AIBU to feel hurt by my husband's lack of care after surgery

[OneSpoonySnake]

I’m not sure if I’m being overly sensitive or emotional but I wanted to just vent I suppose. I’m 24 hours home from surgery for endometriosis. My first diagnosis of this and they removed it in 3-4 areas. My husband has brought me up to our bed and mostly just left me to it. We have 2 kids so he seen to the school run this morning but I’ve had to ask for a cup of water and he’s not bothered to come check in or see how I’m feeling? AIBU to feel down by this? He came home earlier and had a moan about how tired he is after a day of dealing with the house, things I do all day every day on top of working full time. I’ve had surgery and he’s not even brought any food up to me? I’ve felt for a long time that he doesn’t care much for me anymore after 15 years together but this to me just solidifies that feeling. X

I had an MRI on my pituitary looking for a tumour. I drove by myself nearly 2 hours each way for it and when i got back home didn't even get a hug. I'm divorced now.

Of all the problems in our marriage this was the one incident that i just could never forgive or ever find a way past. That one day was the beginning of the end.

I felt completely unloved and unseen.

I am so sorry @OneSpoonySnake. You are at your most vulnerable and the person you should be able to count on to care for you is your husband. He is a selfish arse.

It is not normal and you have every right to feel hurt and angry. After each of my c-sections (the last with emergency hysterectomy) DH did everything, I got told off for going in the kitchen. After the last one it was 4 months before I could do the school run, he cooked, sorted out 3 kids under 4 and made sure I had what I needed. He still gets me drinks and snacks if I am unwell or had a hard day at work.

You need to speak up about how you feel and spell out what you would like instead. If he can't take it on board and do better then when you are feeling back to yourself then perhaps consider whether you actually need or want someone who could be so callous in your life. You deserve better.

I am so sorry for you OP. I had minor surgery on Tuesday and we have two very young children too. I don’t believe the excuse of it just being a man thing.

My Dh has dealt with the kids exclusively, told his office he’s working from home this week and next and has cared for me alongside kids and working full time. I am able to get up and down the stairs but he’s insisted I stay up in the bedroom and even downloaded some of my favourite films on the laptop to keep me company.

Hes just text to say he’s picking me up coffee and breakfast on the way back from the school run.

I don’t say this to rub it in, but this is the least I’d expect from him in our marriage. I’ve cared for him when he recovered from things.

I do hope you can have a conversation with him and express your disappointment

He was just such a fantastic man. My health isn’t the best I lived with him for a while and he was so caring.
Forever in and out of our local women’s hospital for hours on end in waiting rooms.
‘What are we in for today, then, ovaries?’
He actually had to carry me in once and the first thing they asked was if I was pregnant and he pinched a Victoria Wood show….
Not unless sperm can get through a sash window.
When my mum lost her hair he bought her a really expensive wig and then himself one from a joke shop and he’d stick it on.
Are we doing wigs today or are we not Maureen?
I am so shocked when I read these stories of women left without so much as a piece of toast. My other half isn’t that bad but I do miss my dad.
A trooper until the end his last words to me were ‘Brexit my arse!’
What a fella.

Misses the point entirely 🤨

All the people who climbed Everest days after hysterectomy are spectacularly missing the point. It is not about whether OP could or should look after herself. It is that the person who is supposed to care most in the world about her, bar her parents, simply does not care enough to even ask her what she needs. He doesn't have to instinctively know her precise needs, he doesn't have to be Florence Nightingale, only to ask her.

Love is a verb. It is shown through actions and how you treat the person you claim to love. Absence of action speaks loudly.

Yanbu. I'm really sorry OP it's horrible to realise that the person who should be there when you need them, a. Isn't and b. moans about helping you. I don't think you'll be able to unsee this.

Why should she have to when she has a partner who should want to care for her and support her post surgery. Following my hysterectomy my husband did absolutely everything for me and looked after all the household stuff too.

He’s shown you his true colours

@PetulaGordeno Your dad and mine are the same generation it feels like and very similar. When my mum was very ill at one point, I went to visit them. She was out of the hospital by then but needed a lot of care including suppositories, toilet help etc and I said something to him about how great he was and he said something like, "She's given me the most amazing family, and put her body through hell for us as a family, the least I can do is look after her when she's not doing so well."

There's this idea that men of that generation did nothing at home but I think it's bollocks. My experience is they did loads - gendered, often, but loads. And they took their RESPONSIBILITIES to their families very seriously.

I had a much older aunt who, when her DH died, discovered he'd been broke their entire married lives. He'd always done the traditional "man" thing of paying all the big bills and her earnings (which were decent) were for the extras and for her to spend. He treated her to things etc. turns out, he'd been doing without his whole life to provide that life for them.

OP I'm sorry your husband is being so usless. I would ask him for a drink or a snack and see if it is genuine thoughtlessness, or a lack of care. I hope you feel better.

