My husband IS generally sick/ill with something most of the time?

Are you kidding? What a terrible response to give to someone who is clearly suffering with compassion fatigue. Her husband sounds like a huge burden, bless her heart for putting up with him as she does. Remember there are TWO lives here, and we only get one go round on this planet...

My boyfriend (62) is ALWAYS sick, too. If I ask him what's wrong he just says he hurts all over or he's too tired to do anything. At least 2 days a week he sleeps all day long, watches tv all night. He does absolutely nothing around the house except take out the garbage. I feel like a terrible person, but I've just had it. I don't know what to do!

I am so glad I found this thread, and that I am not alone. I'm 57 years old, my husband is 65 and retired this past May. We have been married for 17 years. He does have some legitimate health issues - type 2 diabetes and a heart condition. He is on insulin and a whole bunch of other medications that he actually does need. He has also been diagnosed with anxiety and is seeing a therapist and taking medication for that, too. Finally, his vision was getting worse, and he finally went to the eye doctor and was diagnosed with cataracts. He had the first eye done on August 2, and is scheduled for the second eye on August 30. In the meantime, he is supposed to using three different kinds of drops in the eye that had the surgery done, a couple of times a day.

So that is all of the health stuff that is actually real. The problem is that every time he catches a cold, it is weeks of endless moaning, whining, dramatics, which includes coughing and hacking and gacking and even SPITTING. It is disgusting and it grosses me out, and if he actually goes out in public like that, no doubt it grosses other people out, too. I don't know if he coughs like this on purpose for the dramatics, or if he really can't help it.

So I caught this cold a couple of weeks ago, and while I was feeling really rotten, I had to get up at the butt-crack of dawn two days in a row, to get him to his first cataract surgery, and then to the follow-up appointment the next day. I was already sick of him moaning and whining about going blind, so I did not want to be the cause of of his having to postpone any surgery. So I dragged myself up, took a lot of cold medicine, and did what needed to be done for him.

Then HE caught the cold, and you would think he was dying from the plague, the way he is acting. He has done nothing but sleep, and I know that if you spend too much time sleeping you only feel weaker when you get up. When I feel sick, I try to sit up and move around at least somewhat every day, so I don't feel so tired and weak. I also think that laying there and wallowing in your own misery makes things worse.

But this is leading to other problems. Many days, he can't be bothered to get up to take his meds, his insulin, even his eye drops. There have been situations in the past where he ended up in the hospital because he didn't take his meds and/or insulin. So every day, I have to nag him until he does all of this stuff, telling him that if he doesn't, I am going to call his PCP and his psychiatrist. That usually gets him in line, but I am quickly getting weary of all of this. He is a grown man, and I am not his mommy. I ell him that if he really is dying that badly, he belongs in a hospital anyway, because I am not a nurse or a doctor and can't help him. But he never wants to go to a hospital, he'd rather stay home and make me suffer with all of his ridiculous dramatics.

I thought I got through to him yesterday. I told him he would only make himself sicker by laying around all the time and not making an effort to sit up and move around. He has another follow-up appointment with the eye doctor tomorrow, plus the second surgery in two weeks, and I warned him if he goes to the eye doctor with the symptoms and the dramatics, she can and will postpone the second surgery.

So he sat up all day yesterday, did all of his meds and drops, even ate some food. Even the coughing got better. But today, it was back to square one. He did get up to do the eye drops, but then went back to bed and stayed there until past noon, when I informed him that if he didn't get up and cut the c**p, I was calling the doctor and having him hospitalized. He had not even taken his meds or insulin until I made him do so. Now he is sitting downstairs an giving me the full dramatic effect, with the moaning and whining and hacking and gacking and spitting. I seriously doubt he will make it to that appointment tomorrow. I think I really am going to have to call his doctors, rather than just making threats about it.

I love baseball and we have had season tickets to the local minor league team for 7 years now. This past Friday, they held a charity baseball game, police vs. firefighters, that I really wanted to go to. He was pissed that I decided to go without him, probably because then he'd have no audience for his dramatics. I didn't care, I just needed to get away from him for a few hours, And I did have a good time.

He also has this cat who is "his" cat, who normally is near him all the time. But he has been so bad lately that not even the cat wants to be anywhere near him.

The team comes back to town tomorrow, and he thinks he is coming to the games with me. Not if he is going to take his horking and gacking and coughing and spitting and dramatics to the ballpark, where it will gross out other people and embarrass me. There are only ten home games left in the season, why should I have to give up something that is important to me, that I get joy from, just to mollycoddle and enable a man-baby? I'll just go by myself and hope he decides he is too sick to bother to show up.

And this is not unique to his having retired. It is probably a good thing he retired when he did, because I was wondering how long he'd be able to keep the job, anyway. He had gone on short-term disability several times over the years, most of those for hospitalizations for problems he brought on himself, such as not taking meds and/or insulin. When he was not out on disability, he was calling in sick every time he got the sniffles, and I was the one who had to listen to the dramatics over this dire illness.

