SPOUSES SIDE OF CANCER

[Guest]

my spouse and I had communication and marriage problems before the cancer and when I was told i was stage 4 at 41 . I actually thought It might make him see me and we could become a team. when he went in to denial and became my 4 child . i was angry. he has been a good father and a hard worker tp pay the bills but refused to get emotional help or take any time off for me he never went with me for treatment..

I know he is depresses and wont seek help but I am more depressed that this marriage has been fallening apart more. I am ned and can maybe beat cancer but I feel bad I dont have the partner I hoped for.

I put all my energy into my 3 kids now I feel trapped to leave .if I have a recurrance, I have to start over will my kids hate me.
but I think I am dying of loneliness. Cancer made me open my eyes and maybe I cant wait for them all to grow up lifes short.

just my two cents to the posts. I am curious about the statisitics on divorce. I now what my heart wants to do but the practical mom part doesnt know if I can do it.

[georgemma]

Dear Guest: I am very much in a situation like yours. My husband, very unhappy in his job, used my cancer as an excuse. He hardly went into the office, telling his colleagues that he needed to be with me and travel with me to different hospitals for second opinions. He became very depressed and came home every afternoon and slept for hours. Meanwhile, I drove myself to all my appointments, felt sad and alone but fine physically. The kicker is that he is angry about the money that has been spent out of pocket on my treatment and that I even had a tumor in the first place. Life can be very complicated. I am even feeling somewhat nostalgic about my time in radiation. It didn't hurt, and the technicians and doctors were concerned and interested in my well-being . . .

[wdt]

Guest spouse, I must say...this has become a very interesting and thought provoking thread.

No marriage is perfect, but the strains of dealing with a cancer diagnosis can be devestating. Even the "best" marriage will be stressed to its very limitation under these circumstances.

What I think sets us apart from others with cancer is our age. We are younger - we are trying to balance careers, children, making mortgage payments, and all of the other obligations that people in the prime of their life are immersed in.

When my husband goes for his chemo, the chairs are all filled with eldery patients who are retired and on Medicare. Quite possibly, they are living in a home that is paid off. They don't have to try to balance work, young childeren, Doctors visits, and treatments....and they don't have to work in order to have health insurance benefits!

Here we are trying to deal with treating the cancer AND we have to work iso that we have the priviledge of keeping health insurance to pay for it all! Factor all that in with trying to keep life as "normal" for our children and the fact that many of us have aging parents we are also trying to care for! Many marriages suffer under the strains of working, having kids, paying bills, and that doesn't even include a diagnosis of cancer!

There is no any easy answer. The average is that 50% of all marriages in the US fail. The emotional and financial strains of dealing with cancer can be devestating. Having cancer impact marriages regardless of how strong or weak they were before the diagnosis. Also, any problems that the marriage had before gets compounded at least 10-fold when you add cancer into the equation.

I really do believe that it is more difficult for those of us facing this problem due to our age group. I am not saying it is a breeze for older patients, but even good marriages can go through a rough patch when people are in their 40's (hello... ever heard of the old "mid-life crisis"?)

People with long term successful marriage weather the storms, however those of us here don't know if we will have the opportunity to ever see the calm after the storm. Life is so very fragile and no one really knows how much time we have left on the earth. However, when you are faced with a cancer diagnosis - your perspective changes. My husband and I are trying to figure out a way to enjoy our time together, see some of this big, beautiful world, and somehow manage to pay our bills and keep health insurance. Ha, ha...yeah right. Help me, I need a reality check. Guess what? IT ISN'T POSSIBLE! So, I guess we will just try to do the best that we can with the situation we've been handed.

I heard a quote yesterday. It was, "you can't make chicken salad out of chicken shit." You can put all the mayo and relish in there you want, but it's still chicken shit. Why does that suddenly seem so relevant?

[Frank G]

I have seen a couple of numbers in this thread that are a little like cancer survival rates we here(pessemistic and incorrect).

The divorce rate of over 50% is inflated by serial divorcers.The rate for first time divorce is more like 32%.Take heart commitment and perservierence still holds the day.

