Pain is a sneaky thing

[Gwenivere]

I just passed the year anniversary of Steve's death.  I spent the last year partially in shock to attend to the legal things, faced a couple of health crisis and learned to handle the things we shared taking care of our home.  Now that is done and I find myself in another strange land with no buffers or distractions from the intensity of raw reality I am truly alone.  I don't even know if I can explain it because my mind is even more jumbled than it was, which is making it harder.  I see how I changed my days and nights to 'adapt', but that it all it is.  It's not a lifestyle or routine, it's just survival on an emotional level now.  I have become acutely aware of his absence.  How I haven't seen nor heard him for so long now.  The memories are like ghosts that follow me everywhere.  I can't shake them with distraction as I did even if it was for a very little while.  Sometimes it even feels he was an illusion or dream.  His physical presence is slipping away.  I never thought about if that would be a good or bad thing.  I don't know what it is but unsettling.  I never felt I had to push myself out of the house, but I do now.  I want to curl up and find this was indeed a dream.   But I know that is not healthy for me and could lead to becoming more withdrawn.  An analogy my fiction gave me is really accurate about the energy stress takes- he said we get a debit card every day and to spend it wisely as when depleted, you are done for the day.  I am finding that very true.

My computer was hacked last week and after having it wiped clean and the back ups reinstalled it isn't what it was.  I have been totally flipped out over it because Steve customized it for me being a simple soul regarding technology.  My brother in law is attempting to get it operational, but to me it is another loss.   He can't recreate what Steve did.  It sounds silly, but it took away another part of him.  Even the getting hacked would have never happened had he been here because I would have called him to look at it and he would have blocked it. So it seems everywhere I turn there are new places for him to be missing.  I get used and another pops up.  The kicker is, I never wanted to lose any of them and as time passes, I have no choice.  I have to let him go or isolate in wishes that can't come true.  I didn't think it could get worse, but I was wrong.  It just shifts how it lays in wait like a predator.  

[Guest]

Gwenivere- 

It always amazes how integrated our spouses become into our very being.  I think back to the fiercely independent person I was before Deedo and suddenly she was melded into my very dna.  Now I can't envision an existence that does not actively include her.  I freely and willfully gave her all I am and now the question is how do I get just me back.

Even though you have survived the year of firsts I certain there are more firsts coming your way and each one will be a kick to the heart.  The way I see things one of the most challenging parts to moving ahead with life is to find a way to redefine ourselves, keeping Steve and Deedo a vital element in the equation without being able to have them there to help.  Deedo wants me to find happiness, she said as much multiple times, but I don't know how.  Hence I need to reinvent myself as I am no longer BradnDeedo the couple joined ridiculously and freakishly at the hip.  We need to find a way to move past "survival on an emotional level" and try to discover a way to live life.  It will be different.  I just don't know what it will look like.  Yes, we need to let go of our dreams of the future; of that I am certain.  My group facilitator is always speaking of grief as work. I see the work is in finding a way to move forward without letting go of too much of the past.

[kayc]

Gwenivere,

I am sorry...I know what you mean.  I hope, with time, you get used to the computer as it is, and perhaps if you talk to some young folks, one of them will be able to make your computer appear basic like it did before.  I recently upgraded to Windows 10 and wish I was back with Windows 7, for the most part I try to ignore all the changes.    I understand liking things basic.

 

[Gwenivere]

Brad, you nailed it.  Being joined at the hip and we were also fiercely independent people.  Did we sacrifice that independence when we committed to our spouses?  I don't think so.  I think we stored it away some where because we didn't need it when we found them.   We found a way to stay that way WITH someone.  So now, when we need it back, it's stored and I don't know where.  Maybe I don't want to.  I want that shared strength together.  Maybe that is my fear.  That moving forward might require letting go of too much of the past.  People have mentioned going to places and having to leave because of memories.  I know that feeling and it happened today because I saw a silly soap holder I had bought Steve.  I walked thru the Christmas decorations and knew that time of magic was now gone.  I didn't have to flee the store but cried all the way home.  I now notice how our perfectly sized home for us has become huge.  Rooms now not used because they were his office, bathroom, studio.  I know he would want me to be happy, but I also know that's a very tall order on your own.  I hate feeling that closeness slipping away as the time passes.  

