kayc

I too had those "if only"s...George and I spent all of our time together when we weren't working. Once a year I went to my sisters' reunions...June 16 he came home from work early, not feeling well. I got up and packed for my trip, thinking he just had a bug or ate something that didn't agree with him. Usually he hauled everything out to the car, this time he didn't. He said he thought he'd sleep sitting up, so I did too, next to him. But a half hour after I left, he had a heart attack and then drove himself to the doctor and was then transported by ambulance to the hospital in the nearest city. The doctor wanted to call me but George wouldn't let him, he didn't want to spoil my trip. By the time I found out and got to the hospital it was two days later and he died without us ever being able to talk alone. I have a lot of "if only"s...my heart is broke for all of the last minute things we never got to say, for not being able to be there when he needed me most. I don't understand why things went the way they did, and I probably never will. I could have at least held his hand when he died except the nurse threw me out of the room when he started having his last heart attack. I can never forgive that. I was everything to him and he to me, she had no right. But life goes how it does and it's up to us to accept it and do the best we can with it. I miss my friend, my husband, so very much, I always will. Right now I try not to think about it any more than I have to, it's too hard and too painful. I've shed a million tears, I've dealt with a ton of "stuff" you have to deal with, and I don't know what else to do but try to build my life. It will never be the same again, it never can be. But I must give myself the gift of trying to make my life something worth living. What else can one do?

Deborah, Yes we sometimes feel fear and dread...usually when I feel that I try to push it aside and not dwell on it. I try to fill up my time and not be alone much. One day at a time is right. I've lost the "couple friends" we had, but I've gained a couple of friends that I wasn't as close to before too. I talked to someone last night who had been through this and she said someone had told her "when things get back to normal..." and she said "there isn't any normal...what was normal before doesn't exist anymore, she had to create a new normal". That's true, our life as we knew it is gone, we have to try to rebuild from scratch and it's hard. It's not a matter of liking it, it's a matter of trying to find something good in it anyway. Good luck and keep on trying.

I am so glad to hear that you are doing so well Spela. We have all come such a long ways in this unchosen journey. To Deborah, whether we talk to our departed one or not, it doesn't change what's happened, it is for us that we talk to them, to help us get out our feelings. I have an ongoing letter to my husband, and in it I voice everything, my fears, anger, hurt, love, hopes, ups and downs, joys, everything. It doesn't make him any more or less dead, but it does help me to "get it out". And to the comment that someone made about not imagining ever being in love with anyone else, of course you can't imagine that, it's too soon to think about it, but even if you were to love someone else, it doesn't take away from the love you already have with your spouse...I have known people who have been widowed and remarried and they tell me one doesn't replace the other and you never ever forget your loved one...but they just didn't want to do life alone. No two loves are the same because no two people are the same. Right now we are just trying to get used to what we are left with and have to face..."life without". And of course we really know deep down inside that the person is not completely "gone", but moved, and our love never dies, but how we get to convey it is altered. Please keep writing out your feelings, it's one of the most important things you can do right now, it validates them, it gives your voice a chance to be heard, and it empowers you, and right now you need that. We are here to hear you. God be close to you.

How true! Just last week a friend of mine was very depressed about his job and other circumstances in his life. I told him when one door closes, it seems to us to be a hurtful thing, but it is God's way of getting our attention and communicating with us, but to look expectantly because shortly a door will open and we should be excited about what that will hold for us. I realize how these words might sound to someone grieving, yet I know it to be a true concept that has been borne out in my life repeatedly. It gives me faith that God knows what He is doing and is yet to do something wonderful in my life. We must hold on to our hope for sometimes, at the moment, that is all that we have. It is that hope and faith that sees us through the darkest of times until we can see our dreams realized in fruition. We have the hope of seeing our loved ones again and being reunited, we need to focus on that and on what we have now rather than concentrating on how long the wait is.

All I know to do is keep busy and I write, I talk, I surround myself with people. It's when I'm alone and the memories hit that it's the hardest. My faith keeps me going. I know I will see him again. We exchanged what we had for another life...a life in which he is now free from pain and I am left here to endure. I am glad that it is me and not him. I control the things I can, like my health, since I feel some of my power was taken from me in his dying without anyone asking me what I wanted. This is how I survive.

I am sorry your family doesn't understand. But that doesn't alter how you feel or how real it is. You shouldn't have to justify anything you feel or do to anyone. Honor your sweetheart's memory however you wish and do what you want to do with the holidays...it is yours to do with as you will. If you want to go away alone by the seashore and listen to the voice of the waves, do so. Your family should try to understand and accept what you are going through. The reason they don't is simply because they haven't been there, and thank God for that! You have people here that understand and listen. We arehere, too!

Thank you for sharing this, it is helpful and beautiful. Anything that lends meaning to the seemingly senseless...

