Frustrated with husband's constant illnesses and injuries
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My husband and I have been together for 10 years. During this time, he has had numerous illnesses and injuries, and it has gotten to the point where I think he is making it up for attention. He is still in his early 30's and it is puzzling to me how someone so young, without a diagnosed chronic illness, could have so many unrelated things wrong with him on a consistent basis.
He has had his gall bladder removed, after being in the hospital for numerous days without doctors being able to find anything wrong with him;
He had a knee surgery, and complained of excruciating pain; after surgery, they identified a small bone spur that they thought might have been the cause of the pain, but there was no major damage;
He has had two shoulder surgeries, without any injury. He woke up one day and said his shoulder felt "floppy" and had surgery a few weeks later; and again a few months later because he felt the first one wasn't done correctly;
He has had a hernia surgery;
He bent over and his toe "popped"; he claimed the doctor told him that his "toe was hanging on by a thread"
He claimed to have shingles, but never exhibited any symptoms;
He drove himself to the emergency room in the middle of the night and claimed to have diverticulitis;
He thought he had cancer, with swollen lymph nodes in his neck; he went through MRIs, CT scans, and biopsies to rule out cancer;
This week, he has been complaining more and more that his knee is giving him unbearable pain again, and took a week off work because of colon issues. He has now had 2 CT scans done that apparently found an abscess on his colon, and said that the doctor required cancer testing before doing a colonoscopy to rule that out.
There are a couple of things that have me concerned about these medical problems:
1) He always asks the doctor what the worst case scenario is, and then proceeds to tell his parents and other people that the worst case is happening to him.
2) It always happens at predictable times (once in spring, once in fall) and usually coincides with his parents' vacations, which I think is so they will have to worry about him on their trip or feel guilty about leaving
3) He is exceptionally happy when he's sick - he seems to get pleasure out of having to go to the doctor, like he's very happy to be getting attention from his illness
4) He "googles" symptoms and reports that symptoms to the doctor, to make it seem like he has a certain illness (Last week, when he was having stomach pain, he googled symptoms, and it came up with appendicitis, and he altered his original symptoms to more mimic those consistent with that ailment
I know not everybody is perfectly healthy all of the time, but is this excessive? It's costing my young family a lot of money, and my young son is starting to complain of ailments he doesn't have because he hears his dad doing it so often. I'm not compassionate toward him when it happens anymore, and it's not like me to turn a cold shoulder to someone who needs something. However, I get so mad when he's sick that it's starting to effect my marriage. I also go through roller coaster emotions of "What if something really is majorly wronrg? Then I'm going to feel like a jerk for acting like this!" to "If this continues to happen, I'm going to have to leave him for my emotional and financial stability."
Could this be a mental health issue or am I overreacting?
1 like, 2 replies
mari34228 k73119
Posted
Hi there, no I don't think you are over-reacting at all! There are many chronic illnesses that can throw up lots of apparently unrelated symptoms (from my own experience) but this doesn't sound like that to me at all.
Has he been like this for as long as you have known him? What does his family say? I'm very surprised he would have had so many surgeries without something actually being wrong though. That is shocking to me! Why did they remove his gallbladder?? He sounds like he has some sort of extreme hypochondria. I think you really need to get him to speak to a professional about his mental health rather than physical. I'm not a doctor though so obviously can't say for sure. It just sounds to me like a mental health issue. I would speak to his family if you can, to see if anything in his past might help shed a light on things.
Best of luck!
amy57522 k73119
Posted
I have had this conversation with my doctor recently about unexplained and I diagnoses illnesses. I'm 25. For years I complained about stomach pain. Some days it was so bad I couldn't move. I was told appendicitis- X-ray confirmed it wasn't, got told I had shingles- I had the facial pain and sensitivity but never got the rash, had 8 hospital admissions in 6 months, suffered with constipation and no exploration why and the pain is horrendous. I sat down and spoke to my doctor because I started to think to myself noones taking me seriously. There's something wrong I can't be in all this pain for nothing.
After having a discussion weekly for about 2 months we have figured out that I could possible be having physical symptoms from an emotional and physical traumatic experience I suffered with as a child/teen. A bit similar to PTSD except it's physical pain that is experienced. Has your husband been abused? Experienced any trauma in his life? A close death in the family? It could all be physical symptoms.
Another thing we are ruling out for me is I have been referred to a psychiatrist to see if I have a personality disorder of some sort. This can also be a reason. Not a cry for attention but attachment, someone who listens there loads of different types of disorders. But if he has suffered trauma in his life this may be why he experiences so many different pains and has them being unexplained or undiagnosed. It happens and it is a thing. The pain is terrible and it does feel like there is so many things possibly wrong. It's just learning to cope and accept and get the right help.
If he hasn't been through trauma then he needs to get some help find out exactly what is going on why he's having all the pains. Maybe fibromyalgia which is very hard to diagnose. I am a nurse and there are so many things I never knew were possible.
I hope you both get to the bottom of what's going on x