Boho-Soul

I'm so glad the smoke is better, was concerned for you and your fur babies. Hope the trend continues 🙏

I agree with kayc said. Come here and share your thoughts, concerns, frustrations when you can. I've had another thought about this somewhat unique situation. Please consider that you are also experiencing a loss at this time as well. You're now grieving the loss of dreams you hoped would unfold in this new relationship, one being the celebration you thought would happen for your 40th birthday. Things have shifted with her father's death and that has upended the typical phases or stages one goes through when starting a new relationship. Those early phases of bonding took a hit, and you may feel the impact harder than your girlfriend. She's in the early days of grief, which from experience are complicated as one is trying to navigate feelings of fear, shock, numbness, anger etc. Emotions can be all over the map, even within minutes several emotions can hit like a tsunami. You too may feel waves of different emotions as you process what could have been with this new relationship if things unfolded in a more typical, unencumbered way. One final thought - perhaps it is best not to share with her that you too are grieving what could have been in the relationship if... This will only add to her heavy burden of grief she is experiencing with her father's death, and you do not want her to feel guilty or responsible for your feelings. You are experiencing something fundamentally different than your partner, and you cannot expect yourself or your girlfriend to be in a different place. Give your own experience the space it needs. Accept your partner’s feelings as her truth, and accept the fact there is nothing to do about it.

So glad you have air filtration systems, and I'm not surprised you wear a mask 😷 I really hope that smoke clears out soon.

Welcome, there are many kind people here on this forum. Your situation is truly challenging and I can fully understand your want for wisdom, guidance or advice. The responses you read my vary, but they will all come from a caring place. What initially stuck out to me was the comment that she didn’t have the emotional bandwidth. Wow can I ever relate to that. The loss of my husband was sudden and unexpected, and I experienced massive shock for almost 3 months. Even passing the 22 month mark of his death I do not have the emotional bandwidth for many things in my life. With your girlfriend experiencing anticipatory grief and then experiencing her father’s death, it makes complete sense she would not have the emotional capacity to focus on anything else, and a new relationship would just be adding to the limited emotional resources she had. I seriously understand how hard this situation may be for you when you’ve just started dating this lovely woman that you’re so excited to get to know and develop a relationship with. There’s something called “The Window Of Tolerance” which explains how deeply stressful and emotional events can reduce one’s capacity or window of tolerance. I’m not saying your girlfriend is experiencing this, I’m just giving some insight to how traumatic events such as a death can cause one to become dysregulated. It could explain why you suddenly felt out of sync when things became more stressful with her father’s condition. As for wisdom, or advice - if she feels she can’t be your girlfriend right now I’d say if you care for her then respect that, give her the space she needs as she may be experiencing shock as she journeys through her loss and grief. I agree with what you said in your last paragraph, you need to take care of your needs. Be gentle when reaching out to her, don’t push or rush things. Let her know you’re there if she needs you without putting any expectations on her. And be her friend above all, if she give you the space to do so. By you truly demonstrating you can be a supportive friend builds a solid base for any romantic relationship. I hope this was some help to you. Be well friend 🙏 Here’s the pic of the window of tolerance if curious.

Our air quality health index goes from 1-10 where I live. I looked into a different scale showing the higher numbers. It's insane that the number is so high, 800s, in your area. How are you able to breath without it affecting your health?

That would've been great if you were able to join in the walk 😊 The weather is unseasonably warm for this time of year, today was 22C, above the typical 16C. When I went out for my walk I passed my neighbour's house who lives 2 doors down from me, and saw her in her yard. I called out out to her and told her I'd received the ME results. She joined me on my walked, we talked about the results, and chatted about our other neighbour in our cul-de-sac who just lost her husband last month. It was nice to have someone to share the walk with and to have someone to talk to.

Pix of today's walk on the pathways in my community - love the autumn colors.

It's been 2 weeks since I got the ME report stating my husband's cause of death. Most of my symptoms that I initially felt like muscle tension have subsided, although my energy levels have tanked. Did not expect to experienced energy crashes again. It's rather annoying and I find I'm irritable, mostly to my cat who doesn't deserve it. It's strange because that's not me, I've never been one to be irritable. It's an amazing autumn day today, trying to gather enough energy to do a short walk, want to enjoy these amazing warm autumn days before the big shift in seasons happen. I think getting some vitamin N (nature) will do me good. It's Canadian thanksgiving this weekend, so I want to give thanks for the wonderful weather we have this weekend and reflect on the blessings I have received over this last year. Gratitude is healing and thankful reflection will put me in a positive state of mind.

