has not always drank.