This is is long and I apologize but I am trying to get input to see if my thinking is incorrect or if there is another way to see this situation besides the way I see it now. Kinda need to start way back so here goes... We have been together for about 8 years now and when we met it was crazy good for quite awhile . I was almost vegan just because I don't care to cook before we met so I told her I was 99 percent vegan and only ate meat when eating out or if my kids came over and we made pizza with pepperoni. She told me and showed me all kinds of evidence for us being vegan and not needing to eat meat and it made sense to me so switched completely with no qualms or even missing anything. Never, not once, did I cheat on that or desire anything. We ate incredibly healthy by any standards. I always had a blender full smoothie everyday while I worked and then we would normally have a big salad at dinner. If we were being bad as we would say, I would have some chips and salsa , or some vegan crackers or a little pasta. I have a small business that when we got together she said she would work in with me and as it turned out it wasn't something she wanted to do so we agreed she would be a stay at home mom with her two from a previous marriage. This was really the biggest sore point throughout our relationship. As the business grew I was still having to be the jack of all trades in the business and she would complain about the hours but never offer to help. I always felt like I had to work more to keep up with her spending. Our grocery bill would be around 2400 a month for two kids that were there for two weeks of the month , and us two. All organic every time. Pets were always fed the best and that bill was around 400 to 700 a month for their food.
Fast forward to June of last year 2022 when I got diagnosed with a stage 3 colon cancer. Now mind you my brother has died 9 years ago at the age of 42 from cancer , he went through chemo and it ravaged him and didn't really help so I was very cautious about Western medicine. I really believed the "let food be thy medicine part . Wanted to go natural and heal myself so I read lots of pubmed papers on the mechanistic pathways of the chemo and then tried to find natural herbs and foods that would work the same. Even did a 30 day water only fast to find out in November that my tumor had grew by 30 percent. Of course my wife found the grape cure and a bunch of other ideas for how to cure cancer from the Internet . I had some genetic testing done that showed that I have a gene that makes me much more susceptible to not converting vitamin a from plants well , and another gene that shows I don't absorb ALA from plants well. I also had an ileostomy after a tumor removal surgery in May of this year that was just reversed at the end of August. The instructions for that were no raw fruits or vegetables because they wouldn't digest and could cause a blockage. I decided after my surgery that I would start eating meat since my genetic test said what it did and my intake restrictions with the ileostomy. Soooo... Crazy enough I started seeing changes in my body within just a couple of weeks of eating meat again. My muscles seemed to pop again and I could sleep and feel this difference, I had a mole on my back that had been growing that was actually shrinking , a small kind of scaly spot on my leg went away... So it really seemed to me like there was something to the meat being in my body that I was missing before. My wife is in complete disagreement about my interpretation and will cry if she sees me eating salmon, or so thing else. I have to eat outside on the garage and can't keep my food in the frig so she doesn't get upset. I honestly don't like eating an animal, it still does make me sad to think about , but it really seems like my body needs it. I should also say my wife took a bunch of vegan nutrition courses and we have both extensively read about nutrition and mechanisms of food.
The other big sticking point is that even as a stay at home mom (the kids were early teens so at school, whenever I asked for help with the business (carpet cleaning so I have to answer all the phones and emails and texts while I'm working ) she would always tell me she didn't have time because she has to clean and cook and meal prep. She would never set her alarm and wake up when she wanted to which meant I had to get my smoothies made before work and make my coffee and try to do a quick workout but would always be rushed to get out on time . It was the biggest sore spot for me because she is so wonderful and caring for everyone else and always tries to help on any way but when I asked for it and begged honestly all I got was excuses. So she would sleep in and then dinner was never done until 7 or 8 at night and then she would be up till late doing dishes so we wouldn't be able to go to sleep together. When I got the cancer we talked about if she should go back to work or help with the business to grow it that way. We decided together that we would finally work together in the business so that with my 10 percent chance of making it for 5 years , we could have time together. We decided that we needed to get her trained on the phones so when I was in the hospital she could take over . The day I was going in for surgery I was going over with her the couple of email leads to follow up on and she got quiet so I asked what was wrong and she said that every other company she had worked for people got time off when their spouse went in for a major surgery (she was an engineer ). I said that we weren't a major company and we can't do that and that she had agreed to answer the calls during that time and that if she didn't want to do that she should have said something so I could have a voicemail setup . I was in for 6 days and we had thought maybe three days originally would be the amount of time. She would come visit me around noon and leave around 6 or 7 and she would say that she was cleaning for me to come home.
On the 5th day at the hospital we were thinking I might get out the next day but weren't for sure. We talked and she said that she would come in the morning for an ostomy class at the hospital and then leave to go do shopping and and finish cleaning and then come back and get me and I said ok. Well the next morning came around and at 6 I was told I could get released. It was such a relief that I was like I want to get out of here .. I had two sets of IVs in my hands and they were both really starting to hurt and my I was pretty sore and tired from being woke up all the time and not eating much because I had a blockage . When she came in and we got done with the class I told her that I really just wanted to come home and . I asked if the shopping could get out of till the next day since I wasn't really hungry and the phones and emails were starting to go crazy and I didn't feel like dealing with them because I was still sore from the surgery. She got mad at me because she said we had a plan from last night on now I'm wanting to change it. I asked for help with the work stuff and she told me no . I got really hurt and upset because of this and reacted bad but I told her to get the fuck out because I was so hurt that she was mad that I wanted to leave and deviate from "the plan". She left to grocery shop for like an hour or so and then called and asked if was ready to come home and I said yes so she came and got me. When we got home she started cleaning and I tried to take a little nap but then I had to get up and start calling everybody back and answering emails.
She has grandkids in another state and will go pick them up and keep them for a few weeks but doesn't have time for me when I ask for help.
Am I wrong for questioning if this is someone to stay with now ? I find it hard to believe that she would not be with because I eat meat and that she still fights me about that and that I need it. I don't feel like she has my best interest at her heart . It sucks because I see how amazing she is with everyone else.