Challenges of a Medical Marriage

I would love to hear any of my medical school friends' opinions on this article I came across this morning. Last night I was watching Boston Med (GREAT SHOW) and the discussion was about how hard it is being in a relationship with a physician. Much of it was.... so true.

In working with troubled medical marriages, we have observed that one of the biggest handicaps is the failure to develop an intimate relationship. For one reason or another the couple are strangers to each other. Some years ago the novel Not As a Stranger told the story of a married medical student and his wife who worked to help him through medical school. Then he found that he had outgrown her intellectually and socially. They had lived together, but they had not developed together: eventually he dropped her. That pattern is familiar but, in our experience, the actual break usually does not come until they are in their forties, when the "someday" of intimacy, which kept them going at first, never materializes. The physician's spouse accepts the hard work and loneliness of the years of medical school and tolerates the situation because she believes there is light "at the end of the tunnel." However, this does not come during the hard years of internship and residency. Immediately after that the physician becomes fully absorbed in establishing a medical practice and in wider medical activities. Finally, after he is well established, his wife finds that commitments to medical practice still do not decrease. It is then that she realizes that the hoped-for intimacy and sharing is a mirage. Often the wife feels that emotionally she has been a widow for years, and has had a husband who just wants to be looked after when he is home.

Spouses of physicians also feel the loss of general public esteem for the profession. As wives, they may be anonymous and forgotten in modern society, where not long ago they would have been visible and highly regarded. More tragically, however, many wives feel unneeded by their physician-husbands, who still get psychological support through work and public recognition. Thus, some physician's wives feel they can add nothing to their husband's welfare and self-esteem. At the same time the physician has not taken enough time to show his wife that she is important to him. The deflated wife may complain that she is nothing but a cook and prostitute, while the deflated husband may complain he is nothing but a breadwinner. When we ask doctors' wives if their work is as important as their husbands', the usual reply is "no." Few believe that their husband's professional achievements depend on or require their support. At a time when society is withdrawing its respect for both physician and spouse, each has even greater need for the appreciation of the other.