"I can't take it anymore": exhausted husband is tired of taking care of his sick wife and leaves her at the hospital
Caring for a family member who suffers from debilitating diseases or illnesses is never easy, especially if within the family it's your husband or wife is suffering. For this reason, one will have to take care of the other, as if it were a child in need of care. It is not easy to live in such a situation, so much so that many families ask for help and assistance from experts in the health sector; others, on the other hand, can't handle the pressure ...
via AITA/Reddit
An anonymous man posted his testimony on Reddit, telling readers how caring for his wife who has stage 4 cancer is wearing him out in ways he never imagined. The words of his story are eloquent, and for this reason he wanted to ask other readers for opinions to understand if he was acting like an insensitive person or not: "My wife now has stage 4 colon cancer. For the last year and a half I have had to work and then go home and do most of the housework and also be a nurse. We have two sons and a daughter who help us, but I was expected to be their go-to parent on everything. A year ago, my wife pretty much stopped being able to do anything on her own. She's become a little rude with me, and practically screams and cries hysterically all the time. She also blames me for not being "nice" to her, when in fact I am. I felt like I no longer had an identity of my own."
During the summer I talked to the doctors and they told me there was a lot of red tape required to get my wife into a nursing home. Last week, my wife had to be rushed to the emergency room. All week I realized how much of an effort it had become for me to take care of a woman who was barely lucid and angry when she was lucid. I realized I was basically mom and dad in the house and was so tired of doing it every single day and waking up at 6am. When I found out that my wife was going to be discharged, I made up my mind: when the hospital called to say they would discharge my wife and that I had to be there to collect her, I told them I didn't want to take care of her anymore."
The man then concluded: "The hospital kept calling me back and the person on the other side begged me to take my wife home. However, I stayed firm in my position and said my wife had to go to a professional nursing facility and said them that the social workers needed to understand this. Had I reached my limits? My daughter in particular is very upset that her mother is not coming home. My children were yelling at me that they would take care of their mother 24 hours 24/7 if they had to. However, I knew the hospital social worker would do her job competently and help my wife get into a new facility."
Obviously, even Reddit readers didn't take the decision by this exhausted husband and dad well, siding with the angry children: what would you have done in his place? What would you recommend to this very tired husband?
