Father in Law Is Sick and Husband Spends All of His Time at His Parents.

At some point his father will be better and things will go back to normal. I would much rather be married in the long run to a man who loves and respects his parents than one who would ditch them to placate his wife.

In other words, be glad you have a good man, this won't last forever

You are married to a good man.

He knows he's possibly losing his dad. He's doing everything he can to help his parents.

Be thankful. He's being a wonderful role model for your child. I'd much rather have a partner who loved and respects his parents vs on who could care less.

I know you feel like you're on the back burner but keep in mind.,,if it's you or your son.., look what kind of man you have who loves his family!!

I am sorry your FIL has cancer - I am glad he is feeling better.

I think if I were you - I'd think of something that would be a break for your husband too (no doubt he's very stressed) and just say "How about we go for a walk at the park (etc.) for an hour this morning before you head over to your parents?".

Make it easy and simple. You come up with the idea. Get a coffee on the way (or a treat to turn into a little impromptu picnic). Doesn't have to be long. Just one short thing a day. That way you get some time with him and your son as a family.

If you want couple time, arrange a sitter and say "How about we see this movie (etc.) on Saturday night - just the two of us? I have arranged a sitter".

That way it's a break for him also.

I think you just have to support him at this time - it's one of those life-situations where he needs to do this.

My only other thought is - is there someone else, another sibling or family member, who could give your husband a break? I think it's great you wanted to go and help too - but you have your hands full from sounds of it.

Just to add - my husband's job requires him to be there all the time for about 2 months of the year. I have physical challenges, so at that time, life becomes a bit hard. The thing is - he has to be there. I don't take it personally (and I don't think you should either) because it has nothing to do with us. People have other obligations they have to tend to. I view it as short lived, and we make it work. But I do find that if I come up with ways to give my husband a break (like I mentioned above) he doesn't have to think of what to do with the family when he gets a few hours.

If you present it like that, it's not another thing they have to plan or think of. My husband really appreciates it when I say I've made the plans, he just has to show up. And the more low-key the better :)

Welcome to mamapedia!

I'm sorry your family is good ng through this. My mom died of pancreatic cancer in six days after diagnosis. I live in do she lived in Los Angeles.

I flew out and was gone a month. Was it hard in my husband and family? Yes. But you take care if your parents.

Just because he's feeling better doesn't mean he's out of the woods or in remission. You know where your husband is, it's not like he's at a bar or out with other people.

You can find a baby sitter for your son. He's picking up on your stress. Why not suggest to your husband that you two go out on a date to catch up? It doesn't mean to abandon his father, but it means he needs to take care of his marriage too. It's give and take. How would you want him to act if this was your father.

My dad died of cancer 3 months after he was diagnosed. I spent at least 1/2 of that time there and a good deal of time flying back and forth. My husband never ever questioned this. He picked up all the slack with our son, the house and our business. When my dad finally died, he got on a plane and brought our son to his grandfather's funeral. I am sorry you and your husband (and FIL) are going through this but your husband needs to be where he needs to be. You, your kids and husband have decades ahead together.

I know having him gone those many hours is difficult. I also suggest that he can spend time with his parents and also with you. Tell him you're proud that he's taking care of his family. Ask him to also set aside some time with you and your son. Recognize that this will be difficult for him. Support him and how he is taking care of his parents. Don't complain. Use I statements, show compassion for him and his parents. Tell him you and his son needs just some of his time with you.

What is your FIL's prognosis? My cousin died of cancer. His oncologist told him approximately how long he could expect to live if treatment was unsuccessful. He lived 5 of the 4 to 6 months the doctor suggested. He had cancer tumors in his brain, liver, lungs, bladder. The cancer had progressed to the point he was going to die if a new protocol didn't slow tumor growth. He would never be in remission. I had a difficult time accepting that he would suddenly die. I expected his death would be slow after learning this treatment didn't work with enough time to try a different treatment. He was.OK one day. Couldn't pass urine the next and gone 3-4 days later.

My cousin didn't tell me how far the cancer had progressed. We both held our hope the tumor growth would slow giving him more time. Now, I wish I had spent more time with him and talked with him about his dying and what I needed to do as the executor of his will.

Do you know your FIL's prognosis? Is it possible he will die in the next few weeks? Unless your husband goes with his father to doctor appointments, it's possible your husband doesn't know the possibility of his father dying soon rather than later. Or he may know or feel that his father will die soon.

