Monday, January 07, 2008

Facing Facts

John hates going to the Dr. John deals with sickness and ageing with denial. We had a terrible row last evening after church! I lost it altogether with him.

He has has asthma now, which could lead to worse. He takes drugs for it. He also has high blood pressure. He doesn't eat healthily. He thinks if he eats the healthy option meals, he can eat all the chocolate and crisps etc he wants. He doesn't get they are high fat and high salt. Or he thinks it doesn't matter because he eats healthy meals.

Anyway, he is on antibiotics again for a chest infection. The third time this winter. He has a running order for the drug so didn't see the Dr. He started taking them last Monday and still went to work on the Wednesday!!! (He is NOT indispensable.) He is still coughing. The pills haven't worked.

Last evening in church he was spoken to by the speaker who told him bluntly to go to the Dr and not be so stubborn. Well, on the way home he was rather unpleasant. I know he is afraid. I know he doesn't like the fact he is over 60 now. Denial though will not help him keep well. The Dr has said that the condition he has is very early and with treatment and his cooperation, it will stay that way. He will still get old.

I get furious with him about his attitude. He makes me feel bad. The last time I refused to drive him to the train and he sulked and sulked but went to the Dr's appointment I made for him and was told bluntly that I was right-he needed drugs for his chest. Yet he still was humpy with me.

Just like this weekend. I told him he needs to see the Dr. He ignores me and when I repeat it he gets nasty in an attempt to make me feel like I am nagging for no good reason and being neurotic.

So right now I have the hump. I will make his appointment TODAY and he will go(he said so last night after being nasty)but he will go on his own. Not only does he lie to the Dr but he will lie with me sitting there. Clearly, 'nagging' doesn't work, saying anything at all about his health is nagging. Maybe if I ignore it and leave him to get really sick, he will do something on his own account.

I am afraid too. I love him and I don't want him to suffer and die early. Yet it seems I am powerless to force him to stop denying.

Oh and just to make it clear, I can be just as nasty when having a row!

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

You love him. It's hard watching him refuse to take care of himself. In his heart, if not his head, he knows you are caring about him. He'll go. It's too bad he makes it such a bone of contention. There's probably a reason for it, but you may never know what it is.

Good luck, my friend.

CP Warner said...

Colin --

Maybe this will help, maybe not, but here's my two cents on asthma.

I am a life-long asthmatic. Before I went on the medication I take now, I can honestly say that in the past 25 years there were a few attacks I really thought would take me out for good. The last was in 1996. I was a nursing mom with an infant at the time, and tried to play it tough. I hated going to the hospital, where they keep you waiting HOURS for a breathing treatment. By the time I finally realized the black coffee wouldn't do the trick, I could no longer advocate for myself, was too cheap to call an ambulance, and had to have hubby call the local clinic and beg to take me in for an after-hours urgent care visit. I thought I could drive 10 minutes to the office, but knew I could not drive 20 to the hospital. Hubby was at work an hour away. So, still in denial about how bad things were, I got the kids into the car and drove over, gasping all the way. My then seven-year old daughter had to carry the baby AND provide a shoulder for me to lean on so I could get into the place. The doctor got to me in a hurry and was scared to death, though he didn't show it at the time. It took five breathing treatments and three IV injections of some steroid or other to get me to a point where I could draw a semi-decent breath. My peak flow readings when I first got there, usually 600 to 650 when I am well, were down to 150. In the middle of the third inhalation treatment I happened to look up and in the mirror I saw that my face had actually gone blue. Ditto for the fingernail beds. I went home with a nebulizer that night, though the doctor wanted me in the hospital. But I was nursing an infant and refused to go, so he did the next best thing.

I had been working on what I thought was a mild case of bronchitis when this attack came on . From 0 to 60 in a matter of about 15 minutes. Asthma is nothing to mess around with.

The medications for it are so much even better now than they were in 1996. There is an excellent inhaler (called Advair in the States). It combines a long-term bronchodilator and a steroid in one med. You take one puff in the morning and one at night. (I cheat and only take one puff in the morning, because the med has a high co-pay fee on my health insurance, and I am, as mentioned before, notoriously cheap when it comes to medical stuff. But that's another soapbox for another day!)

Anyhoo, asthma being an inflammatory condition, a steroid is necessary. Inhaled, it does not turn a person into a beast, the way an oral steroid will. It keeps the lung passages calm and the long term bronchodilator keeps the tubes open. One should always carry a fast-acting albuterol "rescue" inhaler just in case, but personally, since I have been on Advair (at least 5 years now) I have had no need for the rescue inhaler. Many times, mine reach the expiry date without my ever having had a single puff. (Luckily, this rescue inhaler is one of the cheap meds, otherwise I would feel terribly guilty about wasting it this way.)