[missjv]

wow,
after reading all these posts i consider myself very fortunate to have a wonderful husband and father to my daughter who has not complained or griped one time ( at least not to me) about having to do a little extra on the days after my surgery or after the chemo when i felt like shit. he has been a real trooper we have been together since middle school we are now in our 40's. he was more upset then i was at the diagnosis last year of stage 4 colon cancer i thought hey i can beat this and he was scared to death for our daughter and all of the chemo and surgery i would have to go through to beat this crap, and so far im doing great. i do have my bad mood days which he understands and we have a few little spats but other then that we try to keep everything normal. as for the guy who is mad at his wife for being an advocate for colon cancer and wants to help others that is in my opinion selfish. your wife went through a life threatening disease and thank god she survived and you are thinking about yourself. i applaud her for wanting to help others it is people like her who give the rest of us hope. im sorry your life has changed i don't know about you but in my wedding the minister said in sickness or health and for better or worse. you took a vow to be with that person forever and that includes the good times with the bad. you should be thanking the lord everyday that you still have your wife and not complaining cause your life is not going the way you want it. your wife is coping the best way she knows how because as a person who has fought cancer the thought of recurrance is always in the back of their minds and her doing what she is doing is maybe a way that keeps her grounded.


missjv

[bossan]

That was lovely missjv. We really have confronted the "for better or for worse" part of the vow, and my wife has accepted it gracefully, with love and sincerity.

[missjv]

hi bossan,
thanks! yes for better or for worse we took that vow and now in the past year have gone through the worst thing that has happened to us so far and we will get through it. i thank god everyday i am lucky enough to have a husband who loves me and cares and does not think of himself and i know some days are hard on him and he also knows if it were the other way around i would do the same for him. im sorry that guy is having a rough time but he needs to think about his wife and what she went through and he should be so proud of her in wanting to help others not mad at her or resent her for it. know one in the world knows what a diagnosis of cancer does to a person unless you experience it for yourself. i have had many relatives who have fought cancer some made it some didn't and i thought i knew how they felt boy was i wrong.

we have come to the conclusion that it is what it is and we will live with it and do the best we can. right now things are looking up for me but i know as a stage 4 i have a good chance of recurrance and im ready to deal with it when or if it happens i pray that it doesn't but one never knows about anything from one day to the next and that goes for life in general not just a sick person. i hope mr guest realizes he is lucky to still have his wife and let her do what makes her feel good about herself.

missjv

[cd]

Sorry, but if you haven't experienced being poked and prodded, radiated till you can't sit, have to go to the restroom so bad, but it hurts real bad to go. To go through the damn pre-treatments before scopes and surgery or some things that would happen during radiation (actually some of it is so unreal, I laugh now), like the first time I drank coffee and tried to change my bag...........or waking up in the middle of the night and rolling over my air filled bag.............whoa!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Watch what you eat......

oh, back to the subject, and not knowing if you are going to live.

It is just a part of life, 100 years ago, we just died, now there is a pretty good chance of being cured. But the experience is life changing. I can't say how bad it is having to watch it, I was too busy living it.

This is what I will say, when your dealing with cancer, it is not selfish to focus on survival. And to focus on survival is to shut others out while your mind tries to figure out what is happening, your body gets weaker the days tend to blur, and possibly you hurt more then you have ever hurt before and there is nothing others can say or do to change any of that. A person has to find the strength within.

So if you do feel shut out, there are only 2 outcomes of cancer and do you wish to continue the relationship if that outcome is survival. You will probably find a different person after the ordeal.

[PammySue_51]

I am the victim, not the spouse, but this is an interesting discussion.

I had left my husband last May after 29 years of marriage. It was a difficult decision for me as I am not an advocate of divorce except in dire circumstances, but my reasons were many and good.

I was forced to come back home in early August 2006 as I was not feeling well at all and needed to get to my own doctor (I was 2000 miles from home at the time). It was at that time that I received my stage IV diagnosis.

