Coping with husband's pain too

DogsBody
DogsBody Member Posts: 4
edited 28. Nov 2023, 14:10 in Living with arthritis

Hello All. This is my first ever venture into a forum for anything, but I hope that maybe somebody may find my situation familiar, and maybe have suggestions for coping. Here goes. My TKR left knee has just had its 14th birthday, and is doing pretty well considering, although what soft tissue still remains is starting to age/ache. My right knee is now bone-on-bone OA, making stairs, hills and prolonged walking painful, even with a brace, so presumably another TKR is on the cards. Now, three years ago my husband badly injured his left knee which resulted in a TKR last year. So, in the interim I became chief cook, shopper, driver, bottle-washer, gardener and dog walker. Husband's right hip is now bone-on-bone OA too, and he is virtually house-bound while waiting for his replacement op; before the Nurses and Junior Doctors' strikes (which I do understand) we were about halfway through the suggested waiting time. Now we have no idea where we stand, or hobble. I am still 'chief everything' but find it is getting harder to cope with his worsening pain and the feeling of being unable to help him apart from just being there. He hates that I have to do things for him when he can't stand/move/bend over, although it's OK because he would do the same for me. Some days I just have to rest my right knee so that I can do what needs to be done around the house and garden, and everything else. And then I get a bit grouchy, and he out-grouches me in response. Paracetamol doesn't touch his pain, he can't take ibruprofen because of stomach ulcer history, and he detests codeine for its side effects. He has also had clinical depression for years, and is generally not a proactive person, which leaves me as the 'ideas' one when it comes to trying to help ... and I am running out of them. How to cope with it all is the question. Any ideas? Sorry for the rant; think it needed to get out.

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