Patty65

He definitely forgives you IMHO!! Ron loved Bud Light. We had it at his beach service 6 months ago. There was a lot left over. They've been sitting in the driveway in a plastic bin, rained on until it overflowed, now there are plants that randomly started growing from the rain water. I left it out there hoping someone would take them, I can't touch them (and don't like beer)... I finally had a plumber replace the water heater, I've had virtually nobody at the house. He laughed when he saw the bin of beer and the plants growing -- "Oh, it's a beer plant, that's where beer comes from!"... These things that linger. So hard. It's not that he forgives you actually, it's that there is nothing to forgive. He would not want you eating it if it caused you pain. (((((Gin)))) Patty

Dear Jgillen, I think it's different too because of your children. Going a year without making big decisions -- I don't even know if that is possible with having to support kids and so much more -- just think -- NOT moving would have been as equally a big decision, as it would have affected your level of support. Maybe instead of calling it a "big decision" you can call it seeking out the support you need to survive this devastatingly hard time. That doesn't mean it does not come with its heart wrenching grief of not having him part of all of these adjustments. I think it's incredibly brave. Your pain does not mean you've done something wrong, at least to me. I'm not sure if the pain would be any less had you stayed... just different. Take care, Patty

I went to Kauai once with some girlfriends long ago, and we were in Hanalei ... you know, the song "Puff the Magic Dragon" "...In a land called Hanalei..." They had a Goddess shop -- and I bought a ancient goddess symbol necklace, and then we went on loooonnng, hard, exhuberating, cliff-hanging hikes to waterfalls deep in the middle of the island. Every stream I came to, I dipped the goddess necklace in. I did that everywhere I went for a long time. The necklace was a symbol of strength for me, and keeping it in literal contact with the waters of the islands was a great little ritual that helped me at the time as I had left my first unhappy marriage and was on my own with a two year old. There are really beautiful spots. Sacred spots, spots with petroglyphs. You will not have trouble finding a special spot there!

Kay, So sorry you are sick! I have not been sick yet, and I can only imagine how hard it is being sick without the support of your love. Here is a virtual cup of tea! (_)> Patty

I did the same, Steven... I had an ipu, a dried Hawaiian gourd - I dried it years ago having gotten a fresh one from the farmer's market when we were selling pasta there, not knowing what I would ever use it for -- but just respecting and wanting to follow Hawaiian tradition by drying it. The blob on the right is concrete where I poured in some of his ashes to the mix, along with shells that we'd collected together, and I made an eternal reef. Part of his ashes went in the ocean poured from the ipu, the rest went into the Eternal Reef piece, that we dove down and placed among the tropical fish. Ron had once told me in jest that if anything ever happened to him, to put his ashes in the ocean or he would "haunt me". I almost didn't do it so he would.

I HAVE to listen to that song daily... from Ron's Playlist...

I so relate Marita. It's why I've been invisible here. It would be just like me too to write "don't read this" at the top of a post or something. But being deeply in the same space you inhabit, just know that your post did not bring me farther down, it helped me feel less alone. Today Ron has been gone 6 months. "Big Milestone" someone said. How??. Someone came in for a scheduled meeting with me to sell me a new, cheaper (supposedly) credit card processing system. All he did was tell me I needed to provide HIM with more information about our current sales by card type, Why was he wasting my time if he had nothing to show me? He could ask for information over the phone! I got angry, I told him to leave. Me, the former Miss-Please-Everybody. Friday evening I had my first "maybe I can survive this" moment at the house. I felt him right there with me, I lit incense, candles, I cleaned, I relaxed, I felt him next to me, I went to sleep on his side of the bed, feeling his energy, and woke up ok. I ran errands with my new partner in the morning, and then -- like a tornado out of nowhere, I hysterically fell apart, sobbing in the baking area, unable to move, in front of staff and customers. New partner had to help me out back, and offered me a Xanax. By night at home, I had every pill I had in the house out, along with a giant bottle of Nyquil. I think somewhere I knew I would not, but oh, how I wanted to. I think it all had to do with "Alone" and how NOBODY in my physical world, not my supposed BFF, not my family, not anyone who knew Ron and I together, has contacted me or asked how I was in well over a month. My BFF gave up on me 3 months ago. Just empty silence. No way, no strength to go on. The evening the day before was obliterated from my memory at that moment. The thing is, many of us have no safety net, and that is scary on top of everything else. The EXTREMES of this are just insane. And so unpredictable. Finding new friends in this vulnerable state is nearly impossible. The only thing that kept me from harm was writing in my journal, it was all I had, and all that I could allow myself to do. All the crazy. It was like releasing poison. My garage is flooded, my electric bill was $400 dollars higher than normal and my water bill $200 higher than normal because since all this, the water heater was dying, and I didn't care/care to know. It was Ron's to fix and figure out. Now $1500 or so later, it will be fixed tomorrow, no choice if I ever want to take a shower again and not wash my hair in cold water in the kitchen sink. Life is damn overwhelming alone. I know its no wonder we want to give up. Somehow, one way or another, we keep going on, and finding a way to wake up, if only because our eyes open. Man, it's brutal. I totally relate. So sorry so much about me, but thank you for helping me reconnect here by your post, Marita. PS - I saw a psychic medium last week. I'm still processing that. If appropriate, I will post my thoughts here soon, when I am back on my feet. Right now I'm on a - well, dangerous roller coaster from hell. Take care, Patty

