kayc

How beautiful that is! And how it conveys my heart. I can hardly bear to look at those things that were his...the treasured memories. Sometimes I wonder how long I'll grieve or how much of it I'm trying to push from me. We had a large two drawer chest that contained our special momentos...one drawer for him, one for me, and in it were pictures, letters, cards, special things...I cannot go in to his drawer, it is too much. His life could not have been reduced to the "things" that I cleaned out, his clothes, his fishing gear, the things he loved, but rather it is in our memories, the things that can never be wiped away, the things that exist for all time, our meeting, our courtship, our honeymoon, the beauty of our marriage, the enjoyable weekends we devoted to each other...the understanding, exchanged knowing glances, and always, always, holding hands. Memories of sitting up with each other when one of us was sick. Memories of sharing our hearts with each other and staying up late into the night to talk to each other. Memories of wonderful shared cups of coffee or enjoying a snack together. Memories of sleeping through videos (we never could seem to stay awake! ) Thank you for sharing that with us Dusky, it means much to us as well.

I think, like Dusky, that it helps to honor them somehow. But I also feel that however you find it best to deal with those days is what you need to do. We are all different. My husband died on Father's Day...I'm not sure how I will handle it and may not know until that day arrives. I only know that the day will not escape unnoticed and I sincerely doubt it will be easy. Father's Day for me is forever ruined as it was the worst day of my life. I don't know how it can be otherwise. Perhaps for me I will call his grown children on Father's Days...if I could think of something special to do for them it would help to make the day salvageable. And I know that's something George would like. Is there something that meant a great deal to your loved one? A cause, a hobby, a sport? Any way you could contribute to it that would honor him in some way? For example, if teaching was his life, you could volunteer reading to children. Or if he loved plays, you could attend one in his memory. Be creative, something will come to you. I wish you the best.

Stik40 We are glad to meet you although wish it was under different circumstances. All of us here have been through it. Talking and writing helped me tremendously. And art...I found it helped for me to express myself through collages...collages depicting how I felt, collages depicting where I wanted to be, collage depicting what I was to George, and collages depicting what he was to me. It's not as important how we express ourselves as it is that we DO express ourselves. It's not good to hold it in and we all need some safe place to go...somewhere where we don't have to feel bad for saying what is in our hearts. The rest of the world does want to move on, but for us, that is not possible. I am fortunate, I have my husband's friend John who has been there from day one, listening, caring, sharing stories with me about George, helping me sort things out. I realize that not everyone has someone to listen...but all of us here on this site listen and we care. It sounds like you had something very special...it's not about how long we get together, it's what we make of what we have, and it sounds like you lived to the fullest together with your love. It's just that when we have something so good, we don't want to lose it so soon...soon meaning any time that would part us. For the lament is the same whether we've shared a year or a lifetime together when we have loved and lost.

My dearest Walt, No there is no humor in losing the love of your life. I remember that evening so clearly in my mind and the intense pain that I felt, lilke the sharpest of daggers going through me all at once. I remember my world tumbling and falling and all sense of purpose lost along with it. The days that followed were a blur, an unreality that I did not want to live through. I do not recall smiling except when remembering funny things about George. George and I both have such wonderful senses of humor...he had to learn to laugh to survive life! And me, I got my sense of humor from my father, that was his greatest gift to me, one that me and my whole family use as a coping mechanism. I know a lot of people think our humor is sick and do not understand or agree with it, and yet it is what has gotten us through. My little sister had a baby born without a brain...she had the stem that controlled body function, breathing, etc., but not the rest, no cognitive abilities, no thinking, etc. I remember my little sister bought her a T-shirt that read "If I only had a brain". Now a lot of people would find that sick, but they went through so much and if they hadn't kept their humor, you would have had to have locked them away for they never would have made it. I love nothing more than sitting around with family and friends and hearing us all sharing stories about George...and he would love it. When I think of him, I think of him with a big smile on his face. He made me smile even on his death bed! The whole time we were married, I hounded him for receipts...I am the organized planner in the family, a Bookkeeper/Office Mgr. by trade, but he was not good with tracking things. We lost a lot of tax deductions because he didn't bring home his work-related expense receipts! Well he is laying there dying in the hospital and he very weakly whispered to me...I had to lean down to hear him say "There's a receipt on my wallet". That made me smile...Sure enough, a $14.00 receipt! It took me my whole marriage to train him and just when I get him trained right, he up and dies on me! You have to find something to smile about in that...and yet I agree, there are times that it is inappropriate, and we should be sensitive to people. We know our loved ones...if we feel it would offend, we should refrain.

