My husband's side effects and my exhaustion

Started 28 June 2026 · 14 replies · 75 hearts · read 749 times

LandoLeeds, UK · 28 June 2026

3 weeks ago

Something I have been sitting with: My husband's side effects and my exhaustion Not looking for advice so much as other people's experience.

Anyone else navigating this? I feel as though every piece of advice I read was written for someone with a completely different week.

The social side of this is harder for me than any of the logistics, and I have not found anywhere else where that is discussed practically.

I nearly did not ask because it sounds trivial written down, and it has been the most persistent difficulty of the last six months.

If anybody has an arrangement that works and is willing to write it out, I would be very grateful.

PamSouthport, UK

Coming back to say we found a rhythm, that his care has been stable for a year, and that I have kept going, which two years ago I would not have predicted.

BramberSteyning, UK

Lando, answering your question directly rather than going round the houses.

Nobody has asked me how I am in about four years and this circle asks every week, which is most of why I am still here.

4me too 1

WrenFacilitatorLeeds, UK

I am pleased with this thread. Practical, kind, no instructions, no comparisons. That is the whole brief.

PipBristol, UK

What I found is that the logistics assume a person with a spare afternoon, and I have not had a spare afternoon since 2019.

GigiNaples, IT

Recognition rather than advice, if that is any use at all.

BrennaEnniskillen, NI

The exhaustion was already there before any of this. Working out what was new and what was simply caring took me a long time.

ZoraSarajevo, BA

Gently disagreeing with Brenna, or rather adding the other half of it.

Something practical: I got my collections aligned with the ones I already do for somebody else, and it saved me a journey a month.

5me too 8

ÖzlemIzmir, TR

Eating properly is the thing that goes first when I am stretched, and it goes without me noticing, and this circle is where I noticed.

IdrisCardiff, UK

Zora — yes, and the bit that took me longest to accept was the next part.

My GP asked how I was doing as a carer, once, unprompted, and I cried in the appointment, which surprised us both.

SableCape Town, ZA

#10

What helped was one hour a fortnight that is genuinely mine, arranged formally, so that it cannot quietly disappear.

LinnetKendal, UK

#11

Bookmarking this. Thank you.

3me too 4

IzoldaVilnius, LT

#12

I have found the check-ins here more useful than the circles, because two lines on a Tuesday is what I can actually manage.

WrenFacilitatorLeeds, UK

#13

Speaking as a facilitator: the person who asked wanted company for a difficult week rather than a plan, and the thread has given both, in that order.

NkosiJohannesburg, ZA

#14

The thing that nearly stopped me was a fortnight where his needs increased and I had no capacity for anything of my own.