i think i wish i had more promises to keep. might be easier to hold on.

I totally, totally understand about the "time" word... and it seems no "end" to the "time" either -- I heard it everywhere, and it was so frustrating. I am at 5 1/2 months and I'm hearing that word less, and sometimes I honestly wish I heard it out in the world, because the loss would be acknowledged at least. Now I'm trudging along in no-mans-land with everyone tip-toeing around me, figuring out whether they can approach me normally or still with caution, but not talking about it anymore. I keep bringing up his name, to keep him close, it's up to me now. Now I'm just living out that "time" and I can't expect much from myself, at least at home. My daughter is 21, and living 5,000 miles away at college, and still, while feeble, it's still the only thing I can grasp to hold onto to keep going sometimes. She still needs me. So I go on. Your son needs you. As manic, depressive, phobic, whatever, that I get in this grief, I just keep getting up and doing the next right thing. It's all we have, till this mysterious "time" passes, or so they say... The days that I don't believe this "time" will ever pass are the days I lose hope and want to give up, so I try extra hard to have a core, like here or my therapist, to turn to on those days. Hugs, Patty

Steve, Nobody will be losing it - it will be going where it is meant to be! I just painted it long before I knew what it's full purpose and meaning was, and where it was supposed to find a home. It was one of those paintings that came into my head that I had to paint - the only time that has really happened for me - and I went out and gathered my source materials to match the vision of it that I saw. It has meaning and I'm thrilled to donate it, and my business partner already agreed to pack and ship for me! I had even planted the hibiscus plant from a baby years before because I just had to. All the meaning is clear to me now. Yay, this all makes me smile I Patty

I am going to send "Shadow of Nature" the one I posted here in this thread. Do I know where to send it? Could you message me the details? It feels right. I'm going to delegate my partner to pack and send it for me It has been part of the shop, part of me, part of me and Ron, and he brought it here. It's hanging in a sink room. I'm ready to give it to the show, and to a new home somewhere. And I am unable to paint right now. I am told that my inability to be anywhere at home except my spot in my bed is OK -- that it is my cocoon and I'll emerge to the rest of the house when I am there someday when I'm ready. Ha. I literally have been so overwhelmed by work chaos and problems I haven't been even able to log in here. Right now, I have just about every pan in the shop kitchen to clean, it's 8:30p and I've been here since 6, 140 something days in a row. Have to go back to cleaning. I wish I could be here more. Sending out hugs to all. Miss you Patty

Steve, I AM so fortunate that a business partner dropped in my life. I have a REALLY hard time this year saying I'm fortunate for anything (that "grateful" conversation that's been around...)... but I have to hold that closer. It will help with the defeatest feelings, and give me a "memory" of thinking/feeling that when all seems lost. My new partner deserves to know that too. That's another thing we were talking about last night -- my business partner was talking about how excited she is about the shop and being part of it, and she understands it's hard for me to be excited about her. I felt horrible, I don't mean to not be excited. She IS just what I need now. "Excited" is just an impossible emotion these days. Kay, actually that is what kept me from sleeping last night. I was thinking about "telling" our story to our staff -- then that switched to writing, since I'm much better at being able to say what I mean in writing rather than talking. I choke back tears thinking about how few people are left here who knew him at all, and I wanted them to understand why I bring him up so much here. To me, he is still so integral. I want them to know why. I have a blurb in our takeout menu about the history of the business, but I have not changed it since before all this happened. It still says "husband and wife Patricia and Ron... are..." Sigh. Guess I gotta change that soon. I can make a nice tribute to our baby, Maui Pasta. I'd like that. Thanks for the suggestion!

