<p>Please dear god don’t let true love derail another good thread. As someone who is getting married soon, I am really getting a lot out of reading this.</p>
<p>TrueLove; good luck with blessing your spouse’s socks off…remember those words in the years to come.</p>
<p>"NSM…I hope you find it “priceless” and worth a chuckle to have been called “baby cakes” by an 18 year old. Only on CC. "</p>
<p>That whole post made me laugh. </p>
<p>Thank-you to everyone else for the helpful perspectives and ideas. You’ve been very helpful, and I have some ideas about how to proceed with my life and marriage.</p>
<p>Don’t stop yet, NSM! One more post and you hit 18,000!</p>
<p>Momlive, it sounds like your separation was the ideal separation where you were able to gain some perspective and your husband showed his best self and his love for you. Im glad for you. What if it had been different? What if he had turned ugly and mean, what if he had insisted you had no grounds to leave and ignored whatever issues there might have been? What if, with distance, you realized that things had been a lot worse than you’d thought and and you felt a sense of relief? Would you have gone back? You are very fortunate that it turned out the way it did. It’s hard to come back from a separation and often a separation allows people to realize how difficult things really are.</p>
<p>Montegut, what if you were married to someone who didn’t have a wonderful family to miss? I hate to say it, but if my husband and I ever separate, I’m pretty sure I would not miss his family, although I have some nieces and nephews that I care deeply about. I care about his sisters and mother as well, but it would be a relief to get away from some of the dynamics of his family. The men who divorced my husband’s sisters do not miss the in-laws. As for getting old and knowing that this is the person who would care for me, I hate to say it (again) but that is something that really scares me. My husband has never done well with me being sick or in pain. When he gets anxious, he doesn’t hear or communicate well and it scares me so much to think that he would be the one communicating with doctors and not hearing well and alienating them in his anxiety, that I am seriously considering signing paperwork for one of my adult kids to make decisions for me in case I cannot. That may sound weird, but I need to know that I have someone who is capable of considering my best interests beyond what he or she is experiencing and who is able to process information well and communicate clearly and who is medically savvy (my husband is brilliant, but for some reason really not savvy medically, and my DD who manages a chronic health condition interacts extremely well with physicians and medical personnel and is capable of putting my needs and wishes ahead of her own, which is why I’m considering it.) It makes me sad though to read posts like yours because I don’t have the assurance it would be as you describe and that should be one of the perks of staying in a long-term marriage. </p>
<p>Truelove, I’m sure you can understand the concept of speaking to your elders with some respect since you have such traditional values. You may have a good point to make; you’ll be heard better if you make it tactfully and graciously.</p>
<p>^^^ Last paragraph, eloquently said mimk6.</p>
<p>"am seriously considering signing paperwork for one of my adult kids to make decisions for me in case I cannot. That may sound weird, but I need to know that I have someone who is capable of considering my best interests beyond what he or she is experiencing and who is able to process information well and communicate clearly and who is medically savvy (my husband is brilliant, but for some reason really not savvy medically, and my DD who manages a chronic health condition interacts extremely well with physicians and medical personnel and is capable of putting my needs and wishes ahead of her own, "</p>
<p>That doesn’t sound weird. It makes sense. </p>
<p>I need to make my younger son the person who makes those kind of decisions for me. H tends to deny the seriousness of problems. Younger S is the calmest and most thoughtful person in the family.</p>
<p>When DH and I were dating, he was so excited about me wanting a career, and I was thrilled he felt that way. (Esp. since I had broken off an engagement because the guy insisted I stay at home to raise the kids.) In the seven years we were married and before the kids arrived, we were in synch and climbing the ladder together. DH struggled with our decision for me to stay home for a couple of years when the kids were small, and when I dropped from FT to PT later – even as he acknowledged that my flexibility enabled him to pay his dues and advance in his career.</p>
