Long time user and poster, but have NC to avoid outing. Though, I'm sure some of the story will be outing anyway!
I have been with DP 10 years. Some of that time has been a bit grim, some really great, mostly Ok. For the most part we make a good team.
DP has had a dog since it was a pup - it was 9 when we met, so we are now the custodians of a very old dog. DDog has dementia, as is to be expected. He also struggles to walk any more than a few metres, and has accidents in the house if we are not on hand to let him out - 1s and 2s. He is 'healthy' just old.
So, the last five years at least we have done nothing, for fear of DDog passing while left alone, of falling and being unable to get back up (this stresses him out). More recently he has had a couple of seizures, from which he recovers.
I don't think, in the last 6 months at least, either of us has had a full nights' sleep. My DP comes to bed very late (after midnight most nights). I go to bed by 10.30pm as I get up for work around 5.45am. I also have an auto-immune disease that causes awful fatigue, but at a level I'm now used to, so can function with. Just.
Recently tensions have been high. We are both tired. I try not to snap but I get snapped at, not helping out properly or doing things right, sighing if I'm fed up. I'm not innocent, I know, and me 'fighting back' is relatively new for our relationship. When I do he tells me not to let my emotions ruin things, and, grossly, not to 'get moist' over things.
DDog picked up fleas at the in-laws (they knew they had a flea problem but didn't think to tell us). We didn't notice for a week until, it seemed quite suddenly, DDog was covered in black gritty bits - flea poop. This was the Saturday night, so on the Sunday I went out and got loads of shampoo, some frontline, flea combs, etc., and £75 later spent over an hour shampooing DDog, combing him, getting him clean, then drying him and applying the treatment. Well, that was all good until a couple of days later "you didn't do his tail". No, I didn't - I must have been too concerned with the rest of him. "He still has some under his chin". He didn't when I'd washed him. Turns out, in the week between visiting the in-laws and us noticing, we have an infestation. So I got spray for the house, which we've used.
Last night was it for me. I went to bed around 9.30pm, I was shattered. For two hours all I heard was DP moaning at the dog for whining (the dementia causes this and there is nothing that stops it). He put him out, brought him in, shouted (not loud, more just raised voice), and the cycle continued. Come 11.30pm ish, DP went into the spare room (we are in a bungalow, wooden floors, this room is next to bedroom). He dropped something. Yes it was accidental, but I sighed, I hadn't had any sleep. Well, that was it, he was going to go out for a drive, not have me sighing at him, he didn't give a f**k what I thought. I got up, went into living room, said it's not a good idea for you to go out. He went, came back around midnight. Then he starts combing the dog. Lots of fleas, alive and dead, starts hoovering, says he's going to shampoo him. By this time it's 00:30, I said I'm going to sleep in the car. I'm 38, earning a good salary and in a good job, and slept in the back of my car. I got a couple of hours eventually. Went in at 5.30am. Ready to leave at 6.30am. He has ripped up a carpet (that was going anyway) and sprayed everywhere with white spirit. Says he was able to work late "like he did before we met" because I wasn't in the house and he didn't have to worry about waking me up.
No, I wasn't in the house. Because I was in the back of my car (seats down so it was ok space wise), on the driveway.
We are both tired, I get that. But I just feel like I am totally coming second to DDog. I get that, too - DP has had him in his life 19 years. I just don't feel important enough. I don't feel like any kind of priority to him. I would never, ever expect him, or let him, sleep in the boot. He could have done all of that today while I'm out at work. I am exhausted today and have done next to nothing in the office.
I don't want to go home.