Oh Spela, You voice my sentiments...I didn't want to do Christmas, I didn't want a tree, I just wanted to ignore the whole thing andhope it'd go away, it seemed too unbearable. But my son drove out and got a tree and my daughter put it up and decorated it and the house and baked a million cookies. Friends dropped by and wanted me to make cards with them. I didn't shop, I kept it very low key. And when I saw the decorations that held so much memories for George and me, it was hard, really hard, I cried as if he'd just died. I cry on the way home from work. I cry into my pillow. Everyone thinks I'm doing wonderful, they don't see...there is a George-shaped spot in my heart that is empty and hollow now and no one can fill that spot. Daily stresses come and go, financial challenges, work problems, but those can be dealt with, it is this spot inside that is so hard to deal with. I try to build my life, but I still don't know what that life is. I keep waiting to find out. But Spela, you and Walt and Ustwo, and the many others that have since joined us, you are what keeps me going. Lately I have had a hard time opening up with what is within me, but still I check on line to see what you all have to say, and still, I say a prayer for you, each of you...

Well we have survived yet another hurdle...and much of my surival is due to you wonderful folks...thank you for listening, caring, responding, and sharing throughout this year. Many of the Christmas cards I received this year expressed the hopes for a better upcoming year...it certainly couldn't get much worse than this one was. But we survived, such as it is...sometimes the question we have is, why? I wish each of you not only an enjoyable Christmas with family and friends, but a much better year ahead. God bless you.

Acceptance for me came when I remembered I could trust God with my life and with George's. It doesn't mean I like what happened. It doesn't mean I'd wish for it. It doesn't mean I wouldn't choose to have George back if that choice was mine. It does mean my hand is in God's and I know He is doing what is best in our lives. I couldn't have said that before I "accepted", then I was just angry and hurting. And acceptance doesn't mean it doesn't still hurt because it does. It is deeper than that, more like faith, which is believing in something that is unseen.

Oh Walt, I don't think we ever "get over it", so don't feel badly for not doing so! But you are making your way through this...life is never the same again, and none of us would choose this, but it's ours all the same. You are where you are supposed to be and doing very well, even if you don't feel like it. Jeannie would be proud of you.

What an apt analogy! Even now I run across people who do not understand, and of course they cannot...what I have lost is my life! I try to accept life as it is now and continue on, but it is something like camping out in a hollowed out house with no electricity or plumbing...

Oh how true...and how many times I have thought it, that at least my George doesn't have to endure the pain of losing his spouse...for in that land where he is, there is no sorrow, and I am sure he is able to see me now. That IS a gift...

That is beautiful, I'd like to hear it with the music.

How lucky you are! I have no video or sound recording of George but he is indelibly etched in my memory. I had a message on my cell phone that he'd left and I remember so vividly how wrenching it was when I lost it too. My cell phone was new and I hadn't known his message would automatically disappear in a week or two. It is almost more than I can bear to think of our memories...the one memory that continues to come back to me is how he looked at me and pulled me to him...that will stay with me always.

I am NOT in the holiday spirit this year nor do I think I can be. If it wasn't for my kids I wouldn't have a tree or decorate the house or bake even. My son got the tree and my daughter put it up and decorated it and has roped me in to baking with her. I see the ornaments that were so special to us, all of our "firsts", the singing bears that hold hands that a friend got us last year because they "looked like George and Kay"...it is almost more than I can bear. Christmas will never be the same again...

I don't see why you can't do a memorial service even if it has been several months. It may be unusual, but I would think most people would understand, it is hard at best. I wish you well.

Evelyn, you are not alone in you lack of zeal for the holidays...I have been dreading it. Thanksgiving wasn't what I would have hoped and I don't even want to do Christmas. My daughter brought out a picture of George and I from last Christmas...we looked like such a happy old couple sitting together amidst all of the festivities! It breaks my heart with the pain of missing him. My son cut down a tree and my daughter set out to decorate...the first bag I opened set me off...it contained a pair of bears holding hands that my friend got for us for Christmas last year because it looked just like us. It played Christmas music. George loved it so much he set it in the back seat of his car and grown men had to put up with sitting next to it as he drove to work. I cried and cried last night. It's no wonder I don't feel up to this season. It's just too hard.

