Let Illness Destroy Your Marriage In Ten Easy Steps

If you’re currently in a marriage where one spouse is chronically ill, researchers say that your relationship is more likely than the average to end in divorce. Health problems – especially chronic ones – typically lead to other problems: financial, emotional, romantic, etc. Put that within the framework of a marriage and voila! Perfect storm coming right up. 


Living with a chronically ill spouse for many years has given me some interesting insights – including what not to do. If you want your marriage to survive your spouse’s illness, do the opposite of what you read below.

1. Focus only the illness, not your spouse. Make the illness the priority and the sole focus of your relationship.
2. Only communicate if it’s about the illness... or any other problem. Who has time to talk about anything pleasant? The illness is important, so the illness  (and only the illness) always needs to be discussed.
3. Only talk about very important matters when you’re extremely tired, hungry, or not feeling well. It’s even better if you’re both feeling lousy!
4. Never recognize or commend each other’s efforts. No one needs to hear that they’re doing a good job at anything. In fact, it's better if you can put your spouse down at every opportunity - especially in front of the kids.
5. Don’t bother to say I love you every day. You don’t need to actually say it. Come on, you’re still together, so isn’t it obvious?
6. When you feel an argument building up, go ahead and duke it out. Why should you hold back your anger? You put up with a lot and you should get to scream, shouldn’t you? You deserve to be heard – at any volume. It’s even more effective if you throw something or use profanity.
7. Never go on a date. Don’t worry about keeping the romance alive. Puhleeze. It’s enough that you still live under the same roof. Going on dates, leaving each other love notes, and constantly reminding each other of why you fell in love is a total waste of time.
8. Don’t worry about the healthy spouse staying healthy. Constant worry and daily stress might take a toll, but so what? If you’re not the sick one, you don’t require any attention. Try not to get enough sleep, don’t bother to exercise, and just ignore your constantly rising stress level.
9. Blame your spouse for being ill. Hey, they chose to be sick! The whole situation is all their fault. After all, couldn't they have chosen an illness that was easier to deal with?
10. Stay isolated. Don’t go anywhere as a couple. Make sure not to attend parties, dinners, or accept any invitations to anything even remotely fun. Make sure not to have people over. Stay insular and focused only on yourselves and your problems. After all, the illness is the only thing that matters... right?

Narcolepsy and Binge Eating

To look at him, you'd never know that my husband frequently binge eats.

Before his diagnosis, I just couldn't figure it out. If there was any kind of sweet or junk food in the house, it disappeared overnight. Cookies, doughnuts, chips, pie... the only evidence that there had even been a snack of some kind would be smears of icing or trails of crumbs. It drove me nuts! When questioned, my husband would admit - with embarrassment - that he had eaten all of the sweets, typically at 3 in the morning. 

Most recently, he devoured an apple pie overnight. The next week, he demolished the cake I had just baked that day. Finally, I thought... What's the deal?!

In reading a diet/health book a few years ago, I first learned the word ghrelin. In brief - ghrelin stimulates appetite. It's the little beast that growls and complains until we feed it. Unfortunately, when you don't get enough sleep, ghrelin is kicked into overdrive, making you feel even hungrier than normal. This is partly why doctors strongly advise getting more sleep when one is trying to lose weight.

When I did a little research and put two and two together... bingo! Well no wonder my husband pigs out in the wee hours of the morning - his sleep-deprived brain is telling him to! Crazy, right? It made total sense, though. It also made me wonder just how many narcoleptics overeat or constantly crave carbs and sugar... So now I know that something needs to be added to our action plan. Sure, I can keep junk food in the house for him, but what about his arteries? Skin? Cavities?

Maybe we can keep a treadmill and Listerine next to the Poptarts.

The Narcolepsy, Not the Man

So I had a conversation with my mother today that left me feeling pretty guilty. Although we only spoke for a few minutes, by the time we hung up, I felt as if I'd spent hours railing against my husband. In retrospect, maybe I did. I often think that I confuse the two: my husband and Narcolepsy. Over the years, I've come to think of myself as being married to two different people: my husband - whom I chose to marry, and Narcolepsy - who tricked me into marriage.

It's the Narcolepsy that I think is lazy and unmotivated, careless and forgetful, annoying and dull. My husband is none of those things. Instead, he's funny and interesting, smart and resourceful, motivated and hard-working. Those are some of the reasons why I fell in love with him.

Narcolepsy is such a betrayal of who you really are. It literally transforms my husband into a different person - a person that I sometimes don't recognize, and sometimes barely tolerate.

But I don't think I conveyed any of that to my mother. That's what left me feeling guilty. I am just barely beginning to understand this illness, so I'm pretty sure my mother doesn't fully comprehend it. I think that I will make a vow: I will only vent about my husband's condition to those I'm confident will understand the extenuating circumstances.