<p>Fast forward to when I got sick and had to leave work. NOW I know why it was so important to him that I have a career. His mother was bedridden and chronically ill with mental and physical health issues, and he had to become the functioning adult in the family at age 13. When I became ill, it was his worst childhood nightmare come true. The brilliant guy who keeps his whole world intact by sheer force of will, careful control and risk assessment was blown out of the water. I’ve been in counseling to deal with my illness and the fallout, but DH will not participate. It feels damned lonely a lot of the time. In eight years, he has yet to say the word cancer. I am immensely sad that he may never break free from his childhood, both because it would set him free to appreciate the wonderful life and family he has, and for my own selfish desire to have him present emotionally though all of this.</p>
<p>Now that the guys are older, I should consider who I want handling medical decisions.</p>
<p>Oh, boy, I’m about to sidetrack this thread, but let me just put my two cents in, that as the child, one of five, who has the responsibility of taking care of my widowed mother, who has physical and mental illness issues, I would ask that those of you who are considering handing this responsibility to one of your children rather than your spouse to please reconsider it. This would be incredibly selfish of you. Let your children have their youth, their own families, their own lives to enjoy. While you think it may only be for a few years that they will have to fulfill this obligation, I can tell you that I have been doing this for my mom for almost 19 years. It is a big reason why I only have one child, and why we can count on our hand, how many family vacations we have taken. I not only have the financial commitment, but the emotional commitment to care for my mom, and it is very much like having another child, but this one with special needs. So sorry to sidetrack this, and please, let’s not sidetrack this wonderful thread, but please, please don’t do that to your children. Trust that your spouse will rise to the occasion and take care of you, like he promised to do when he married you.</p>
<p>I don’t think that anyone here who is married is planning to ask one of their children to be their primary caretaker if the parent gets ill. Some of us – like me – are saying that our kids would be better choices than our spouses to make medical decisions for us if we were not able to make them for ourselves.</p>
<p>Since most parents die before their offspring die and since most parents don’t both die together probably most adults posting on this thread will have some caretaking responsibilities toward at least one parent, and that may include making medical decisions for an ill parent. </p>
<p>I’ve already been in that situation and as have many of my friends.</p>
<p>So sorry CountinDown. A good friend is in a similar position but her marrrige had long been bad before her diagnosis. She needs love and affection now and he just can’t muster one iota. It is the most painful part for her. It is a few close girlfriends that are in charge of her care.</p>
<p>Fortunately I’m still fully functional, albeit not at my old 110%. More like 75%. Montegut, I hear your point. I have tried really hard to keep this illness from interfering with my kids’ lives more than absolutely necessary. Have also had to make sure that my kids’ worries about me once they are both out of the house doesn’t keep them from launching successfully.</p>
<p>I’ve also worked at expanding my circle of friends to help alleviate the loneliness. DH is great at doing specific tasks if I ask – but I don’t generally need that kind of help.</p>
<p>NSM, I’m wondering if your DH isn’t quite sure how to relate to you any more since so much of his early life and your marriage were shrouded by depression among the women. For better or worse, that was familiar territory to him. Now that you are doing so well (and I know how much effort was required to conquer the beast), he may feel a bit lost without that familiar role and not sure in what ways you now need him in your life.</p>
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<p>He promised to stick with me “in sickness and in health.” He didn’t promise to handle sickness well or to rise to the occasion well. Also, he’s had ample opportunity over 30 years to rise to the occasion and has not always done so. I trust what I have seen. Anyhow, as NSM said, I’m not asking my kids to take care of me. I’d just be naming them in a living will as the person to make a decision. Spouses are not always the best person to make a decision like that even in the best of marriages. Some people do very poorly in a crisis situation and shut down completely.</p>
<p>I have not had a chance to read this whole thread, but I have a slightly different perspective. My H and I have been married for almost 26 yrs. His jobs have required travel, but the last time he traveled this much, the kids were small and I was busy with them. It was hard and I missed him, but we managed. </p>
