Spouse becoming less supportive?

I like this support group. I used to participate a lot more, when cancer was new and in my thoughts 24/7. But now I just focus on living. I may have 2 years left, or 20. Doctors won't give me a number. So, I take all my meds, follow doctors' orders, and live in the present.

What's most interesting about this post I started is that I failed to mention many relevant variables (my recent retirement, spouse still working, vacation home in another town where my new friends are, the fact that I hadn't had any friends in many years, etc. etc.), so y'all just filled in the gaps with your imaginations. Which leads to conclusions ranging from I'm a poor innocent victim to I'm a dirty rotten scoundrel.

The truth is probably somewhere in the middle.

@heavyphil I think we're saying the same thing from different directions.

@bluegill Neither victim nor scoundrel, I think. But from what you chose to share, it does sound like your relationship has hit a crisis point. I hope you find your way to something better, whether it's together or on separate paths. ❤️

My partner and I have been together for 12 years, having met when we were both in our early fifties, so we weren’t kids when our relationship started.
Before PC, I was an athlete and, while I still ice skate and cycle, I know I’ll never be the athlete I once was which means I lost a major part of my identity. She’s also an athlete and she’s having trouble accepting that I can’t perform as well as I did when I was healthy - she believes I am just being willful. Because I couldn’t perform in the bedroom, she became furious and locked herself in the bathroom and wouldn’t talk to me. During a hiking trip in Santa Fe, she hiked way ahead of me, leaving me alone on the mountain trail - she was frustrated that I couldn’t hike like I once did.
So we saw a therapist, which helped and, during the session, I admitted I had been conversing with my female training partner on the bike racing team about my partner’s behavior. My partner knew I trained with a woman but she never met her because she doesn’t race. Now, I am not romantically engaged with the other woman, who is my age and divorced, but, the idea that there MIGHT be another woman was enough to change my partner’s behavior. She’s more accepting now that I actually DO have limitations I didn’t have prior to PC and being in a state of denial was stressing the relationship.
We’re continuing the therapy and life together is getting better.
And living with an heiress isn’t as much fun as one might think.

@madisonman0326 I'm glad you two identified the problem and worked it out (a work-in-progress, I'm sure, like all relationships).

It sounds like she had put off the grieving and acceptance part. That's understandable, and it's good she's closer to where you are now. ❤️

When I grow up I want to be North 😊 !!! 💗

@madisonman0326 Why deal with that? Get a new partner and move on.

@rpogatchnik1590 Both are fair choices.

I've been with my partner for 39 years, and we've chosen to work through rough patches together; I feel that the reward now far outweighs the effort it took then, but also, it was never transactional.

OTOH, when you're already dealing with prostate cancer, you might not have the energy to work on repairing a relationship together too. @madisonman0326 did find that energy and I hope he is happy with the result now, but everyone's situation is different, so I wouldn't condemn either choice. As I mentioned in an earlier post, the important thing is to be honest with yourself about what's happening and what you want. Also, if you determine that a relationship is emotional abusive rather than just temporarily in trouble, then yes, you need to leave.

Muddling along can be the worst of all worlds (but even that is sometimes the least-bad choice, especially since cancer and divorce can both be expensive in the U.S., so staying in a less-than-ideal relationship might mean the difference between secure food and shelter or poverty for both of you).

tl;dr - it's complicated. 🙁

@rpogatchnik1590 My hope is that the therapy will help her see how unfair she’s being but, I admit I weighed my options. I said there’s no romantic relationship between me and my training partner but that’s not entirely true - she has had a crush on me for a couple years now but what she what she was attracted to was the athlete who won races and that guy left the building last year when I was diagnosed.
When I considered my options, I realized that my training partner and my life partner are remarkably similar in both history and personality so leaving one for the other wouldn’t solve anything - same issues, different woman. For me, it made sense to work on the relationship I have than to start a new one with a similarly high-strung woman.
Here I am with two of my teammates at the finish of an endurance ride: