Husband in denial - Hep C positive

[HepJourney]

Hello,

It has been awhile since I have posted.  My husband was dx with Hep C in October.  We went to see the GI doc and he said that looking at a copy of a CT scan or MRI of his abdomen that they took when he had kidney stones in November that his liver looked good.  They did some bloodtests to check for geno type and viral load etc and told him to check back after the first of the year to talk about treatment as the CDC recommends most undergo treatment.

I called once to get the results, but they never called me back, I just left them another message.

The problem is my husband was of course scared to death when he first found out.  He has always been a drinking man until he had a seizure in Sept and they said it was because of his drinking, so he quit....that was it.  They also found that his liver enzymes were elevated and eventually diagnosed Hep C.

So....now here we are in Feb and he acts like nothing has happened.  He has also started drinking again.  He knows I dont approve, so he is hiding it.  He gets a quart of beer on the way home and then gets rid of the bottle, I even have found cans in the trash and a bottle under the bed.  I can tell when hes been drinking and now it seems most times it makes him really tired and hot and he has to go lay down.  I ask what is wrong and he says he is just tired and wont look me in the eyes.  I have told him I wont buy beer for you, but I am not your Mother so I cant tell you no, it is your body, liver and brain.

I love him, but I dont know what to do.  I told him I thought it was okay to have a drink on special occasions like his birthday, new years ect, but to sip it, not down it.  I am trying not to judge him because I know it is a disease and an addiction and it is his way to cope with things, but I also know they wont treat him if he is drinking.  

Now he is also constantly bent over kind of sideways leaning to his left and says its his middle back that hurts, but he is just stiff.  It also seems to mean that he is suffering from brain fog.  We have been together 20 years and in the last year he just seems to be slower in conversation and often has a hard time just asking a simple question.  He forgets little things alot, but mostly he just seems kind of like an air-head.  Our boys dont know, they are 15 and 12, but they have commmented and joked about it and I can see sometimes they get frustrated with him.  He is also itching a lot and has the skin condition Granuloma Annulare which I read is associated with Hep C, he has had this since I knew him.

I just dont know what to do.  I constantly worry about getting Hep C from him, so sex is pretty much non-existent and that makes hubby mad.  He wont go out anywhere because he cant drink so that pretty much cuts me off because we live in a rural area, so now we have no social life, just when our boys were getting old enough to start enjoying things again.  Oh, and he doesnt want ANYONE to know that he has Hep C, so you guys are the only ones I can talk to.

I feel so bad because I find myself getting mad, and then I feel like......oh well, he is a grown man (just turned 45, got Hep C about 25 years ago) and he needs to deal with this, but I know he is scared.  He used to be so healthy, never sick and in great shape.  Now I watch him try to play frisbee with the boys and he runs very clumsy and looks stiff, where he used to be fast and agile.  Maybe its just age, but seems to be more noticable in the last year, that and the brain fog issue.

I guess I am not really asking any specific question, just needed to "talk" to someone, its so hard to carry this around and not be able to share.  We were already struggling relationship wise before all this happened, so now I have that guilt as well.  I want to stick by him and help him through this, I know it will be hard, but I know if we really try it can and will bring us closer, I mean we just celebrated (yeah right) 20 years on Feb 21st.  But I dont want to be the one to push him through everything, make all the appointments ect, is that wrong?  I think he needs to do this, so I havent said or done anything after the GI appt, so he could feel in control, but he has done nothing.  I am wrong, should I just take control of all his treatment, tell him when he will start etc...but then again, he is drinking...can you tell I am confused.

Thanks for letting me ramble, maybe I should have just put this in a personal journal instead of here.  Any advice...anyone?  I am hoping they will call me back with his geno type and such so at least I can know that.

