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I strive to be a better person...


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  • 2 weeks later...
On 6/3/2018 at 6:32 AM, DarrelW said:

For my own sanity and well-being it's important for me to accept the fact that I need to be okay with spending the remainder of my life alone. After all, how does one duplicate perfection

I can totally understand this statement and the question.  The idea of being alone for the next however many years (25+ maybe) certainly was shocking to me.  But the more I get to know new people the less I want to spend time with them because they just aren't my Gord.  I think it's better to live with the love of a great person in your heart and memory than to spend time with people that don't make you laugh, or hold you when you need any cry.

What would be nice is to have a man friend who just wanted to be a friend.  I would like a fishing buddy.

Sorry @DarrelW.  I didn't mean to make this about me.  I hope you can find comfort in knowing you loved and was loved by the perfect partner.  All others are pale in comparison.

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I understand all those thoughts & am very conflicted. I do have a woman friend and it’s uncharted territory. We do a lot together but I can’t help comparisons to Susan popping up at random. I really want a sailing buddy for cruising but what are the sleeping arrangements?

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I've accepted being alone the rest of my life but welcome friends, male or female, that I can do things with, hang out with, still not where I'd like it to be, but working on it little by little.  At the end of the day it's me, my dog, and my cat.  And that's okay too, we're a family.  Maybe that makes me pitiful, I don't know, don't really care.

Tom, just be candid up front about what you want and don't want.  

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I think Joni Mitchell sang: But now old friends are acting strange
They shake their heads, they say I've changed
Well something's lost, but something's gained
In living every day

I've looked at life from both sides now 
From win and lose and still somehow 
It's life's illusions I recall
I really don't know life at all

There are some good things about being older.  Some good things about being married (fixing to be 57 years), even if he has been gone some of that time.  Remember the little woman that was about my age that married a classmate after her husband passed away.  She had a heart attack and was in a wheelchair while he was getting her medicines), and he heard her say this "It's not the same."  And of course it is not the same.  I think it might be possible for two ghost partners to live with two new partners, and I'm not getting kinky.  I've seen it work.  But you have to agree with me on this, after this length of time, how could I ever not compare someone with my ghost who was the best ghost there ever could be.

And besides.  (No, I don't look in the mirror much), but all those guys I used to know, if they are not already dead, they have dementia, and damn........they are old. 

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  • 4 weeks later...
On Tuesday, June 12, 2018 at 7:46 PM, Marg M said:


It's life's illusions I recall
I really don't know life at all

I hope it is not just me, but have any of you felt that because of death and this type of grief we carry, you became a worse person? I do. I have not became a better person because of this tragedy. How could I be without my soulmate in my everyday life? Legacy and memories are not enough to me. They should but it is not happening. I give an example: a friend of mine has just told me sje is very much in love with her new boyfriend. I congratulated them and felt so angry cause Iwas in love, I was a loving grilfriend and one day I was not anymore and now it doesnt matter if I am in love, on the contrary, perhaps is no good at all. I felt it has only been me who has been touched by the flames.

I know feelings are feelings, but living two lives, one for the outside and one that you feel inside that is quite the opposite of what you are showing.

My brother told me: you cannot afford to lose the few friends that stayed by your side because they have the life you wished for yourself. So, I am playing the part of the good friend. 

 

 

On Tuesday, June 12, 2018 at 7:46 PM, Marg M said:

 

And besides.  (No, I don't look in the mirror much), but all those guys I used to know, if they are not already dead, they have dementia, and damn........they are old. 

I have been told "there are many divorced men you could meet"

I HATE ALL OF THIS. 

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On 6/12/2018 at 3:46 PM, Marg M said:

I think it might be possible for two ghost partners to live with two new partners

You can count on that being true Marg. It goes much deeper than one might think.

 

2 hours ago, scba said:

I hope it is not just me, but have any of you felt that because of death and this type of grief we carry, you became a worse person? I do. I have not became a better person because of this tragedy. How could I be without my soulmate in my everyday life? Legacy and memories are not enough to me. They should but it is not happening.

No matter what Ana, we would of course be worse a person than we were. In grief your sorrow is never going to make you a better friend to others or even be able to help others when you would have done that before your loss. But time changes that. We soften in our loss and one day we find ourselves alive once more. Grief of course never leaves us but we find ourselves better than we were at first. Of the two of us, Kathy was the best. Knowing her and loving her made me a better person. She made me want to emulate her. Of anyone I ever knew, she was the person I wanted to be. After her death I slipped into old bad behavior. I drank myself to sleep most nights. I grew to hate everything around me save for our little house and everything of her in it. I knew I had to get it back I had to honor her by being a better person. (a task I found so very difficult)

The song "I've Been Waiting" by Sixpence spoke to me in a very powerful way.

