I want to start by saying that I don't intend for the title to sound cruel. I can't think of a better way to refer to what I'm about to explain, and I hope you will understand once you read my post.
My husband takes an SSRI and a mood stabilizer for anxiety, PTSD (from his time in the military) and suspected bipolar disorder. They generally work to keep him even-keeled. He is a kind, smart, thoughtful, helpful man and I love him very much.
He works full time at a job that is not overly stressful. However, a majority of weekdays I come home to someone who doesn't feel like my husband. This does not happen everyday, and never on weekends; it's almost as though whatever mental capacity he starts the day with is drained by his day and by the time I get home his faculties are diminished. I can tell immediately when it's going to be one of these days based solely on the way he speaks. I don't know what to call it, so I refer to it as speaking with a "soft mouth." His words lack their normal annunciation, he speaks more slowly. If he's texting, it's riddled with typos (which is not normal for him). He acts goofy, becomes talkative, almost babbling and narrarates his actions to himself. If we're watching TV, he comments on every moment. He becomes clumsy and often drops things. Any amount of logic with which he normally approaches life vanishes. He becomes impossible to focus; if I ask him to put our 6-month old down for bed (which he normally does quickly and without issue), he's suddenly keeping him awake by talking to him, bringing him out to the living room, turning on lights in the nursery. What would normally take him fifteen minutes becomes an hour-long affair of waking him back up, like he doesn't understand that the goal is to get the baby to sleep. As I'm typing this, he just brought our swaddled baby into the kitchen to try to wash dishes while he's "putting him down for bed." He becomes distracted and forgetful, sometimes forgetting things I had just said minutes before.
Sometimes he stays up late doing random tasks around the house under the guise of "being productive when he has the time." If I get frustrated, he gets defensive and self-righteous, traits I would not normally use to describe him. Trying to talk to him about it when he's like this ends up going in circles and on tangents. He's often remorseful the next day, but in the moment he can never see that he's acting any different.
I guess what I'm asking is, does this sound familiar to anyone? Has anyone experienced something similar with a loved one? Does anyone know what might be causing this? On days like this, I often find myself at wit's end and waiting for the day to be over, hoping that the next will be better. It makes me so sad to feel that way.
I'm sorry for the long post, and appreciate any insight anyone may have to give. Thank you.