No more triathlon for me (Page 4)

Sorry for you problems, but I find it funny.  Why?  Because I fly single engine planes, including in instrument weather (i.e. you can't see out the windows), as one of my hobbies.  Small plane crashes make the news more often than triathlon swimming deaths.

I have friends that think I'm nuts.  My kids have friends that aren't allowed to fly in small planes.  Fear is irrational, so I don't bother trying to change their minds.  I will correct them if they say something wrong, but that's about it.  Anything else is pretty much a waste of time.

There are others that are fine with it.  I take the family on trips, or one of the kids and a friend or two of theirs to the beach.  A lot of my flying is helping people through Angel Flight.

Wish I had a good solution for you.  Unfortunately not knowing the two of you means I could at best just offer generalities though.

Thhis is your wife and your family and as such you need to respect her feeling which I see you are doing. Good for you. As many have stated statistically the odds of this happening are very low but the media has really brought endurance sports in to the limelight with the last few reported deaths.

I suspect you will be tri'ing again soon while she cools off and you work on her a little bit. In the meantime you need to try to get her to remove her emotions from the issue, get a physical (specifically a cardio stress test or something similiar), and show her the statistical data and also give her data on driving, drinking, lack of excercise, etc. You need to give her things to compare to so she can understand it is being blown out of proportion comapared to the reality of it

remember she is doing this out of love and fear of losing you. Not out of control like many on here would like to believe

....or maybe thats just the optimist romantic in me

Pure conjecture.

Then maybe you just married wrong to begin with, or watch to much Houswives of __________

bahahahhaha!!! talk about pwned!!!!!!!

Give her a box of these and then go swimming:

never mind

I think lambs turn into sheep at some point before 100 years.  Maybe 1 year as a lamb and 99 as a sheep.

Perhaps its the story of a stallion who turned into a gelding?

That stinks.  My wife who has done a few tri's herself also has concerns, but she saw how depressed I was when I could not train/race because of a stress fracture back in March.  So maybe she likes me both healthy and happy.  She saw me nearly collapse from heat stroke earlier this summer, and now insists on coming to all my races, which I enjoy having anyway.  

Now, my mother-in-law one day decided to have the same conversation with me about swimming being dangerous, needless to say I got a little defensive and a lot Rude!  Whole different story...

Hope you get this worked out with her.  Like others have said, if it is truly a passion, then hopefully she will find some flexibility.  Or else, just start moping around the house like I did for 3 months...

The thing with fear is that it is driven by emotion, no amount of statistics will change an emotional opinion. Look at hings like Panic Attacks where an individual experiences intense fear, having dealt with someone experiencing it for upwards of 8 years it didn't matter how much logic and fact was presented it didn't change the experience. Most times overcoming fear requires facing it head on and not trying to convince or change something.

For the OP a couple asked, but you haven't really said.. what is the consequence of going to the pool and swimming.

Compromise. Tell her you're willing to undergo any medical test she wants to alleviate her fears. If anything comes back marginal, you'll reconsider. If it all comes back clean, she should reconsider.

I can understand the fear issues, which is magnified by the rare yet highly publicized deaths in triathlons. If you address that, and she still won't reconsider, then it's a control issue and you've got to decide if you're a gelding or a stallion.

No, my wife has a sense of reason and wouldn't make such a silly request.  Asking someone to quit swimming because of deaths "out of love" is not consistent with a loving, reasonable mindeset.

But hey, thanks for juding me.  Screw you.

Wow, a lot of chest pounding going on here.

If my wife was that nervous about some of my activities the first thing I'd do is try to find some facts to help alleviate the nervousness.   Finding things to compare the danger to would always help.  If I was unable to calm her fears then I'd find something else to do for a while.

Guess its all about priorities.

Amazing.  So if someone is unwilling to cave to every strange little sense of insecurity in a relationship, that person's priorities are out of whack?

Been married 13 years, 2 kids, happy successful life.  That's not how we operate.

If you love someone, set them free. If they come back after
an OWS then it was meant to be...

I'm not supporting my family off of triathlon.  Its a hobby.  This isn't about insecurity in a relationship.  Its about someone who cares about you fearing for your safety....over a hobby.  Rational or not I love my wife enough that I wouldn't put her through that.

That said I try real hard to convince her that her fears were misplaced.

I think you are making assumptions like everyone else.  For some of us, this chain of events is simply unfathomable from our SO.  It's based on years and years of mutual understanding and respect.

My wife finally let me get a motorcycle after the youngest went to college (go terps!). I think it's because I became expendable at that point.

X 1,000

This is the most reasonable response in the thread. My wife had two rules when we got married - no sleeping with other women, and no motorcycles (but that one got changed after only 25 years - so another 25 and I can sleep around.). Her concerns were that I would be seriously hurt or die, and that is the limit of her tolerance of the anxiety. My choice was to stay married or to break the rule. She has allowed me to do a lot of other dangerous activities, including SCUBA diving, despite personal up-close and personal experiences of people dying while diving.

If your wife is worried about your safety, you should respect that. Reasonable people can identify reasonable tolerances of risk and risk reduction strategies. Ultimatums and absolutes are rarely productive in a relationship.