Oh goodness, Manon, I can’t think of any good words to say how sympathetic I am. I’m not sure how much use anything I can say is really…but for what its worth, I would say that you could dispense with his services if you choose, but only if you put a lot of planning into it whilst you are still well enough.
I was first diagnosed metastatic 5 years ago. At that point, I could have lived independently, although it would have been quite hard whilst I was doing ECX (a very aggressive combination chemo which I don’t think BC patients normally get). Now, not so much. I am widely metastatic and have had a lot of chemo, so I am quite feeble; can walk OK, but not very far, but probably more importantly I find it hard work taking decisions and organising small stuff (like, say, geting someone to fix the broadband). Nothing to do with brain mets (which I don’t have, AFAIK); it’s just that thinking is tiring and thinking with some specific output even more so. It is kind of disconcerting, not to say annoying, because I used to be a senior manager in the City and and a very decisive person. We are currently in the middle of moving house, and my husband is doing pretty much everything, both physical and mental. I did order a new table online yesterday, but when the one we wanted was out of stock, I had to ring him to discuss whether to take alternative A or B, because I was having a tired spell and making the decision myself was just Too Much. It’s not that I can’t ever think properly, it’s just that I can’t reliably think at the point when I need to because of external circumstances.
So if I had to live alone, what would I be looking for so that I could cope alone? Small flat (small because not much cleaning, flat because less outside maintenance needing to be looked after), somewhere that one of the supermarkets will deliver, as close as possible to “my” hospital (like, short taxi ride not complicated cross-London public transport), ideally near supportive friends or family. Also, if I were rich enough, I would bearing in mind whether I could identify someone who I could pay on an occasional basis to come in and do stuff for me; not nursing, but things like 'move all these books from here to here" or “set up my new router”. A reliable teenager, maybe.
I think I probably could live alone if I had my life set up like this. I guess the other thing you need to think about is whether your husband would, in fact, be a good carer anyhow. I would, myself, rather live alone than with someone who was a grudging carer in any way.
Sorry, I seem to have gone on a bit. Some of this is the fruits of me having thought it through for myself, against the eventuality that my own husband were taken out by a traffic accident or a sudden heart attack, becasue I am now so dependent on him.
I would say, contact me privately if you like, but I can’t now give you my email address becasue of the forum rules. If you frequent (post edited by the moderator), I could do so there, however.
potentilla