Margm

Agree with it all.  Two wobbly wheels here with a flip-floppy heart and brain, and water works that seem to happen and run down my face at the least little thing.

That was beautiful.  I have briefly seen Billy twice.  Just as I was waking up, like in a dream.  It has been less than a month and I would just live for the times to briefly see him again.  Until then, I will just live, possibly just exist, and maybe one day be alive again. One thing that is positive, the sun is out today.

Well, I picked a movie to watch tonight where the man's wife had just died in the hospital.  I turned that off fast.   Watched The Voice instead.  I looked at forecast for tomorrow, it did not forecast my mood, but it did forecast sun.  At this point in this life we have, we have to hope for something, even if it is just the sun.  I want you to know, all of you, my heart is with all of you going through this horrible time in our life.  I hope even for sunlight.  

I think we so want things to be normal again, but we all know it will never be normal again.  But hopefully the sun will shine again.  Thank you all.

Thank you Enna, that was so sweet.  I don't think I cried day before yesterday, but I have made up for it today.  Sometimes it is heck being human.  

Marty, thank you for shoring me up.  The headache analogy hit me.......right in the heart.  You see, I never have headaches, luckily, and I better knock wood on that one.  I did give in twice in the first week and went into our RV to scream into a pillow.  Both times it gave me a headache, so it is one of those things that, well, if it hurts, don't do it.  But yesterday I woke up with a headache.  That is always a clue to me my blood pressure is a little high.  Does not have to go up much, just a tiny bit and Billy would take my blood pressure when I had a headache.  It might be 140/80, which is too high, but just that little bit would give me a headache.  Still had it when I went to bed last night, had taken my blood pressure medicine as I am supposed to do, every day.  But, I went to bed thinking I should leave my kids a note about how to get my insurance.  That is one thing I have to do, another piece of business I have to attend to because Billy is the beneficiary.  No headache today, just heartache.  Thank you Marty, I needed to read this.  I so want to be "up" for everyone, but sometimes I just cannot.

Nothing but an observation.  It is raining and dreary here.  Okay, so is my mood.  I am fighting my emotions.  I am trying so hard to fight this depression, this grief.  Weather changes bring on too much.  Too much everything.  My neighbor sister widow Hettie was even fighting it too.  I need sunlight.  We all need relief from this pain.  Sometimes I can fight it to some extent.  It has not been a month yet.  I have to fight to keep final pictures from flashing in my brain.  My grandmother, aunt, other relatives passed away in their 90s.  My mother is 94.  These had to be strong women.  Why am I such a coward.  I have to fight this..........................

You have my hand.  We will make it.

I have Billy's photography for Arkansas's beautiful autumn leaves.  October was my favorite month of the year.  Now it is my most hated month.  

Debi, if you lived next door to me we could share Hettie, my sister widow.  She helps me so much and yesterday after her Loyal has been gone two years and three months, she was depressed and it was one day, possibly the only day, I was not in total depression so I was able for the first time to sorta help her.  It was the weather change from warm autumn weather to dreary, wet, sorta cold weather.  So, we are in for it with weather changes, sunlight, rain, snow, wind blowing...........anything.  Again, maybe the fog will lift one day.  But you, Hettie and I could help each other a lot.  I have at least five sister widows that check on me.  These are "girls" I graduated with so many, many years ago, and some I worked with.  And now you, a friend in Brussels.  

KPL, I woke up alone also.  After 54 years, I reach over on his side of the bed and I tell him I know he is gone and is never coming back.  That does not help, but it is a ritual I have begun.  My granddaughter gave me a life sized huge stuffed soft dog.  I put Billy's boxers on him and his PJ's.  Knowing Billy, I am surprised I do not wake up each morning and find "Daddy Dog" on the floor.  Of course it does not help, but it was so sweet of my granddaughter.  He was the only daddy she ever knew and for 16 years, she was his baby.  We helped raise her.  He was such a wonderful father, grandfather and husband, he is totally irreplaceable.  Our son cannot watch boxing anymore because he and his dad watched it together.  We will be able to do these things again.  It hurts me to look at his picture because I cannot touch those high cheekbones ever again.  I wanted us to die together, like things I read in the paper and things I read to him about long married people dying within minutes of each other.  I wanted to go too.  But, he told me that whoever lived "should stay."  Hurt my feelings at the time, because I was very ill and was sure I was going first.  I was comforted that he was going to take my ashes in the RV with him where ever he went.  But, I know Billy.  He would have taken the RV to the woods and he would have been a hermit, he would have lived alone like that until he finally passed away.  I read a poem, anonymously written.  It goes like this, and actually did not help that much, but the meaning is clear.

One or the other must leave, one or the other must stay. One or the other must grieve, that is forever the way. That is the vow that was sworn, Faithful til death do us part. Braving what had to be borne, Hiding the ache in the heart.  One, howsoever adored, First must be summoned away. That is the will of the Lord, One or the other must stay.