At Christmas time I was asked to light the advent candle and speak on "love"...I thought, "Why me? Why would my pastor pick me to speak on a subject of which I feel so devoid?" Obviously, I chose a different "love" to speak about than the one George and I shared. Now Valentine's Day is approaching and I am being asked by my choir director to sing a solo on "love". Again I felt, "Why me? Why wouldn't they pick someone else, someone who hadn't just lost her Love?" I have filled my life as best as I can with new friends and activities and tried so hard to keep an upbeat attitude and smile...yet inside a part of me is still raw and burning with pain and emptiness, a lonliness that misses my husband. I don't even want to attend the valentine's banquet...it's something George and I always did together. He was so good to remember me on Valentine's Day, my birthday, Christmas, and every day inbetween. He was my biggest fan, and I his. I can't listen to barbershop quartets sing love songs and watch other happy couples exchanging glances and holding hands. It's just too hard. How are the rest of you handling these situations?

I think this is a very positive statement...we all have missing pieces in our lives now, and all we can do is look for something good and try to rebuild our lives with that...it's not the same, it's never the same, it never will be. But we're here, we have to go on, and we need to make the best of a bad situation. Sometimes we don't want to, but we have to keep our focus and keep trying. Ustwo mentioned having a hard time focusing on anything but today, that's okay, sometimes all we can expect from ourselves is getting through today and that's enough. How I wish I could bring comfort to your souls!

Pat, You are doing well to realize so much so soon...the Serenity Prayer is indeed a very good thing to remind us all of, for this is truly one thing we cannot change. It's not what life doles out to us...it's what we choose to do with it. None of us would have chosen to lose our loved one, we cannot blame ourselves in any way...we love and continue to love them, but we must come to terms, somehow, with our altered state. Good luck to both of you...

I lost my husband on Father's Day, and I barely remember last summer...I was in a fog the whole summer and it's like I lost the entire summer. I remember come Labor Day wondering when it had come and gone, and I missed it. I remember spending a lot of time on this forum and talking on the phone...trying to connect with people, pouring out my feelings through writing. Trying to assimilate it all...it's hard. The only thing I can say is, be kind to yourself. Don't expect too much. You will make it through the best way you know how, and it may not the the way others do, for all of us have to find our own way to survive. We are here for you in your journey. I wish you the best in it!

Oh Walt, thank you. My internet provider's program was somehow damaged and I had to get it fixed, so haven't been able to use it lately, but coming back on here today is like salve to my soul. I really miss everyone when I am not able to connect with them. I think of and pray for each of you every day. I think all of our loved ones are with us, they just aren't able to communicate with us in the conventional ways...but who knows, maybe a beautiful sunset or a shining star is them passing on a message of comfort and peace to us...

Suze, I want to add a hearty amen to Walt's comment ...that lends comfort to us, knowing they continue to live on in us and will never be forgotten. It has been seven months ago tomorrow since my husband passed away...it feels like years to me also. It seems so long ago since I was so blissfully happy, I miss him more than life itself. It is so hard to long for someone and not be able to touch them. I still talk to him, I think I always will, who knows, maybe he can hear me or even read my thoughts...he was pretty good at that when he was here. All of us have wondered how we would survive without our spouse/loved one, and none of us knew any answers to that...but with time we can look back and see what has helped us...this forum, people who understand and care, and living in the moment, trying not to focus too much on the long span in front of us...and the hope of seeing our beloved again. Finding purpose has helped...even if only the purpose of helping someone else survive their loss...something, anything that lends meaning to this.

