Help save my WAW

[NotReadyToQuit]

Sorry, this might be a little long but without the background you won‘t get the whole sitch. My wife and I met 13yrs ago in high school and dated for 2 yrs. We broke up before college, stayed in touch, and then reconnected and got back together after college in 2005. I was ecstatic! She has always, and will always be, the love of my life. Everything was great, we were happy, loved each other and got married in late 2008. I couldn’t imagine myself with anyone else.

About 8 months before the wedding, my wife was diagnosed with chronic myeloid leukemia (CML). She never got sick, was never hospitalized, and if you didn’t already know, you wouldn’t have any idea she had cancer. Her CML is managed by a daily chemo pill, and apparently, if you’re going to get leukemia, this is the kind you want. As long as she responds to the medicine, it will keep her in a form of remission.

Obviously this was a shock and changed our entire life plan. Her life dream was to have a family and be a stay-at-home mom. That was my dream also. Because of the chemo, she will not be able to carry children. We froze some embryos before she started, but we don’t have much hope they will be viable. The other thing is the price of the medication. She currently works for a large company that has pretty good insurance, so right now that’s not a problem. I have my own small business, so the cost for me to cover our insurance premiums would be astronomical. Not to say it won’t be an option someday, but as for now, it’s not. I’m still in the start-up phase, so for the time being, she is our sole income. This creates her fear (justifiably so) that she will always have to work, and destroys yet another of her dreams.

Looking back now, I probably didn’t deal with this situation properly. We never really faced these obstacles head-on, and didn’t ever deal with the diagnosis. I constantly tried to be the cheerleader and convince her that everything was going to be ok. I loved her more than anything and as long as we had each other, we would be fine. If children weren’t in the cards for us, maybe we adopt, maybe we just travel more. I wanted her to know that nothing else mattered to me as long as I had her.

To say that we had a great burden thrown upon us early is a gross overstatement. We were just kids. Still are kids (28 now). So we’ve had to deal with a lot of crap in our first two years of marriage that most people don’t deal with in their lifetime. This has led to some depression on both of our parts.

For the last year or so she hasn’t been her self. Pretty down and just worn out. I attributed it to the meds and side effects. I always tried to do anything she wanted or needed and always tried to make her happy or comfortable. About 6 mo ago, she was starting to seem down-right miserable and acted like she was always irritated by me. I couldn’t do anything right and she was always very critical of anything I said. Finally, I sat her down and asked her what was going on. She didn’t seem happy, and didn’t seem happy with US. That’s when she dropped the first bomb.

She told me that she still loved me, but didn’t think she was IN love with me anymore. She thought that our relationship had grown into two good buddies living together. I asked her if she thought she would be happier being married to someone else and she said she didn’t know. We had a good talk after that, but things didn’t get any better at home. She was still so irritated with me all the time and made our house almost uncomfortable to be in. It was like she hated me. We weren’t communicating very well, so I wrote her a long letter laying out all of my feelings, admitting the mistakes I’d made, and ways I would try to change for the future. She didn’t even acknowledge that she had read it. After two days I finally asked her and she looked me in the eyes and just said “yeah.” No emotion or feeling, just “yeah.” Needless to say, that didn’t get us anywhere.

The first therapist we saw, we didn’t like much and didn’t get much out of it. The next therapist (the last) was much better. My w said she just didn’t know what she was feeling and wasn’t sure what to do. She tends to hold grudges and once someone pisses her off or disappoints her, she more or less writes them off. This is what I’ve been afraid of. In these last therapy sessions she opened up a little more and told me she felt betrayed by me. That I wasn’t the person she thought I was, and I didn’t seem like an adult to her. This hurt. She couldn’t come up with any specific examples other than my seeming lack of ambition. She thought that my business sitch (and lack of income) didn’t bother me. I tried to explain to her that it bothered me a great deal, but her mind was kind of made up already and wasn’t really listening or trying to understand my point of view.



The next bomb was when she said she didn’t feel like I could support her or take care of her. She said I just didn’t make her feel like she thought she should feel and that maybe we were never as close or as in-love as we thought we were. I couldn’t believe this. How could she all of a sudden feel this way, and how can you look back and say you weren’t as happy as you should be. How can anyone know that?



