Suitearia

We must have all suffered our losses about the same time. I buried my husband a month ago today (our 13th anniversary was Sat 6/6) ... Rozemon, Ric and I had our issues too but I still loved him. My last Valentine to him read "we've been together a long time now. We've laughed and cried and seen each other through the our best and worst and everything in between, and whenever I look at you, I feel even more love than I've ever felt before. Your're my partner, and you're my best friend, and I ask nothing more than to spend the rest of my life with you". Maybe it's the sticking by each other through the best and worst and all that inbetween that glues us to each other ... I'm so sorry for your loss ... and you too lattiee, I'm sorry that you lost your uncle.

Hello MagWalsh, I am new here as well (my husband died 5/1) and I've found all these people to be so supportive. I don't have any words of wisdom to offer you other than to tell you that your story tugs at my heart. I cannot imagine the pain that both you and your beloved had to endure and the loss of your dreams ... I'm so sorry for your loss.

Fae hello. Thank you for the journaling ideas. Right now my notes are mostly emotionally (I buried Ric in Mobile a month ago tomorrow -- and I cannot even go see him as I'm in FL) as my emotions flit around all over the place. I am interested in meditation as well so I will look for the thread. Maryann ... I am so sorry that you lost your husband in such a traumatic manner. I cannot imagine your pain and the thoughts that have to run through your head. Hugs and prayers to you ...

Thanks Marty, I've been out and bookmarked the link for future reference. Just a word about Kubler-Ross; the book is clear to state that people may move though the 5 stages sequentially but more than likely they will move back and forth through the stages (or even skip some of them) until they can truely accept "the reality that our loved one is physically gone and recognize that this new reality is the permanent reality ... it's not OK but we learn to live with it". I had started grieving last July when Ric was going downhill fast from a GI Bleed (we didn't know what wrong but I decided he needed to go to the ER and we did). I cried and cried then ... and in the fall I withdrew from the school of public health, for the first time admitting (but not really believing) that my husband was dying. Anyway I will definitely look up "I Wasn't Ready To Say Goodbye" by Brook Noel & Pamela D. Blair PhD.

I will continue to post KayC especially as I havent started working with hospice yet (I'm doing my own pre-lim work reading Kubler-Ross's book on the 5 stages of Grief). Yesterday I got the balance of my life insurance (minus the mortuary costs) ... and while I'm relieved I have the money, its the way I got the money that has me in turmoil. I have to consider the cost paid for those benefits and I'm not sure how I feel about that. It's a strange feeling inside, maybe some level of anxiety combined with guilt for feeling relieved that I know that I can pay our bills for the immediate future ... or maybe its just a hole in my soul where I just cannot feel right now. I don't know how to describe it. Somebody posted this statement on being a widow and acceptance; it struck a chord within me so I wrote it in my journal: "... he faced his death with faith, love, and courage. My job now is to live as well as he died". I whispered in Ric's ear that I would be OK once he died -- so I feel that if I don't find a way to work through my greif and to "live as well he died", then I lied to him and myself.

I did start the thread but since it is a discussion group I'm glad to have started a conversation and happy birthday. We never did a lot for our birthday's either especially as he got sicker and couldn't drive at times or go out and enjoy a meal. But it is the thought that they aren't here to even know and say Happy Birthday or Happy Anniversary that's emotionally rough for us. Maybe you can start some grief counseling over the summer ...

Hello Rozemon, I am down in Fort Lauderdale. We drove by St Augustine on our way to Mobile in early May (that was a long exhausting drive). My dad and stepmother came down to FL on 4/4 and didn't leave until 5/14. They stayed with us until Ric was buried and we finished some business I needed help with. I don't have a mother in law or a father in law as they passed many years ago (Ric was 62 and I will be 59 in October). I'm sorry that your's is adding to your grief and stress (aren't the lawyers enough stress?). Maybe her pain and perhaps anger is driving her to lash out at you. Mitch ... Ric and I ... our birthdays are a week apart (we're libra's). I will think of you on the 10th and whisper an affirmatory prayer for you ... I will pray for you too Rozemon. Were you injured in the accident?

