DH wants me to take him to A and E because he feels so ill

[jazzyfazzy766]

My DH always seems to be ill. He is 48 and quite fit but as soon as you put him in a pub, theatre, cinema, church, train or bus - he gets ill with a cold cough sore throat etc but it is always 100 times worse than when anyone else gets a cold and lasts for weeks - ( his car went for a service end of week before last and he got the bus back) - next day he came down with a cold - he screams in pain and panics and shivers like mad moaning he is really hot but he never has a temperature. He has even bought 3 different thermometers now coz he thinks they are broken. Twice before he has been admitted to hospital coz he has walked in the Dr's bent over double crying with pain so docs have thought he had pneumonia or quinsy. Both times he has been admitted to a ward and had tests which have come back clear and told he has a cold- he is upstairs screaming in pain saying he is burning up temp is 36.8 ( so no fever) and demanding I take him to A and E now. He saw Dr on Friday who said it is a cold no chest infection or tonsillitis. WwYD? Without a high temp I really honestly think it is just a cold - this prob happens 4 - 5 times a year and I think he spends more time being ill than well. During lockdown was the healthiest he has ever been! Should I take him. 111 said no temp it is nothing serious .

I have allergies and get cold like symptoms all the time. It’s not unusual for me to wake up with a half blocked nose and a sore throat. It’s big a virus though. My nose is stuffy from allergic rhinitis (I think it’s dust mites ) and my throat is sore from breathing through my mouth. A number if times when I’ve had these symptoms just before a holiday I’ve convinced myself it’s a cold (or covid).

Maybe after getting normal allergy symptoms after being near a sick person he convinces himself he’s sick. He ma not be doing it on purpose. Sounds like his mother has conditioned him to be a hypochondriac and germaphobe from a young age. Like others I also almost immediately suspected he might be neurodiverse. I can’t imagine Covid has helped things either.

He needs professional help whether his issues are physical or psychological. The family can’t keep going on like this.

Multiple factors would be my guess.
Rubbish immune system, possibly negatively affected by parents health anxiety if they kept him away from people and places often.
Health anxiety learnt from parent, belief that only doctors can help.
Heightened interoception, due to neurodiversity, making the experience of pain or discomfort very intense.
I feel for him and you all.
Honestly, health anxiety is a bugger to treat, and he probably won't see it as the issue, but CBT that takes into account the other things would be helpful maybe.
See if you can engage him in the idea that as it keeps happening, he needs to take control by changing his response (instead of A&E, can he learn ways to better manage his discomfort and symptoms; if he is prone to bugs, what things help boost immunity and health, what proportionate steps can he take to reduce the number of colds per year). Parents have taught him ill health is a disaster and must be treated externally, that's not true, he can take some effective steps and cope himself.
But yeah, don't collude with trips to A&E, or helpless - support self efficacy and coping, however validating how shit the pain is for him.

Sounds like he needs treatment for chronic hypochondria.
My OH always massively exaggerates minor illnesses but nothing like on this scale.

@Dymaxion People with autism went one of two ways during the pandemic.

1. Anxiety was heightened and they couldn’t cope with changes in routine which increased their stress.
2. Anxiety lowered due to much fewer social expectations and a constant environment decreasing stress.

I would suspect OP’s husband was the latter. Which would explain why his health was better during lockdowns.

Also, with covid or any virus, could be due to threshold not being met for infection.

For example in the real world you might be on a bus/train for 30-40 mins in the morning (confined environment) with 30-100 people and 20% of them might have covid so you have multiple exposures to viral particles, then you go to your workplace and again have multiple exposures, you need to go to tesco to buy some bits for tea and again have multiple exposures, then you’ve got the public transport home again…. By the time you have got home or after a few days of this where the virus is circulating at high level you have had so much exposure your body can’t fight it off and you meet the threshold to develop the infection yourself.

Meeting that threshold comes about due to viral (strain, replication rate, ability to persist in the environment etc), host (previous exposure, immune system, sex etc) and environmental factors (temperature, social distancing, hand hygiene etc.) combined.