I've thought about that. It feels almost sacrilege to sleep there. Then sometimes the thought comes that maybe it would be good to. Closer to him to. Hmmm. Patty

I remember asking my therapist right after it happened, how long can I live like this? She perced her lips in a sad smile, and said, "A long time, as long as it takes." That was not the answer I wanted to hear. "Early into it" has been hard to hear, here on this forum and anywhere/everywhere. It means there's so much hard ahead. But the truth is what we deserve, even when it feels impossible. I have a bag with all the pillows that were on his side of the bed. A plastic bag to preserve the scent. So powerful emotively. I so wish all his aloha shirts smelled like him still -- when we were first married, he was still living in California for the first few months till he found a job here, and I missed him so -- I would go into our closet and smell his shirts. But I was too efficient washing when we were together, they just all smell like laundry detergent now. The bad times -- I don't talk or think about them, at least not yet. I remember Marty saying we tend to glorify. I thought about why. I probably wrote about it here. I just don't think for us here struggling so with the loss of our soulmates, that it was their essence. It was all lessons -- lessons he was learning and I was learning and we were learning together. Lessons for all time. Maybe someday I'll want to talk about it, but I doubt it. At least not all on its own. I'm so glad that you didn't go into the forest. I'm glad you must stay. I know we are all, mostly, words on a page, but it is more, and important, that we are here together, for me -- for that very reason -- we must stay. Might as well all stay and work on staying together! Patty

I got a little clarity at what was going on with everything last night in therapy. I just started talking and talking about how the business started -- all the joys that Ron shared with me, all the victories, the growth, the early morning Farmer's Markets, and my therapist said, wow that sounds like having a baby! I went on, talking about how it took over our lives, our conversations, our dreams - so much so that I started worrying about our relationship, it was so engrossed in Maui Pasta - every waking minute. Therapist said, yes, just like a baby! I wondered why I was doing this anymore. PJ reminded me how it has been my only solace and my passion, that's why. I we realized, losing our office space by redoing it, it was losing a piece of him at Maui Pasta. The intensity yesterday was insane. By the afternoon, I felt like he had just died, all over again. Because I felt the ache deep in my chest, physically, again, going up into my throat, like I felt those first weeks. I am mourning the loss of the father of our child, Maui Pasta. I realized I needed to write Maui Pasta's birth story. So, I'm going to work on that. I hope one day I can transform our home bring Ron along with the changes, too, Steve. Patty

I had rearranged the desks when Ron was in Hospice, so I could do anything here. Before removing everything, I put them back the way they were before when he was here, to say goodbye. Nobody here understood until I couldn't hold it in anymore. "Ron is not his desk" one said. I broke down, they shut up. Yes, I know. But our era is gone in here now. It's just so wrong.

Don't know what I would do without you guys, thank you. Maybe I'm through the worst of it. Emptying the drawers and seeing it get taken out was hell. The new desks mostly in, chaos and my head is so foggy and eyes so sore, I can't think to put things back together. Only thing I did was plug in computer to check in here. ((((everyone)))) Much love, Patty

Yes, so hard -- I want to wear Ron's sunglasses so (the ones I'm wearing in my profile pic) but I don't dare, I lose everything. He bought me a pair to match his, they lasted a couple of months, which was a record. 10 years later, he still had his. I'm so sorry you lost Al's! Hugs, Patty

