I have been married to him for almost 40 years. The last 10 have become hell on earth thanks to diabetese and its complications. He has gastroparesis which is one of the worst. He is in constant pain, has reflux that wakes him each night, and multiple other problems.
He is needle phobic trapping me with having to be there to inject him and taking away what freedom I had. He has depression and anxiety. I get blamed for everything.
Health care costs are killing us. He is too young for medicare so we pay through the nose. over a thousand dollars a month for health insurance. Co payments for doctors' appointments at least $100 per month plus 500- 600 per month for his pharmacy bills which are only partially covered.
Everything falls on me as he is less and less able to cope. He can not even re=order his own meds on time. I find myself becoming the food police. He demands things that are bad for him and rages when I refuse to give them to him. I find myself giving in more and more, soda with sugar, pastries and cake, tons of carbs, pasta. He does not exercise.
He rages behind the wheel. I am damned if I drive and damned if I do not. he rages either way. He refuses to take many of his meds or takes way too little of them. He them feels sicker, takes them again and then stops as he starts to feel somewhat better.
He will not go out at night. Last night, he needed a refill on a prescription and would not allow me to go out and leave him to get it. He is terrified of being alone at night. He is terrified of getting sicker but will not comply.
I have spent my whole life since age 17 with him. I have gone from loving wife to distraught caregiver. The future terrrifies me since he is getting progressively sicker and our financial situation keeps getting worse and worse. My earning ability has dropped drastically as his demand for care and his crazy behavior has increased.
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ReplyDeleteThe doctors are so pro patient and anti spouse that it is no use. When the gi specialist says that your husband is a very sick man and has no answers, you know he is in trouble and therefore so are you.
ReplyDeleteIhave mentioned to his doctor that the spouses need support too, yet even at this world famious diabetes center there is non.
The pharmacist knows about this needle phobia situation, but his sympathy is to hubby
Sar,
ReplyDeleteI also have a diabetic husband but I am lucky that he is compliant. My husband is a type II but has to inject a drug called victoza once a day. This is the last step before being insulin dependent.
The first time he got the victoza he had to inject it himself (or I had to inject him)before the doctor would give him the prescription. It was a really hard five minutes because both of us are needle phobic. My husband did his injection because he knew he couldn't depend on someone else to do it for the rest of his life.
I think the only place I am going with this story is that your husband needs to learn to do it himself. What happens if God Forbid you are killed in an accident? Can you make it not optional for him to do it himself?
You are in my prayers Sar!
Angela
They tried for hours to get him to do it himself. Over 3 hours with a diabetic educator RN. No one has been able to break through.
ReplyDeleteHe has a morbid fear of sharp instruments. His sibling was violently killed when H was a child and this has severely affected him. He is petrified of knives and scissors . I would buy them and he would take them and throw them out. If he sees so much a a steak knife, he has to hide the blade.
I have tried the what if I can not do the shots for any number of reasons. His answer is that he'd hire someone or go to the hospital. (He is used to being wealthy and able to hire people to do what needs to be done. he does not get what the change in our economic status has caused.)
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