Kay, I am trying to avoid Windows 10.   Does anyone like that operating system?  Not that I have heard.  Hang in there!

 

[kevin]

Aren't we all the same....Brad, the phrase joined at the hip is so true. Even after 4 months, there are times I find myself waiting for Ang. Picked up Christmas cards yesterday, sons, daughters, grandkids, etc,,, then I saw the card for your Wife , I broke down and teared right up......And Gwen, my House is a big waste of Space.....I have at least 70% of my house is avoided or not used...too many ghosts or memories. In the spring I will make up my mind on my future lodgings.........I also am staying away from Windows 10... 

[scba]

Yes, pain is a sneaky thing. I have been doing relatively ok, and I don't understand why, all in a sudden, with no specific objective reason, I'm sad and feeling helpless and hopeless.  I cancelled my appointments to teach and I didn't go to the gym. It amaze me how powerful emotions can be to wanting to quit everything, run away and hide in a forest. My heart is completely broken and I feel very alone. His family seems to be doing much better and his siblings moved on. I'm sure I am getting it wrong, we all grief differently, but I feel I was left alone and behind. Brad is right, the path from the brain to the heart is the longest one. 

 

[hollowheart]

scba, I had exact thing happen to me last night. It was just little things that send me over the edge--I called my Mom and kept getting a busy signal because she had the cordless with her and didn't put it back on the base, and never thought that I would be calling. She didn't even say hi when I got home either. So it all just sent me spiraling into a pit of loneliness and depression and anger.  I am tired of feeling this way.

When you see others moving on you do wonder why can't you, and I wish i could as this is no life. I also feel I was left alone and behind and no one bothers to realize how much harder this is for me to get through. It's just like 'we're doing OK, so you should be too' type of thing. I'm miserable.  I just cry alone now because I just need to give up on anyone understanding and I don't want to burden them with my grief. I wish I could just go off alone someplace as I feel alone anyway.

[debi.williams]

Scba your words really resonate with me. Sometimes I am 'almost' ok and then 5 minutes later I feel like I am drowning with pain. it is a sneaky thing, you're right. Sometimes I know what triggered it and others it just comes at me from seemingly nowhere. 

Hollow heart, it is so hard to be around others who just don't understand. I think that is the loneliest place to be. I feel the same many times, but then I think how can they understand? This is so traumatic for all of us that unless you have walked this path with exactly the same love we have it is just impossible for others to get even an inch of it x

[Gwenivere]

I posted this in Shock and Awe, but think it belongs here.  It was in response to people that tell us we may fund someone else...

I've been fortunate as only one person has mentioned finding someone else.  That someday it could happen and I shouldn't rule that out.  There are some things you know in your heart.  They 'say' never say never, but here is what fixers forget...that maybe we don't want a new partner.  Many of us had that someone that anyone else would only be someone we would be comparing them to.  I know that is how it would be for me.  I spent my life with the man I entrusted my deepest and darkest secrets with.  He with me.  Things I could never share even with the best of friends I had.  Things I would never tell a counsellor despite the confidentiality clause.  My mother remarried, but I know from talking with her that her marriage to my dad did not have the depth mine did.  I don't judge her for that one bit.  She didn't get that in her 2nd either.  I had the greatest gift of having that and, for me, I know once you have, nothing or no one can recreate it.  It's a once in a lifetime deal.  It took decades together to become the partners we did.  The history shared.  I don't want to do that again nor could I.  Of course I crave companionship like any human and will have that with people along the way til I am gone.  But I gave my heart to someone already.  He still has it and always will.  I can't give to someone something I longer possess.  I have Steve's and protect it fiercely.  To give what has become my heart would be giving him away.  

[kayc]

Gwenivere, I just read your post in Shock and Awe and then came here and here it was again!

I'd say avoid Windows 10 as long as you can, I've heard they'll support Windows 7 another five years.  Wishing I hadn't taken the plunge. 