"So I'm changing who I am   Cause what I am's not good."

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"Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more.  It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."

Do you think Shakespeare all that long ago, writing Macbeth, do you think maybe he felt the same as we do so many centuries later?  

3 hours ago, scba said:

My brother told me: you cannot afford to lose the few friends that stayed by your side because they have the life you wished for yourself. So, I am playing the part of the good friend. 

So, in fact, I guess we are all just playing the part that was left us to play.  I look at my friends, two of them have birthdays today.  It seems like last month they had birthdays.  Time is flying by so fast and yet sometimes it is standing still.  We all live a contradiction, but we all live, and our other "half" has to live on through us.  They are gone, but are we not better people for having known them?  As for friends, I don't want to lose my friends, but I am at the age that our birthdays seem to all run together and we just have to make the most of what we have left. I cannot live the life of my friends any more than they can live mine.  I do not envy any of them, even the ones who still have their husbands.  I cannot share their life anymore, I am a reminder of things to come. 

1 hour ago, KATPILOT said:

You can count on that being true Marg. It goes much deeper than one might think.

(I was typing the above when this came through.) I know happiness can be found after we lose our loved ones and I know there has to be give and take from both sides and also share their life with those they have lost.  I have seen this done.  I know it can be done.  One of my best friends remarried two years after she lost her husband (who Billy and I got together many years ago).  She has lived about 15 years with this husband.  My sister-in-law was a young woman in her  late 30's when Jim passed away with a heart attack, she was pregnant with their 4th child.  She had at least two  serious relationships before she married Britt.  Her daughter (from first husband) heard her tell him one night that she loved him even more than her children's father.  She was happy for her mother.  Her first husband, the two other relationships, and her last husband all had heart attacks and passed away.  It played with her mind and she spent some time with a psychiatrist and in the hospital.  She was a wise-cracking waitress that could have lived on tips alone, she was that good a talker and worker.  But life led her down so many paths that when her daughter died of the inherited heart condition, she passed away five months later in a hospital bed, her little life clock just ran down.  She was a four pack per day smoker and cancer had finally caught her, but she did a lot of living in her 70 years.  I am sure she did as much grieving.  She did not give up though, until she had to.

I look at pictures of one classmate who lost his wife to cancer and remarried not long afterward.  He had room in his heart for the mother of his children and now for many years, he is happy with another.  We are all different people.  I think you might be young enough that you have a life of possibilities that only you can let happen.  I guess a person has to let go of some preconceived notion that their life is worthless now without that other person.  My life is definitely not worthless, though sometimes I feel old and worthless, and I feel many things, just like before I met Billy I felt many things.  I am changed. I'm not looking at getting off the path, but that is my choice.  Others get tired of that same old path.  Right now, at this point in time, it is mine and only mine.  Would I feel guilt, of course I would.  Billy, if it is like I am led to believe is in a perfect place, a perfect being.  But, if there was any of the Billy I knew left, I know what he would want.  He would want me to "stay with him" and if that seems selfish, yeah, he probably was..  I learned to love that about him.  We are as happy or as unhappy as we allow ourselves to be. 

Ana, we just have to live this life that was left us.  But, it does not have to stay the same.  Sadness is now.  Some of us feel cheated not to have reached "milestones".  We planned our life after retirement and had to give that up to save a grown child.  I know I can speak for Billy, neither of us begrudged changing our plans, we would do it again and again.  We did not miss out on anything.  Sometimes we did make lemonade from the lemons, but life was good.  

