Advice for Male Breast Cancer Caregivers

For more information on breast cancer caregiving, I encourage you to visit our Breast Cancer Caregiver Center. Here you'll find advice about how to best care for loved ones -- and yourself -- through the difficult time of breast cancer diagnosis and treatment.

 

Best,

Maria

 

Maria Gifford

Community Moderator

MyBreastCancerNetwork.com

 

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hi marc, your blog was given to me through Katherine DuHamel . M wife is a patient of hers . I'm a husband trying to be the best I can for my wife , but I get overwhelmed at times , and I have taken it out on her . Overall , we are doing great , but I was wondering if you knew of a meeting for partners , like AA , where you could go to share your experience , strenght and hope with other partners . It can be a lonely , fearful place being the devoted spouse of a cancer patient /survivor . I want to be the best I can for her , but at times it drains me . thank you for any help you can give me , Dan McNamra

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I have gone to everything my wife has gone thru, in others words, I been right there with her. Most of the time by myself. I ask for help I ask medicial staff who I could talk to and there was no one. Most of the guys I talk to didn't want any thing to do with breast cancer. You know what I see my wife go thru 6 months of chemo, then a double mastectomy, then 30 of 33 appointments for radiation, cause she burn to bad to finish. So we had to wait till that heal then go thru reconstruction surgery that took 13 1/2 hours, then watch her has both lungs has problems and they took her back to recover with out tell me. Nobody told us that she had to walk at a 45 degree angle so we are walking around normally and she end up opening up 22 inches out of 27 inches. So we are now going around pack so she can heal up and what happen she gets a inflection thats also most kill her, she has a 105 temp, throwing up, ends up in the hostipal for a week. All said and done she end up in the hostipal 4 more times for the same thing before we finally find out the problem and take care of it. She still isn't done and it been over 3 years now and I'm still right beside her and planning to stay there.
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