Hi Rose, First of all, I am in a situation similar to yours. I am 'technically' married to my husband - we have been together for 35 years and he is 16 years older than I am (I'm 53). He is a Vietnam vet. While we are legally married, we have not lived together for about 15 years. He insists upon living alone, and he is quite severely mentally ill (OCD and anxiety), and I suspect that he has some signs of dementia. He FLATLY refuses to seek medical care. We live exactly 1 mile from each other, but he is at my apartment every evening for a few hours, then he returns to his house. I am his emotional caregiver, for sure. I am not yet his physical caregiver (as I was back when we were raising our children), but I doubt it'll be very long before I am. We are close to our two grown children and our son-in-law, but they are all three very busy with their lives.

I have two suggestions, and I hope I'm not repeating others' suggestions:

1. Can you become your companion's official caregiver and get paid for the position? I did that with my mother for some years, many years ago.

2. Is there a caregivers' group you can attend? NAMI has free caregivers' groups in many locations. Also, the VA in most locations have a tremendous number of resources for vets and their significant others...not only medical, but therapeutic, groups, counseling.