Anyone who has read my posts over the last years knows that my hubby has been alternatively supportive, stubborn, terrified, reclusive and even on occasion aggresive towards my illness, pouch surgeries and complications...so Friday he came home and told me that while talking with a colleague who had met me last week that I was 'his rock, his pitbull, his mountain on whom he counts more than anyone else...that I was amazing and surprising in that I faced up to illness and disease with a smile and never, ever let go of my dreams...and that he was so proud to be my husband'...and then he appologised to me for ever doubting me or my capacity to fight for what I believed was true...that I would one day be healthy and be able to have a normal life...
It has been a long and terrifying journey these last 13 years...over 15 major surgeries, some successful others disasterous and as many occlusions, torsions, blockages and hernias plus all of the other post op complications that go along with them...the last 3 years of full out convalescence where I could not even dream of working plus the loss of my appartment and all of my savings...some days I did not honestly believe that I would be able to put one foot in front of the other ever again...but he stuck it out with me inspite of the advice from many of his 'friends' that he could find 'better' elsewhere. (no longer his friends...I made sure of it!)
It was harder for him than for most because his job requires me to be present for many events that demand a healthy spouse...Hour long visits to construsion sites (where is the toilet???!) and inagurations of new unfinished buildings (stadiums, amphitheaters, urban renewal projects...) where we had to walk around for miles without a break...weekends spent with couples in foreign countries where I couldn't eat a thing and was terrified to leak in front of some official personality...plus all of those events that he was invited to that he cancelled at the last minute because I just wasn't up to it ( terror of public leaks or too much pain to move)...and refused to go alone...
It has been a long and bumpy ride for him...I got sick after our first date, we had our 2nd and 3rd in the hospital!...And he had no reason to stick around other than the fact that he loved me...many would not have hung around let alone married me between 2 major surgeries...he fought against family and friends who told him to end it a thousand times, that I was too 'complicated', too much trouble, too sick to give him a good life...and a couple of times we almost didn't make it...so when he told me that he was a weakling and coward and I was the one who gave him the courage to go on I was shocked...My Chistmas present this year was him telling me that he loved me and was lucky to have me as a wife...so for those of you who think that it is over, that an unsupportive spouse is the end or that it can never be good again...give it some time and nurture it...maybe, just maybe it will work out in the end.
I am so grateful that I didn't give up on him.
PS...I found a job last week too.
Sharon
Original Post
I struggle with the idea of letting someone new see all of it.
