Situation: wife has had a trip to visit relatives across the country, and attend a wedding. Hotel and plane reservations made, dress, jewelry, shoes bought. Relatives have been begging her for years to please come visit.
Husband is immature, needy, anxiety-plagued individual who has an umbilical hernia. All of a sudden he decides he has to have an operation possibly before she goes. He doesn’t want to stay home alone for a week in case he’s struck down with intestinal strangulation. He has NO symptoms, no pain, he’s had the hernia for month. He doesn’t want her to go on that trip, and she feels he’s pulling this shit now to ruin her trip.
She is devastated, just devastated. If they schedule the operation (which is an in-out thing with a few days to take it easy) and it interferes with her trip, she will have to call it off and attend to the husband. He’s seeing a doctor today to get an opinion.
There is no one - NO ONE - else to help. She is IT. (she also has to take care of two disabled adults, found someone to fill in for her.)
I can understand each one’s feelings. He is scared, doesn’t want her to leave him home alone, wants her there to take care of him. She feels he is doing this precisely to prevent her trip, that he’s had months to have his hernia operated on, and she is devastated that she won’t see her beloved family after waiting a whole year. She is SO depressed.
Won’t find out what will happen with husband’s big fat herniated gut till later today.
What should she do? Suck it up, call the family, cancel the trip, and be a good supportive wife? How can she do that? Just pretend she’s good with it? Is SHE being the immature selfish one?
Unless he is told by the Dr that he must have the surgery, she should go. Maybe even if he does have to have the surgery. It sounds like he’s being a bit selfish actually.
Sounds to me like she needs to take care of three disabled adults. Husband is a whiny baby who should put on his big boy pants and hold off on the surgery until she gets back. If he’s so terrified that the hernia will worsen while she’s gone, he can carry a cellphone everywhere he goes. IMHO.
If it were me, I would go on the trip regardless of what he does. Hernia repair is not such a major surgery that he needs around the clock care. If he does need help, well, he can talk to the social worker at the hospital about having a visiting nurse check on him.
Go on the trip. The husband is pulling this to control her because he doesn’t want to be alone. If she also takes care of two disabled adults, she needs the break. And husband needs to assure her that it’s perfectly fine to leave, he’ll be fine, have a wonderful trip, etc.
If it doesn’t require urgent surgery but needs prompt attention they should both go on the trip and he should have the surgery across the country. One hospital is much like another. He can lay around recuperating while she enjoys herself.
She’s being held hostage by her husband’s selfish neuroses. I agree with QuickSilver, she should get a one-way ticket. Or at least contemplate whatever she’s getting out of the marriage.
This might make sense in any modern country in the world except the US. Insurance won’t conver elective surgery at a remote and distant location from his coverage area. Doing this would likely result in financial devastation – that is, assuming they’re in the US.
She should go on the trip. She may find out life can be fun, and he may find out he can survive without her there all the time. Are the disabled adults her relatives or his?
Don’t think of it as leaving him behind to fend for himself.
Look at as a learning experience, tough love, preparing him for an independent life. He needs to learn to fend for himself and more importantly, learn he can fend for himself.
It’s not selfish to leave him home alone, whether or not he elects to get the surgery.
It’s selfish to allow him to stay in a child-like dependent state.
Is she a wife or a mommy?
However, we’re only getting one side of the story here. I would be quite interested to read the husband’s version of events. I’m sure it would paint a much different picture and we’d all be telling him to dump the bitch if we heard it from his perspective.
Sure, except he’s “an immature, needy, anxiety-plagued individual…” What else do we need to know? Of course he’d paint her as an unfeeling, selfish bitch. Far more fun to judge and condemn without all the annoying facts getting in the way.
Maybe too late now, but she should be going with him to the doc. This is a health care decision that affects both of them, so she should be involved. At the very least, she can be assured of getting straight answers if she hears it from the doc instead of from the husband.
:dubious: They have absolutely no friends whatsoever where they live? Not investing in friendships is right up there with not investing for retirement. Depending on just what sort of assistance is needed, friends are a resource that you can potentially call upon in times like this. It can be as basic as providing a ride home from the hospital, and checking in on him once or twice a day.
What’s he gonna do if she gets hit by a bus? My wife makes my daily life easier, but I do fine when she’s out of town.
As has been said upthread, we probably don’t have the whole story. But from what’s been provided, it seems the surgery could be postponed until after she gets back. If his condition spontaneously worsens to the point of incapacitation while she’s gone, well, that’s what 911 is for.