Like most people I feel apprehensive about admitting my marital problems for fear of unnecessary embarrassment and vulnerability. Although there a collective silence about marital discord exists, reality dictates that every marriage possesses conflicts and obstacles to be navigated. A medical marriage in particular forces spouses to deal with additional stressors like ridiculous work schedules, economic strain, quasi-single parenthood, decreased intimacy, marginalization of the non-physician’s accomplishments, and possibly a diminished support system if the couple must relocate for training.
Just to set the record straight, many of us have arrived at the low point of questioning whether we should continue on the same road with our physician partners. If you ever have thought about quitting or giving up, you are not alone. Maybe you also feel uncomfortable telling anyone about these thoughts because you fear shame, isolation, or guilt. If you have found yourself at these crossroads, rest assured, you are not alone. I will share the story of my marital crisis point to provide hope to anyone out there going through the same process.
In the Summer of 2000, my husband began his general surgery residency at a location thirteen hours away from our hometown. Just a few months earlier, I gave birth to our son, who brought unbelievable joy, love, stress, and sleeplessness in a single instance.
I moved to this new city without ever having seen it before. My husband did not rank this program first and neither of us really believed that we would end up here. The joke was on us, however, because we ended up in a place in which we were not prepared to live. That summer my husband worked over a hundred hours a week, which in turn made him perpetually exhausted and cranky. We survived on credit card debt because the cost of living in our new city was higher than we anticipated.
To further complicate matters, I knew no one and the program did not offer a spouses’ group, or any support for that matter. In fact, my hubby was the only married categorical surgery resident in his class, let alone the only parent. Over the summer I became increasingly angry about the circumstance with which we would have to deal with for the next seven years of our lives.
This life which was thrust upon us resembled none of the dreams that I had for us as a family. I seethed with hurt, anger, and loneliness. My hubby was in survival mode and unable to reach beyond his own exhaustion, confusion, and stress to help me navigate through these troubles. I equally was unable to move beyond my own pain to support my husband through his demanding times. It seemed like all I did that summer was nurse my baby and cry. I had reached my breaking point.
One night after my hubby came home after a grueling thirty-six hours of call, I threatened to leave him. I was serious. I remember feeling trapped in a crisis and believed escape was the only option for survival. I really can’t remember all the horrible things that we said to each other that night, but this fight left an indelible mark on both of our psyches. Our love and commitment to our child made us try to make it work one more day, and then one more week, and then one more month.
I’m happy to report that we remain happily married to this day. Somehow we muddled through those times and didn’t give up. In truth, I am grasping to remember the measures that we took to improve our marriage. Nothing really comes to me, save a few small things like regular date nights, more daily phone contact, and simply letting some time pass.
What I do know, however, was that deciding to give the marriage one more chance was the best decision that we ever made. Hindsight makes it easy to discern that this conflict was the result of our individual stresses and our inability to support the other. Like everything in this life, internship and the attendant pressures passed. I had confused marital incompatibility with external pressures on the marriage.
My hope in disclosing this story is to provide hope to those of you considering your marital options in the midst of the conflict that a medical career brings. In truth, I feel fortunate that we endured this experience and built this marriage from a near divorce state into a more solid union.
Our marriage has become an absolute priority now and we have become best friends again. I don’t want to mislead, we still have our moments, but disagreements tend to assume a more transitory feel nowadays. In the end, I realized that I had to let go of my vision of how I wanted my life to look and embrace the life that continues to unfold before me.