🎵"More than This" EOA Wanting out (Roxy Music)
because sometimes your spouse is physically still beside you… but pieces of your marriage are already disappearing.
This may be one of the hardest posts I ever write.
Because somewhere between:
👉 Stage 4
👉 Stage 5
👉 Burnout
👉 Loneliness
👉 Loss of intimacy
👉 Becoming caregiver instead of partner…
Many spouses quietly start thinking:👉 “What about ME?”
Many spouses quietly start thinking:👉 “I want more than this life”
And then comes the guilt.
💔 LET’S TALK ABOUT THE THING NOBODY SAYS OUT LOUD
Sometimes:👉 Caregivers want MORE.
More:
Connection
Conversation
Touch
Partnership
Support
Affection
Help
LIFE
And admitting that can feel:👉 Shameful
Especially when your spouse is sick.
🧠 CAREGIVER MARRIAGE GRIEF IS REAL
The relationship slowly changes.
At first:👉 You compensate a little.
Then:
👉 You guide more.
👉 Repeat more.
👉 Manage more.
Eventually:
👉 You become:
Caregiver
Parent
Nurse
Financial manager
Protector
And somewhere quietly:👉 The marriage itself changes shape.
💔 INTIMACY CHANGES EVERYTHING
This is huge and almost nobody prepares you for it.
Sometimes:👉 The emotional connection fades first.
Sometimes:👉 The communication fades.
Sometimes:👉 The attraction changes because the caregiving role overwhelms the partner role.
Sometimes:👉 Hypersexuality appears.
Sometimes:👉 They no longer understand intimacy cues.
Sometimes:👉 YOU are simply exhausted.
😔 THEN THE LONELINESS HITS
You can feel:👉 Completely alone while still married.
And honestly?
That kind of loneliness is hard to explain to people who haven’t lived it.
⚠️ SOME CAREGIVERS START THINKING ABOUT DIVORCE
There.
I said it.
And before people judge:👉 Sit with this reality first.
Because Alzheimer’s caregiving can involve:
Years of chronic stress
Financial destruction
Emotional isolation
Loss of partnership
Aggression
Wandering
Personality changes
Safety concerns
Parenting alone
Career sacrifice
Sometimes for:👉 10+ years
💔 REASONS SOME SPOUSES CONSIDER DIVORCE
Not always because:
👉 They stopped loving their spouse
Sometimes because:
💰 Financial Survival
Families become terrified of:
Losing everything
Medicaid spend-down
Medical debt
Long-term care costs
Some people explore divorce:👉 To financially protect children or the healthy spouse.
🧠 Safety & Aggression
Some spouses become:
Aggressive
Unsafe
Sexually inappropriate
Paranoid
Unmanageable at home
And caregivers reach:👉 Physical and emotional breaking points.
💔 Emotional Abandonment
Sometimes the disease progresses to where:
👉 The marriage no longer resembles a marriage emotionally at all.
👩👧 Parenting Alone
EOA caregivers may still have:
Young kids
Teens
College students
Careers
They are simultaneously:👉 Raising children AND caregiving a spouse.
😔 The Healthy Spouse Starts Disappearing Too
This part matters. There are statistics on the cargivers decline and 1/5 die before the spouse with the disease.
Sometimes caregivers realize:👉 They are losing themselves completely.
And they become terrified:👉 Nobody is coming to save THEM.
⚠️ THIS DOES NOT MAKE SOMEONE EVIL
Caregiver judgment is brutal.
But unless someone has:
Done this 24/7
Lost their marriage slowly in real time
Carried the financial fear
Lived the isolation
They truly may not understand.
💔 MANY PEOPLE DON’T ACTUALLY WANT DIVORCE
What they want is:
👉 Relief
👉 Help
👉 Rest
👉 Partnership again
👉 To feel human again
FREEDOM
🧠 SOME COUPLES OPENLY DISCUSS THE FUTURE
This surprised me in caregiver groups, is how many don't. We did right away, I am 9 years younger, with two living healthly (well somewhat) older parents.
Some spouses have honest conversations like:
👉 “If I no longer know you someday, I don’t want you alone forever.”
Those conversations are:
👉 Beautiful
👉 Heartbreaking
👉 Complicated
💡 THINGS TO DO BEFORE MAKING HUGE DECISIONS
✔️ Talk to a therapist
Preferably:
Caregiver-informed
Dementia-informed
✔️ Speak with an elder-law attorney
Especially if finances/Medicaid are involved.
✔️ Get respite care if possible
Sometimes exhaustion itself distorts everything.
✔️ Build support BEFORE collapse
No one thinks clearly:👉 In total burnout.
💔 THE REALITY NOBODY TALKS ABOUT
This disease can:👉 End marriages emotionally long before it ends medically.
And caregivers quietly grieve:
Their spouse
Their future
Their identity
Their companionship
Their intimacy
Their FREEDOM to travel, to go, to grocery shop even.
All while still caregiving daily.
🧠 WHAT I’VE LEARNED
Wanting:
Comfort
Touch
Support
Happiness
Connection
Vacation
Spontinity
Does NOT make you selfish.
It makes you:👉 Human.
🎵 Why “I Want More”
Because eventually many caregivers quietly realize:👉 They miss being loved back.
And that realization hurts deeply.
💭 Final Thought
If you’ve had thoughts like:
👉 “I can’t do this forever.”
👉 “I miss who we were.”
👉 “I don’t want to be alone forever.”
👉 “I need more than survival.”
You are not a monster.
You are a human being carrying:
👉 Enormous grief
👉 Enormous responsibility
👉 And impossible emotional contradictions.
And honestly?
More caregivers think these thoughts than anyone admits out loud.
💬 Disclaimer
I’m not a doctor, lawyer, therapist, or expert—just a wife trying to figure this out one day at a time. Everything shared here is based on our experience and things that have helped us along the way. Take what helps, leave what doesn’t, and always check with professionals when needed. I also use AI to help clean up my writing, organize thoughts, and pull together resources because honestly… caregiver brains are tired too. If something here helps another family feel less alone, then it’s worth sharing.
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