I suggest you and your husband are both scared. He stays with his parents's as the way to help him deal with his own pain. . I suggest you need time with him to help you deal with your pain. Have tge two of you experienced providing emotional support for the other in the past? Or is withdrawing from you his usual response to stress?

I suggest you tell him you know he needs to be with his parents and that you also need time with him. Ask him to consider ways he can be there and with you at times. He may not be able to think about how to do that. Perhaps you could suggest how to do that aND then the two of your decide what to do.

Perhaps he could go to his parents for a couple of hours and then come home. Perhaps he could hire a housekeeper so that he doesn't have to spend so much time helping. Is his mother unable to do housework? Does she need him to stay this long? If you've had heart to heart talks with her in the past, perhaps she would be willing to influence her son to go home

I suggest you will feel better if you don't spend hours there. I can think of no reason to be there all the time. In fact spending hours there will drag you down. There are at least a couple of other reasons for you to limit your time. You have a special needs child who needs to be home living the structured life he's had until now. Special needs kids do not react well to changes. They also don't respond well to emotional stress.

The second and equally important reason is that you need to take care of your feelings. If your husband is unable to support you thru this, you must find a way to get support for yourself. His not being willing to spend more time with you does not mean you are less important than his parents. It may mean he is responding to only having them a short time. He has you forever. It most likely means he's so stressed he has nothing left to give you.

I suggest that if you could sympathize with him and express pride in the way he's supporting his parents. Provide some emotional support for him he may be able to be more sympathetic towards you. Perhaps you also don't have anything left to give. Find ways to emotionally support yourself.

I suggest that you spend more time at home and focus on things that will help you and your son feel better. Find a way.to let go of your hurt. Remind yourself of the times your husband was with you, loving you. Positive thoughts really do improve moods.

Play with your son. Take him to the park, library or McDonald's.I suggest you will feel better when focusing on helping your son instead of on how hurt you are.

I read to give myself a break from serious thoughts. Perhaps you could spend more time with friends. My friends help me regain a healthy perspective.on what is or is not happening. You will get through this. Unless you and your husband always have difficulty being close, you will be close again.

I really loved Marda's suggestions.

I have worked with high-needs toddlers and understand how demanding that can be. Child care would be a great thing in your lives. I would bring it up in a conversation with your husband and ask to budget for it. (I homeschool our son who is nine because of his special needs and when we decided to pull Kiddo out of public school, I spoke to my husband about allotting some funds for child care for the sake of my relationship with my spouse.)

It's a wonderful thing that your husband is willing to care for his parents. Consider that this is the care you would receive if you were in the same situation. Consider that he is modeling that this is 'normal' for your son, even if he only remembers it in stories told in later years.

My own parent seems to want as little as possible to do with their own aging parent. I am not impressed.

Are you close to his mom? If so you might ask her how they feel about him coming over every single day and staying all day. But if they need him then there's no way I wouldn't be over there with him. I loved my mother in law and miss her every single day. My father in law is a crusty curmudgeon that I enjoy spending time with too.

One thing you could do is start letting little guy go to a babysitter a couple of evenings per week and then you can go with hubby. Your child is fine and old enough to go to a babysitter for a couple of hours a couple of times per week.

Let hubby know you are willing to support him and that you love his family.

If you have to, you could mention, in front of them, that so and so invited you guys to go out with them to do such and such, maybe his parents would like to babysit...see what happens.

Just because someone seems to get better when they get treatment doesn't mean they actually are. It can mean that something is happening but that doesn't mean the illness isn't going to win out in the end.

My mother in law fought cancer for 6 months, up til the 5th month she seemed to be improving. Then she got a stomach virus that put her in the hospital. She never recovered. She died a few weeks later. Her system was so compromised that a simple stomach virus did her in.

Your husband has realized his parents are going to die someday and he's doing what he can.

When they're gone how will you feel about yourself and your actions? Will you feel like you did all that you could to help? Did you keep them from seeing their grandchild? Did you go to their home and treat them respectfully?

We all have to live with ourselves after our loved ones are gone. That's what we have left. When I'm doing a service for someone that I absolutely hate the chore or the time I have to give I ponder on what I'd be left feeling if they died the next day or in a week or month. Would I feel like I did what "I" was supposed to do?

That's all you have to live with. Did you do what you feel you should do? If the answer is yes, if your mother in law called tomorrow morning and said dad had passed away in the night, did you do all that you should have?