Anyways, a few days later (11/18) she said she was done trying and wanted a divorce. She said she deserved a chance to be happy and that there wasn’t anything in our R worth saving. She said I didn’t need to move out anytime soon and could wait until after the new year to find a new place. Since then, I’ve been sleeping in our guest room and things have seemed a lot better. She seems happier and less irritated. We talk more and she seems more attentive and caring. (stupid things like saying “thank you” and “god bless you.”)



I guess I’m just wondering what I’m supposed to do. I don’t want a D, but if she’s going to treat me like trash I need to move on. Her sudden switch in mood and attitude has given me pause though and a little hope that maybe she’ll change her mind. I started looking for apts and she told me that I shouldn’t rush into anything and that I could stay til the end of the year.



I think she is in a really dark place now and doesn’t know what she wants. She seems to be blaming me for her unhappiness and I’m sure there’s a great deal of resentment. Is there hope for us? I’d like to think there is. I’m not done fighting, but it feels like I’m the only one who cares. I’m trying to seem happy around her, like I’m OK and that I’ll be fine without her. It’s just so hard, especially around the holidays and thinking about the future without her. We’re not just talking about a 2 yr marriage, but a 13yr relationship. I just can’t shut the door on that yet. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. I feel like I’m drowning.

[dbmod]

Hi Not Ready to Quit,

Welcome to our community. I am glad you're not ready to quit. There's no need.

You ARE young, you two an incredible amount of stress, and of course you would have depression involved. It would have to take a toll on your relationships.

Are you willing to change jobs--get a full-time job with another company and either drop your business or keep it on the side?
It appears to be the 180 that could change her mind.

What are the other things that irritated her?

You still seem to have a lot that is good, because you did have some improvement when you gave her space. And that is good because you showed you cared enough to do that, and she doesn't need you rush out.

You DO have hope. And we are here to help you.


One other thing: It might be possible to 'DB' your business, and get you more clients or a bigger client. There might be something you can do differently there. Think about it.

[sandi2]

Welcome to the community. So sorry to hear about your W's illness. Both of you are so young to face such a heavy burden. Has her doctor talked to you without her being present? Some of her mood swings might be related to the treatments, IDK, but it would hurt to ask the doc. I wouldn't suggest it to her b/c women tend to be touchy about that.

It's good that she can talk to you, but she probably has had many thoughts that is burried in her heart that nobody knows. She's having to deal with some very major issues. Does she ever seem afraid? The reason I ask is that she may feel that she's got to grab as much as fast as she can. Finding out that she can't have children and saying that she "deserves" to be happy......I'm sure she's got to feel like she's been cheated.

Are you both still seeing a therapist? If you have one that can tell you how to coop in a R where one is very ill....that will be valuable. But if the M is all that is discussed, it may not be enough. Your M has a special crisis and some couples simply do not have the tools to know what to do.

It's good that you have been her cheerleader. You've shown so much support aNd she's lucky to have a H who is willing to go through the thick & thin with her. Many, many H's will take off when this kind of pressure hits their life. My D has a disease, and the first H couldn't deal and he left. Now,she has a man who I think will be there for her. I just threw that in to let you know that I can feel for you.

I think one thing you may need to be careful about is smothering her with your efforts of cheerleading her on. Trying to "help" too much (if you know what I mean) and checking on her to see how she's feeling too much.....well she gets irritated. Better back away some and try hard not to smother her with your great concern.

I think you need to stay with her as long as you can.

You sound like a mature young man. I hope you are b/c you may see some bad sides of her before things start to get better. Sickness tends to do that to us. She may even feel guilty that she's robbed you from having children. She may feed guilty about being sick and thinks you need a life with somebody who could make you happier.

Get the Divorice Remedy book by MWD. It's an easy read and has great advice.

Read other threads here on the board, and reach out to otheres. Post here on your thread and keep us updated. It does help a lot to come here to talk, plus we a lot of good folkes who have wise advice.

Have a personal question, do the two of you attend Chruch? This is a time that you need to have like minded believers around you...and praying for you. The Pastor or Priest could probably help in the matters about dealing with M issues and how much does her disease affect this.\

((hug))

[sandi2]

I meant to say that talking to the doctor would NOT hurt. The edit button doesn't work anymore.

[NotReadyToQuit]

Thank you so much for the responses. It feels good to hear that someone understands.

As far as the job sitch, I can't change jobs but I'm getting ready to start a second job in addition to the private practice. I think this is probably the 180 that will have the biggest impact. Not just for her, but for me as well.