[kevin]

KayC.......Went down to pick up mail., quick trip, only 1 mile......jumped into Van and off I went, got mail, and Van would not start to go home....It is pitch black, a little cool, didn't bring my cell, so I had a brisk walk home(uphill).....Got hold of neighbour, jump started Van and returned home...... Lesson learned(same as yesterdays) is be prepared, don't leave home without cell or wallet,,,and dress warm.....have a good evening everyone. 

[Guest]

Gwenivere 

That is the point I tried to make with Deedo every time she brought up companionship for me. I know she doesn't want me to be lonely but then I need to be a realist too. When one finds that one person who truly completes them I fail to see how another could remotely come close. I couldn't do that to another person. She would forever be deep in Deedo's shadow. I know several men who have lost wives and then remarried. I'm thrilled for them. I just know it won't work for me. 

 

Kevin-

Glad you got the van running. Hopefully it will start up in the morning. 

[Gwenivere]

When I think back on the talks of what each if us would do if we lost the other, another person never even came up.  We both felt that we would hang in there for the dogs and after that.....I dunno.  Wait for our own time I guess.  It's like we knew there wasn't anyone else for either of us.  It just wasn't an issue.  Now....the being happy we did discuss and we both agreed neither of us could really be that.  That is another thing I miss.  We knew each other so well that thinking of that being possible alone was NOT possible.  I know that is why he felt so bad he had to leave.  He knew I would survive, but would never feel that kind of happiness again.  I'm just satisfied at this point if I smile or get a small laugh when I see something.  But out and out innocent happiness?  Nope.  Not going to happen without him.  I'll adapt.  I don't want to be 'Debby Downer' (a character from SNL) the rest of my life and I can pull off a pretty good demeanor when needed.  That gives me some hope.  I would be a crappy volunteer at the nursing home without it.  They depend on us to bring some life and smiles into a place they have to call home.

[Gwenivere]

Kay, going to hang onto Windows 7 as long as possible.  Hopefully by then they will have replaced 10 with something people like.  ?

[debi.williams]

We are an amazing group aren't we? Not only do we give each other masses of emotional support in the most loving way we also offer IT and mechanical advice! You have no idea how I wish we all lived in one big neighbourhood called 'Supportland'.....(I wanted to put a smiley there but they have disappeared of the bar...any ideas why from the IT support?)

I think the question of 'finding:meeting' someone else is a fraught one. One one level, we all have so much love to give as is demonstrated here, yet on the other it would be unfair to the person we meet to always be comparing. I think if it happens it happens and it will have been sent to us. for younger people desperate for children I think it is a different situation and I understand that. I would say though that there are many wonderful souls out there. Many good men and women with so much to give. If perchance we did meet someone in the dim and distant future I have no doubt there will be a good reason for it and we must not be blind.

My husband always joked he had to travel continents to meet me. He would say 'Where were you all those years?' I would reply 'Waiting' Someone could be at the beginning of that journey now to meet us. 

Our son has the same good and precious soul as his father, he will hopefully one day make a wonderful husband.  Despite the troubles of this world there is always more good than bad that is why it has survived this long. Our souls are more open now than they ever were through our grief and suffering. Who knows, maybe one fine day we are supposed to share that?

[MartyT]

We still have our emoticons, Debi. At the top of the post field, hover your mouse over each of the icons you see there. If you click on the fifth one from the left (i.e., next to the B, I, U, etc.) the emoticon options will appear. 

[debi.williams]

 Thanks Marty xx

[Guest]

Grief (pain) is a sneaky thing.  I am so used to facing challenges head on.  Identify the problem; identify the solution; work at obtaining the solution; problem solved, move on.  This is not working with grief.  Granted, I am still early on in the process (16 weeks); I know that.  And when I look back over the 16 weeks I do see how I've developed  a modicum of acceptance.  And maybe right now I just too reflective having made the round trip from home to the Mayo and back with some Papa Moosie time thrown in.  And maybe listening to Willie Nelson sing Kris Kristopherson's "Loving Her Was Easier" three times didn't help.  But just when I feel I'm ready to develop acceptance.  Bam!  The little sneak belts me in the heart.  Oh well crying is cathartic.