<p>Now the kids are grown and DH’s new position (consulting) has him away from home, thousands of miles away, a lot. I came to realize how much he does for us and our family, and I probably took some of it for granted. It has given me a new appreciation for him, for our relationship, etc. I am sad that he is not physically here a lot, but I came to realize that even when all 4 of us were home at the same time (a rarity since older s lives in another state now, and younger s has said this is likely the last summer he’ll be home) , we often ended up in different places in the house. While at first I thought that was kinda sad, I realized that we don’t have to be physically in the same place to have a healthy family system. We can enjoy being under the same roof, even if on different floors. </p>
<p>My H works ridiculously crazy hours. Often his work requires calls overseas, which occur in the middle of the night our time. His body clock is all messed up because his current consulting gig is on the west coast and we live in the east. When he is home he is awake and asleep at weird hours. But he doesn’t complain. He is also a runner and is up early to meet his running buddies or work out at the gym (thats where he is now). </p>
<p>My point in this rambling is that as we and our relationships mature, we may have to readjust our lives, our behavior patterns and our expectations. I miss the quantity of time my H is in the house, but I now try to cherish what we have and make it quality time-- or accept that he and I fall asleep at different times but thats really ok. </p>
<p>The other day I walked by the office he has in the house and saw him asleep on the floor. This is not an unusual occurrence. He likes to take a break by getting lost in a book, and he often then falls asleep. But I commented to him later that my heart skipped a beat because I was able to actually see him in his office, as opposed to the many times these past months I’ve walked by an empty room. </p>
<p>I too have widened my scope of friendships- I belong to a womens investment group, a Sunday morning exercise/ladies coffee group, and have my time online with cc “buddies”. I can’t expect my H to meet all of my social needs (and he too is one who is happy to be alone with a book or a podcast). I see these transitions in our lives as normal passages. I guess reading this thread, while I wish my H was here more often as I am lonely in this house when I am here all by myself, and I surely miss the “old days” when he worked locally and was home more, I will adjust and get through it. I love him, and that is what matters. I have now come to appreciate the morning IM computer chats we have when I see him on line and know he is able to “chat” even for a few minutes. </p>
<p>NSM and all the others here who have hit bumps in the marital road, if you love your H, intimacy doesn’t have to mean what it did when we were in our 20s or 30s. Intimacy can mean both sitting on the same couch with your feet touching as you read the Sunday paper. It can mean washing each others backs in the shower or making the bed together. Yes, the kinds of things that kept us physically together (meals, attending kids sport events, school activities, etc) are either gone or fewer and farther apart, but it just means having to adjust and shift with the change in the family dynamic. </p>
<p>I think I’ll text my H and tell him I love him. Thanks for the reminder here.</p>
<p>I remember seeing my father completely incapable of realizing my mother’s death was imminent. He was allowing CAT Scans to be performed the morning of her passing. It reached a point where her doctor who was a family friend told me that we had to get through to him… that he needed to let go. He was in such denial with her disease that he stepped back from going to the doctor appointments. Sometimes children should be the ones to act in your best interest. I had to convince my dad to sign the paper work to let my mom be at peace. They had a great marraige but my dad was awful during my moms illness. There are people that can’t seem to deal with these things.</p>
<p>jym626,</p>
<p>Great post, much wisdom and healthy ideas. </p>
<p>As a consultant that has done more than his share of West Coast gigs while living on the East Coast, I also see the value in the 4:30 (Pacific Time) phone call home. I typically will work to 7:30 p.m. but try not to miss that 4:30 time to call my wife. This allows her (post-dinner) to talk with me and get on with her evening and allows me to touch base and chat before I’m too tired to really participate.</p>
<p>NSM, it sounds to me like you have awakened from a life time of depression and are looking around for the first time with new and different eyes. The man you partnered with as a depressed young woman looks different to you now that you are no longer depressed. You are evaluating this partner in a wholly new context. Do you want to remain partnered to this person now that you are a very very different woman?</p>
