Chocolate

On 10/7/2022 at 9:53 PM, V. R. said:

I feel my husband here, he is in the air I breathe, he is everywhere

I feel this too, all the time.  For me it can be no other way.

For me it was hard to watch my husband lose his mental capacity.  He was highly intelligent, and when the cancer took his ability to think clearly and he realized that was what was happening, it nearly destroyed him in that moment. 

11 hours ago, V. R. said:

 He is this house and this land. I'll hold on to at least that part of him.  I feel my husband here, he is in the air I breathe, he is everywhere, however  I do understand other points of view, we all react in different ways.

The laws of physics say that nothing is ever lost.  It only changes form and substance.  There's a bunch of science stuff I won't go into here, but it basically says what a lot of religions say, that we are all one, even though science uses different words.  All that is comes from the same source.  This is our house, his and mine. Like with you, V.R. he is the air I breathe.  He tells me to breathe him in.  I'm learning how to access him more fully.  When the house feels vacant, empty, I tune more closely into him.  I say things to him to strengthen the connection. I carry a good- sized picture of him in the car with me when I go out grocery shopping.  I put it on the passenger seat.  This is a learning process.  I'm learning things I did not know were possible.  Sometimes I get scared of all the changes in the world, climate change, running out of water, the fires that could start here and what I would do if my house burns down,  etc.  He tells me not to be afraid, that it will be handled.  I'm tired of being without him physically, but.... there's nothing I can do about that.  I'm doing all I know to do to learn and grow.

There are so many ways to look at all this.  My husband is not gone for good.  He just lives in a different dimension now aka the afterlife aka heaven.  I talk to him.  He talks to me.  His voice comes as thoughts in my head.  We are getting closer.  We are part of each other, so there is no separation.  Love does not leave it's own. I am learning to accept the changes.  It's difficult for me, but it's coming along.

Marg M, true one size does not fit all.  But sometimes what works for one, can work for another. For me there would be no one who would not want to be travel by myself.  All those people have already passed away.  My husband has been gone 8 months.  The doctor I would like to go see passed away some time ago.  He'd be 110 if he was still alive.  And he definitely does not make house calls.  At least I've never seen him around here, grin.

41 minutes ago, Marg M said:

I did everything I was told not to do.  I moved.  I spent a few nights alone and knew that was not going to help me in an over 2,000 sq ft home.  Nothing but forest all around with homes hidden in little places that were hidden from view.  Two and a half acres between all of us.  Heaven for me and Billy.  I wanted to hear "life" and not "quiet" though.  I loved our retirement home, but without Billy there it was a millstone around my neck.  I moved back to our old home area where we  began, our kids began and finished school, where we got married, where we worked until retirement.  Most all my relatives live here too, but they sleep in the cemeteries around our area.  Moved to an apartment where everything would be fixed that broke..  The couple who live above me have a new baby and a young daughter.  I hear life.  One night about 2:00 a.m. I was woke up with a familiar sounding "thump" above me and knew the baby had thrown her bottle out of her bed.  Life.  COVID made me almost a hermit.  My family draws me out eventually.  I want to just not worry, read, and wait.  I'm okay.  (If the worry does not hang on too long).

So, all in all Marg M do you regret your moves?  I live in a rural setting that was perfect for my husband and me, and it comforts me even with him gone.  He presence seeps out of the walls and comforts me.  If others are around I find them disruptive.  I would be concerned about the couple with the two little ones, knowing that with the climate change they do not have a future.  That's how I feel about the little ones who live not far from me.  Most of my large extended family are gone now.  I focus on my own personal growth.  How long have you been widowed?

It's so hard when we've done all we can and it isn't enough. 

3 hours ago, V. R. said:

I understand what you mean, Chocolate. I know why I'm suffering from inhibited grief, it was all so sudden and unexpected and we were all present at the time, I can't stop blaming myself that perhaps I could have done more, but perhaps not. Seemed like a bad case of indigestion😢. 

Anyway, just to answer your question in a previous post, my kids are 24 and 26. 

Thanks for telling me your kids ages.  I thought maybe they were little children. They are old enough to handle themselves, so at least you can try your best to take care of you.

I really don't like labeling something.  When something happens quickly, it is very hard to adjust.  It's a huge shock.  It takes shock a while to wear off.  I think the shock helps us do what we have to do as we have to do it.  I think blaming ourselves is natural.  I think all of us worry that there could have been something else we could have done.  I know I do...it's a case of if only.... 

