My husband has had his share of health issues, and I have always been by his side as he recovers - I have supported him through quite a bit and we've made a good team! Recently, he became quite ill and needed to go into a rehab/skilled nursing facility for about a month to regain the strength and coordination to walk. When he was released, we decided it was best for him not to go home to our home because he'd be alone all day as my job keeps me out for 10-14 hours a day. He moved in with his elderly parents, and was going to stay a few weeks until I could change my work schedule.
Just as he recovered and gained strength, his Dad started to decline. Classic dementia (inability to swallow) and sundowning. Dad went to the hospital and was released to skilled nursing. My husband remained at their house to look after his Mom, as she can't hear/use the phone and is forgetful (leaving food on the counter instead of in the fridge, etc.).
Sadly, Dad passed and with him went all of the support Mom depended on. She's never had an ATM card, paid the bills, scheduled her own appointments, or even called in a prescription. She doesn't drive and her days are spent sleeping until 10-11am, watching TV, and rummaging through the clutter in her house. She often asks my husband to go get fast food or takeout because she doesn't want to cook....which he does, on our dime.
My husband now has to deal with his Dad's affairs and keep an eye on his Mom...and this is not going to be a quick process as his Dad never set up a will/trust and my husband never got power of attorney for anything. I want my husband to come home and I believe his Mom needs to be in either a senior living facility or a skilled nursing facility. The home she lives in has a lot of clutter on the floors, and she has zero safety equipment in the bathroom...meaning she's getting in and out of a bathtub daily without rails or assistance at 92 years old! I'm truly afraid she will fall and break a hip, and not even know how to get help if no one is there!
My husband believes Mom is still independent and not in need of in-home care, but he won't leave his Mom and come home, either. When I suggest getting her some part-time in-home care he defends her every move...even things that he knows aren't safe or logical.
It's been six months since my husband and I lived in the same home and I just want him back. I am so lonely and depressed. We see each other at least every few days...but we are drifting apart. I can't see this situation continuing much longer. I was my husband's rock when he needed me, and I've literally been cast aside because he won't admit his Mom needs help or to move into assisted living.
Just a side note...Mom cannot move into our house. We don't have a downstairs bedroom or bath/shower. I also could not stay sane if I had to live with her, because she'd demand takeout one too many times....
With the husband's own health issues, his dad's decline and passing, and then his mom's re-adjustment to her new life, he is now facing a lot of challenges.
I understand that why the wife is, now, feeling lonely and depressed with the way that this situation has unfolded. This situation is difficult for everyone - the husband, the mom and the wife.
Yet, this scenario seems to be presented as being so polarized - his mother versus his spouse. The husband is suddenly forced to deal with not only his own grief over his dad's passing (and any estate issues), his worries about his mom and her health/needs, his health but also now, his wife (his purported "teammate") pushing him to choose between his mother (who needs him, for right or wrong) and her.
Being put into a forced choice situation between a wife and widowed mom, could (and frankly should) make the husband resentful. A true team would be working together to provide the widowed mom with the support that is needed. The only issue preventing her from living with the widowed mom is because she "demands takeout"? I wish that the wife would have some empathy for her husband as well as for the widowed mom - the wife is not being "cast aside" - her husband and his mom are struggling with the many losses that have occurred. Give them both some grace and maybe she can actually be the teammate that the wife purports herself to be, one who understands that her husband and his family have gone through a lot rather than becoming demanding herself.
My FIL's wife died last year. He was living in independent living in Florida but needed more help. We had been down to Florida 5 months earlier and tried to talk to FIL and his wife about assisted living. They refused. When the wife died it was apparent my FIL had declined since we saw him 5 months earlier. IN a matter of 6 WEEKS this is what was accomplished.
My husband picked up his Dad planned the funeral and we took him to his wife's funeral in NY.
Then my husband flew back to Florida with his Dad for a week to collect belongings to be sent to us and empty out apartment. And I might add, traveling by airplane with his father was a nightmare. His father was also horrendous during the packing process, He just wanted to be taken to his MANY favorite restaurants one more time before he left.
