Thank you for sharing, Lia. Your strength in enduring so much at such a young age is admirable (yes, 28 is still very young to me
Midway through your post when referencing your husband as your superman, I got an odd thought about the SG. Being a caretaker can be incredibly overwhelming. In between doctors visits and tending to a sick spouse, there are still the mounting duties of cooking, cleaning, shopping, scheduling, etc. with little time for rest. My daughter has had the flu for a week now and I realize that my husband and I are much different in our care taking. I don't mean this to be sexist, but it's possible that men deal with these pressures much differently than women. I'm not attempting to provide an excuse for the SG in any way, just saying that a year's worth of these added stressors in a fairly new marriage could have driven the SG to behaviors that led to a need to gain back some control in his life. JMO
Thank you
I agree with you completely, I used to tell my spouse that he had a harder job having to see someone he loves suffer and not be able to do anything about it, than I did as a patient..but I know the toll being a caretaker can have on people can be disaster on relationships, your comment about my superman comment got me thinking lol
I remember when I first began becoming very sick I went to read those online support group forums and I realized over the years how very lucky I was to have mike stand by me how he did.
When your stressed out taking care of your spouse but feel guilty for feeling that way and keep quiet, you feel alone ,it seems neverending, it can become so frustrating but I feel that a lot of men are scared to open up about that. they don't want to sound like they are whining about taking care of their spouse while their spouse is gravely ill. I remember this guy saying, "What am I supposed to say to her? Sorry hunny but your cancer is really putting me in a bad mood and having to help you with everything is making me feel resentful towards you. Plus, I know your in horrible pain and can barely get out of bed, but our sex life is non existent and that is also putting me in a really bad place emotionally"
In fact, I noticed that a lot of relationships where there is a longterm or terminal illness end up failing. I cant say what causes it for all of them, but a repeating theme I had noticed was the guys were misdirecting their anger and frustrations--they were really mad at the situation, at the disease even--but it ends up being taken out on the patient. Of course, since the guy feels that if he were to voice his struggling with being a caretaker, he would be a jerk or whatever, this leads to finding outside comfort in some cases.
Of course I have no clue how the SG is feeling or the status of their relationship, however you've brought up a really good point
Picture it, SG has been feeling the stress and strain of being a caretaker to his wife. he loves her, but hes getting frustrated, feeling under-appreciated and he believes telling his wife how depressed or down he is, would be insensitive since she is the sick one--perhaps he feels his family may also view his complaining as selfish as well in his mind.
so, eventually, he begins opening up to other women about his stress, his feelings and it starts almost an emotional "affair" in HIS mind. He begins telling a sweet, kind woman about how down he has been and he feels like she really cares, she really is listening to him and that feels good, something he hasn't felt in ages. However, to the woman, she may see this as simply comforting someone in a frail mental spot struggling with all these heavy things and not even notice that he would consider taking it any farther because shes been comforting him about his wife.
but in his mind, he could view the sympathy as an opening, an innocent comment of support from the woman begins to bloom into much more in the SG mind and as he has so much stress and hurting in the other portions of his life, he begins obsessing and revolving his thoughts around her.
In many cases of people who are really sick, the sex life for the couple goes out the window. I remember reading a lot of women would post on these support boards. To the women, its baffling that the male can even THINK about intimacy when she feels like shes been ran over by a train and has no energy but with the guy, it is just one more area of frustration and potential growing spot for resenting his spouse even though it isn't her fault.
In 2009, my friend was seriously ill. She would talk to me about how her boyfriend as time went on, pushed away and she ended up snooping around, and discovered he was having what she called an "emotional affair about to turn physical". She said it would of hurt less if it had just been him looking for physical intimacy but she found email after email of him complaining about the stress and exhaustion of taking care of her on top of his hectic work schedule. That he had begun to feel unappreciated, and the woman would comfort him but for the most part her responses were therapeutic and emotional in nature, not sexual yet but his intentions seemed clear to lin.
Perhaps if a guy who is really struggling with his job as caretaker finds a woman he feels he can finally confide in and talk about all of the things he wanted to talk about with his wife but couldn't, if the guy began making more intimate moves and the woman rejected those moves, I guess I could see how this guy would feel his world falling apart because he had created this obsession with her to block out things in life he didn't want to deal with anymore and the guy becomes enraged and flips out and abducts someone?
Again, this is long lol, sorry, the thought in my head is hard to explain and say right when im writing it down!