The trend with asthma now is towards daily maintenance, rather than simply treating symptoms. With daily maintenance, one will always have asthma. It is never "outgrown." It is under control or in remission, but never gone.

I went through some pretty quacky nonsense with asthma as a child and into young adulthood and wouldn't wish that on anyone. There was no way, then, to lead any kind of a normal life. But it's not like that now, with the new generation of meds and the revised thoughts regarding treatment.

As far as getting John to take care of himself, it sounds like the asthma/bronchitis is the first hurdle. When he feels better, then work through the diet issues.

He sounds a lot like my husband, who also denies being ill and hates the doctor and won't wear his sleep apnea machine, and...

But when they are tired of pursuing their own stubborn way and start seeking help, you and I are the kind of folks who know what to do, and thought it might be tempting to say I told you so, we don't. Or else we find a slightly more tactful way to say it.

If I can help with more info, feel free to give me a holler via e-mail. I'll be thinking of you both and sending good thoughts your way.

I'll be at work until about 6:30 PM your time, but will answer as soon as I can get back to the computer, if there's anything further I can say, or clarify.

Take care of yourself!

Paula

LizzieK8 said...

It's really hard to sit back and let loved ones take responsibility for their actions....

Anonymous said...

He maybe working up phobia's about going you know? I have the same prob as you know. It's hard for my DH to stand by and watch, he thinks I'm ''a silly girl'' but there are triggers here and fear of it all makes you run away further from it, rather than go to the GP. Maybe if you tell him, that it isn't just older people who get this but very young people too need help now and then. A chest infection will aggravate the asthma of course.

hth...higz cher x

Karen said...

My husband is the same way. I have to nag him. Its a real annoyance. My hubby has had cancer now he has high blood pressure. I want him around I love him.
Just keeping bitching at him he'll go so you'll leave him alone. So what if you fight You are being proactive for his benefit and yours. Your his partner not his friend. There's nothing worse than being told by someone you want "I like you as a friend".My point he's yours and you want him around. Some people need a kick in the pants to go and some one has to do it, and its you.

anachronist said...

Hi Colin,
I can second mad angel in all she is saying.
I have had untreated asthma of the exercise and allergic kind from childhood on and my dad is like all 'manly men' are, dont go to the doctor, even if you have your head under your arm.

Now that I am taken care of with Symbicort (same mix, long acting dilator, steroid) I am so much better, and had no attacks since. Having an infection lets it flare up big time, and I need to triple the dose, but it works and can be gotten over with.

Maybe your man wakes up if you tell him it is no shame to take care of ones health, and life can be more fun? if one feels up to his best?

He seems to be a person who can not live with needing help or assistance, so something needs to click inside him that it is ok to be 'soft' once in a while :-)

Anonymous said...

I echo what Paula says about the asthma medication.

Obviously chest infections will make asthma worse - I had a chest infection in 2001 and asthma remained undiagnosed (at that time) until I ended up in A & E on New Year's Eve, as the infection refused to budge and resulted in one heck of an asthma attack. On a good day my peak flow is 630 and it got down to 220.
Normally I am quite unaffected most of the time by my asthma and whilst I carry a blue reliever around with me at all times (salbutomol) for when I need it - very rarely - I also have an up to date brown "preventer" inhaler - Becotide - which I take the minute I get a cold to counteract the inevitable cough and wheeziness that will happen if I don't. This one takes time to build up and you have to take it every day. However once well again, you can gradually reduce it and then stop using it, like I have done. Last time I used it was about April last year. I also had to have prednisolone (steroids) a couple of times to help me out (2001).

If your partner takes his meds, this will go a long way towards helping him (even if he hates taking it, I know I do!). Its finding out what triggers the symptoms for him and working a way out of dealing with it.

It probably will return from time to time as that's what asthma does, it will never really totally go away. But it can be controlled.

Hope he gets better soon.

Anonymous said...

Colin, my DH is asthmatic and has been since he was a baby, he is 54 now! For a long time they just treated the symptoms but now he has an inhaler which is reliever and preventer combined and touch wood since he has been taking that he has been quite good. He has to watch colds and viruses though. Caught a bad one earlier last year which nearly did him in, has to go back to the consultant in February. My mother was a chronic asthmatic, and my daughter is asthmatic too, I feel like the town nag, keeping behind them. My Mum didn't take good care of her asthma, her weight or the quality (never mind the quantity of her food), it took her at 51 years old and weighing over 370 pounds. So keep nagging Colin you are doing the right thing. No one likes to hear the truth, and it always feels as if you are being hurt by the one you love, somehow it seems tougher coming from them.