u/curlieandtwirlie

I am coming off an enormous and demoralizing flare. For the last three months, my fibro was so bad, I only had about an hour and a half window a day of being awake and functioning. My labs showed that my iron levels were quite elevated. Apparently, high iron can seriously wreak havoc on the body. I switched my multivitamin to one without iron and I seriously feel like a new person. Hang in there, everyone!

I’m married with three kids under the age of ten. My husband and I have pretty much always had an exhaustive and unequal relationship. I am 100% the default parent, and in general, he has been a source of stress for me. He requires a lot of attention and patience. Now that I’m disabled with this fibromyalgia curse, life has become way more difficult. My husband has not been able to “step up.” He escalates the kids and really struggles with the role of caretaker. It also often feels like he doesn’t understand how brutal this diagnosis is.

After a fight last week, he stayed with his friend for a few nights. Oh my God, my fibromyalgia symptoms basically went away. My children were peaceful!

Now, I’m facing the problem of what to do. We have no outside support and no extra money to hire help. I know I feel better when he is not around (and my home is more at ease) but, with my disability, I DO need someone to help me with the kids and household responsibilities (I have the brand of fibromyalgia that requires a wheelchair sometimes). He seems to be the source of a lot of chaos in the house but at the very least, he completes a task if I ask him enough.

What would you do?