Arguably, the OP’s husband was at substantially less risk in a house with a single person infected who likely was isolating in their room with a window open or at least wearing a mask…. Than he would be now in environments such as OP described with no social distancing, being exposed to large numbers of people who will have higher levels of infection themselves after limited exposure to viruses over the last few years.

Also I don’t agree with the health anxiety angle; it’s likely the parents were bringing the kids with valid complaints to see Gp and that autism was undiagnosed because high functioning wasn’t really on the radar in those days.

Saying this as someone who was taken week after week with various complaints as a child. And was eventually diagnosed with various autoimmune issues and autism as an adult. One of DC is also autistic, and will have complete meltdowns over a tiny cut.

Research psychosomatic illness. It doesn't mean he's making it up or the symptoms feel any less real to him, but the origin is psychological rather than physical. The mind is a powerful thing

He sounds really distressed. I think ND and acute sensory distress 10000% fits the bill. I'm astounded by the total lack of empathy displayed by PP.

I tend to agree with this. A parent faced with a child screaming in pain for whatever cause is likely to react by seeking medical help. It’s not necessarily that his mother overreacted to ordinary mild signs of illness.

He absolutely needs the GP OP and I'd try to get him there whilst he's like this so they can see how severe his issues are because it's really hard to describe people's mental state when they're well again. He needs some sort of therapy or treatment for his health anxiety.

I wonder if Mom used to egg them on a bit in the dramatics when she constantly took them to the Dr's and it's almost a trained response now?

As a aside for the regular colds, I'd try a one a day antihistamine long term and see if it helps. I have low level allergies to lots of things, a reaction to an air spray can feel like immediate flu, low level is sinus pain, constant runny nose but I've worked to reduce allergens so no pets etc, and over the counter antihistamines were enough to bring the rest down. It might be worth a try IF you're seeing signs of actual cold not just histrionics

As someone who has ME, probably the illness that has been the most demonised as being ‘psychological’ when it’s not, I’m very uncomfortable with all the talk about the fact the OP’s DH suffers from a psychosomatic illness rather than a real illness.

Nothing not showing in the tests doesn’t mean you aren’t ill and some tests aren’t out of range. You need to do the right tests!
Feeling extremely hot Wo a temperature isn’t unusual. (Works with feeling cold and shivery too btw). Just see the menopausal hot flushes for example.
Same with the fact he is in pain.

i really feel for him tbh.

And this would be the right thing to do too.

Imagine if you had a child screaming in pain and didn’t take them to see a GP. And it turned out that actually they had <insert if if the many potential including the autism hyper sensibility>
What would say about that parent? How would you feel if you were the parent letting child down?

Not read the whole thread, but have they checked his vitamin D? I was constantly catching everything going, and struggling to shake it off, when mine was deficient.

Didn't explain the screaming with pain though! Some kind of sensory processing difference perhaps?

OP I hope you and the rest of the family got some sleep. As a relatively able 48 year old it is his responsibility to get some professional help with this.

There is definitely something amiss here, and not something that A&E can help him with. If he routinely gets into this state 24 hours after being in a public place, that's not sense. Viruses don't take a constant 24 hours from exposure to symptoms, and if he was this susceptible he would also be catching viruses from you and your children at the drop of a hat, yet he didn't catch the covid that was in the house.

The bottom line is that whatever the issue, it is not yours to fix. It is completely unreasonable that your children have to leave the house because they can't sleep due to his screaming and flailing. I have never known anyone scream and flail and thrash due to physical illness. Kidney stones can be horrendously painful sting a bit, but even that doesn't often cause the reaction you're describing. He needs the right kind professional help.

I would draw some healthy boundaries now, it sounds like you have put up with enough, and let him know it's his responsibility to take steps to find out what is going on for him, as this is very much not normal. You are his wife, not his enabling crutch.

A&e wouldn't have been appropriate but I would start recording him and pushing him to ask for a mental health assessment. What he is doing suggests there is an issue there that he would very much benefit from help with.

