"How can I ask him to help me when he’s barely holding it together?"

As the husband's facade begins to crumble, glimpses of his true self emerge:

where a man is portrayed as emotionally damaged, often to the point of being a "shell of his former self"

He asks a dozen questions about a simple task ("Which soap do I use?" "Where does this go?") until the mental load of explaining the task becomes harder than just doing it.