Here in Arizona it isn't uncommon to see little shrines erected along side the road where there's been a fatal accident.  It is also not uncommon to see those shires fall into disrepair over time.  I believe this is the nature of grief; what is urgent today eventually fades into the memories of tomorrow.  When we first moved here 27 years ago, 16 year-old-twins were passengers in a vehicle that was t-boned and both were killed. I remember then how their deaths had such an impact on me as I felt so badly for their parents.  A beautiful shrine was erected and I drive by it each time I take that route to the Valley.  Today as I drove by I was impressed, as I frequently am, at how well maintained the shire is and then started reflecting on the width and the breadth and the depth of grief  and love that those parents still feel that motivates them to make the trek several times a year to maintain the shrine.  More tears. 

I find myself not only grieving for myself and what I have lost, but for countless, nameless, faceless people who have been thrust against their wishes into this abyss.  

Found myself very jealous of Doug Flutie's (former American football player) parents when I read they both died less than a hour apart from each other.  That's what I wanted for us.

And yes Debi - our souls are more open now; at least mine is.  Additionally, none of us know what the future will bring.  I was listening to a gal in my support group talk about how she had buried three husbands.  With each one while they were married she believed she loved him more than the others but once they were gone she realized she loved them all the same.  That being said I can't believe she had the same kind of relationship I had with my Deedo; but then I might easily be surprised.

 

One last thought - If you all would have Mac OS there wouldn't be the consternation over Windows - Windows has always been a pretend wannabe to Apple since the beginning.

[hollowheart]

Brad, I would often feel deep sadness over stories of random people killed that I didn't know. Just last year I heard something about two sister killed on trick or treating,  I guess hit by a car and I couldn't stop thinking about their parents trying to cope with losing both of their children at once, and because they were trick-or treating of all things. I always said I couldn't imagine that kind of grief. I definitely know horrible grief first hand and I hate it like the devil. I hate how it takes a grip on your life and never lets go.

I hate that because everyone is always telling you to keep living and move forward and all that but it just doesn't work like that. I hate my life now, so how do you keep going with it?

On the IT note, I have a Mac, although I have yet to update my OS because I'm still playing The Sims 2 and don't want to let it go yet, lol. But Apple definitely causes less grief than Windows that's for sure.

[debi.williams]

Brad, there's a nerve hit there. I realise over the years the more loss I have had the deeper the fellow feeling. The English  poet John Donne said from 'No Man is an island'

“Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee.”

My husband, as you know had fought in a horrendous war, felt empathy to his core. Rather than harden his soul it made him softer. Seeing the senseless waste of life 'everyone was someone's son' made him cherish people. He was the first to weep when he saw any human sadness and it made him so kind. He carried out so many random acts of kindness even to those he knew looked down on him because of his olive skin. They soon, however saw his goodness, and wept when he died. People change perceptions of people by actions. 

As in the US there are flowers placed here at the site of accidents. it is not a UK thing, I had never seen it until I came to live in Europe (except when I went on holiday of course). These images haunted me. Now I know as you said Brad 'the width and depth of grief' The twins that perished must have left the hugest of gaping holes - if such a thing can ever be measured as such. To know a broken heart to be on the most intimate of terms with it is to understand a little more of your soul and why we are all here as human kind I think.

When I first tracked the horrendous news from Paris all I could think about where the parents, spouses, sisters, brothers, friends who would join the club of broken hearts. Living with the pain until they too breathed their last. It is hell. 

Found myself very jealous of Doug Flutie's (former American football player) parents when I read they both died less than a hour apart from each other.  That's what I wanted for us. Oh Brad. In my head I saw him and I  in our 80's curling up together for an afternoon nap, hand in hand and then breathing our last. Floating away together over some distant horizon. Forever as one. Leaving Max - and our many grandchildren - happy in the knowledge we were together as we wanted to be.

Brad, did you ever see the look Kris Kristofferson gave Ellen Burstyn in the ovie 'Alice doesn't live here anymore' ? Pure love.