Then you can have a clear conscience and move forward having learned about yourself and be glad you took time.

I do think hubby could spend some time with you and kiddo too. But then I'd be over at the in-laws with hubby even if it was just to sit and visit. Those memories are precious.

That's a tough one.
Don't you have family and friends of your own that you can turn to, spend time with?
I think it's really hard on a marriage when we depend on a spouse as our only support, companionship and friendship.
Of course your husband SHOULD be the main person in your life for this but you shouldn't forget about all the others that love you and your child as well, especially during times like these when your husband's focus also must be on his parents.
Spend some time with your family and friends, nurture those relationships, get out and join groups of moms with kids similar to yours. It truly does take a village to raise a child.

Even with treatment, his father may not have a lot of time left, depending on the type of cancer and how advanced it was when treatment started.
Let him have his time with his father while he can.

I can understand your husband's feelings. Cancer is one of those diseases that can be unpredictable, so even though his father is feeling better, he may not be sure he is clearly out of the woods and even then, he may be feeling like he can't just leave his ill father to the side while he focuses on you. My co-worker is going through this as well. She currently has her father in an assisted living facility, but before that, he was in and out of rehab and hospitals. He had been feeling well and then suddenly, he was hospitalized. Now they are saying that the chemo is too harsh (he has kidney cancer) and they will need to discontinue it and discuss further treatment, but in the meantime, he has been able to go to the ALF, whereas before he was hospitalized (prior to being hospitalized, he was home and getting chemo and feeling great, as I said).

You don't mention FIL's prognosis and treatment. My own father died of cancer. We were told he had 6 months left to live, and we believed it. I don't want to scare you, but dad was cleared from the hospital and was feeling so great he came back home and returned to work. A week later, he was back in the hospital and a week and a half after that, he lost consciousness and died in our home, so the 6 month prognosis was way off -- he did not even last a month. Some people start to feel better before they get worse. Maybe your husband knows this/has heard this from someone and that is why he is wanting to spend so much time with his father, afraid he could lose him from one moment to the next. He might even know something about dad's health that he may be holding back from you because it is too heart-wrenching.

Anyway, back to my co-worker's situation. She is also married and her husband has to deal with her being out of the house often, visiting her father. She will usually spend all day Sunday with her husband, and in the weekday evenings, she gets back home around 9-10, sits to eat dinner with her husband, and falls asleep in bed with him, watching TV. Her husband has been incredibly patient with her in all this, knowing he'd do the same if he were in her shoes. On alternate Saturdays, she will ask her brother to at least come and see his dad for the day since the rest of the time he is too busy with his girlfriend and work to come visit, the day she does. By doing this, my co-worker has every Sunday with her husband, and every other Saturday as well. Her husband understands that his illness will not last forever (and he has a whole lifetime with her, as Dana K. also mentions in her post) and so he has his own hobbies and pursuits in the meantime. He is working on upgrading his boat and remodeling the home office space, so he is kept busy while she is visiting her father. Is this something you can do? Ask a family member to visit for one day on the weekend so your husband can stay home?

If your husband is an only son and there is no other family member that can be a back-up, why don't you pack some food and go visit your husband and the FIL during the week if you miss him? You can then relax after dinner and watch a movie and go home together. FIL might enjoy seeing you and his grandson every now and then, and it would give you some time to spend with your husband and the rest of the family. On the weekend, try finding someone else that can visit, so you can have hubby around at least for a full day.

Talk to your husband and discuss your feelings.

My mom was diagnosed with cancer just three weeks ago. She had been living with us for the past 2 years to help care for our 18 month old son while we worked. She also helped us a little around the house.

Since her diagnosis, I've been having to take her to many of her doctor's appointments and for various procedures, one that required hospitalization. This meant that my husband had to pick up the slack -- with the kids and the household chores. I think my husband was feeling the way you've been feeling and have been very short, impatient, and resentful. I told him what I felt and about his behavior, and he apologized for making me worry about him in addition to dealing with my mom's diagnosis, having to care for my mom, and doing more around the house and for the kids.

I really hope you can find it in you to be more understanding. As a person in your husband's shoes, I can say that it's not easy dealing with a parent's cancer diagnosis. And hopefully, once you discuss things with your husband, maybe he'll realize that now that your FIL is feeling a bit better, he can make some time for his family too.