I think her moods are definitely affected by her treatments. She has been on all sorts of hormone replacements and is now trying to get off of them. This and a couple other meds are definitely not helping the situation, but the drs don't seem to care about that and so she won't change anything.

One of our big problems is that she CAN'T really talk to me. It's taken two years for her to finally tell me some of these fears and dreams that have been ruined. I think she did feel guilty at one time for how it's affected me. She recently told me that she had wanted me to tell her how scared I was and that I was really disappointed that we couldn't have children. Why the hell would I tell her that?! The last thing I wanted was for her to feel any guilt at all and that would just lay it on pretty thick! She took my behavior (trying to make her feel that everything would be ok) as me not really caring or being concerned about our future. Boy did I miss the mark on that one!
SInce then, I've tried to address these things and clear up any miscommunications we may have had, but it didn't seem to do anything. She just doesn't think I can take care of her and said she has never felt secure. I know part of this is due to us relying on her income, but we discussed this before marriage. It would probably take 5 years for my practice to get up and running, and until then we would live on her income and any profits I was making would go towards the hefty student loans. Now I think this is an issue, hence the second job.

We aren't seeing a therapist anymore. At our last appt. she said she was done trying and wanted a divorce. She said her mind was made up, so the therapist offered to help further if we wanted, but if her mind was made up then she didn't have to convince me or prove anything further. It takes two to make a marriage work and only one to break it. At this point, I don't know how to bring up further therapy. I've been trying so hard not to talk about our R, and trying not to imply that I still have hope. Is this wrong? She seems so less stressed now. Yesterday we spent the entire day together shopping, buying a christmas tree and putting lights on the house. SHE asked me if I wanted to do these things with her. I thought that was a good sign, but maybe I'm just reaching.

Currently we don't go to church. She recently told me that she doesn't know if she believes in God and isn't sure if she ever has. I've gone sporadically by myself, but my faith hasn't been that strong lately either.

I talked to her mom last week to see what her thoughts were and get a vibe for what they were telling her. I was pleased to hear her say that she told my W not to do anything yet. Just let it be for awhile and take some time. She told me that my W just gets so worked up sometimes and has this anger that she can't let go. Once someone or something disappoints her or upsets her, she holds a grudge and knocks them down a peg or two and rarely lets them back up. This, I was aware of, but have no idea how to help fix it. She sees a therapist once a month, but I haven't seen any changes or improvements. His view on marriage is not a great one, so I fear that he is helping her be OK with leaving.

[NotReadyToQuit]

What are the other things that irritated her?

Part of what has been so hard is that she couldn't really come up with any particular things that irritated her. She said it was anything and everything. She didn't really understand why. It has always seemed to me that she is angry about a lot of things and resents me for whatever reason and takes it out on me. I'm ok with her taking her anger out on me sometimes, but I'm worried she thinks I'm causing her anger and that she's convincing herself that our m is what is keeping her from being happy.

[NotReadyToQuit]

SO, for the last couple of days my W has seemed happy around me. Not irritated or annoyed. We've joked around and she's even been laughing. Can't remember the last time I've heard her genuinely laugh. I even put my arm around her and she laid her head on my shoulder. It felt really good. I can't believe how much I've missed physical contact.

On my way home tonight, I called her to see if there was anything we needed at the store and she seemed like her old self. We talked for a few minutes about her day and it felt like old times. We were actually talking, no uncomfortable dead air.

My question is, are these good signs or could this mean she's moved on completely and is content with her decision?

[NotReadyToQuit]

ok, so i just found a note that my W wrote to herself (maybe for a blog or something). she says that "it's not about family or friends, it's about feeling loved. we need different things to feel loved and we just can't provide that for each other."

to me, this is definitely not a reason to end a marriage and 13 yr relationship!! i know i shouldn't bring up talk about our R, but i really feel like i need to address this. please, please, someone give me some feedback.

[InAPickle]

Quit snooping. It will just drive you crazy.
And let her initiate any R and D talk.

[NotReadyToQuit]

i know i shouldn't snoop. it's just that it's the only way i can get any insight into what she's feeling and when i DO find something, it's a feeling that you shouldn't end a marriage on. i don't know who all she's talking to, but someone is in her ear telling her that this is a good move. i'm just so worried. she won't talk to me about any of it. the last time we talked about our R, it was about my apartment search. i know i'm supposed to just let it be and give her space, but it's killing me!