It should be put in poem form, but the spaces would take up too much room.  I hope one day the fog will lift off all of us, and we will find out why we had to stay.

Big hugs to you Debi.  I wish I could see Brussels.  My son has visited all over Europe.  I will go visit Brussels on Google.  Won't be the same, but you and I have shown that people are people where ever we live, where ever we come from.  We all feel things the same.  XXXXX  You are a good friend and people just have to love you.

Debi, this morning has been sorta hard.  Removing his name from our Medicare, removing his name from our joint checking account and having to send back in a sheet to our retirement system because I put "married" instead of "single" are just some hard things to do.  They underline that he is gone.  I get up each morning and I look on his side of the bed and say "you are gone, you are never coming back."  Just a ritual.  But, I have to say I had an almost passable day yesterday.  I talked over 54 years of marriage to four of his hats on my trip to the SS office.  I talked the good and the bad, the early years, the later years and the in between.  A friend had done this talking  to her husband's favorite chair.  Somehow, and I don't know how, this helped me.  I know, I am a strange person.  But tomorrow, who knows, I might not be able to get out of bed.  Last night I slept, only waking up once (old woman's bladder), but have to admit, I do take Xanax to sleep.  I know it is addictive.  Right now, addiction is the least of my worries.  I am going to move back home one of these days, and I have my old shrink I can go to.  (If she  has not retired by now).  You take care of yourself my friend.  I think we are all going to find our way out of this fog, eventually.  

That is funny Debi.  My dad, if Billy and I ever fussed (and we did), my dad would seriously ask me "what did you do?"  Guess he knew me very well.

We have missed you Debi.  No words of wisdom from me.  I have words, no wisdom.  My mom is 94 with Alzheimer's and lives with my sister.  I have had times I wanted to talk to her, but that is impossible, but with my mom, it was always impossible.  Alzheimer's is just a continuation of a long mental illness.  She still loves her cigarettes, the things she has always called "her friends."    

I carry my cell phone in my pocket.  I wear pants with big pockets.  My glasses go in one place as soon as I pull them off.  My purse stays in one place.  As soon as I get out of the truck, I push the lock button for all the doors, but I make sure my keys are in my left pocket.  Phone in the right, remember.  Those are my main things to remember.  If I forget any one of those, I am in a panic because I will not remember where I last had my keys, my glasses, my  purse.  Also, I make sure my blue billfold has to always be in my black purse.  I don't change any of these simple things around.  Maybe they are just training tools for my second childhood, but I have to have them in place.  The front sheet of my retirement packet I lost for about an hour.  I was in a terrible fix.  I could not send it off without it.  It was where it was supposed to be, my challenged mind just did not comprehend.  Our minds are terribly challenged right now.  It is like training our child to take the first steps.  These are our first steps without someone to depend on.

My dad used to tell my mom.  "Just sit down and remember where you were the last time you had it (whatever "it" was.)  It worked for her.  My mind is not that sharp.

Thanks Enna.  This explains so much.  Sometimes I feel like I am going through some other world and there are people all around me but they cannot see me.  At the same time, I have got to say this, I have so many sister widows who have shown me the empathy I had to have, have given me the advice I did not even have to ask for and have let me know that this is a process, not a timed process, a whole body process that I will have to go through, the pain, the suffering, the crying.  I am so fortunate for my family and support sisters and one lives right next door to me.  They are all Christian women whose main desire is to help me live through this fog in my mind, body, spirit, and physical surroundings.  We all need this.  Thank you so much for explaining that we are not mentally ill, not really physically sick, but are really trodding through a time warp that hopefully we can eventually see sunlight at the start of each day.  So many on here understand.

My mother told me fairy tales, read me fairy tales, and I had such a vivid imagination that I could imagine all kinds of things.  Nothing horrible, nothing but wonderful things, except at night.  If you Google it, you can read about "I want my toe."  There was also "raw hide and bloody bones." After dark, my imagination had things living under my bed (sorta like a movie for kids with Howie Mandel I saw once).  Now that I am an old woman, I have so many dust bunnies they are large enough to give names to, and they all live under my bed.  I don't know where I wrote this, maybe on here, if so I am repeating myself.  I write on Facebook too, so I am sorry if I repeat the story again to you.  The other night I was reading on here, either this forum or a news forum.  Maybe Facebook.  I heard a distinct noise in the garage.  Very loud.  The garage was locked.  In my childhood days my "mighty protector" was my dad who comically would take up the shotgun and run around outside the house in his boxer shorts he slept in.  Did not matter, winter, summer, rain or whatever.  Then, he would come in and go to bed.  I was protected.  Now to my "mighty protector #2."  The first time I woke up and told Billy I heard something he said "well, go see what it is."  Now, #1 and #2 is gone.  So, I woke my son up.  "Mighty protector #3" took our BB gun and opened the garage door from the wash room.  There was a big possum running around.  We could not get it out, it hid behind boxes.  When I am out of this big house, when I am in my small apartment I am hoping for" I will have to be my own mighty protector.  No guns, I shake so bad I would hurt myself.  But the point of all this is........I am a coward.  My imagination gets the best of me a lot of times.  I used to have dreams of vampires, werewolves, witches and all sorts of things when I first married.  Poor Billy.  I was such a kid.  But one time my vivid imagination was joined in by his own sleepy version and he jumped out of bed to get a weapon, hammer or something.  I woke up at about the same time he did and he sheepishly came back to bed.  I never had a terrible dream like that again, I was  cured of things sitting on the foot of my bed that were going to hurt me.  The point is, my vivid imagination at night will have to disappear, or I will.  