Another word salad, but I have to include this.  My brother-in-law lived with two women for most of his life.  One he was not married to, but lived with for 25 years.  He was miserable in both relationships but would fight for the right to say he was happy.  They both passed away before he did.  He moved into the apartment building in downtown Hot Springs to be close to us..(My (our) son lives in that same apartment building).  I liked him living with us, but he had other ideas.  I had told him he would meet someone else after the 2nd "wife" passed away.  He was not devastated, like most of us are.  It was a relationship none of us understood, but it was his to choose.  He met a little lady in the apartments and at this juncture in his life he already had developed Parkinson's disease.  She was at the beginning of dementia.  They married.  We would see them getting groceries together, they would come out and eat dinner with us, we would meet them at restaurants.  They had a little over two years together.  He told me these years were the happiest in his life.  He was much older than Billy.  And what an inspiration he was to me.  He passed away with Billy in the hospital room with him, he was at peace.  We think he had recurrence of prostate cancer.  His little wife we kept watch on for a short while, her dementia was taking a hold on her life and they lost each other at the peak of their happiness, but like he said, they were the happiest years of his life.  Two years are so short, but they piled a lifetime of living in those two years.  Her daughter took her back to Kansas, and I'm sure she is long gone.  For some, that short period of happiness is enough.  

 

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Ana, my dear, I'm so sorry that you are in such pain, and I wish I could offer something to soothe your aching heart.

I just read a piece by Staci Sulin on the Soaring Spirits website, and it made me think of you. I invite you to read it if you're willing: Beginnings  ❤️

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 A love I can see with my eyes.  A love I can hear with my ears.  A love I can touch with my hands.  I want a love like this - again-  before my life is over.  This is from Marty's article above and I don't know if I'm allowed to copy it, but I did. I liked the article.  

This woman is brave enough to tell it like it really is for her and probably really is like it for a lot of us that are not brave enough to put it into words.  Again though, this is one woman and I admire the heck out of her for saying what she wants.  And, that is HER path.  And she is tired of walking it alone and is not ashamed to say it.  

I will say, some of us, because of age, because of reasons we won't put on paper, and just plain "because" we don't feel this way.  But you can admire someone who puts it out there what she wants, even if you do not feel the same way.  One day you might feel that way.  And some of us may never be ready for what this woman wants, not in secret, not in reality, not in a fairy tale.  Some are just satisfied to have lived their long fairy tale, even if the definition was not "happily ever after" it was happy for a damn long time, but never enough time.

Like with the "me too" movement, someone had to be first.  I think I probably have had many "me too" moments, but for some reason my feelings were not hurt enough to defend myself, or it was so many times, working around a bunch of men that it became common and my feelings just never were hurt enough to raise a fuss.  They still are not.

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"I can make his death as complicated as I want to, but really it is simple. 

Mike died.  I didn't."
 

Staci Sulin

 

Powerful blog she wrote Marty. Many of us can get something from this.

A few years back on this site I wrote that I had had an epiphany. I realized I was no longer Steve and Kathy. I was simply just Steve.  That night I knew my life was changing. The grief doesn't end but the path I took in my life changed me for the future. I could go on living even if it were to be alone. How little did I know what was yet to come.

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6 hours ago, KATPILOT said:

...A few years back on this site I wrote that I had had an epiphany. I realized I was no longer Steve and Kathy. I was simply just Steve.  That night I knew my life was changing. The grief doesn't end but the path I took in my life changed me for the future. I could go on living even if it were to be alone. How little did I know what was yet to come.

Yes, I have come to the same realization.  I don't know what the future holds but I do know that since I am still alive I am supposed to live my life to the fullest.  Sometimes, that is just getting up in the morning. Sometimes the FEELINGS seems so real yet for me they are but an illusion that is guiding me to TRUTH. (FEELINGS are not always the FACTS). I realize that there is so much in life that is NOT in my control yet there are some that I still have choices.  

 I'm learning to accept life on life's terms. Resiliency seems to be my latest conquest.  Just to bounce back at whatever life throws at me and to just live in the now and strive to improve, accept life as it is and continue to improve.

There is a line from the movie(my wife loved) , "Shawshank Redemption"... "GET BUSY LIVING!"  

I am pursuing my life long dream, (to get my PPL and fly an airplane).  I can look at all the obstacles and just surrender, or I can chose to search, look and pursue my dreams. There all sorts of logical reasons why I will never be able to fly ( age, weight, health, money, ability,.etc...)  or I can just persist until I succeed.  I have lost 135lbs in the last 13 months,and continue to find ways to improve my health through better sleep routines, sun exposure ( VIT D), and now working on some resistance training to improve muscle tone.