Just for the record I am an Apple girl. My husband bought me an IMAC and it changed my life.

 

[kayc]

Gwenivere, don't put your hopes on Microsoft too much!    You know, we also had those "talks" but didn't think it'd come to pass for another 20 years or so.  We thought we'd slowly go crazy and talk to ourselves...I think I'm living proof of that now!  We had also had that discussion and my husband didn't think he'd ever have anyone else and I basically gave him permission to as I couldn't see him surviving alone.  It honestly never occurred to me that I could ever consider anyone beside him as we are soulmates through and through!  Still, one never knows how they'll respond, and when it came down to it, all our friends disappeared when I was still in shock...leaving me vulnerable to someone who "conned" me.  Looking back I realize it never would have happened if I hadn't been deeply mired in the throes of grief so that I could not see upward, but was frantic with grief and anxiety over the loss of him.  I've had to forgive myself, for being so weak that I did not know how to survive his loss.  It's been a tough road, but one I've learned so much from.  Knowing George the way I do, he would have wanted nothing more than to hold me and make everything right for me...oh how I wish he could!  But we will be together again someday, of that I've no doubt, and all will be well the moment that arrives.

 

[Guest]

Debi - 

Your husband was truly a remarkable person to be able to weather the atrocities associated with what he went through and to be able to emerge from it so compassionate and kind; especially in the face of the bigotry and hatred which is so rampant in occidental societies toward any remotely perceived as coming from the Mid-East.  There are two ways to respond to hate but only one will make a change and he was perceptive enough to know.  

"No Man is an Island" is a favorite of mine but then so is Ernest Hemingway.  It continues to amaze me that societies can exist for thousands upon thousands of years and yet never find a way to peacefully coexist.  Kevin was right when he talked of Global Education but then keep in mind I'm from Arizona where the government would rather build private prisons than adequately fund education even though they know that for every dollar saved on education will cost $100 in prisons.  

I don't know if you ever saw the movie "The Notebook" with James Gardner and Gena Rowlands but that was the ending I always wanted for Deedo and me, sans the Alzheimer's of course.  

The fact your hubby loved you enough to buy you an iMac speaks highly of his devotion as well as his intelligence. 

 

HollowHeart

I hate that because everyone is always telling you to keep living and move forward and all that but it just doesn't work like that. I hate my life now, so how do you keep going with it?

It does not happen often, yet, but when people ask me now what I'm doing to keep busy my reply is quite matter-of-fact: "I am busy grieving with every ounce of energy I have."  I too hate my life but if I'm totally honest with myself I do see where it is very slowly getting better.  I can now laugh sometimes and initiate social activities, but only on my terms.  In answer to how do you keep going with it?  All I can say is one day, one hour, one minute, one breath at a time with the hope that someday, somehow, someway, it will get easier.

Kayc

One of the big surprises to me is which of Deedo's friends have completely dropped off the radar.  Deedo was always the one to remember important days including death days and always touched base to let that person know that she was thinking of them and that their mother, husband, son, daughter were not forgotten.  These are the people I would have expected to reach out, after all they've been through intense, complicated grief; yet none of them have.  I'm also sorry you were conned.  It is so sad that there are those who look for any opportunity to prey.  Additionally Kayc: I hope you are healing well from your fall.  They are always scary...especially this time of year with the snow.

[Gwenivere]

One last thought - If you all would have Mac OS there wouldn't be the consternation over Windows - Windows has always been a pretend wannabe to Apple since the beginning.

OK Brad....now you sound just like all the other Mac users I know.  Smug little bunch, aren't ya?  ?

 

[Guest]

Gwenivere-

With all the trash talking I've absorbed over the last thirty-three years (yes my first computer was an Apple IIe) I enjoy returning it now and then.  By the way I am bilingual having taught technology for thirty-years but if given a choice will go with Mac OS simply because it is some much more user friendly.  And I like easy.

So smug???  Yep.

[kayc]

My friend Jim is a Mac user...my son would be too if they weren't so expensive!  Yeah, that your spouse buys you a Mac is a true proof of love!   I used to have Linux and loved it!  And it's FREE!