Boyfriend suffering with Tendonosis and Depression

Pinkmoon19

Hi,

I'm not sure if this is the right place for this so feel free to move it. My boyfriend, who I've been with for almost 5 years, is suffering with acute tendonosis now for about a year. For the last 6 months or so he hasn't been working due to the pain. He's been getting physio for the last 5 months or so and it has it's up and downs. Lately he's been getting extremely depressed about his/our situation, even saying things like if the pain continues he doesn't want to go on. Obviously everything combined is a massive strain on our relationship, and although I want to do everything I can to help it really feels like nothing I do does help. I have been feeling that regardless of the pain that it's time for him to go back to work, not just for financial reasons but because I think it's doing him no good sitting around at home all day. Even part-time work would give him some sort of focus. Has anyone else been in this situation? Does anyone have any advice on how to deal with someone suffering from depression. Should I be a bit more tough love? Any advice would be great. Thanks!

Mark Tapley

If your boyfriend is saying things like "he doesn't want to go on" he should contact his Doctor about his depression . Sooner rather than later.

cormie

I had something similar, took f**king ages to heal and I was out of basketball for 6 months. Going from playing maybe 5 times a week to nothing is a big kick in the teeth, was going to rehab with a physio and everything too but to be honest, I could have done a lot more to speed up the recovery and I'm sure your boyfriend can too. You need to strengthen your whole body so that all the other muscles are stronger to put less pressure on the area of weakness, this will give it more chance to heal. He probably knows this already but it's extremely important, I didn't do this and I've gone and pulled my neck again, infact, my whole upper body is pretty out of balance and it's a regular occurrence for me to pull something given I do furniture removals for a living and play so much basketball when I'm injury free.

I've had about 3 other injuries within the 8 months all related to a weak upper body and will hopefully cop on and start putting more time into stretching/strength and maybe cut the basketball down to 3 times a week

Encourage him to go and get more exercise in, anything will help, not only the recovery of the issue itself but it will help the mind too. The simple answer is to just use and try strengthen the rest of his body as much as possible without putting strain on the damaged area. Also he should try socialise a bit more, being home bound is never a good thing and will only put pressure on anyone who is in close proximity for prolonged periods of time. He could try something like yoga or pilates too, great for strengthening and good for the mind too and a social environment.

Oh and it does get better, hard to believe when after 4 months the pain is still the same.

drunkmonkey

I've had the tendon problem lasted over a year, it was so bad I'd wake up in agony at night just by moving the wrong way, I had to change some habits and be very carefull what I did but all the time I couldn't take time off work as I'm self employed, you just have to adapt to the situation and get on with it, going back to work might be the best thing for him, could there be an alternative motive though that your boyfriend just doesn't want to go back to that job, he's been out a long time at this stage, his tendon should nearly be on the mend at this stage, he's had a lot of rest.
Tough love time!