He refuses to listen that he is probably doing this to himself. I think my only hope now is to call his doctors and have him put in a hospital. I can't take it anymore. Thanks for reading.

Ladies! we are all having the same problem and exhausted of the situation we all stuck in! so we need to figure out how to deal with it? What are the clinical or not-clinical solutions... Just like you, I am tired of always being the strong one!

Run. I lived with a man for 30 years who became ill before social meetings. It does not get better, no matter what u do. Run

I know exactly how you feel! In the last 6 years my husband has either lost a job or had to take extended time off for a severe bout of depression, anxiety, an undiagnosed back problem, an ulcer, and carpel tunnel. And he insists on taking days off just for a little cold. I live in constant fear that he's going to lose his current job. He is supposed to start school this winter and I honestly have no idea how he's going to get through it.

He has fibromyalgia. You described it to a "T". He will never get better.

RUN!!! Find someone else!!

I keep following this post. My husband is the same way. His parents till me he was a sick baby and sick his whole life. When I try to find out what his health issues were/are there is never a specific medical issue. I have encouraged him to keep searching for a diagnosis, but, I have come to believe that this is a learned helplessness. I also believe he suffers from anxiety. I wish he would seek help but he refuses to see anyone. It makes me very sad because I wanted such a different relationship and I wanted a different life for my daughter. I often want to end the relationship but, I won't for the sake of our daughter. I do love him and try to see that he is fighting a real battle with mental health issues. But, everyday I feel like I'm fighting for my own happiness and fighting to create a normal happy life for my daughter. He is a good and kind person. He just is always tired and so I am often left to parent alone. I tell people he has health problems when they make note of his regular absences from social events. He's managed to work full-time but, it consumes all of his energy. And, I'm worried that he's going to have a nervous break down. We can't survive on my salary so I just try to stay supportive and give him as much rest as he needs. This means I do most of the parenting for our young daughter and take care of the house.

What is the solution?

My husband has Fibromyalgia, Rheumatoid Arthritis, Osteoporosis and an underactive thyroid. All these conditions cause him to be tired and in chronic pain and consequently cranky and abusive when the pain is at its worst. He has very little strength to do things and falls asleep within minuts of going out in the car. He sees his doctor or other health practitioners weekly, which is very expensive, and takes about 12 different pills, more expense. He hasn't worked at all in 2 years and I work 2 days a week, which gives me a break.

We've been married 38 years and I don't want to move out of home, although it would be delicious to have a peaceful home and no one but myself to care for. I give him space when he's feeling bad by leaving the room and finding something pleasant to do by myself, such as reading or using the computer, cooking or taking the dog for a walk.

When he's really nasty I go into the bedroom and cry really loudly with the door locked. Makes me feel better and him worse - Win Win.

We are in this for the long haul and I admit it is draining to live with the constant moaning, but it must be worse for him to live with constant pain and no energy, so I just suck it up and try to let my mind dwell in a more pleasant place, even if my body is stuck in the same four walls as his.

Are we married to the same person??!!! OMG

GET OUT NOW

I had a wee chuckle at your post. I can do relate. I’ve been with mine for 10 years and he was 35 when I met him. He has had job after job because he hates them all. He sleeps for days and every couch we have ever opened has went out of shape because he lies on them so much. He watches tv all day long on his days off (that’s when he has a job) and I’ve not to ask him to do anything around the house or with his kids because he has such a hard life at work and feels ill. I’m only 31 & I don’t want to be someone’s fuc@king carer. He acts like he’s in his 60s I’m so board of it now.

This is my husband word for word.

Holy c**p. That post can really put our lives into perspective. I guess it could always be worse. But the point is we women do everything we can to take care of everyone. We work, clean, do laundry, cook, do dishes, put away dishes, and we are feeling taken advantage of. I had the flu the other day and just kept to myself and didn't make a big deal about it. Sure I wined a little but my husband has been sick so often. Right now it is chronic bronchitis and has lasted for the last four months. He has cough attacks in the morning only but it is because he smokes. He has missed 6 funerals in my family, and many weddings and outings because he is too sick, but he as someone mentioned before will visit his family. He is fine when he is playing online games. It does seem like crying wolf. I do need him and love him but his constant grouchiness and complaining, and never being happy is so annoying. I was just singing in the kitchen and I heard him on the couch in the living room making his usual annoyed sigh. So I said what's wrong. He was trying to sleep because he is sick. He said "Your singing is too loud". I turned it off and said sarcastically, "Sorry, oh it's 8 o'clock and you need to sleep?." and he threw a pillow at me and got up and started screaming at me. He had a deranged look in his eye and was so mad at me for being sarcastic calling me a b***h and saying I don't care about him all I care about is myself. I was so mad I got up and he is still screaming at me so I pushed him on his chest and said "shut up, our son has company" then he slapped me in the face. Wow. So I went from singing to being slapped because he is always sick and I'm so over it. How embarrassing when our son has to come out of his room to stop the argument and his friend is here listening. It is hard to be happy when you live with a hypochondriac.