My dad had a flexible job and he so did lunch and tea every day.
When my mum wanted to retrain he supported her every step of the way.
The same with me.
I feel so much for OP here. Having had a laparoscopy I was in agony after it and had to be readmitted. It’s really important to try and eat and stay hydrated.
I do wonder sometimes how some men really like of women - hatred, dislike, indifference?
When you are released after an op and live with a partner/spouse it is assumed they will help.

Do you genuinely not understand how you and @wintericestorm have jumped on this thread and made it all about you and how amazing and special and different to OP you both apparently are?? Really?? Come on!

If we're asking bloody stupid questions, I could just as easily ask you why can't you find a life partner to love you and take care of you through life's ups and downs?
But that would clearly be just as daft (and rude) as your question to OP.

Where on earth did I say I was special or amazing? The ONLY thing I said about it is that the hospital made me prove I could do stairs before I left ( same as everyone else).

So bloody quite all this other stuff I said

Omg your post has just made me cry so much. This is exactly like my dad. He is 100% the same. My mum died last year and he looked after her so well, until he was no longer able to. My dad is still with me thankfully, he fusses over me constantly even though I'm in my 40s and him almost 80! He's always said "it's my job because I love my family."

It sounds like you have amazing memories of your wonderful dad to cherish, and yes, it does prove that it's about the person; the op's DH shouldn't be excused because he's a man, he needs to step up and give her care.

Also @OneSpoonySnake , take care of yourself and hope you recover well. It's hard after surgery, I remember my hip operation and how hard it was for the first few weeks and that was before I had kids! X

Do you have to be so utterly inappropriate and rude?

What a lovely and kind gentleman your dad sounds 🥰
I think sometimes it’s the knowledge of having someone care so much for you that matters rather than them waiting on you hand and foot if that makes sense? Xx

This!
this hits the mark exactly and along with a few of the other lovely comments. It’s not that I can’t care for myself, I managed my newborn and toddler when I had a 3rd degree tear after birth. It’s having someone just care enough to want to make sure you’re ok xx

You have my full sympathy OP, your husband should be stepping up to care for you and he isn't. Please ignore the ignorant posters!
I hope you recover quickly x

Yanbu.
I am so sorry.
It is very hurtful to realise this.
I suggest you call a friend and ask for help.

This is what my friend did to me when she got covid 5 years ago and her selfish husband of 30 years was very poor in his care of her.
I dropped food over to her and some bits and pieces to her door.
Other friends rallied around dropping food to her too.
We deliberately brought single portions for her and not something to be shared.
He's such an arse, he actually complained 🙄.

He got it 2 weeks later and she totally matched his energy, a first in their relationship.
He didn't get anything like her normal care, the absolute bare minimum.

5 years on and he has long Covid. They are still married but live very separate lives.

It was her huge, long coming wake up call.
She doesn't do anything for him now, at all.
She is planning on retiring next year and will be divorcing him.
She has no intention of becoming his carer.
He has 3 children that are close to my friend but his years of being a selfish father have left their mark.

My advice to you is try not to upset yourself, it won't help your healing.
Reach out to friends or family, tell them the truth.
Get well.
Then start to look realistically at your future with honest eyes.
We are here for you.

I think sometimes if you've been really independent, they really don't know how to step in and take charge. It's like people get so used to you 'doing it yourself' that it literally does not occur to them that sometimes you CANNOT do it, because it's like you've changed personality overnight.

I am wildly and horrifically independent and live alone. Sometimes I really need to borrow an adult child to help with some task that can't be done single handed and I have to request it quite stringently because it would simply never occur to them to offer to help. They don't see me that way.

But I do think you need to Have Words with your DH, just in case he's being wilfully blind to your needs.

Seriously, get out of the bed. It’s recorded thing for you. Not saying to do everything as usual but laying in bed can lead to complications. Get up and move, gentle movement but quite a bit of it. Don’t lay in bed or sit in one position being waited on. Move. Move. Move.

Gosh but those posts of wonderful fathers have made me cry, not easily done.
So moving.
What absolute hero's they were and are.
What a tremendous legacy to leave their daughters, incredible examples of manhood.

Sadly too rare.
My own husband was very poor when i was very ill after my 3rd child and basically it never occurred to him that he should bring me food and not have me ask for it.

I became very ill, double pneumonia, and was hospitalised for 10 days, with several weeks of further recovery.
The link with me not eating was very clear.
He had to mind 3 children on his own with zero help.
It softened his cough I can tell you.

This is very wise.
I noticed it when I had my daughter. My mother was so used to me being the typical "eldest daughter" who didn't need anything and provided help rather than asking for it she was not at all prepared for a 10pm phonecall out of the blue while I sobbed that it was all too hard and I couldn't do it.
People accept us for who we say we are and when we cannot be that person anymore it can take them a minute.

In this case though, I still think the OPs husband is being insensitive and stupid, because he is right there and can see her struggle!

I think sometimes if you've been really independent, they really don't know how to step in and take charge.

How self centred do you need to be to put aside how tired you are because you're having to do your share for once and wonder how someone who has just been through surgery is doing? The person who you pledged to love above all others, in sickness and in health. Never mind taking charge, how about checking in?