This weekend, my new business partner and I found an "office closing" garage sale and we bought two desks among a bunch of other things. We need them. Things are growing, we need office help, etc. The desks arrive tomorrow. I'm so tired of crying in front of my staff, but it seems all I can do. It means I have to clear out Ron's desk, and mine, two rickety things that we dragged up together from the basement, they were left behind by prior tenants when we first rented this place, and our hopes and excitement were so high. Which also happened to be two years ago this week. We have to move them out of here to make room for real desks with storage blah blah blah. Some baskets with his clothes and slippers (when he was feeling so bad but still wanted to come in to work) are in my car, partner put them there yesterday (I said she could) but I could not take them out last night. I wanted them back here at work. I don't want to anticipate tomorrow, but I'm having a hard time not doing that. I can't let go of him here. I can't let go of our dreams, our stuff, I can't turn our space into something else, something that is not our space. Yet I need to. I have not, and have no immediate plans to, touch anything of his at home, his clothes, anything. It NEEDS to be there. But here at work, I know it needs to happen for the business to keep going. Yet I want to STOP it all. Partner will make it pretty and organized in here. And I'm dreading it. I'm so dreading it. I don't want to lose another piece of him. OMG. Tomorrow is going to be horrible. I don't know how I will go through his desk drawers. That last time I did, just to grab something quickly, well it didn't go well. Need strength and the well is dry. Thanks for listening. Patty

Oh Gwen, I won't say how hard (impossible) it is to change our sheets. But the bed, I've slept in it from night one back in the house, it's been hard often, but it was and is still comforting in the hard, grieving kind of painful way things are in this alternate universe. I spent a couple of nights on the couch when it was too hard at first, and that was worse. It was our spot I don't want to give up, and it helps me feel close to him. In fact, being in the bed is where I go directly from work, most nights since. Someday soon I have to find something else I can manage at home. All in due time I guess.

Yes such truth, albeit hard. I think that represents ALL those moments we remember something special, and also the pain of its loss that makes us sob. So sweet, such pain too. Like today for me. I woke up getting ready for work in the bathroom, the light flickering on and off, and clicking. I get in my car, and the very first lyric of "Bad, Bad Leeroy Brown" started blasting on the radio. That was Ron's nickname -- I gave it to him our first Christmas at my parents when we drank way too many bottles of champagne one night, the two of us, and we snuck up the long driveway in the morning to throw them away, hiding them from my parents (mind you we were in our 40s) and acting like teenagers in love. From then on, his fun "bad-influence" nickname was Leeroy Brown because it played on the radio then too, on our way to dispose of the bottles. He was my Leeroy. Then, listening to the song this morning, I realized my gas was below empty, and if I had tried to make it to Costco, I would have run out, because I lost my Costco card last week. So I got gas. Since he couldn't, after all, come get me if I ran out of gas (happened many times), I believe my Leeroy was reminding me. It started me laughing and crying all at once, and has not really subsided. The joy of the memories that I was so lucky to have, and the pain of never having more with my Leeroy exist together.

A grieving, broken hearted, can't-take-any-more, honoring yourself and your pain kind of thinking, ((((((Marg)))))) If the thoughts we hear in our head are not kind and loving, they are from fear and pain, and we should try not to take them to (our) hearts. That's what I'm told, even though I'm horrible at doing it. I keep trying. We're all with you. Patty

I think we need those chips -- Grief Chips, like AA.

wait, where's the delete button?? : ( my post is for a childhood issues forum not a grief forum. I'm sorry. I thought there used to be a delete-your-own-post button.