Re: quote by Ustwo Every time I hear about something from "before", like our 2005 Valentine Banquet, or the April retreat I went on, I think, "That was 'before'"...before I knew my world would come crashing apart, before my world as I knew it would end...before, when I was happy, before, when I had my beloved, before when I looked forward to the weekends, before when I could still enjoy cuddling up in his arms, before, when I was happy. It's not that there is no enjoyment now, but it certainly isn't the same, now I make more effort to find or see it, and it is never the same. I think about him, his smile, the way he looked at me, his personality, the smell of his skin next to me, and I can never be the same. Before. What a word, before.

It is so horrible...we just keep replaying everything in our minds, over and over...it doesn't stop. It's been seven months for me. Today at church the pastor showed a film he'd made of 2005 "events" and there was George and I, over and over, at the Valentine Banquet, at everything throughout the year...up until June when he died. He'd just had his 51st birthday. I sat there and cried and cried, seeing the pictures of my husband and I together, so happy, so in love, always attentive to each other, holding hands, our heads together...it was more than I could bear and I just sat there with tears rolling down my cheeks, thinking, I want my husband back.

What helped me in 2005? My church family, they invited me places, came to see me, and tried to help me not be so alone. And this site has been of tremendous help, all of the friends here...for being here, understanding, caring. John, for listening, caring, not pushing me to "get over" George, but just accepting me at my pace, with all I've been going through, and for his love of George and acceptance of him "as is". My sister Julie for staying in close touch, my sister Peggy for helping me financially to afford health care and for paying for George's cremation and taking me out to dinner a million times so I wouldn't have to hurry home to an empty house. My job for being so wonderful and supportive. My kids...my son for helping me out in practical ways, attending to details and repairs. My daughter for coming to stay with me so I wouldn't be alone, for getting groceries so I wouldn't have to (it was something George and I always did together). Our friend Dan for finishing our patio rails (a project George had been in the middle of when he died), and for unstopping my plumbing. Our new cats that came to stay with us when Tigger left (after George died he ran away). So I've had a lot to be thankful for in 2005. You know, it really helps to name your blessings...my biggest one being God, who gave me ample time to air my anger and waited patiently for me to come to acceptance and trust in Him. He gives me assurance and without Him I wouldn't have the comfort of knowing I will see George again and he is being cared for in the meantime.

Maylissa, Thank you for sharing...my husband came from a family riddled with problems and abuse of all kinds so I can definitely understand why/how he could end up with residual problems. I have always understood him and love him, and he me. We did have something very special. But I still find it hard to fathom that he could pawn the ring I got him for a wedding present. It was $1800 and he probably got $150 for it...yet it's not the monetary loss that concerns me at all, it's the fact that he could do that...there are many other things he could have pawned. And if he only would have talked to me...I asked him when he "came clean" if he owed anyone anything and he said "Yeah but I'll take care of it"...I told him I wanted to just do it and get it over with and gave him the money for it. And now this. So it's so hard to understand...he didn't need to lie to me...unless he wanted to continue to use. And of course, I wouldn't stand for that. I realize it takes an average of seven tries to get clean. And I know he wanted to. On his cell phone bill after he died, I saw that he'd made calls to rehab places for help. I have to accept that he wanted to change and leave it at that. You are not alone in having mixed feelings about family members...dead or alive. My own mother is pretty crazy and has been a problem all of her life and I'm not sure I can even totally say that I love her. I always wanted to but she's just so hard...my dad was an alcoholic and I loved him but he's dead now and I never got to reconcile why it was that he could watch her abuse us and just take another drink and never protect us. So I understand the mixed feelings thing. I guess life and people are just complicated. I never thought I'd bring all this up on this forum! Maybe there's a higher percentage of people that come from "normal" families than "abnormal" ones...if so, that's good! It's hard to lose people whether your grief is for the loved one or for the good memories you never got to have. Our loss is real.

