r/WellSpouses

Hello,

My wife has had minor to moderate health problems in different levels of severity since I've known her. Flares happen now and again and can change our plans. It happens. I went into this with both eyes open and ready to support her when she needed me.

But the last couple of years she was dealing with something entirely different. She was dealing with a new set of symptoms, that became more and more debilitating. The past few months have been just helping her to get from her desk, to the couch, to the bathroom. Cooking her meals, tallying her calories, talking with her doctors. Watching her lose weight, watching her world get smaller. If you flashed back a month ago, it was all I could do not to think about where this train was heading.

Then, we finally had a break. An MRI caught something, and they recommended she go in for emergency surgery. Thank god, the new symptoms improved almost immediately. She was out of the woods, and feeling better than she had in a long time. I cried for days, because I didn't realize until the pressure was off that I was trying not to think about how this condition might take my wife from me.

She's become much more energetic, and after having her world so closed off all she wants to do is go out, be social, and expand her horizons. Which is great. She still has chronic fatigue and with her weight and muscle loss I have to keep reminding her that we have to take it slow. It's the last thing she wants to do, but here we are.

However, there's been a cost to me too. I'm so mentally, emotionally and physically spent I can barely keep up with her. I'm at the point where my own health has suffered trying to keep all the plates spinning during the last two years, and I've fallen behind on almost everything. I need rest so badly that every time she talks about going out and doing something I tear up a little because I just don't have it in me right now. I wish I could crawl into a cave and hibernate the winter away. I wish I could put my body back in the box it came in and file it away for a month. I've been running on vapors for so long, and I'm so releived she's OK that it feels like I'm going to break down at any moment.

But it's gone beyond this too. Being this level of a caregiver has changed how I see her in ways that are hard to define. I feel like she's so delicate, I can't even conceive of physical intimacy. I love my wife, and I don't regret pouring my heart and soul into her care. However I can't shake the feeling that being this level of caregiver has changed something. At present, I feel like I need time away from her. I'm not trying to run, does it make me a horrible person to feel like I need a break from worrying about her? I feel guilty for feeling like I need time away.

Let me preface this by saying I don’t really have suicidal ideation. I don’t have a plan to kill myself, nor access to the means to do so, but who here on the bad days has said to themselves “I just want to die?” I’m finding myself saying that more and more, especially when having to clean up bodily fluid, clean up the house, fix meals, grab medications, go to doctors appointments, go to the hospital, and try to maintain a career. Last night my spouse was too sick to make it up the stairs to go to bed, so he crashed on the couch. It’s just all so shitty and so lonely I could scream. I’m trapped in a nightmare that is my life right now. When I do get to go out to see friends, then the topic turns to how he is doing, and I don’t want to talk about it anymore!

I just need to vent, again. my son suffers from Tourette’, severe ADHD and OCD. This week has been especially bad. He’s developed physical tics where he flings his head back and it’s causing severe headaches, neck pain, so I had to take him to the hospital through the ER to get new stronger meds for those tics. So now he was physical tics like shaking his head, snapping back his neck, kicking objects, punching random objects and severe muscle tightening to the point where his muscles cramp. His audible tics are fuck, pussy, the N bomb and the C word. Emotionally it’s been hard cos he’s expressed suicidal thoughts cos he doesn’t want to deal with the pain.

As a parent it’s so hard to watch and feel helpless.

My wife’s MS has been acting up, dizziness, nausea, vomiting, she’s required so much care physically and emotional.

I’m just feeling so overwhelmed today, like this can’t get any harder but It does.

its such a lonely feeling, the person I relied is no longer able to help me. no family or friends live near me. Like I sai I just need to ven.

My wife has chronic illness and I’m struggling

Before anyone get started no of course I love my wife. I’m not planning to leave her. I don’t think I’m a bad person, but I’m saying all this to get off my chest.

As soon as we got married, my wife’s chronic illness has started and ever since then it’s pretty much only gotten worse. We’re really young and it’s hard because it feels like we’ve never had a normal marriage and many cases. I feel like I’m more of a caretaker than her husband not just physically but also emotionally as well. I never thought married life would be like this. Sometimes makes me sad and then other times I look her out of my life, and I know that the beauty of my life is directly proportionate to the suffering in it.

All in all, it’s not that I’m upset with her, but I’m just tired tired with life tired with everything sometimes it’s hard to make time for myself whenever I’m the one that’s always needed to take care of everything. I get back home from work and right after work, I take care of my wife and the household. It’s really hard doing all this and sometimes honestly it’s lonely and sometimes my mind even wonders it’s just very difficult. I try my best to keep us afloat provide for my wife physically and emotionally as fast as I can and I tell her that I love her every single day and spend quality time with her whenever I can.