Lina

*hugs* I hope she is able to buy the voice.

Unfortunately the soonest they could see her is August 28th. She seems to be doing a bit better though.

My daughters Dr put in a referral for allergy testing...we will go from there.

I will try to remember you words of hope. Thank you. Right now it is hard to imagine that this all could make me a better person...right now it just makes me feel hollow and like a lot LESS of a person. I feel less compassion for others...I simply do not have any energy to offer anyone else right now and being there for others takes energy and strength. My deep inner hope seems to have withered, I am cranky and tired all the time.

A friend asked me how I was doing...I think that maybe I was too honest in my response. I am ok..no actually that is a lie...truly this last week has been hard. I had read that life milestones can be difficult, especially the first ones without a loved one. Turning 37 without Arthur makes me feel sad. It reminds me that he shall never turn 37 himself, let alone 40, 50, etc. I find myself torn between feeling as though my life should be over now that he is gone and that I should simply bide time til I can die...and yet I also find myself feeling angry; refusing to give in to death so young. I do not want to walk through life simply waiting to die. I find myself resenting the universe. I feel too young to be a widow and yet too old to be starting over again. I miss him horribly and I am so incredibly angry that he is gone. I am not angry with him...I love him more then words can express. I told him once that I could forgive him anything and I find that I can even forgive him for dying. It is the universe and God I am having a hard time forgiving. I can see him in my mind...I do not have to close my eyes to see him...he is with me always, part of me, part of my heart and my soul. I miss his hugs more then words can express. He could make the world go still when everything was too much. When things were too loud, too bright, too sharp, too scary....he made the world feel safe and still. Nothing was too much when he was here. I feel a bit as though I am being buried alive. There is no air and even if there were my lungs can not bring that air into my body. Half of me is gone...half of my heart died with him. Somehow I have to learn how to function in this world broken. I know someday the broken pieces will knit together into a Frankenstein of a form...freakish and scarred and yet somehow it will have to function. I do not feel beautiful today...I feel shattered, old and hollow.

I am not sure if it is ok to talk about this here...it is kind of about the loss of my husband and kind of not...mostly it is about how my life seems to be falling apart right now. I lost my husband and now I am so scared I am going to lose another huge chunk of our family. I am truly terrified. My daughter has been showing signs of allergies the last couple of months, but the last couple of weeks it has been getting steadily worse. Right after my husband died I put our guinea pigs into foster because I thought they were the cause. That did seem to help a tiny bit (she is no longer waking up wheezing in the middle of the night), but the last week her eyes have been itching like mad and she has been rubbing them so much that this morning she almost looked like she had a black eye. I am so scared she is allergic to our dogs and cats. We have had our two cats for seven years and we are deeply attached to them. Two of our dogs were my husbands and they are both senior citizens. My chihuahua would be easy to place (though it would break my heart even more then it is already broken) since my mom has already said she is madly in love with her and really wants her if it ever comes to a point where I can't keep her. My younger dog Kahlua could go into foster (I have a friend who has already volunteered to foster her if need be.)...but my older dogs are old and have enough minor health problems that it would be hard to find them good homes. Plus they were my husbands babies...I would really feel like I had failed him if I have to let them go. Truly I feel the last gift I can give him is to make sure his dogs are ok...and rehoming them would be letting him down. Add to it I know my MIL would want them, but I also know Arthur would not want them to go to her because she already has too many pets and her house smells badly as a result. He did not even want her to keep them when we went out of town. If I had to tell her she could not have them I don't think she would ever forgive me. So please pray that I can make this work. I don't want to lose my pets also. I don't want to have to choose between our furr family members and my daughters health. I am so scared. I truly don't know how I will survive losing more of my family right now...especially Arthur's dogs. I made an appointment to take Sophia to the Dr on Wednesday and I am going to request allergy testing. We already have 12 air filters going in our house due to my allergies...if this is allergies I am not sure what I will do.

I am so happy to read you have such a wonderful time. *hugs* What a healing experience.

I have to believe it will get better...I am clinging to that belief with all my might. *hugs*

I am so sorry.

*gentle hugs*

Just sending *hugs*.