Hello. My name is Suzanne and I lost my husband, Ric, to prostate cancer 5/1/15. Today was our anniversary and I did my best to celebrate my 13th year with him. The morning went well. I decided to go out to breakfast at the first restaurant we went to when we moved to Florida almost 2.5 years ago. I pretended that he was sitting across the table from me reading his newspaper while I read my book. I felt so calm and "good" that I wondered if he was sharing the moment with me. Then I went to the bookstore and bought a book that he had recommended to a dear friend just before he died and mailed it to her. It was the Celestine Prophecy and I sent it to her from Ric "for all of the possibilities" then I went home and went to the beach for awhile and watched the waves. Somewhere between leaving the beach and walking home I lost it. I don't remember the trigger I just remembered dissolving into tears. I got home and listened to the song "just you and I" and cried even harder. I listen to Josh Groban's "to where you are and cried some more (and wished that I could go to where he is). We moved to florida alone ... so it has just been the two of us here for the last couple of years and much of that time he was so very ill (last year a bout of meningeal metastasis at Easter with radiation, bone pain and more radiation, then a GI bleed that put him in the ICU in July. The gastric ulcer was positive for prostate cancer. So begain the struggle with anorexia-cachexia and the struggle with the oncologist to move him to a fentanyl patch rather than playing games with oxycontin and oxycodone cocktails. April 3rd 2015 he decided that he couldn't do it anymore and wanted to get into hospice. As soon as he said that to me the phone rang and it was the nurse from our new oncologist (thank you for fentanyl patches and dilaudid for breakthrough pain). Ric told her he wanted to stop all treatment (he had had 2 Xofigo infusions and gone into bone marrow failure) and go into hospice. By that evening he had been admitted to hospice. It was a relief that now I'd have help but sad because that meant the end was near. Then the morning of May 1st I left the room where he his hospital bed was to go to the bathroom. I walked back into the room and walked over to the hospital bed and the nurse leans over and says "he just expired". And I'm WHAT DID YOU SAY??? I knew he was going to die; but maybe I thought he wouldn't. But he did ... I watched the funeral home take him away from me. I asked for his clothes back that we dressed him in and washed them and folded them. He always ironed his shorts so I had his shorts pressed at the dry cleaners so that they'd be like he wanted. So how do I make sense of this? How do I build a life without him and not feel like I've abandoned him? Sometimes I just feel blank and detached from it all. I watch the news, I watch Wheel of Fortune, and Jeopardy .. the shows we always watched but I feel separate and void ... I cannot even go to a grave to see him. He didn't want me to leave him here in FL if I moved away so I buried him in Mobile where he was born and next to his mother. It was the best I could do for him and it was the right thing to do for him. The hospice said that they'd be in my life for the next year so that is good. It's just a very tough day today. Thank you for listening. On a positive note, though, I'd read Final Journeys and Final Gifts and was blessed to witness Ric's interaction with someone from Heaven. It was incredible to see but remembering it doesn't take away my pain, or my sorrow, or my feelings of "what do I do now".

Hello Mitch ... since my husband died I've often said I just want to go where Ric is and be with him. Just like you I'm not suicidal. Just like you I have a quantity of dilaudid and fentanyl patches (not sure how to dispose of those - the hospice will probably tell me). I'm sorry that you were traumatized by some of the things that you saw on March 6. I'm too new at this grief thing to offer you any sage advice; but you did take the first step by setting an appointment with a grief counselor, so that is a positive .... I wrote to let you know that someone else was touched by your post.

I highly recommend the book by Eben Alexander Proof of Heaven. Eben is a neurosurgeoon who was comatose with a very rare form of meningitis for 7 days and had a NDE. I read the book before my husband died then I read it again after he died.

Hello from one new visitor to another one. I just lost my husband to prostate cancer on 5/1 and buried him 5/9. I am so new to grief myself but I wanted you to know that I had read your post and that I can feel your pain. I hope that knowing that someone heard and recognizes your pain and offered a virtual hug will help in some measure today. I don't have any words of comfort for you because it's all too fresh for me myself. Have you tried walking to help reduce some of the anxiety and frustration you must be feeling?