Thanks all,

K-HepJourney

[Forseegood]

what are you talking about???? anybody the least bit "touchy" here???? naaaaaaah:)

[nygirl7]

you nut we know what you meant.....but you are right about qualifying the statement I betcha somebody would have ended up yelling like crazy!  :)

i would agree though honestly as a group...we do tend to know more than the average bear, a lot of us either are addicts or ex-users and it is so rare to get that "gift".

[Forseegood]

qualifier...I don't mean to suggest that everyone is an alcoholic, when I said the gift of sobriety, I meant for *alcoholics*....I am fully aware that many people are just casual or social drinkers, and are not alcoholics...I find that if I don't qualify my statements sometimes I end up offending people...

[Forseegood]

wow...all I can say, what doesn't kill us....you know the rest, and youre one of the strongest people I know, I can't even imagine what that must of been like...and of course youre right when you talk about "wet alcohol brain" Ive had to deal with that more than once dealing with my younger sister....Al-anon saved my bacon with her, and a prior boyfriend....

I hope Hepcjouney realizes that we aren't just talking about these issues cause we know them in the abstract, I'm sure most everyone on this thread has been there, and knows this this is like, to varying degrees...it's terrible what demons some people have to contend with just inside themselves, and like was said, not everyone does get the gift of sobriety, but fortunately some do, thank God....

so sorry that you have been through this, but the upshot is that you can share your hope and experience with someone else here, on the chance that they benefit from your experiences...if you were here I'd give you a hug! thanks so much for talking about this...

[HepJourney]

Thank you for sharing your very personal and tragic experience.  I have talked to my husband and we will see what happens.  He does plan to get the biopsy and says he will call the Dr's.  I also did mention AA to him and he didnt say no.

We are just starting this journey so we know we have a lot to prepare for.  My kids do know that their Dad has some problems, we did not hide that from them and I have talked to them about his drinking.  I will do what has to be done if needed.

Thanks again and take care,
K

[nygirl7]

I've been hesitant to add anything because as you will see your post hits very close to home for me.

The man I married was diagnosed before I met him in about 1986 with hep non-a non-b which is now called hep c.  He continued to drink and party like crazy and got into all sorts of trouble. I finally left him in 1995 but we never divorced. I knew if we did it would push him over the edge. He never treated his hep.

I was diagnosed 3 years ago and did 72 weeks - one year later I am SVR.

This past summer when I refused to let him move back in with me and told him it was indeed time to proceed and get divorced he got very drunk that night and hung himself on my front porch. I didn't know until the police woke me up in the morning. He's hung himself with an extension cord and was hanging there all night into the daylight when someone saw him.  I thought he went into the guest room and went to sleep.  I can only thank God my kids (almost 17 & 19) weren't home and did not see what I unfortunately saw.

He never treated his diseases - either of them. Oh he went in and out of rehab constantly but never could curb his desires. In the end they got him. I don't believe he had much of a liver left at that time and his back ALWAYS hurt him so he'd take pills and dope and drink on top. As you can imagine not having much liver function at all the booze really just made him crazy, his liver couldn't process it the way a healthy persons might I suppose.

You are left with few options.  Either he gets help or most likely he'll end up dead one way or the other.  As his liver continues to decompensate from the tremendous attack it is under he will get worse and worse. You and your children will be there dealing with it.  Do you know the expression wet brain? That's permanent brain fog. If he's not treating he doesn't have 'brain fog' we get that from the meds...it's a different thing really.

You have to take a serious look at how much of this you want your children exposed to. Dad dead on a porch or dad dead or in transplant - the way he's going right now there aren't any other forseeable futures. Take it from me, I prayed, I begged I did everything I could but nothing worked.

If he won't see what the alcohol is doing to his liver and brain - prepare for the worst.  It's sounds harsh but it's an obvious outcome.

I'm hoping that you get help for yourself and your children from Alanon and Alateen and do what you can for yourselves.  You can try to change him but if he does not want to...he just won't.

God bless you. I pray that somehow he sees how serious this is and does something about it.  It IS that serious.

Good luck.