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Illness is making me resentful

Dogue27's picture

Hi everybody. Let me just jump right in. I have an on-going problem that I really need some outside perspectives on so I don't lose my mind.

My husband and I have 3 very young children together (the youngest being 1, the eldest being 6). He also has a child from a previous marriage. Due to the distance from each other, we see his child 1x a month, and then holidays. I have been in his child's life almost from the beginning, as they separated very early in the pregnancy, however, due to the very small amount of time we spend with him amongst other issues, I am not very bonded to him. I don't really have a step mother role, more of a caregiver/wife of his dad role, and that's okay- he has his own mom and I have no desire to try to push myself into that role.

Anyway, since my stepson was around 2, there has been a problem where every.single.time he comes over for any extended period of time, and about half of the time he comes over just for his monthly weekends, my entire household gets sick.

He himself often has a cough or congestion, but never is really sick or feeling bad. He is carrying some sort of germs that he is mostly immune to, but we get hit hard with without mercy. My eldest is in school, so we must be exposed to germs on the regular, but nothing gets us sick except my stepson. We are obviously not immune compromised because, like I said, we never get sick, except upon his arrival. But with his arrival inevitably comes illness. And I can not reassure myself anymore that we'll build up an immunity soon, because this has been going on for years, and very often we get sick with the same bugs over and over again (one in particular, which causes vomiting and extreme diareah can be identified by the abnormal smell of the poo before it even hits hard, so I know we've had this bug at least 15 times by now).

When it was just me and my husband, getting sick often was an annoyance, but tolerable. But I have three children of my own now, and it hurts me to see them hurting. To know that when my stepson visits, my poor babies will be throwing up, and/or sick with fever, and miserable within a few days... well, I am to the point where I dread his visits, and I am holding on to a LOT of resentment and anger, even if I know logically that he is not doing it on purpose. My daughter has missed so much school because of this that I now have to take her to the doctor each time she misses, or a truancy officer will be at my door.

When I see him sneeze and touch things, or go to the bathroom and not wash hands, etc. I am getting legitimately angry. And when I see him get near my baby, my first instinct is to run and scoop my baby up away from him. I know this is not a healthy or nice way for us to be together, but I feel I have developed a learned negative response to him, and I do not have any idea how to fix it. Sanitizing the house doesn't work. Pushing hygeine on him doesn't work. I don't understand how he can possibly be such a biological weapon, but dang, it is really not tolerable for me anymore. 

I write this, as we are on day 5 of a visit, and my 4 year old spent all night throwing up, and now my throat is scratchy, and it's all coming on AGAIN and I'm losing my mind. His last visit had the whole family knocked down vomiting every 15 minutes for 2 days. And it isn't just us. When extended family comes to visit when he is here, they get sick too. Two elderly family members have ended up hospitalized with severe illness immediately after visiting. One of them nearly died. I don't get what or why this is happening and I have no idea how to fix it. 

I need help, advice, anything.

 

MrsStepMom's picture

I mean I’d say make him wash his hands, a lot. My stepson gets me sick constantly. He has had the same u touched soap in his bathroom for the entire time I’ve lived with him. He’s disgusting. I was sick for 6 months straight with one thing or another. We can mostly get him to use hand sanitizer but now I don’t even let him touch food that we share. He has his own of anything that requires hands. If I tell him to wash his hands he just ignores me and continues on with whatever he was doing. It I tell him to do ANYTHING he ignores me. Husband doesn’t remind him regardless of how many times i beg because I’m so tired of being sick. The $300 in copays that added up that husband just had to pay for me being sick hopefully knocked some sense into him. I told him since we are going to try to get pregnant soon I will not be sick and pregnant for many obvious reasons. I have begged him to get SS into the habit of washing now so it’s second nature by then but I doubt it’ll work. Brushing his teeth and not shitting his pants at the age of 16 isn’t even second nature for him. God i hate that kid. 

Wrong Way Diva's picture

It's possible that the boy is carrying a bug like giardia ( a parasite ) or norovirus or even c diff that he needs to be treated for.   It's gross, but next time he comes over take him in for a full physical, get stool samples and tests done and find the source.   

Dogue27's picture

I wonder if I can get those tests done with just the sample, instead of bringing him to the doctor. I know that would not go over well with his mother.

Rags's picture

This is your DH's kid.  Take him to the doctor and get the tests.  Screw what his BM thinks about it.  

DH can engage any medical tests he wants to engage with his kid. There are online test services that will run any test you want.  They send you to a collection clinic and send you the report.  No trip to a Doc office required.

SteppedOut's picture

Bleh. Omg. I have no advice except hand washing and hygiene, but I know its exhausting following behind someone else's kid to make sure they do. 

How old is skid now? 

What does your husband say about all this nonsense. 

I don't know that I could deal with this happening every single time he visits. Ugh! 

Dogue27's picture

My husband is starting to get pissed off at me because I get in a bad mood when the illnesses start up. I don't treat SS badly or say anything about it to him, but just my annoyed looking face is aparently enough to make my husband mad. He doesn't seem to care at all that his other kids are getting horribly sick over and over again. He gets affected the least of all of us, lowest frequency and lowest severity, so to him, this isn't a big deal I guess. If anything, he is getting pissy towards our children when they GET sick, instead of being upset that SS keeps getting them sick. I am the one that has to wake up with them at all hours of the night while they throw up, because if he has to do it, he yells at them. My daughter unexpectedly threw up while sitting in an upholstered chair a few weeks ago and he was yelling at her like she had control over it. This issue is driving a wedge in my marriage. 

secret's picture

Gross.

my SS seems to always be sick too... and unfortunately, he puts his dirty hands on EVERYTHING... so I follow him around with Lysol wipes.

There was a time DH didn't seem to think it was as important as I did... until I flipped out and called it like it is... that he's 5 years old... old enough to know proper hygiene... and that if DH wasn't going to make sure his kid didn't spread his germs around, that I had the right to take preventative measures to avoid getting sick...

Just because the kid is DH's doesn't mean the rest of the family needs to tolerate his sh!t. Literally.