3. The Choice to have Surgery
New MD
Out of the blue my wife announced "I've got an MD appointment tomorrow morning at 9:00 - Oh, and I changed doctors." The fact she changed from our family physician of several years without talking to me, coupled with the fact she picked a male MD caused me to have a moment of "What?? Why?"
We talked about her recent lack of communication - how there were so many things she wasn't sharing with me about important things in her life... pains, illness, family events etc - that I was quite honesly feeling like her roommate rather than her husband. She apologized and said she had forgotten all about me not being particularlly comfortable with male MDs.
10 days later she upped the ante.
Surgery
I received a call one afternoon asking if she could "go next door" and schedule an appointment with the Plastic Surgeon (who happens to possess an X chromosome) in the office next to hers. I was speechless - but she reassured me she was only scheduling a consultation for weeks down the road, I would have time to figure out all the questions I wanted to ask before she went.
That gave me a bit of a breather -
A few hours later at 4:20, she called and said "when I went over, they said they could get me in at 4:30 - Can I go? Please?" My office was a good 20 minutes away - there was no way in the world I could have gone even if she had invited me.
She went and I started to disentigrate. I shared with her how it 'scrambled my insides' with her picking a male MD... and then even after our conversations, she picked a male plastic surgeon?
She went ahead with the plans for surgery. Nothing I could say could disuade her in any way. We had conversations where I expressed my personal appreciation and love of her body exactly as it was. I shared that I knew it was her body, but she was taking chances with anesthesia since she had one bad reaction before.
When I realized nothing I asked of her so far was something she would agree to, I asked for a compromise. If she was determined to have the surgery, could we select a female surgeron. There were two very well respected surgeons closer to our home - and neither of them had any wrongful death suites pending. (Her surgeon had 3.) Their price was $500.00 more.
She got angry and told me what I felt inside wasn't worth spending an extra $500.00.
From that moment on, I shared my own hopes and desires - then said no more. I supported her in every way I could. I went to her appointments with her, I did all the reading and research (since she wouldn't.) I bought straws for her to drink from after surgery, I bought more than twenty bags of frozen peas (to use as ice packs)... I filled her prescriptions, I asked her surgeon for drugs to keep her from getting a bladder infection...
I took off several days to care for her at home, I helped her go to the restroom, I fed her - in short I did everything I could think of to be a good husband. Inside I was still hurting with her decision to do everything she wanted and ignore the consequences her decisions had for me and the strife it caused in our marriage.
Out of the blue my wife announced "I've got an MD appointment tomorrow morning at 9:00 - Oh, and I changed doctors." The fact she changed from our family physician of several years without talking to me, coupled with the fact she picked a male MD caused me to have a moment of "What?? Why?"
We talked about her recent lack of communication - how there were so many things she wasn't sharing with me about important things in her life... pains, illness, family events etc - that I was quite honesly feeling like her roommate rather than her husband. She apologized and said she had forgotten all about me not being particularlly comfortable with male MDs.
10 days later she upped the ante.
Surgery
I received a call one afternoon asking if she could "go next door" and schedule an appointment with the Plastic Surgeon (who happens to possess an X chromosome) in the office next to hers. I was speechless - but she reassured me she was only scheduling a consultation for weeks down the road, I would have time to figure out all the questions I wanted to ask before she went.
That gave me a bit of a breather -
A few hours later at 4:20, she called and said "when I went over, they said they could get me in at 4:30 - Can I go? Please?" My office was a good 20 minutes away - there was no way in the world I could have gone even if she had invited me.
She went and I started to disentigrate. I shared with her how it 'scrambled my insides' with her picking a male MD... and then even after our conversations, she picked a male plastic surgeon?
She went ahead with the plans for surgery. Nothing I could say could disuade her in any way. We had conversations where I expressed my personal appreciation and love of her body exactly as it was. I shared that I knew it was her body, but she was taking chances with anesthesia since she had one bad reaction before.
When I realized nothing I asked of her so far was something she would agree to, I asked for a compromise. If she was determined to have the surgery, could we select a female surgeron. There were two very well respected surgeons closer to our home - and neither of them had any wrongful death suites pending. (Her surgeon had 3.) Their price was $500.00 more.
She got angry and told me what I felt inside wasn't worth spending an extra $500.00.
From that moment on, I shared my own hopes and desires - then said no more. I supported her in every way I could. I went to her appointments with her, I did all the reading and research (since she wouldn't.) I bought straws for her to drink from after surgery, I bought more than twenty bags of frozen peas (to use as ice packs)... I filled her prescriptions, I asked her surgeon for drugs to keep her from getting a bladder infection...
I took off several days to care for her at home, I helped her go to the restroom, I fed her - in short I did everything I could think of to be a good husband. Inside I was still hurting with her decision to do everything she wanted and ignore the consequences her decisions had for me and the strife it caused in our marriage.
posted by Drucifer at 3:13 PM
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