Thank you Spela and Walt. It was hard to share this. My worry at first was in his kids reading this, but I feel after all this time they have pretty much continued on with their lives and I don't think they've ever gone to this site anyway. My kids were closer by so they were more aware of what was going on in our lives as it transpired. I am glad you don't feel I've dishonored his memory by sharing something so painful, so personal. It has been a huge load to try to carry by myself. It's good to have it out in the open.

I do understand...hey, I still "talk to" George, I look at his picture and think of him, I try to picture his hugging me in my mind...and ocassionally I still wear his bathrobe when I need comfort.

Ustwo, Thank you...that is pretty much what I have had to conclude too. It's a long hard struggle...

I have been feeling the need to write about this but also apprehensive about it. You were all married to such wonderful seemingly perfect people. My husband was also wonderful, but he had problems. I am very proud of him for having over came so much in his life. Shortly before he died he came to me and told me he had been using meth. It was a real shock to me because I had not suspected at all. I knew our bank account was gone and the home I’d had paid free and clear when we married now had a mortgage on it, but he always had reasons, excuses…a few months after he died I began to learn that he had undoubtedly used longer than he had let on. In fact, when I began to put two and two together, I could see where it had probably started. He had been very low in energy and had a very demanding job and a long commute…he’d chosen a very poor answer to a situation that needed other changes to take place. Anyway, we dealt with all of that before he died; however, as I began to learn the extent to which I had been lied to in order for him to enable his habit, it hurt me tremendously. On Christmas Eve I was told by a friend of his that he had hawked my wedding present to him…I never would have thought that possible. I know that he loved me deeply and would be deeply grieved now to learn the extent to which he’s hurt me. I also know that he was very troubled and drug addicts do what drug addicts do…they lie, connive and steal, anything to support their habit. And their families cannot go unscathed. We are left behind hurting and wounded to deal with all of the fall out. Now I am working two jobs to make ends meet and barely surviving and I am grappling to make sense of what our relationship was and is. I have been working through all of this pretty much on my own, not wanting to hurt his memory or for “people to find out”…yet when I hear those of you come on line and say how quiet it is, how lonely it is, I know you feel like I’ve dropped off the face of the earth or don’t care, and that’s not true, I just haven’t known what to say. I hear how wonderful your loved ones were. Well my George was wonderful too…he was sweet and caring and loving and intuitive. He was always helping someone, always working, always trying. But he had an addiction, and he was trying to lick it. In looking back, maybe God chose to spare him all he would have had to have gone through. Or maybe it was me He was trying to spare, I don’t know. I do know that I gave George the best years of his life, and he mine. But I am going to be paying on our debts a very long time. And the fact that he could pawn something so dear to us…well that hurts. I can’t talk to him about it, I can’t cry or hit him or have him hold me and say he’s sorry. So I have to come to terms with all of it by myself, and that’s hard. We had what we had, I don’t want to minimize it, nor do I was to be unrealistic about it either. I have started seeing a friend of his, John, someone who knew him longer than I did, and he’s been of tremendous help to me. He knew George, all of him, his strengths and weaknesses, and he loved him “as is”, and it’s been a tremendous comfort and encouragement to me to be able to talk to him. I am trying to move on and build a life for myself again, and yet I know that George will always continue to exist in my heart, no matter who he was or what he did, and I know that he loves me still and if he could change the past he would. If there’s anyone else that has encountered discoveries that are hard to resolve after their loved one’s death, please know you are not alone and take comfort in that. You are welcome to pour your heart out to me, for I will understand. I just want to admonish you to take the whole of the person with you in your memory, not just the part, and embrace your loved one for who they are. I am sorry I have had a hard time coming out with this, it’s very difficult. One thing at a time.