My husband did not leave a will and he never talked to me about what he would want done with his estate. Legally I inherit 3/4 of all pre-existing property (the house he bought before we married, his car and a few collectables he owned) and since we live in a common wealth state all common wealth property (bank account, and household items, and things purchased after our wedding) also goes to me. Both of Arthur's parents signed documents saying that they want the portions of his estate that would go to them to be assigned to me (they each had the right to 1/8 of his estate). I am incredibly grateful to them for this since it means I do not have to sell our house or figure out how to pay them for part of it. The problem is that I am feeling horribly guilty. In a way I don't feel I deserve to inherit everything. He had two sister, a brother and his parents...I can't help feel they have more right to everything that was Arthur's. I am not sure why I am having issues with this. No one in his family has expressed the opinion that I don't deserve to inherit...in fact everyone has told me they want me to be able to keep the house and dogs and for us to be ok. They have also all told me I am still part of the family and they want me to stay part of their lives. This guilt is driving me nuts...it makes no sense at all. I keep on trying to figure out why I feel this way. The only thing I can think of is that we were only married for ten months...that somehow the shortness of our marriage makes it less real and thus his stuff was his and I have no right to it. It is not a large estate...mostly our small house a few small investments and a life insurance policy and of course his beloved dogs (Cougar a nine year old German Shepard and Couper an eight year old Lab)...but still I can't seem to help the guilt. Is this insane? I love my Arthur with all my heart and I know he loved me just as much. Next to me and Sophia (my daughter) he loved his dogs more than anything else in this world...so I am making sure I take good care of them in their old age...this is helping a bit with how guilty I feel...but is not solving it. I am not sure how to deal with these feelings. Could this be spill over from other confused and confusing emotions? I know I also feel guilty thinking about the future. Every time I think about how to live a good life without him I feel guilty. Part of me feels like my life should be over and I should go into maintenance mode and tread through time until I can die...but there is a large part of me who clings to the idea that I am still relatively young and I don't want my life to be over. I don't want to never love again. I don't want to give up on life and joy and love. I feel horribly cheated...I feel like I had finally found everything I wanted in life. I was so incredibly happy...truly I felt blessed and thanked God every night for my amazing husband, wonderful daughter, loving pets and safe home. This is all so horribly confusing. More then anything I want Arthur back. I want the life we had planned. I want our dream house in the country with a big garden, a flock of chickens, lots of fruit trees and cuddly adorable toddlers. I want to go to sleep at night listening to his breathing. I want to have my beloved here...I don't want to have to plan my life without him. I don't want to have to grieve for him. I don't want to have to deal with the guilt of still being alive when he isn't. He deserved to be alive more than me. He took better care of himself and worked harder to be healthy. I feel bad for being the one still here. I feel bad for having 'gained' financially because of his death....he worked so hard for everything he had...I don't feel I deserve it...I have never been ambitious or hard working...I have always been the sweet spacy kind...I was happy supporting him in his dreams....but he was the one who earned them.

I am so sorry you lost your Charles. *hugs* What you described happens to me often. I am going along and seem ok and then wham...I am a sobbing mess.

You are right...my daughter has lost two fathers now...one because he has chosen not to be an active part of her life and then her heart daddy died. Arthur loved being her step-dad and called her "my girl"...I grieve that she lost such a wonderful daddy. *hugs*

I know this feels huge, but learning to define who you are outside of "the voice" is going to be very good for you. I can imagine that while it will be scary at times it will also be very liberating. *hugs* I have found that I tend to define myself by who I am to other people...I am my mother's daughter, my daughter's mother and I was Arthur's wife. I have started to realize that I need to learn how to define myself without those labels...who is Lina...not the daughter, mother or wife...but the woman.

I am so sorry. Change is so hard and change that seems to emphasize how things are different is even harder. *hugs*

I lost a lot of hair also. It was coming out in clumps. My sister in law suggested taking a B complex since that can help with stress. I am not sure if it is helping or not, but I seem to be losing a bit less hair now. You are right...you lose so much. I lost my husband. I lost my best friend. I lost the life we had planned. I lost the babies we were going to have. I even had our first son named. I lost all the memories we had not yet lived. I lost knowing my daughter had a good daddy who loved her. I lost my hope.

I have taken to reading a bit of a book or playing stupid mindless games on my phone when I first go to bed....this all is brainless enough that I don't focus on the fact that Arthur is not there. I agree though...music might be a good substitute for when you can't have a tv.

Grief is an odd thing...you can think you are doing well and then it will sneak up behind you and whack you hard on the back of the head. That happened to me yesterday (or today depending on if you count the end of the day based on the clock or when you go to bed.) I was driving down to my parents and I had a thought that I wished to share with Arthur...one of those random moments that you think someone else will find interesting...suddenly it hit me that I won't be able to tell him...it was like for a split second I forgot he was dead. I think I cried off and on (mostly on) for the next six hours. Truly grief sucks. The thing that I hate the most is the permanence....the knowledge that he will always be gone...this is not something that will get better...simply something I will have to get used to. He has been dead for nine and a half weeks...what a horrible thing that is.

That sounds really awesome...thank you for sharing this information.

*hugs* I understand. Truly it is all hard. It is a constant ache that does not go away. Some moments are piercing and some are more of a throbbing pain...but it hurts either way.

Arthur always brushed his teeth in the living room while watching TV or outside while checking his plants. He would wander around the yard with a cup of water in hand and his toothbrush in the other...when he brushed his teeth in the living room he would have a cup that he called his 'spittoon'...lol. I miss how Arthur always nagged me to drink enough water and take my vitamins. It made me feel so loved when he nagged me to take care of myself.

I keep telling myself that 36 (I will be 37 on the 26th of this month) is still relatively young and that I need to not give up on life, but I feel as though I have aged at least 20 years in the last two months. Before Arthur died I felt like I was just entering the summer of my life...life felt ripe, full and vibrant...but since he died I feel old. Colors are not as bright...I think I actually LOOK older...I have less energy and I am less optimistic.

It is funny how much we miss their quirks...those little things that was just them. I even find I miss his gross quirks...the ones I got on his case about. I miss how he would claim I was hogging the bed when really I was right at the edge almost hanging off the bed and he had his pillow right in the center of the bed. I miss how he would snuggle with me, but when it was time to actually sleep he couldn't be touched. A week and a half before he died I woke him up in my sleep by petting him. He reported I did that three times in one night...all while sleeping. I told him that it was proof that even in my sleep I loved him. I feel less safe also without him. He was very protective and always made me feel like he would keep me safe. I still have the dogs and Arthur's home security system...but it is not the same as having him here. I don't wear Arthur's shirts anymore, but I sleep with one of his tshirts against my cheek. I like to stroke the fabric between my fingers while falling asleep...there is something about that old soft cotton that is so comforting...maybe it is because I used to press my face up against it a lot while hugging him.

I honestly think it is ok to give yourself permission to only do what HAS to be done...the rest will wait. Its not like the laundry is going to walk off...at least that is what I tell myself.