I agree with this. He's definitely 'not well' in some regard, and the situation is becoming untenable.

I could not be with someone like this, what an attention seeking wimp

and I say that as someone with numerous painful health problems.

Whether he feels really ill or not, something needs to happen here as it's not fair for you and your children to be putting up with this shit every couple of months.

To be screaming and writhing around on the floor - id be telling him to go to a&e if that's the case but I wouldn't be driving him there.

I have a few painful conditions myself so if it is something I'm not unsympathetic but I have never been screaming and shouting and causing distress to my children repeatedly. He needs to keep going to his GP if he really is in this much pain on a regular basis and get some proper tests arranged and painkillers to take.

Personally without more information it sounds to be like attention seeking behaviour. You can be in a lot of discomfort but to be screaming like that and demanding you take him to a&e every time is just ridiculous. That's not what a&e is for and he's already been seen by the staff there previously.

I'd be really limiting attention when he's acting like this so as to not reinforce it.

I can't get over the screaming. Do you mean proper high-pitched shriek as if in terror - the kind of noise someone might make in a scary film?

I genuinely don’t know how you tolerate him! He sounds like a nightmare. Like him lm terrible for picking up every cold going -record is 2 different colds in 2 weeks. Difference is l suck it up e.g. last year l only had 2 days sick from work in the whole year, despite colds, COVID and being pregnant with twins at 43 etc. Zero chance of me going to A&E: it’s not an accident or an emergency plus what will they do for a cold? If he’s as ill as he says he is, then how can he have the energy for the screaming and writhing?! It all sounds very dramatic and indulgent

My 15 year old was diagnosed with Chronic Fatigue syndrome when he was 11. He takes antihistamine all year round, gets cold etc very easily but didn't catch Covid. Plus Essential Tremors. He is also autistic (diagnosed last year). He complains of pain a lot, I believe it is genuine and linked to everything else. I think sometimes you can have an unfortunate set of conditions that exacerbate everything. He's been seen by physio, paediatrician, neurologist etc.

He doesn't scream in pain, but that's about the only difference I can see (and I appreciate that's a difficult one to tolerate)

He seems a bit better today (this is day 11) but still says he feels the poison is attacking him and he is on fire but the paracetamol has worked today so it isn't as bad as yesterday.

For a better word as my kids call him he is a"wuss" when ill. He definitely isnt making it up he has proper cold symptoms each time he gets hit with a cold and it is far worse than when I get a cold, constant sneezing and runny nose for at least 10 days sometimes 3 weeks - I get a cold it lasts a couple of days. I can pretty much carry on. Because the space between each cold is getting less and less and each time the cold and symptoms are lasting longer and paracetamol doesn't always work it definitely does warrant further investigation. He spends more time being ill than well.

About an hour ago when he was feeling semi human and he could talk to me properly he says when he screams (which is more like high pitched moaning) he feels so hot and sick and his body goes into a state of panic because the pain is so intense,

I am going to order him a load of multivitamins and such like because there must be an underlying reason why he picks up everything. For some reason his immune system doesn't work as it should and I don't think it ever has.

What will happen now is that he will get better (hopefully) within the next few days and in about another 2/3 weeks he will get hit with another bug and we go through the cycle all over again.

He sent an econsult earlier and a doctor is going to phone him within the next few days but we definitely need it investigated for all our sanity.

So apart from these two episodes of A and E where he has been admitted onto wards, what other investigations, departments has he been under as an outpatient.

Have there been many referals to different consultants or just gp visits with a diagnosis of a cold.

Pain where though? He shouldn't have pain everywhere with a cold!

I inject a medication that gives me flu symptoms weekly and that also gives me bone pain but that's because of the medication, not the flu symptoms. Usually have a temp of 39/40 overnight

Your dcs are saying he us a wuss because they’ve heard you say that. Either to him or to them when they complained if a cold symptoms.

Im wondering what you’ll tell them if it turns out there us something going on…