We all have choices even when it seems like we have no choice.  Choice Life.  Find something, anything that will get you to look FORWARD to something.   It is not easy but it is what Rose Anne would have wanted me to do... and your beloved wants the same thing for you.  - Shalom 

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I read the blog too and wonder why I can’t feel these things people find in the darkness.  I’m further down the line and I wonder if something is wrong with me.  Part is being physically challenged by 5 medical conditions since he left.  So sick, no pun intended, of that replacing so much time I could be using to do things that would take me away a bit like working in the yard.  Where you are not aware of time for a bit.  You feel fatigue for a different reason.  I really wish I could tell Steve what his being gone has done to my existence.  How it is not a life anymore and desire to be with him again.  How I hate this alone thing.  How I don’t know who that woman is in the mirror anymore.  It makes harder that I can relate to the bad stuff in books and articles but the positive messages can’t get thru.

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🙏 George I have been hearing your message:

'Yes, I have come to the same realization.  I don't know what the future holds but I do know that since I am still alive I am supposed to live my life to the fullest.  Sometimes, that is just getting up in the morning. Sometimes the FEELINGS seems so real yet for me they are but an illusion that is guiding me to TRUTH. (FEELINGS are not always the FACTS). I realize that there is so much in life that is NOT in my control yet there are some that I still have choices.'

Recently, new people in my life have as asked why I isolate myself and why I don't seem to have any real fun.  My answer is, "it's a long sad story, but I am trying to change it and learn to live again".

'Find something, anything that will get you to look FORWARD to something.   It is not easy.'

I know my husband wouldn't want me to be living in misery, and while there is guilt in planning to live without him, I want to change the focus of my story.  I will forever love him and miss him but I want to be able to share a story of a fulfilling life after the death of my husband and our old dreams.

Now I have to find that 'thing' that I will look forward to.  📷

Many thanks to MartyT and this forum, for without the understanding people here I know my journey would be much more difficult.

❤️

 

 

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As like Steve, I realized that I was no longer BradnDeedo, just Brad. I’ve gone to extremes, I realize. I travel a lot but seldom am I revisiting old places but exploring places that have no history with my past. As a result I am reinventing myself. 

The other day I had a different sort of epiphany. I was walking down an alley in a village I had never heard of and I started reflecting on all of the experiences I’ve had that, had Deedo survived, I never would have experienced.  In an attempt to escape my pain i returned to work as a distraction, I’ve travelled lots and lots and as a result have rediscovered love. As a result I find myself thinking far more about today and tomorrow and far less about yesterday. 

 It simply means that as I rediscovered Brad I’ve been lucky enough to invent new passions. I’ve been fortunate enough to find a wonderful Slovakian woman, we all know, who knows my pain as I know hers and within each other we have rediscovered love and rediscovered a tomorrow.

The only reason I mention this is to provide a glimpse into what has worked for me. I know how difficult this journey is and I also know how it can become all consuming. For me I really had to completely change my whole perspective of who I am. 

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George is an inspiring person.

I got a call from a friend at 6 am this morning, wanting me to go with him in just a few minutes to take his dog (out of town) to the vet for surgery.  There's nothing I can do but I think he just wants emotional support.  Not the day I had planned, but I'll hurry and walk Arlie and go.  We've all been there and needed that emotional support.

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11 hours ago, iPraiseHim said:

Find something, anything that will get you to look FORWARD to something.   It is not easy but it is what Rose Anne would have wanted me to do... and your beloved wants the same thing for you.  - Shalom 

We all know that they would not want to see us live on in sorrow and despair but yes it still is the hardest thing we can do. You do it in time. One day at a time. My own evolution in grief was to discover who Kathy truly was first .  Then I was able to start examining who I was. You do a lot of soul searching over the years but when you begin to focus on yourself you find your path. By my fifth year I was so content to live out the rest of my life alone for you see I would never be truly alone. I had my children and grandchildren not to mention friends I have met along my grief's journey. Friends I would never have met had she not died. Then like George you begin to find a desire to do something. You formulate new dreams. And still I took Kathy with me every step of the way. The best part is that she still travels with me. It was only when I began to live my life once more was I able to connect with Patty. We take the love we have for Kathy and Ron right along with us wherever we go and whatever we do. I for one am excited to have been able to be part of Ron's dream....the survival of Maui Pasta. In that restaurant lives testimony to both Ron and Kathy. They surround us. They are part of the whole deal and we love them still and for all of time.

Let's face it. Our time on this planet is limited. What a shame to not do something when we can. 

46 minutes ago, kayc said:

I got a call from a friend at 6 am this morning, wanting me to go with him in just a few minutes to take his dog (out of town) to the vet for surgery.  There's nothing I can do but I think he just wants emotional support.  Not the day I had planned, but I'll hurry and walk Arlie and go.  We've all been there and needed that emotional support.

