Is it normal for your spouse not to come with you for surgery?
I need a reality check because my husband (31m) and I (30f) clearly have VERY different expectations here.
I’m having surgery on my hand soon, and I assumed my husband would come with me to the hospital. When I brought it up, he basically asked why he would need to come and why he would take a day off work for it.
I was honestly kind of stunned. I asked him, “When your lung collapsed, did you go to the hospital alone?” and he said no, but that was different because his was an emergency.
And like… yes, obviously a collapsed lung is much more serious than hand surgery 😂 I’m not comparing the severity. My point was that I can’t really imagine my spouse having an operation and thinking, “Why would I need to be there?”
For context, I moved from the US to Switzerland to be with him. We got married a year ago after being long distance for about 3 years. My German is still not very good, I don’t have the same support system here that I had back home, and I’m genuinely scared about having surgery in another country where I don’t fully speak the language.
I’m not expecting him to sit next to me during the actual operation or magically make it less scary. I just thought your spouse coming with you to the hospital for surgery was… normal? Especially when you’re scared and don’t speak the local language well.
He seems to genuinely see it as unnecessary for him to miss work because it’s a planned procedure and not an emergency.
So now I’m curious: am I expecting too much here? Do your partners normally come with you when you have outpatient surgery? Would you take the day off work if your spouse was having surgery, even if it wasn’t a major/emergency operation?
P.S. I don't have a car here yet. Am I supposed to take the train for my surgery? To fellow European Redditors, how do you get to your scheduled procedures? 😅