Not very sympathetic

It is true, I am not a sympathetic person, especially when it comes to my husband and his health issues, which boil down to having sinus/allergy issues and having had a vasectomy on Friday.  He is, in general, a pretty healthy guy.

A friend jokingly remarked on my apparent lack of sympathy, which has had me thinking (in a good way, K) about why I am this way.

I think a couple of things play into this---

First, my husband's mother, whom I really have a good relationship with and is a wonderful person, is a bend-over-backwards-for-her-kids kind of lady, which is very different from how my mother was.  My mother was of the "you get your own stuff because I'm not your maid" school.

In some respects, to keep peace in my marriage, I have behaved somewhat similarly to my MIL, doing perhaps more than I would prefer.  Some of this is because I am a stay-at-home mom and so feel I "should" shoulder more home-related work.  Some of this is because my husband got used to his mom doing a lot for him and has a passive-aggressive streak which drives me bonkers (and he knows this--I'm not spilling any deep, dark secrets here). Part of it is that I am of the "do-it-myself" variety--if I want something done, I usually want it done immediately and so I just do it.  (I am often my own worst enemy.)

Secondly, as someone who has had health-related anxiety as long as I can remember, there is a "Calling Wolf" element that comes into play when people give you too much sympathy.  If you whine and moan about every little sniffle or, in my case imagined tumor, people eventually stop listening to you at all.  They don't take you seriously.  I know my mother and D never took me seriously when I'd ask, "Do you think I have cancer?"  or "Does this look like cancer?"

And thirdly, and this is not something of which I am proud, I compare the other person's experience to what I have experienced.

As someone who had numerous ENT (3 sets of tubes, adenoids removed and eardrum repair) surgeries before age 10 as well as had allergy tests and took allergy shots my entire childhood and now continue shots as an adult, I cannot muster up sympathy for sinus problems.

Plus, it has only been in the past 3 years that D sought an allergist's help for his issues, which means I listened to sinus-related complaints for nearly 10 years before he did anything about it.  Now that he regularly gets shots, takes allergy medicine and religiously uses his nose-spray, he feels better.
So part of my theory on whether to give someone sympathy is whether or not the person has done something to try to remedy the problem themselves.  If they have a problem yet do absolutely nothing about it, I am not sympathetic.

In 2003, when I was about 11 weeks pregnant with N, D had what we believe was an anxiety-attack, though at the time we thought it might be his heart.  I was terrified, and I think I was very sympathic.  This was, of course, before I became a mother and understood not only the rigors of pregnancy and childbirth, but also the truth that mothers are mothers even when we're sick.  I haven't had a sick-day in over 6 years, although I have been sick numerous times.

I think if D developed a serious health condition--diabetes, MS or cancer--I would be sympathetic to him.  But allergies?  A vasectomy?  In the grand scheme of things, these are minor.  And especially in light of the fact that I tended to children by myself 10 days after having major abdominal surgery.  (Not that D didn't help; he did, but I was solo for most of the day about 10 days postpartum).

I think and hope that when D has most needed me I have been sympathetic and supportive.  Like when his dad died in 2004.