While they were in Florida I scheduled tours for AL for when they returned.
Then my husband and his father flew back to our house in Pennsylvania. He stayed at my house for 4 weeks while we toured assisted living facilities. FIL could not be left home alone, he would use the stove . I work out of the house. My husband had to work from home everyday instead of hybrid . By the third week of FIL staying with us his boss was getting annoyed. Husband had already taken time off with the funeral and flying back and forth he hadn't stepped foot inside the office building in weeks.
The weeks that FIL stayed with us were horrible.
First of all , he could not get up the stairs. My son had to come over and we moved a bed downstairs to my husband's office and moved my husband's desk upstairs . I ran to Target and bought a waterproof mattress cover. FIL wet on my couch 3 times. Left BM messes on the floor, faucet handles , fan switch , wall by the toilet paper, left wet wipes with BM top of the back of the toilet etc in the 1/2 bathroom, which became FIL bathroom while he stayed with us. He dragged BM on floors outside the bathroom that got on his shoes. I came home each day from work and cleaned. In the middle of this we took him on multiple tours for an AL, late afternoons.
We had to take him over to my daughters apartment to shower, she had an elevator in her building, but it was a bathtub. We had to help get him in and out of it which was more difficult then we thought it would be. After that we paid for a handicapped hotel room a couple of times just to use the shower.
When FIL finally chose an AL, the day he was moving out of my house he attempted to extract promises. He said " I'll go to this place but I want to be taken out to dinner twice a week and one day on the weekend. "
And my husband had to do all this and take his Dad to a lawyer to get POA, open a bank account local to pay his bills, get his Dad a PA photo ID at DMV. I"m sure I left something out. as a side note It took DH a year to figure out the financial mess that his father left .
If all this was done in 6 WEEKS while we worked, I think this OP's husband should have made enough progress by now to get home to his wife. OP's husband is long overdue in coming home.
We tell ourselves that we are doing the right thing, and being empathetic to our mother, who needs someone on her property all the time.
We think we are living according to the golden rule: treating our mother the way we would like to be treated (but almost certainly won’t be) if we were in her shoes. And I sincerely told my wife that I would embrace her spending 1/3 of the year caring for a parent. If life gave me that lemon, I would have zero problem making perfectly good lemonade from it.
So LonelySpouse, even if your spouse is only gone 33% of the time, it could torch your marriage.
And to other readers/commenters: what’s so bad about giving your widowed mother so much time and attention in the final 5-10 years of her life? Is this a case of the road to hell being paved with good intentions? Also, is it just my imagination, or do lots of husbands have a much easier time with their wives being wrapped up in caregiving for a parent than vice versa?
He says that she's independent, but he needs to stay?
Does he have cognitive issues? Mental health concerns?
You say that you are the breadwinner?
Now, it's "I am the breadwinner in my household. My work hours are steady, and my husband is self-sufficient now, so my work isn't really a barrier anymore."
Does "self-sufficient" mean financially-an inheritance from his father maybe?
If he no longer needs your money, maybe he feels independent from you now.
Finances are always a big factor. One woman told me that if her husband had his own money, he would leave her. And he did when his parents passed and left him an inheritance.
Something to think about. If your money (which is yours, his, ours) in the marriage is going to support your husband to live at his Mom's, then you could say this to him:
"I respect your decision to help your Mom". Then proceed to quietly cut off any and all financial support of him until, and if, he returns home. His Mom, and his inheritance can support him over there? She can pay his medical bills too. There is absolutely no need to give him any more money?
The shared finances will return when he returns home.
Think also about: Is there a possibility that he does not want to share his inheritance with you?
See an attorney to protect your financial investment in your marriage.
The man who left his breadwinner wife sued and won support from her, got 1/2 of the house value from her etc. On top of not required to share his inheritance from his parents. (This is separate property unless he co-mingles his money with yours.)
Sounds like a legal separation, doesn't it?
I really don't know why I am sharing this with you, for all the heat I will be taking on from others for saying it out loud. And I hope it all works out best for you both. And you get your husband back soon.
The world all seems so upside down now.
Can you start to go out on regular and pleasant dates with him?