and you will find a picture of my husband. What a hard head! I haven't posted much for about 6 months as we have just been locked into a standoff. He needs his esophagus stretched....radiation, the gift that keeps on giving, right...and he was convinced he was having a recurrence and was refusing treatment. In the meantime I've had surgery on my foot and thumb. Finally, finally, he goes to the surgeon today who explains that he needs the esophagus stretched due to radiation......sigh...just like he did last time. So now he's going to have it done. No sign of cancer, a few blood tests and he will schedule it. Sometimes you just want to beat your head on a wall......

Ah Cheryl, I know exactly how you feel. Steve and I still but heads every now and then about things. For some reason if things come from me they just don't have the same impact as if they come from the doctor or his dietician. So if you looked up stubborn, frustrating and a pain in the butt in the dictionary then I'm pretty sure you'd find Steve's picture. Luckily for him I still love him lol.

Hope all goes ok with the stretching. Doesn't sound very nice. And hope you thumb and foot are feeling better now.

Good news though that no sign of cancer. Take care and good to see you back on here x

Wendy

I'm afraid I'm the same as your men. When Ray tells me something I listen sometimes...if my doctor says it then I really listen. Not sure why because Ray is usually right:)

@ Wendy....thumb has been fine...foot still limping...hooray that there's no sign of cancer! @ Suzanne - the doctor told him this 6 months ago but he's just a hard head.
I guess the part that really irks me is that H has been constantly losing weight during his stubborn fit, can't swallow much of anything, and has to sleep upright. Fiddled around with this until he's made himself so much worse than he had to be. It was hard to come back here and post much except to encourage some since I couldn't even motivate my own H! There are such a bunch of fighters on here that I am sooo soooo proud of. But I certainly identify with the frustration of those who have to push, pull, drag and butt heads with their patients!! Obviously, I have farmed myself silly on FB to keep from fighting with him LOL!

My wife isn't stubborn she just doesn't listen to me unless I happen to agree with her which isn't often.

lol David, your wife is a gem

Men...can't live with them, can't live without them. At least you didn't have to resort to a sledge hammer. Oooops, was I really talking about women?

@ Jerry....yeah, I considered a sledgehammer a few times so now he's upped the name from obstinate to pig headed ass (see, using my farming words) as he went out and shoveled all the snow today....the man has dropped close to 70# and has the stamina of a gnat. Would not allow me to help at all. Men!!!!

personally, i think the search would result in a picture of andy...im just saying! i call him my bad patient and the fact that he is a stubborn new yorker would surely put a pic of him at the top of the list!

I will assume then you are as crazy as I am

I know I fought my wife every step of the way, from refusing to get Dx'ed and all through Tx. I remember one instance where I was badly in need of a hospital stay and I was refusing to go because I wanted to watch a college FB game on TV that afternoon and I was afraid I would either miss it or even worse be put in a semi private room with someone already watching Judge Judy so my wife finally having enough of my butt looked at me and said "ALL RIGHT THEN JUST LIE THERE AND DIE!!!" and with that she walked out of the room. A few seconds later I relented. I remember one doctor telling my wife that I was 24 hours from my kidneys shutting down...OK so she got lucky.

Your wife is a saint!!! I've read some of your stories on here! LOL I've tried that tact and have been unsuccessful. If I argue with him, he just gets worse, and if I don't say anything then he just does what he wants which is nothing. Frankly there are days I could just get in the car and drive (south since I'm sick of the snow - 12" a couple days ago and now anywhere from 4-9 this week). I'm considering life as a beach bum because I've just about had it. Even used the ole line "if I said that to you, how would you feel??" But that's different. Personally, I think his thyroid is totally screwed up - mood changes, depression, cold, etc. then fine for awhile and then back to the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde routine. His last TSH was in September and was .46 and he's due now for a TSH, T3 and T4. We'll see.

try taking the good batteries out of the remote and replacing them with dead ones. "no honey, we dont have any batteries but if u get up and go, i will stop by the store and get some". sometimes we have to resort to mean and nasty tactics, but its all for their own good

Whoooooa, that's hitting way below the belt and I thought my wife was cruel and unusual!!

id like to think of it more as creative caretaking

Yeah and I'm sure Hannibal Lecter came up with some catchy phases to describe his trade!!

u guys and ur remote...priceless!

Excuse me, my wife has a sign on her desk that reads, "The one with the most shoes when she dies WINS" and believe me she has to be a front runner in that race.

shoes...where...i want some! yeah its pretty dangerous to get in my way when there is a shoe sale

A quick update on my pig headed h...he had the esophageal dilation today...doing well after a few breathing problems due to the anesthetic. Only one small stricture which was easily cleared. No sign of cancer in view during procedure! Now to set an appt with an endocrinologist...surgeon says do it, too much stuff going on that needs checked. Guess I have to quit calling him pig headed now....at least for awhile

My goodness. I am in a normal relationship! Substitute the word Alex for husband, Steve, Jerry or Andy in any of these posts and it is him. Alex owns the word procrastinator

Well then I own the word stubborn!

lol David you men drive us women crazy. I think Steve has a share in the word stubborn with you David. In fact I think he actually invented it. He would have to be the most stubborn man I have ever, ever met. Luckily for him I love him.

Yes Karen, I do see many similarities between Alex and Steve. Got to feel sorry for you there because I know what you are up against. Steve's treatment was extremely hard work, for both of us, but so worth it when we got to the end. I think most of Steve's issue was he had no control. So he tried to control the little things like eating and doing his oral care etc. Didn't matter how much it would hurt him in the end, I think in some way just by being able to say no I don't want to, it helped him to feel better about the whole situation. Who knows. All I can say Men, I'll never figure them out.

and I will take ownership of "bully". I also have the advantage of a high balcony that I can threaten Alex with when the master procastinator has had his head in the sand long enough.

i agree with u there Wendy....MEN--gotta love em....

Well I'm married, 20 yrs, to the most stubborn, pig headed female in the world. She's Cuban born and I think it's genetically instilled in them to be the leader of the family. It' funny though as she will often complain about how stubborn her mother is and how frustrating it is to talk to her and I just laugh.

She always tells me "please talk to Mima, you are the only one she will listen to" and I quietly think to myself, why can't you follow that advice!

Sons can be obstinate, too! I don't know if it has to do wih being a computer programmer with answers to everything else or what, but after much "Mom, I'm an adult now", and lots of obstinate refusals, the thing that turned the tide for us was when I printed out lots of concerned, experienced, compassionate postings from OCF people and just laid them by his bed while he was sleeping. The next day he was a whole lot more receptive.