OK, fine. I’ll admit it. Sometimes, I am a terrible wife.
Take last week, for example. My husband Doo came down with either a nasty cold or, more likely, an early bird flu. Fever, aches, cough, fatigue, the whole nine non-COVID-19-which-was-confirmed-by-two-separate-tests yards. As I’m typing, I can hear him still hacking up lung parts, a full 10 days after he first succumbed. And I am purposely using the word “succumbed” for all its dramatic implications, because whether Doo was actually behaving like he was on his death bed or not, that’s how I perceived it.
Which brings me back to my point of being an awful spouse. Other than making a one-time separate Meijer run for NyQuil, Canada Dry and generic chicken noodle soup, I carried on per usual. I went to work. I drove to Louisville for an overnight and I generally ignored his sniffles and sneezes and superfluous sighs of sickness. By Day 4 of his convalescence, I was blatantly rolling my eyes and contorting my face in disgust whenever he’d clear his chest or hawk a loogie. Nights were the bane of my existence, and I found myself plotting his demise as he hacked and wheezed and kept me from my most sacred ritual of sleep. How dare he!
Seriously, I showed so little compassion and empathy that I surprised myself. Not that it stopped me from putting in ear buds to mute his moans or anything. Poor guy. He felt miserable, and instead of me offering some much-needed “there, there’s,” I basically bullied him.
So, yeah, I’m a terrible wife. At least I can admit it.
Peace out.