I must say a heart Amen to that! John (Dusky), you are really incredible, we appreciate you!

Wow, you are all going through so much. I want to be there for you, any of you, and if things ever get "lonely" when people aren't posting, please feel free to email me, I check my email daily huntley9@netzero.net All of your postings have been a lifesaver to me and I find when someone is gone for a few days, I miss them. Please, all of you, stay in touch.

I am sorry you have felt lonely here...I haven't been able to use my computer as much lately, my daughter and her friend are living with me now whereas I used to have the place to myself...so I find myself not being on line all week and then reading eveything at once and catching up. Of course it's not the same as getting to touch base every day. That is so important and helpful in our grief. I need to try to get on line more often. We are here and we do understand. Sometimes we read and don't write anything, but we're here all the same. A lot of times I read everyone's postings on my lunch break at work but don't have enough time to reply until later. But rest assured, we're here. We are going through this together, and that is a huge encouragement and source of strength.

Patti, I am so sorry for your losing your husband. I lost my husband unexpectedly of a heart attack too, and it's a shock that is very difficult to assimilate. My husband was one of 11 kids, he was very caring, always helping everyone, yet only three siblings showed up at his memorial, even though most of them live within a couple of hours from here. His father didn't come and I've never heard from him. I've not heard from one of them since. So you're not alone. I have no idea why, I guess maybe they felt he was the connection to you and since he's gone, they don't have a connection to you any more. I don't know, that's all I can figure out. It's too bad, because you'd think they'd want to hang on to that connection all the more. I meant absolutely everything to my husband, so you'd think they'd honor that, like he would have wanted. But regardless, we had what we had and they can't add to it nor can they take it away. I have my memories and will always have a special place in his heart...when I get to heaven, I believe it will be me that he reaches for first... As someone else voiced, it's not you, it's whatever they are dealing with. You still have your connection with your husband, you always will. Oh John/Dusky, You are not a second class father or a second class anything! I have read your postings, you are a very in-depth caring person and your Jack was so very very fortunate to have you in his life. I really believe your/his son will come around eventually...you may be right about his "running away" from his dad's death, but eventually we have to face and deal with things, they have a way of going with us. He cannot forget all you were to him! Kids can hurt, even our own biological children...sometimes it's really hard to undeerstand them. But we continue to love them unconditionally, and I believe that eventually, they will come around. But our whole point in loving them isn't so much to be loved back, although that is certainly what we hope for, but to teach and example them...and that you have already done. I pray for comfort for you...

I think that's true, it does become a part of us that we carry as we go. That's why we're never the same again.

Waterbird, I too experienced feeling like people didn't understand the depth of my loss because George and I were only married 3 years and 8 months...but a relationship is not measured by time alone...there are plenty of bad marriages that last for many years. A relationship is rather measured by quality...how close you were, how intertwined you were, the intimacy you had. And your loss equals the depth of that love. We understand that, those of us who are here, for some of us were married but a short time, some a long time, some never at all...yet our grief is deep felt and our love is great...or we would not be here. I am glad your husband was so caring for you that he gave you permission to go on and be happy again. That is a selfless and caring act! With time, I hope you can carry that out, for it sounds as if that is what he would have wanted.

Well I hope you get it in your dreams...and don't feel bad for having a good time, good for you! We need to smile and breathe fresh air and see sunshine. We've all been too long without it. Usually New Year's doesn't mean anything to me, I don't drink or party so it's no big deal, but this year it was very meaningful to me. This last year was pure hell, one thing right after another. I thought the year was horrible BEFORE my husband died, so of course that finished it off. To me, 2006 signifies the beginning of something new, changes that will hopefully be better, it sure can't be as bad as 2005 was for me. To me it signifies the end of the run of bad luck that I had all year long. The change of tide... Wishing all of you a better year to come!