The article does make some good points.  However, sometimes we are not ready to face the grief.  Sometimes we can allow it to come out when our hearts are ready.  One size does not fit all.

9 minutes ago, Gwenivere said:

You are so right, Chocolate.  It does make you feel like you have so many personalities and crazy.  The only one I can’t feel is the one I was with him.  The only one I want to be.  And what revolves from it.  Living all these other versions has me so looking for a permanent escape.  It’s very frightening.  A lot is becoming disabled to not do normal things like I did when  this started.  That was hard enough without all these battles.  Having to have someone living with me and never leaving the house.  I read others struggles and they are so hard.  Everything I watch or hear is different .  So much anger,, depression and jealousy.  A cold and broken heart. II know I’m not alone in the mindset.  I don’t feel less a person.  I just feel a void that will never be filled with extra challenges I don’t know if I can ever adapt to.  

Gwenivere, I understand about wanting a permanent escape.  I understand about the void that will never be filled.  I understand about extra challenges and feeling like I can't adapt.  It's amazing to me how things that were no problem before now feel like jagged mountain peaks that I can't climb over.  While I don't know how you feel specifically, I know what it's like for me.  I find those feelings unacceptable.  I accept that he died.  But I don't accept where that leaves me.  That's part of what I have to figure out how to work through.

6 hours ago, Roxi said:

Chocolate i love how you can find  solutions and help yourself

Thank you.  Grief, like with all things, seems to be a case of learn as you go.  What works for someone else, might not work for me.  And I've learned that what works one time may not work the next.  Grief seems to make me feel like I've become at schizophrenic at times.

Thanks, kayc.

Thanks.  I know all this stuff.  I studied to be a counselor once upon a time.  It's one thing to know it in theory.  It's another to deal with it.  I just like to hear what other people do.  I think that's important.  And I bring up topics hoping it will help others too.

3 minutes ago, kayc said:

I am sorry you struggle with this challenge, chocolate!  I used to have meds that sent me on lows, I got off them, very scary!  I never have lows on keto and am controlling my BS with diet and exercise.  I feel for you!

We all have things wrong with us.  The only medications I take are for high blood pressure.  They are necessary.  Trying various other natural things kept my blood pressure too high. I tried it for years. Thanks, though.

6 minutes ago, kayc said:

I am staying in close contact with their daily reporting, just repeating what they say.  Yes rains help EXCEPT when setting backburns.

Rain does put out the fire.  If they keep starting them again, that's a different set of circumstances.

21 minutes ago, V. R. said:

Oh what a powerful song. I have to be honest with you, I couldn't listen to it right to the end, just too heartwrenching. I still end up suppressing my grief when a trigger suddenly comes along, like this song. I 'run away', I realise I'm still going through denial, not wanting to accept and acknowledge my loss. 

For me the opposite is true.  It's a promise to me that we will be together sooner than I thought.  It makes it more tolerable.

When I heard this song at first I was thinking this is how it must have been when my husband passed.  Now I realize that the calling is now for me, and my husband and I will be together, soon. Angels Calling - The Tenors

That was very thoughtful of your son, Sad_Widower.  It's amazing how it can lessen the intensity of the loss.  It's wonderful your wife and son were both with you.  I'm sure their love always embraces you.

5 hours ago, kayc said:

Not exactly. They need it dry for the backburns.

The huge fires in other parts of the states during other years only went out once the fall rains hit.

5 hours ago, nashreed said:

I'm reliving her passing... because it is a tangible connection to her. The last time I saw her alive, the last things she said and did. I remember that she had had a drink of water and had spilled a little on the floor. Even though it wasn't much and it wasn't in her path, I still immediately wiped it up (hardwood floor), because my instinct was always "What If it caused her to fall?"