I'm Canadian too ☺️ This is my 2nd thanksgiving since my late husband died. To me it's just going to feel like another day, not thanksgiving. Last September my doctor decided I should go back to work (it hadn't even been a year since my husband's death). I knew I wasn't ready and hit burnout in 5 weeks (right around thanksgiving). I've been on medical leave ever since trying to recover from both burnout and grief. So I honestly don't remember last years thanksgiving. I probably slept it away. Happy Birthday aluckyson!

I appreciate both your comments. I'll post when I feel I'm able. Many thx 🙏

I can somewhat relate VR. My husband's death was also sudden and unexpected. I was in shock for almost 3 months, that shifted when my first grandchild was born just a few months later. Love stirred and emotions flowed which I felt was a good thing as it brought me out of that initial numb/shocked state. I don't feel like I'm in shock, but my emotions are still blunted at times. That's why I welcome those moments when my emotions are triggered because I feel it's healthy and helps with my healing. My husband went into severe distress at home and I immediately called 911, it was all I could do, I honestly couldn't have done more. He died from a cardiac arrhythmia. He told me he felt very nauseous before everything escalated. Our family doctor said nausea, indigestion, heartburn, or stomach pain can often indicated the onset of a cardiac event - who knew?

Thx VR. I got the information I wanted as to 'what' happened, but it does not explain 'why'. It states that there are a number of diseases of the electrical system of the heart that are referred to as channelopathies (caused by either genetic or acquired factors), so I'm letting go of the 'why'. I recently found out that two of his three brothers also have heart arrhythmias, so there's a possible genetic component. I'm still working toward more peace. I'm now confronting the complicating factors of our marriage. My late husband suffered with severe mental illness, and I'm now facing how living with him and his unhealthy coping skills has adversely impacted me. I tried to carry our marriage on my own (not possible as marriage is a partnership, not a solo endeavour), I was on edge never knowing when he would experience a depressive dip, I took the brunt of his unhealthy coping behaviours and he would often blame me for his state etc. There's more, but I'll stop there as this may not be the correct forum for such a topic. The hardest thing to sort out is that he was a good man at his core, and it's hard to hold space for his 'core self' and his 'coping self' in the same moment.

We all grieve in different ways. It's also important to grieve. It must be hard work suppressing your grief, and I do hope your are able to work through this at some point. I read this and found it quite helpful. Ignoring or avoiding emotions of grief is like a leak in our roof. We can face it and take care of it now, or we can wait as it seeps through the ceiling, getting into the walls, warping the floors, and creating toxic mold. This truly describes what it is like if we fail to address the grief that touches our lives. When we suppress it, it seeps into other parts of our wellbeing. It can inadvertently impact other relationships, can keep us from fully enjoying life, and can also negatively impact a person’s health. Here's a link to an article that may help. https://www.usurnsonline.com/grief-loss/inhibited-grief/ Wising you healing along your grief journey V.R. 🙏

I realize there aren't many here that can relate to my specific situation, so any posted response to my threads are comforting. Thx for your kind words kayc.

Yup, it was great. I talked to a few guys who I never did meet, we just became phone friends, someone I could call up and chat about life with, or how our week went. That stopped once I met Michael though. I wish there was something like that now. I remember the system had a friend option. It would be so nice to connect with someone that way, make friends to just call up and talk with, no pressure to meet up, such low risk for many reasons. Now it's all online, type on a screen. Not saying that the friendships we've formed here aren't valued, it's just that most of the conversations are about the aftermath of loss and grief, or in some way connected to our loss because that's the nature of this forum.

Sad_Widower, it's like the planets aligned for you to get that job and met your wife. James, I love your persistence in pursuing Annette. And I really like your writing style. Whenever you post something that involves a story, I enjoy reading it, the way you outline the storyline, and how you toss in little antidotes (i.e. “I still can’t wrap a burrito.”). It’s truly like a short story. I was a single mom back in the 90’s and had a girlfriend who was a single mom like me. She loved to go to clubs to try and met guys. She always wanted me to go so she wasn’t alone. I started going because I loved music and dancing, but most of the guys were either really young, typical club snakes looking for a one-nighter, or both. After 3 or 4 months I had enough and quit going. I told her the club is not the place to meet a quality man. Then 2 months later she told me she found the perfect way to meet tons of quality men. I was hesitant, but also curious, so I tried her suggestion. I meet my Michael on a telephone dating service. Back in the day it was free for women to join, so there were a lot of women on the system. Guys knew this, so they gladly paid to put on a voice profile to find love. That’s how it worked, you get assigned a voice mailbox number, then you record your voice profile and at the end you’d say, “If you like what you hear then box me back at 5822” (or whatever voice box number you were assigned). Then you could choose categories using the phone keypad to pick age range, relationship type, etc. and you were ready to access the system and listen to profiles. If you liked one then you’d leave a message in their voice mailbox, or you could have some messages in your box to listen to. Michael was on the system for 3 years; I was on for 3 months when I came across his profile and “boxed him back”. We talked on the phone every night for 2 weeks (I blocked my number to protect myself) before we decided to meet up in a public place for safety. We had a crazy connection over the phone, and I remember telling him if we have this kind of connection when we meet, we’re in trouble. Well, the connection was instantaneous for both of use. We were like strong magnets that were drawn to each other. It was amazing, he was dark and handsome (I didn't need tall, I'm 5'1", he was 5'7"). He told me that week was such a high for him. He just started this amazing new job on Monday, we meet in person on Wednesday, and went on our first date that Friday, which also happened to be my birthday. When we got married we had a phone at the head table, many quests weren't sure why as we hadn't told many people that we meet on a telephone dating system. We shared the "How we met" story before the speeches, replaying it from each other's perspectives and in reverse. I know that may sound weird, but it went over famously.