I can try except that I'm not holding together all to well tonight. I'm sorry if this turns out long, and I hope you don't all think I'm totally insane. After listening to some audio books, I thought I stumbled upon something that could give me a way to hold on. To find some purpose. To find a way to want to go on. To find a connection with Ron. Has to do with soulmates and the after life with them, and our time on earth and its meaning. I realize it may be an alternative way to think, it might be a pendulum swing of extreme thinking. But I'm pretty desperate now to find a way to convince myself to keep going, and in hearing it, I thought there was something in there that could help me hold on. But it is also causing problems - old problems - before-Ron problems of being wrong about everything I do and who I am, which I know stems from childhood issues that I had mostly resolved and then I moved on to my beautiful life with Ron. Anything I had not resolved didn't matter, I had Ron, and I could be at peace with all of it and my past in order to experience the joy I never thought I would be able to have. I let go. And so I wanted to talk to PJ (therapist) about it all - since she was the one who helped me resolve so much prior to meeting Ron. She made it possible that I could heal and open myself up enough to fall in love with him, and let myself be loved. But her beliefs about life, afterlife etc. are different. And when I started to haltingly try to talk about what was going on with me and what I listened to, I think she interpreted it as me questioning what I listened to, and she ended up saying something like "oh that's the one that believes that our lives are planned by our souls before we are born..." and she blew it off (it seemed), saying (or insinuating) that she didn't believe it and I didn't have to either. And she said that we all just don't know. And knowing I'm all about research, she started talking about me researching philosophies about life, afterlife, religion, etc. to explore what my beliefs are. It had all started a month ago when we were talking about consciousness after death, and the scientific research that has been done about it. She gave me the names of some books that she had used in her dissertation, or has read since. There was a focus in many on NDEs which were too painful for me to listen to since they talked so much about the moment of death, and the trauma of me experiencing every last hour and minute alone with Ron is still too fresh. So I started looking into books that looked at the topic from other POVs -- mediums was one, and the other was this "life between lives" -- the afterlife -- souls, soul groups, soul mates, and our eternal connection and life with them. As crazy as it may be, at least right now, I thought I could hold on in believing that, if I believe the author in terms of his scientifically approached case studies, which seem pretty sound to me. Then again, I'm probably crazy, myself. But if I could -- and with help I thought I might be able to -- believe that I will see him again, be with him again, incarnate with him again -- and if I believe that there is a purpose to me still being here, lessons I need to grow from, and connections and ways to help or be part of community here on earth still -- and ways I can find his love and care -- maybe I could go on. But there is a weight of wrongness and self blame and lack of caring for myself and my environment that now has the weight of the entire afterlife bearing down on me. eg. I'm doing everything wrong on a karmic, multi-dimensional level. I have soared to new heights of making myself wrong from a place inside me that I cannot reach or reason with. I don't want that. I know its from my past, and I know I need help with it if I want to survive this, because SO often I don't want to. PJ also wants me to go on medication; maybe it could help, but medication is dangerous for me to have around. I told her that I might be willing to try right now because I'm so desperate after saying no about it for months now, if I can find a way to manage having too many pills around. Sorry. I'm not suicidal now, but I can get very dissociated from my rational thinking and I need no easy solutions around late at night. My "wrongness" gets in the way of me speaking and PJ is a saint for trying to decipher me. So with the disconnect of her not believing the same afterlife philosophy as what I am currently believing to survive, I can't speak to her about it. Not "I won't" speak to her about it. I literally have verbal blocks to get any words out. And that is the disconnect. And so I plunged into despair that I lost the last person in my physical world that I can communicate with about survival (and of course, it's my fault, continuing the cycle). I swear, my brain is my own worst enemy. I need to address the "wrongness" which feels so "other" and I need to be able to share these crazy new ideas with someone who will go along on the ride with me, since that is the only way I can get the words out. PJ would if she knew, probably, but I don't know if it is too late because I know she doesn't believe the same and that is a big block in my wrongness and silence because I respect her so much. Its pretty out there so I get that philosophies wouldn't match. But it is a huge huge loss if I can't. One night when Ron was in Hospice and I had reached out to our community to help, our shop was changing so fast, and Ron knew none of what was going on there, his brain was too gone to be able to grasp any of it. One day, so distraught and exhausted, I rearranged the office because I could do nothing sitting at my desk, staring across at Ron's empty one, and yet I felt so guilty for moving his desk. That night, I was standing on a small balcony with our chef, a young man who knew Ron very well and was so close to him (he lives three doors down from us) and supportive (still is), and it was after we closed. I was in tears with guilt, and told him it's not like I couldn't move the desks back once Ron got better, and that even though things were changing, Ron could come in and totally be the manufacturing floor supervisor blah blah blah. The chef, 22 year old Kody, said "Yeah! And he could do this, and that..." and he just went on and on about everything Ron could do when he got back. I still believed I could save him in his two month downward spiral, but nobody else did - he was in Hospice after all. But Kody just went along with me, and BELIEVED me. I knew he probably didn't really believe me, but he was enthusiastic about my vision of Ron being back with me, and he just went with the fantasy. It made me SO HAPPY to have a companion in my false hope for those few minutes, and I am SO SO grateful he said what he said with a spark in his eyes as he envisoned the fantasy as if it were real. I need that now, but I could not adequately get that message to PJ, and so she could not go along with the "fantasy" or belief or whatever it is. And the silence that I get stuck in feels like it will swallow me whole. Thank you Marty for offering that I could write about it. If it is inappropriate for our forum, I'm so sorry. Patty