When the One You Love Hurts

Living with a spouse who's living with pain.

by Kate V. Bryant

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"Mrs. Bryant, I don't know why your 45-year-old husband has the body of a 70-year-old man, but he does."

Dr. Ross's words echoed in my head as we talked in the small post-op consultation room following my husband, Paul's, neurosurgery. This room was a familiar place. Just three years earlier I met with an orthopedic surgeon in this room to discuss the outcome of Paul's hip replacement surgery. Now we were talking about his spinal surgery.

My husband is one of 20 million Americans living with some degree of osteoarthritis—a disease that erodes the cartilage that cushions our joints, eventually resulting in bone-on-bone rubbing. It's the leading cause of hip and knee replacements.

For Paul, osteoarthritis first made its presence known in his left hip. After shoveling wet, heavy, Chicago snow in 1992, he noticed pain from what felt like a pulled groin muscle. But the pain persisted for months, and finally he went to see our physician. The diagnosis of osteoarthritis didn't alarm us. Many people we knew had some degree of arthritis pain. Take some acetaminophen, maybe some ibuprofen, and you're good to go!

But Paul went through bottles of acetaminophen, buckets of ibuprofen, and round after round of prescriptions to treat pain. He tried chiropractic therapy, exercise and rest, heating pads and cold packs … the pain became worse. Most days he came home from work irritable from the relentless aching in his hip.

"Hi, hon. How was your day?" I held my breath, wondering what kind of mood Paul would be in.

"Same as always! The contractors are jerks, my co-workers aren't carrying their load, and my boss isn't doing anything about it. Sometimes I think I'll just leave and not go back!"

With that, he'd stomp off to the bedroom until dinner. He was certainly angry, but the contractors, co-workers, and boss weren't the problem. He was angry at the pain.

Over time, Paul's retreats to the bedroom grew lengthier. He became withdrawn, and eventually depressed. We had two children under six years old at the time, and Paul was becoming less involved with our family. I felt I was carrying way more responsibility for rearing our kids than he was. I rehearsed bitter speeches in my head: I'm not the only parent here, you know. I could use your input and involvement. How come you get to lie on the bed and watch TV while I do the parenting and the housework? When does it get to be about me? When I have a headache or cramps, I just work through them—why can't you do the same? Why don't you just take charge and be a man?

But I never gave voice to those thoughts—I was afraid it would make him angrier. Cartilage wasn't the only thing breaking down in the Bryant household. Frankly, I didn't get it … until the day I saw it for myself.

Painful pictures

Paul tried to avoid hip replacement as long as possible, but in 1999, after talking to several other young men who'd had the surgery, he decided to pursue it. We went together to see an orthopedic specialist, who showed us a picture of a healthy hip—a comfy, cushioned ball-and-socket fit. And then he showed us Paul's x-ray. No cushion—just one bone rubbing against another.

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Originally published in: Marriage Partnership, 2007, Spring, Page 24

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