I received a lot of closure in a week – I submitted forms to land titles, handed over keys to the new tenants renting my studio, the ME report arrived, and I sent in the medical certificate to my insurance. All was a huge relief, but I experienced a flair up. I felt rundown, my gut hurt, had muscle tension and struggled with sleep. I’m starting to feel better and return to the point of healing I had achieved before the news, thanks to my supportive therapies. My health and well-being are top priority, so continued healing is key. I also felt new waves of grief, which I welcomed, as it helped me release more of that chaotic energy that comes with loss. Like they say, “You have to feel it to heal it.” So, the medical report states that my husband’s immediate cause of death was cardiac arrhythmia (of undetermined etiology). Significant conditions contributing to his death were his recent tibia/fibula fracture, mild/moderate coronary artery disease, and borderline hypernatremia (a condition due to dehydration and an imbalance in electrolytes defined as a rise in sodium). Given his symptoms of the severe distress and trauma that he experienced, and I witnessed, it all makes sense. I feel my questions have been answered and I can move on from this. I’ll still be processing moments of that day, but it won’t be open-ended, and I can now do it with a sense of completion.

The autopsy report has finally arrived.

I had my doctor follow-up this morning, then saw my therapist - mentioned to both of them that I hope to get the autopsy report by next week. Then I went to my physio appointment, felt really good leaving the clinic. Drove home, stopped at the mailboxes to get my mail and saw the autopsy report arrived. I've been on the phone talking to family most of the night.

Been hearing this song all summer, it hits me deep in my heart and I cry every time. Just heard it while driving today and I cried. It’s not only the lyrics, it’s the way it’s sung that stirs my emotion.

It's nice to hear you feel your Annette is in Heaven, I believe she is too. I know my Michael is in Heaven too, and living in the love of God. It's been said that, "One needs to feel to heal." I often use music to help me tap into my emotions, feel them, and then release them. Feelings are like the weather, they come and go. And sometimes you have to stand in a downpour, and feel it all before the dark clouds pass. I listen to this song when I need to connect to my feelings of loss and grief. The mood of the song helps me mourn.

A brief recap - my husband died December 10, 2020. It was sudden and unexpected. The initial autopsy could not determine cause of death so it went into secondary autopsy. I was told it would take between 6-12 months, then the wait began. After 14 months and no answers I was beyond frustrated, and the wait was taking a mental and physical toll on me. I passed the 21 month mark just over a week ago and called the medical examiners office yet again. They said someone would call back. Typically when I called them they'd say I would get a call the next day, which I did. This time I waited a week with no phone call. I called back this morning, left a message for someone to call - then someone called back. I was told the report will be finalized tomorrow and I should receive the full autopsy report outlining cause of death via mail in about a week 🤞🏼 The wait is almost over ...

I read somewhere that sarcasm is a passive-aggressive way to avoid confrontation. It's hard to hear you have a low opinion of yourself James. Your self-awareness is great though, it's the first step if you wish to change your behaviour. The most powerful skill to unwind that inner critic that tells you you're not a good person is to practice self compassion and focus on your good qualities. You've got to train that inner critic to be more supportive. And I would dump those Facebook 'friends.' As they say, "You become part of what you're around." Arguing on Facebook doesn't sound like a healthy space to be in.

Yes, my job is extremely rewarding, I benefit as much as the kids I work with. My plan is to return back to work next year, just not exactly sure when. My therapist doesn’t want me to rush back to soon and hit burnout again. I agree.

Sending you and your new love my blessings 💗