Dear sufferer, I understand the challenges you face. I've learned that we can't change other people's minds, but we can change ourselves. It might be very hard to hear this, but in my experience as the daughter and sister of combat veterans with PTSD (and a sufferer of PTSD myself as the result of these relationships), plus having experienced my brother's veteran suicide from PTSD - I know that what we fight against, they reject - and what we support, they can often embrace. At this point you might consider changing your perspective, and your response to his decision. I wonder what would happen if you sat him down and explained that you understand his feelings, and that you accept them - and you want to do everything possible to make him happy, and to help your family go through this transition in a peaceful and supportive way. It seems that perhaps he may be focusing all of his anxiety on his inability to fulfill his role as a family man - and he may feel that if he leaves, his anxiety will disappear. We often misplace the cause of our anxiety and think that if we just remove this stressor, it will go away. Of course, that's often not the case. Might I suggest that if his anxiety about leaving is removed - and instead he finds a family who is dedicated to helping him achieve his goals, no matter what they are, even if it's about his leaving - he might feel the burden of his anxiety is removed. I'm nobody special to say this, but perhaps you can have a private discussion about this first with just you and him - and ask him to sit down together with the children and explain that in order to get well, he has to live somewhere else - but he still loves everyone and will still be daddy. Sometimes, by embracing the very thing you fear, and removing the huge stress and anxiety surrounding this subject, you might have something positive happen. You might have a husband who moves out, but a family that remains intact. Or, perhaps your husband will have a change of heart when the stress he's blaming on family, is lightened. Either way, embracing the deepest level of love you have within you, if nothing else, will help you heal yourself - because in the end, you are the one who will have to live with the outcome, regardless - and what a gift it can be in life to look back and know that you approached a frightening and painful situation with every ounce of your humanity, rather than fear. I wish you the best.