<p>How to discuss this with him? This is a hard problem. Have you read the Parent Effectiveness Training (PET) book? It teaches how to talk in “I messages.”</p>
<p>Instead of saying/thinking, “You don’t listen to me. You are not present for me. You are late to our meetings/outings,” (which cause ppl to shut down in defense), phrasing can be, “I feel… when you…” </p>
<p>“I feel lonely when you bring work to dinner because I looked so forward to talking and hearing about the planning for …”</p>
<p>“I felt sad when when you left that talk/ get together because I thought it would be fun for us to be together like back in the old days…”</p>
<p>Please, NSM, I am not trying to critique in any way but this book and approach saved my marriage. We were both reactive and self defensive and when we turned the style of speaking into I messages, were so much more able to understand the other one’s feelings in situations. Instead of feeling like the subtext was, "You suck because you don’t (clean the mess up you lazy ungrateful slug), there was an overt message of, “I am just so tired when I get home and I hate mess and the mess just makes me cranky and I know you are tired, too, but it would be a gift if it were a little less disheveled when I get home.” From accusation to gift. </p>
<p>Anyway, there are ways to alert your spouse to your new self and your new eyes/life needs. Could it be that he is just acting the way he always did - but that you’ve changed? Or has he changed now that you’ve changed? Has he retreated from this new self you present? Perhaps he is dealing in his own way with your not getting tenure - does he feel guilty so that he retreats? </p>
<p>I would think you both would have to mourn the loss of some ideal dream of both of you having tenure together … and now that you have made a new life I would think he would be going through a huge adjustment. </p>
<p>Just ruminating here on the other side’s POV to try to gain insight, hope that’s ok. </p>
<p>For example, back when babies were coming, a male coworker asked me what my husband’s biggest fear was about becoming a father. I was startled - I did not know the answer to that. When I asked, DH was clearly deeply touched. His fear was being able to provide, financially, for a family. How did I not know that? But I hadn’t asked.</p>
<p>Rambling…thanks for an amazing thread.</p>
<p>Counting Down - I was wondering the same thing.</p>
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<p>It seemed to me that H was in denial about your Depression because to him, it was a normal part of life.</p>
<p>Jym - If both partners need less in terms of physical intimacy, that is one thing. But NSM is suggesting that it’s still an important part of life, and H could live without out. Playing footsie on the couch is a nice thing on it’s own, but most people in their 50’s still want more than that. Life changes for all of us, especially as we age and our kids move out. In one of NSM’s earliest posts on this thread she discussed the cordial roommate problem - which is a life with a person without a lot of physical intimacy. I don’t know many in their 40’s and 50’s who are willing to live without sex - even if it is a little less. </p>
<p>A whole pharmaceutical fortune has been made off this “problem”, hasn’t it?</p>
<p>A couple of comments here:</p>
<p>Both my husband and I have dealt with cancer in the last ten years of our 26-year marriage. His required chemo (several rounds) and he took four years off from work (although not other things) to heal his body and psyche; my required surgery and I am now three years out and realizing that those four years of healing seems to be about right, although I thought I was done with it quite early… DH has been very good–I hope I was as good for him.</p>
<p>I told him about this thread this morning (He thinks it’s funny that I’m still on a college advice site 7 years after our kids finished high school)–and said that many women had said they wanted something different from their marriages than their husbands. Then I asked “what do you want?” There was some silence and then he answered “companionship, to be supported and to support you, and good sex.” I like that answer.</p>
<p>To my surprise the person who had the best handle on what was going on when my Dad became ill and passes away was my younger brother’s wife. She dropped everything and took the kids out of school for a couple of days to make sure that my Mom was supported in whatever she wanted to do. She was also the only one who told me to come up sooner rather than later. Sometimes you don’t know who will come through, though I completely agree that if the person in question hasn’t been helpful in the past that’s a warning sign to take seriously!</p>
<p>Finally, a thought. This is a central tenant of my religion, but I think it can be a helpful way to look at almost anything: “Act So As To Elicit the Best In Others and Thereby In Thy Self.” (Felix Adler)</p>