Hi lemmy, this situation is kinda private so it seems easier to look for support here than it is to talk about it with most of my irl friends.

My partner is going into GI surgery in about 36 hours. We’ve been together for nearly 5 years and cohabitate, and he has a chronic GI condition that has worsened in the past couple years. He normally manages it with medication, but his flareups have gotten frequent and severe enough that he’s finally committed to surgical correction. As far as I know it’s not going to cure anything, but should hopefully make his condition more easily managed.

This of course is scary, so I’ve already got fears about what could go wrong and the possibility of something bad happening. I’m sure he does too, and he was very crabby this morning and picked a fight. I suspect it was in response to his anxiety, but he’s stubborn and has kind of doubled down on being petty and spiteful tonight. I will admit that this morning when he was being antagonistic, I let it get under my skin and blew my top back at him some and boy is he holding it against me now. I’m so embarrassed that I acted nasty this morning and have tried to mend the bad feelings with zero success. He’s gone so far as to say he plans to go to his mother’s tomorrow and have her drive him to/from the procedure and plans to spend his recovery time (1-2 weeks) at mom’s. That one hurt, the idea of not being able to see him off sucks.

I’m trying to just give him space tonight, but I have to admit that the fact that he won’t drop it and that it seems like he may huff off into this procedure is really making my preexisting anxieties about this worse. What if something happens to him and he passes away in the middle of all this tension between us? Ugh, the thought makes my stomach turn.

I know there’s no good answer here and I’m not trying to demonize him, he’s a great man that just isn’t very emotionally self aware sometimes, but I feel stuck crying on our couch terrified. (I let him have the bedroom because I know he needs to be resting and I’m gonna be up and about for a bit.) If you have any advice, memes, good vibes, or encouraging stats about diverticulitis surgery, please share. My little brother talked me down some on the phone, but I’m too embarrassed about the fight to call my friends, so here I am, sadgirling on lemmy.

  •  MrMcNamerica   ( @MrMcNamerica@beehaw.org ) English
    11•11 months ago

    Arguments and disagreements happen, especially when you’re going through something stressful and especially especially when one member of a relationship struggles with emotional self awareness. You know this already, but I know for me that having a reminder that everyone has moments like this. Please don’t spend too much time feeling embarrassed!

    Sounds like your partner has already given up on communicating for today at least. Maybe tomorrow approach him with something like “hey, I know things got heated yesterday, and I’m sorry for my part in it. Can we just put that aside for now? I don’t want to be away from you and I don’t want to be upset with each other before your procedure.” That might convince him to take the truce and not shut you out.

    Diverticulitis surgery outcomes are usually pretty positive, especially compared to complications from the condition. Just keep your chin up, you got this.