I came home from the hospital to recuperate from my first surgery (colostomy) and surgery was scheduled for mid September for tumor removal and then chemotherapy. I never made it that far. I became extremely ill early in September and was taken to the hospital with necrotizing fasciitis (flesh-eating bacteria) from the tumor which had leaked down into my leg. I was on life support for 12 days and endured 5 operations during that 12-day period. I remember none of this. I spent a total of 7 weeks in the hospital (needed skin grafts too) and 1 week in a nursing home to develop upper-body strength. The cancer issue could finally be addressed in mid-December when my leg was sufficiently healed to undergo chemo.

I say all of that to say this. My husband has never in all of our marriage been one to accept responsibility. He had one brief affair in 1999 and almost had another one in 2006. He was also a heavy drinker and a gambler (which we could not afford financially). However, throughout my illness he has really "stepped up to the plate" and matured in ways I would have never thought possible. I have physical limitations to what I can do because of my leg, e.g. getting down on my knees to scrub floors, behind toilets, etc., and for a long time I couldn't even vacuum. I can't get on a step stool or a ladder to reach high places. In addition, there are physical limitations when you start on a chemo regimen in an already weakened condition. It's hard for me as I am a "neat freak", but thus far I have been able to just accept that my house is not as it should be and that he is not a cook. He has been there for me in more important ways -- every doctor's appointment, every chemo treatment, every test. He even had to tolerate the fact that while I was in the hospital with ICU psychosis I would not allow him to visit me for over a week as I told everyone he was trying to kill me .

Has our marriage become stronger? I don't know. Will he go back to his old ways as I get better since chemo is over? I don't know. At this point, I don't think beyond the current time and for now...I am ever grateful to him for taking on the challenge of caring for me. Maybe he needed to feel like the strong one as I had always been the strong one, the doer, in our family. I do know that God is good...to go from a marriage that was literally over to a marriage where we can share laughter and tears. That's good enough for me! Our marriage has become "comfortable".

Finally, northern lights, thanks for the reality check. If my husband weren't at work right now I would have immediately gotten out of my chair, thanked him and hugged him! We cancer patients get so caught up in our problems that a lot of the time we don't and can't realize what our spouses are going through.

[guest]

I'm angry at the cancer. It took my dreams and plans for the future and turned them from "Will Be" to "Maybe".

My husband was diagnosed Feb Stage IIIC. He had surgery and is now halfway through 5fu/oxy.

38 yrs old, married 16 years.

Do I mind going with him? No. Mind taking care of everything. No. He minds more than I do and appologizes for feeling bad/having to rest and not being able to help with the kids.

I resent the cancer like h*ll. It took my husband's ability to do what he wants. It is trying to take my hopes for the future. I refuse to let it win.

I try to focus on the positive:
1. He is alive and fighting
2. He had symptoms and the tumor was found before stage IV
3. Great insurance - pays 99.9%
4. We have wonderfull friends that help with no complaints

It's not as if he CHOSE to get sick. You take what is given and go on. I try not to let the worry get to me.

[GUEST]

My husband has been amazing throughout the cancer experience. Ours was never an "easy" marriage. I'm 8 years older than he and he married me when my 3 girls were 3, 5 and 7. My mother also lived with me. He took us all in -- and survived my doctoral program (which increases the likelihood if divorce). He adopted the three girls when my ex-husband wanted to rescind his parental rights. He has worked like crazy to make our life wonderful ... and then the cancerr .. the what-ifs...the stress.
He stepped up. Took care of everything including the 3 girls who were 14, 16 and 18. He went to every appointment, cleaned, cooked, scheduled things. I was not a good chemo patient. I was in bed one week out of 2 -- basically a zombie the entire week. But now 18 months post dx and 6t months post Avastin....things are approaching more normal. He's a real blessing in a world that is so unpredictable.
Oh...but my mother who I have taken care of for 16 years moved out of our Indiana home and to California with my brother today without even telling me or the girls she was going. He just showed up with movers and a van and flew her to California. (but that's another story). (I think it goes with the chicken salad comment