Richard, God does not take away a life to punish us, He loves all of us too much for that. I have learned not to question "why" so much as "what now?" and the "what now" as Evelyn put it, is one day at a time. We look for good wherever we can find it, even if it's stretching it a bit, and we try to help others in our effort to make sense of it. It's hard and it's lonely, and if not for this forum...I don't know. I love each person here and care in a special way for them. Some get more pain in this life, some less, but it comes to most of us some time or another. I'm sorry you've had so much. We try to focus on the good we had with the person. The holidays, as Walt said, are hard. I'll keep you in my prayers along with the others. KayC

Walt, Your comment about hoping to be able to help others who go through it is an instrumental one...the Bible talks about how we are supposed to comfort others with the comfort we have been given...I think somehow that one of the good things that comes out of these dark places we go through is that we learn and try to bring something positive or useful out of it, that we try to spread what we have received to others. It in no way makes up to us for our loss, for any one of us is wishing today that we could only bring back our loved one, if only for a moment, that we would do anything we could for that to happen...but of course, we know we can't. These holidays seem the hardest. I just found out my son won't be able to come home for Christmas, my first without him, and at my hardest Christmas ever, that's going to be tough,but I can't help but feel it will be even tougher on him, for he is also grieving and needing to "be home" (he's in the military), and he will be missing all of us and all alone. I don't know why we go through these hard places...I only know we have to survive them, and we have to look for something good around us...sometimes that takes a lot of effort. Today it is raining hard, but rain or cold, I am wanting to go for a walk and see some beauty in this world. I'd like to think that George is looking down and can see some of it...like you and your Jeannie looking at your star together. God be close to you today and always, we treasure your friendship and your kind spirit. KayC

Walt, I don't think the grieving process ever really ends, but rather evolves...for myself, I know I will always miss George, I have had to learn to live with the pain and the hole he has left inside of me. As I carry that pain and that hole, it is a reminder of all that he was and is to me, a reminder that he is not here, but he is somewhere, waiting for me, and we will be together again. I give myself permission to experience joy in life, to have happiness wherever I can find it, to try and live life to the fullest...yet suddenly, unexpectedly, come those "grief bursts", as if out of nowhere, and they are triggered by seemingly trivial things...the other day I saw a can of bug spray George had bought and that set me off...the stupidest things are a reminder of him and of how much I miss him, everything he did, who he was, everything about him. I will forever mourn that loss, but I do not want it to stop me from living, for I am in the land of the living, and when I am done here, I will join him. I think he knows that, that I love him, that I miss him, that he will always be the world to me. There is no way they could ever be forgotten, replaced, dismissed...we carry them in our hearts and in our souls...forever. KayC

I like that idea, it is neat to think that we could be looking upon the same heavens at the same time.

Yesterday my pastor asked me to speak at our advent service...normally it is a family that comes up to light the candle and speak their piece...but without George, it is "just me" this year. I felt so alone and just felt depressed all day. Then today I come on line and what do I find? Marty has listed a wonderful article of surviving the holidays and in it she gives a suggestion: "Hang a stocking in your loved one's memory, and ask each family member to express their thoughts and feelings by writing a note to, from or about your loved one, and place the notes in that special stocking for everyone to read." I thought this was a wonderful idea...I wondered what I was going to do with his stocking, the stocking I made for him for our first Christmas...thank you, Marty!

Evelyn, All of the firsts are hard...I feel like I don't know what to say anymore...we miss our loved ones, no one takes their place, and everywhere we are haunted by their memories. Last night as I was driving home from getting groceries, I passed the spot on the highway where George totalled his new Honda...the place where it was later learned that he'd had a fatal heart attack...and the air bags going off had given him the thrust to his chest that started his heart back up again, giving him another six months with me. How I wish I'd have known then what was going on! How I wish I'd known he was living on borrowed time. Still, I talk to him, I miss him, I tell him that I love him. And I cry. I try to build a new life, I keep busy, I smile on the outside, but it never really goes away, and I know it never will. Just as you and Gene know it. And many others that are now joining us. And Spela. I have missed you all. There is something about having someone out there who understands and cares. I guess that's why I miss George so bad...he not only had a wonderful personality, but he loved me, he loved me so deeply that no one can ever come close to loving me like that, it is like a gift that disappeared when he died. Only I see evidence of his love, everywhere. I see something he fixed, something he bought, something he did. His memory can never be erased. He is a part of me, just as assuredly as your loved one is a part of you. Firsts...the first everything without him is so hard...just as the firsts that we shared together were so beautiful. How wonderful it is to build something together, how hard it is to see it dismantled. In a week we will miss Thanksgiving together...the whole holiday season is hard. I am thankful for the kids and friends, but nothing is the same without him here. We've gotten used to sleeping alone, not having anyone to talk over our day with, no one to notice if we make it home okay or not, nothing to look forward to llike we used to...we've gotten used to this being our life now, but it is a dreadful thing to get used to. It's like someone blew all of the beauty out of life. But wait...I got to see a herd of elk last night! And I saw the most breathtaking view the other day, the sun's rays coming through the trees, it was gorgeous! And although George and my little cat Tigger left home after he died, someone called me with a cat that needed a home, and he's turned out to be a wonderful cat...Chappy, very affectionate and loving. So there are these little blessings and we must remember to be thankful for them along with our sorrows, for even though our lives may not be what we planned or wanted, wwe are still being given blessings...such as friends like you.

I don't know what's going on, I was logged in...and just now when I tried to post a reply, it came back with an error. I think they still have problems.