Wow is this /r/relationships? This is more of a projection than any real advice.

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14420623 and marked it off-topic.

I'm a founder with many challenges - emotional and money - and my wife is my important partner in the mix. This isn't a job, it's a life decision that you both make together. This advice is horrible.

"Maintaining appearances is important" - to you wife? My life might be different than yours - to me my wife isn't someone I "maintain appearances" with. She is my friend, my support, my counsel.

I couldn't be a founder through the adversarial parts of the things outside and inside myself without her being there.

You're describing an enabler. We're talking about his wife.

Most co-dependency relationships are those in your immediate family.

source: had a father who was an alcoholic and had to learn this myself.

No where in this post did it imply that his wife has this behavior. HN nerds have a really bad habit of conflating and projecting. I'm sorry about your father, but you can't infer that about his wife from the given information; the severity of that implication is why your experience is as extraordinary and makes it difficult to buy that his wife is the problem.

Imagine if we were advising him to remain silent about this to his close business associates. Would we advise an engineer having a rough go of it to not talk to their manager? Would you advise a student to not talk to a parent if they were having a really hard time at school? What benefit would remaining unproductively silent about these problems other than choking on your own poison?

>HN nerds have a really bad habit of conflating and projecting

Go read up on personality disorder clusters. No reason to paint with such broad strokes when you have wikipedia a click away.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personality_disorder#Personali...

In addition to what other people are saying, a marital relationship typically starts between adults. We all have a back story and everyone has some kind of baggage, but a marriage is fundamentally different from a parent-child relationship in terms of power dynamics. An abused child has zero real alternative but to cope as best they can with what the parent is doing to them. Marriage is a bit more complicated than that.

As gently as possible, I want to let you know that not all relationships are like the one you so unfortunately experienced with your father.

You are exactly correct. I am describing an enabler, and that is exactly what your loved ones will turn into if you tell them you are depressed.

When your SO asks you for help, you give it to them. Unfortunately that is the opposite of what a depressed person needs.

Depressed people need to make changes to their lives. You can't do that when you have someone being your crutch.

And I just want to be clear because some people in this thread seem to be misunderstanding, this is nothing to do with being female or male. I would give the same advice to to a woman as to man.

> Depressed people need to make changes to their lives. You can't do that when you have someone being your crutch.

You also can't do that without a great support network. That piece is critical in the path to recovery, and you should not so arbitrarily dismiss the possibility that to many people, family (spouse, parents, even children) is that support network.

For many people their spouses are their best friend. I don't support your advice. Transparency while trying not to overburden your partner is essential imo.

Wow. I am really sorry for you. You and I live in very different worlds, and have very different relationships with our wives.

Just... Yeah, I'm really sorry to hear that.

Interesting angle. I can't imagine not telling my wife (or her not already knowing), but at the same time I know she would proactively work with me on solutions rather than just provide comforts and doses of sympathy.

I guess it depends on the type of personality and the strengths of each person.

> Do not talk to your wife.

That's pretty much never good advice; you should always talk to your wife, that's what a relationship is. If you aren't, your marriage is dysfunctional.

My wife would give me a good kick in the pants if I ever tried to slack off on my goals and dreams. I always go to her if I need some encouragement.

If your wife isn't your best friend, and the person you can talk to about these kinds of things, BOTH of you need to get some marriage counseling.

Assuming a healthy relationship this is terrible advice. For example, in my case my wife is my best friend (duh, it's one of the reasons I married her!). In a healthy relationship partners should be able to talk about things like this in a productive manner.

Is that really your impression of women? If so, that's messed up.

Loving someone sometimes means telling them when they're full of shit, or when they need to make an effort to improve. Sometimes it means agreeing to take on a task, like doing the chores, but only if it's clearly part of a plan to get things back to a sustainable state - e.g. "I need a break for two weeks to get my head straight, and then I'm going to do X and Y, hold me to it."

It doesn't mean being a doormat.

I would say instead of 'Do not talk to your wife' I would say 'Do not only talk to your wife'. Your wife will have her own biases and motives, maybe towards your financial success more than your happiness. Or maybe she only wants you to be happy regardless of how other people are affected. Get a range of opinions. If you are considering drastic moves, experiencing burnout, definitely talk with a therapist. A therapist will definitely know how to help you work to the core of your issues and feel better.

Heh my wife certainly wouldn't let me do that.