Just to help offer support to a friend  proves why we are better off here than not. Imagine what may come of our presence here. Perhaps we can even help to save our planet. It doesn't take much to have an effect on others. All you have to do is walk out that front door.

"To strive to be a better person" is a beautiful topic and I hope this thread will become an important one here. Along with our grief and pain we can learn how to find hope. And don't worry if you cannot see it now. Time will take care of that and your love will be with you every step of the way.

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19 hours ago, Gwenivere said:

I read the blog too and wonder why I can’t feel these things people find in the darkness

Reading on here we know people's limitations and the fact that they are not looking for any other arrangement.  There are people that feel so alone for so long that they wish for a loving partner.   While I certainly wish the best for the ones who do find someone and coexist with the past, it is not with envy that I wish you happiness, it is with hope for the rest of your life happiness.  I know it can happen.  And it will happen for some who least expect it.  I wish them well.  

The last part of this poem by Robert Frost:  

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference

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3 hours ago, Marg M said:

Gwen, there may be something physically wrong with  you that makes it where you cannot get around because of physical and mental pain, or travel like some of our friends on here, and be put in different situations.  Whatever it is, it took time, but those that have found someone else like Steve and Brad, and others, they did not find them sitting at home.    

Well, first off I am not looking for a new love.  Physical limitations are deeply impacting my ability to adjust to being alone for daily tasks and that is my frustration.  My last real outlet of volunteering has become a hassle because of a woman who dislikes me so much and I don’t know why, has the power to make what once was a pleasure and turn it into a tense experience with rules and restrictions directed at me.   Not worth getting into the details off that beyond it makes it hard to go and do what I have for 24 years and left with a positive feeling inside.  

I know purpose has to come from within and won’t come to me sitting here.  I think of things I want to do but I am so limited physically it gets discouraging.  I don’t have any hobbies as my family with Steve was that, my life.  You can’t create interest in things you don’t feel.  I used to draw, evvident by pictures framed around the house.  Can’t force that.  Only my dogs depend on me for care.  If something were to happen to me, it would be days anyone noticed.  Sometimes I have felt so desperate I’ve considered calling the Crisis Clinic and that feels so awful showing me how alone I am.  My counselors are great, but they are not my friends.  Ethical divide there.  

I know you didn’t mean any judgement.  I’m just extremely sensitive right now and the mention of finding someone else knocked me for a loop.  Don’t know where that came from anything I have posted.  That is not even on my radar.

i do envy you having friends you can talk to.   I miss that as mine local ones  have have evaporated for many reasons.  The ones I know would still 'be there' for me have ironically died.  

 

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21 minutes ago, Gwenivere said:

I know you didn’t mean any judgement.  I’m just extremely sensitive right now and the mention of finding someone else knocked me for a loop.  Don’t know where that came from anything I have posted.  That is not even on my radar.

Yeah, Gwen, you know I was not meaning any judgement.  We do have to watch what we say sometimes and it comes out wrong.  You, and a few more on here, I would definitely be surprised if you came up with someone else.  I won't ever rule out impossible because honestly, some things happen that just surprise the heck out of me.  Again, no judgement, just total surprise.  And it is probably best if I don't say anymore.  

The woman in the article said she had been divorced before, now she had lost her husband, and she seemed young enough for another.  My friend, her mother married three times after my friends dad passed and she outlived all of them.  I was with Billy from the time I was a kid and we grew up together, sometimes acting wrong and reckless, but we fought through it and it came down to there could be no one else, but we got married so young there was curiosity.  

30 minutes ago, Gwenivere said:

Physical limitations are deeply impacting my ability to adjust to being alone for daily tasks and that is my frustration.

Hence, you are not able to travel and go places like some other people do.  I did not mean "go hunting" for someone.  Honestly, when I wrote it I figured something would be taken wrong.  I know you Gwen, you just plain do not want another man.  I certainly agree.  If I was 60, I would not want another.  

When I called to express my condolences to my friend's husband, the one I had been with at MD Anderson for so long, two years later she passed away.  I called and talked to Larry her husband and her mother-in-law who took care of her often and talked to her when I could.  This really tore me up..  We had been in the trenches together.  Immediately after the funeral (day or so) I waited long enough so I would not get him or me hysterical, and his mother told me that he was on his honeymoon.  She said "He got so lonesome."  

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