Struggling with husband's cancer diagnosis after years of unequal parenting

[aponyatblackbirdcottage]

I met DH in 2018; we became parents at the very end of 2020 and got married in 2022; our DD was born a year later. So we’re now over five and a half years into having children: DS is six in December and DD was 3 last month.

In that time DH has not really been very hands on. He’s married to his job really. He doesn’t do their baths and stories or tidy up while I do, he just sits there while I sort the children then the house. He doesn’t get up with them at night if they wake or in the morning if they wake early. Even if he does do something it’s been instigated and sorted by me and he just doesn’t seem to think he has to do anything. So for instance he used to take ds to his swimming lesson on a Saturday morning. I’d get DS’s swimming stuff ready, he just had to take him. Then he’d say something like ‘oh, you didn’t pack DS’s goggles’ - it just didn’t occur to him that he could have packed his goggles.

I am sure I wasn’t blameless. I was working three days a week after maternity leave with dd and became increasingly resentful. It was very hard having both children home on my days off and I felt very alone. DH never took them to the park for a couple of hours. Sometimes he’d take one (usually the older one) and make out that was a favour.

Anyway, I did seriously consider ending the marriage but money was a big issue and I didn’t want to disrupt the children or be a part time mum. I also kept thinking if I could get through until both children were at school I could have a couple of days a week for me and they’d be a bit older and more independent and things would be better generally.

DH then started complaining of pain this year and I didn’t pay much attention at first but he does have cancer. We’re waiting on biopsy results.

He is genuinely in huge amounts of pain and I feel awful for him. Despite all I’ve said above I do care about him as the father to my children and someone I said sacred vows too and meant, but if I’m being really honest I am finding it hard to feel any sense of impending personal loss or grief. Which does make me feel the marriage was maybe not in a good place.

So now … DH can’t walk far. He is only able to sit on a specially adapted chair, which is in the main living area of the house. (Please don’t suggest we move it; we can’t.) He is insisting on working throughout, and holds teams meetings on the chair with the children gambolling about because it’s school holidays. Obviously this isn’t practical at all so I’m having to have them out all the time. I am exhausted as a result, and so so fed up.

I know this is a terrible thing to say but I’m so worried about life looking like this for the foreseeable. DH cured would be one thing but in all honesty this does not look likely. DH dying is awful and I don’t want to wish this on us. But this half life, where our home is no longer a sanctuary but a place or stress and anxiety and an office as well is just a nightmare. It really affects the children having DH there but ignoring them and just frowning at his laptop, which affects behaviour.

It will probably drag on for years like this and as it does I’m losing my children’s childhoods and my mind! I can’t just leave of course. I don’t know what to do.

That’s one of the hardest things to accept OP. As well as losing the actual person you lose the future you thought you had. You also find yourself thinking about the conversations you know you should have, but have no idea how to approach them despite the ever present knowledge that time is running out.

You mentioned finances. That conversation is going to have to come soon because if my experience of my DH’s cancer was anything to go by, it wasn’t very long before he wasn’t capable of making the decisions needed and that prompted us to go for lasting power of attorney. It was a godsend when he lost capacity because I just presented it to the banks and other organisations I needed to deal with and I was able to do what was necessary. The problem you have is that if your DH is resistant to it, then once he has lost capacity it’s much more difficult because the courts will likely have to appoint someone to oversee your finances, which means you have to wait for approval for anything you spend. It’s so hard, and sometimes it does seem overwhelming.

Do you have a young carers organisation where you live? They can support you & the dc through this journey, your oldest could go on activities & outings, they offer support to adult caring parents as well. Enquire at your local council to find out.

My husband added me to his main account when he became ill and it meant that the direct debits were paid automatically when he died .We had always been separate financially before.
You are in such a difficult situation and my heart goes out to you. I would also say that the fact that you do everything for the children will protect them although it is a huge burden for you.

@aponyatblackbirdcottage
I am so sorry you’re going through this. My dad is disabled with severe chronic pain and a special chair in the middle of the living room (no longer open plan, but it was when I and my siblings were children). Not life-shortening in his case, so I’ve had half a century to witness the effects on a family of someone who’s a bit selfish naturally, socialised as a male, and then has to retreat into himself to cope with constant pain. It’s worse to be him, of course. But you know what? It sucks to be the wife or child in this situation also. Idk how old/frail my mother will have to grow before friends ask her how she is and not how my dad is. She had a serious health scare recently, had to look her own fairly imminent death in the eye, and people still asked about my dad. How will he cope, etc etc.

I wish you luck and fortitude, and I hope you can access more support. I think age-appropriate honesty with your kids, ‘yes it is rubbish that daddy needs the living room all day’ goes a long way to help them, acknowledges they aren’t wrong to have their feelings. And neither are you, of course.