There is one aspect to her death that I cannot get past. She had a severe low blood sugar that night- so low that the EMT's weren't able to get it back up. She had chronic kidney disease and her blood sugar was getting impossible for her to control. I really wanted her to get an insulin pump, but she was stubborn- she always managed it before....One of the odd things about that night, besides her not calling out for me and me not instinctively waking up to help her like I often did, was that she chose something strange to eat to get her sugar up. She always had easy to eat candy around in case of low blood sugars (she could have had milk or peanut butter), but she chose "Red Vines" (licorice) for some stupid reason- just tried to chew/stuff down a few strands. I don't know if she just was so out of it or what, but the EMT'S found a wad of them in her throat and her doctor believes she choked on them. I don't think that's possible. I found her on the floor, after falling out of her wheelchair, and she was snoring... She was really in a low blood sugar attack, but her breathing sounded normal to me- I don't think it was the candy obstructing her airway as much as she couldn't get the licorice to get her sugar up. The EMT'S couldn't find a vein (always a problem with her) to administer glucose and she was completely out of it. The low blood sugar led to cardiac arrest as far as I can discern, but her doctor believes it was a stupid and preventable accident and I can't accept that possibility. I can't live with that answer, because the guilt of that is too much. It's absolutely stupid to go through this stuff again, and I probably feel like I deserve to be tortured by this all again. But it's all I have. 

I have chronic low blood sugar.   I have to get the right food source at the right time to help me when my blood sugar drops too low.  Most of the medical community does not believe in chronic low blood sugar.  I've had it for over 50 years.  So they negate the things I tell them about mine.  James, you are right.  They are wrong in there assessment.  They Are Wrong!

6 hours ago, kayc said:

It can be overcome through logic, from my experience.

 

1 minute ago, Chocolate said:

 

Logic certainly can help pull a person out of the pits. 

6 hours ago, kayc said:

It can be overcome through logic, from my experience.

Logic certainly can help pull a person out of the pits.

My heart and thoughts are with you.

5 minutes ago, nashreed said:

Well, now that I live at home, my Mom is always up in my beeswax- even though I have virtually no life. I don't tell her about talking to Annette or anything personal, but if I were ever to go seek outside guidance and support (for anything), she would know (or try to at least grill me about where I was).

You ask for your guides to come to you...you don't tell your mom.  You talk to them in your head, even if it feels like you are talking to no one.  There are yoga things online, places that have classes.  You can go to Youtube and search for yoga  and meditation stuff there.  Do a search for online classes. 

14 minutes ago, nashreed said:

I wish I could get in touch with my spirit guides- I'm not sure who they would be. Annette must be so frustrated with me. I can't meditate. I can't shut down my brain and focus and relax- even though I try to be blase' about everything, I still worry about stupid stuff constantly. If there was such a thing around here, I would love to go to a meditation/yoga (well, I don't think I could do yoga) type place. I wouldn't get any encouragement from my family. They think it's absolutely stupid to entertain any type of spiritual or meditative pursuits. 

Ask for them to come to you.  Trust that they are there.  It took me a long time for me to know who mine were and to be aware of it.  Don't tell your family.  My family never believed in that either.

28 minutes ago, V. R. said:

My answer is no. This has never crossed my mind really, that I may lose my connection if I let go of my aches and pains.

I would say yes to the thread title question, though. Perhaps I do feel him closer when I have one of my intense grief breakdowns (that's what I call them). The fact  is that I am still in the same situation I was the day I lost him twenty two and a half months ago, if not worse. I am constantly in pain for my soulmate, he is constantly on my mind, wherever I am, whatever I do, he is still a part of me, will always be. I still feel like a half person, still seems so unreal, still can't believe he won't be coming back to me. So unexpected and sudden, so soon. Not one day has passed  when I haven't cried, only when I'm alone though, especially while driving. I have always avoided letting my two children see me crying, it would just upset them even more. Just this morning I nearly burst into tears when I went to the  supermarket, I thought of running out again but luckily I managed to gain control of myself.  Some days I just can't bear it, I find myself 'looking for' him, calling out to him, asking where he is. I may have moments of solace every now and then when I manage to smile and participate in a lively cheerful discussion, without feeling depressed, but even  those moments are very feeble , they don't last long and they very quickly become over-shadowed by my pain. 

 

I understand what you are saying.  How old are your kids?  I assume you are trying to hold it together for them. For me it's been 8 months today.  Everything I do when I'm out and about takes emotional energy that I don't have.  I am working on not feeling miserable all the time.  It takes concentrated effort.  I watch movies that are loving and touching and some about death.  This is to help me work it through.  Today I had to make some business decisions and that was hard, without him.  It absolutely sucks.  But I am also getting in touch with my spirit guides and my husband - in spirit.  I write down the exchanges in journal form.  It helps.