Have business in the "big city" today.  Going to talk to Billy's hats I keep on the passenger side.  My hope is for a better day for us all.  I so hope and pray for better days.  

I feel your pain.  I hate our pain.  

Thank you Janka.  It is beautiful.  I am at the point that I don't want to enjoy anything, food, music, nature, beautiful sights if my Billy cannot see them with me.  Maybe one day I can feel him standing beside me.  Beautiful music though.  Thank you again.  Do we have good days?  I think I have almost had a good day once or twice, maybe it was a good hour or two.  Time, time, time, time...........

I am fortunate that after 43 years, I finally decided to retire completely.  I had officially retired twice before, but I liked my job.  I could do it in the house and Billy could putter around making his flies, wrapping rod blanks (our kids inherited his artistic ability, and also his obsessiveness).  In later years he admitted some of the ways he was obsessive and we laughed at it.  He was able to put his energy into his artistic abilities, like his photography.  I miss this.  They say don't make plans, but I have them in place.  Whether I live to carry them out only God knows.  Until then, I will just trod on.  Not even a month yet.  Just three weeks yesterday.  Have to go carry out more business tomorrow.  Spent one hour and 46 minutes trying to talk to someone about his Medicare.  I will not use the phone, I will go to the office.  It is only 40 minutes travel.  The music they use on most of these "holds" just aggravates the dickens out of me anyhow.  

I do have to count my blessings.  I have many friends who belong to this society of widows that none of us want to belong  to.  They do not offer sympathy, they offer empathy.  I have a sister who has to take care of my mother, and my mother has Alzheimer's.  My sister is very protective of my feelings and because of her advanced degrees in college, working with psychology, working with me, she really helps me.  And you, you who have gone through this, you who are still suffering as much as I am, you help me too.  I hope I can share some measure of hope with you all too.  Like Billy told me "the one who is left should live."  I have a book written by a pastor's wife, I think it  is called "Grace for the Widow."  A chapter is devoted to the one who is left should live.  I have to admit though......sometimes it really is a hard thing to do.  We hope and pray for better days.

I cannot listen to songs yet.  Aren't we all so different?  My daughter sends me songs she thinks would be about her dad.  I don't listen.  His song was "Billy the Kid" naturally, by Billy Dean.  That is what we called him, "Billy the Kid."  Maybe this is a strange phenomenon I am living.  She puts pictures of him up on Facebook too, and I cannot look without crying.  Yet, his 1956-57 school picture the year before he shot up to 6'3", well, it makes me smile.  I look forward to having his pictures all around me.  Right now the wound is just too gaping and raw to listen to music or to see his beautiful face.  I so look forward to the day that I can do that.  Just like all of his "things," I will put in plastic boxes and move with me, when the time comes to move.  I don't want anyone throwing anything of his away.  I will get to that place one of these days.  Right now music and pictures hurt.  But, I am getting to where I can almost concentrate on a book and I can get lost in a TV show for a few minutes and sometimes even laugh at them.  It has only been three weeks.  I will get there.

I had to send back my papers to our retirement site because I did not put I was single.  Set me back another couple of weeks, I am sure.

I was frustrated with him for not fighting.  He held his palms up to me in submission and I did not want that.  I missed the chance to hold him while he passed away.  My anger is turned inward.  I have to fight to get that last look at him out of my head.  I cannot handle that.  I cannot.  I cannot.

Oh Brad, your Deedo is beautiful.  Your feelings for her even more beautiful.  I am looking forward to the time I can look at Billy's pictures without crying.  I did find his 1956-57 school picture with a cute plump face and slicked back blond hair.  I smiled.  My daughter keeps posting pictures of him and he was a hoot, he was a kidder posing crazy, and I cannot look at them yet.  Your travels these 100 days gives me hope.  We all need hope.  I went from Mama and Daddy straight to Billy and am now finally entering my second childhood on my own.  This is about your trip though, and as terrible as it still is for you, there is a slight chance of hope to find the surface of the water and maybe breathe.  She is lovely.