When Time Feels Like an Enemy

[Gwenivere]

11 hours ago, Kpl48 said:

I attached a pic of Fonzie. Hope it goes through!

He's a darling!  I'd ask if he had a leather jacket, but........  So glad you have him.  I don't know what I would do without my girls to keep me going.

[Gwenivere]

3 hours ago, scba said:

a thought that appears to haunt me is the fact that in the end,what only remains are just memories. Memories....and nothing more? Is that all? To love someone, to wish to die to join him or her, just for living with memories? I seriously don't understand this so called life.

That is what is hard for me to accept for me, also.  I love our memories together dearly.  I wanted more.  To know there will never be any more us very hard to swallow.  I try and remind myself that I am fortunate to have what I have.  It doesn't kill the selfishness of wanting more, but the best I can do is think there are people that have nothing like some of the wonderful times we each have with our beloveds.  

As for understanding this life now, without him, still working on that too.  It's going to be a dilemma for a very long time.

[kevin]

Time is my benchmark right now. Thanks to the advice from this board and others, it was drilled into me to resist doing anything of major consequences for at least a year. I've determined the "hollow" feeling we have is the result of no Spouse or anyone really caring if you come home or not...except the wagging tail of a dog.......This will not change unless we change ourselves.......I personally do not plan on living another 20 years with this hole in my stomach, I've accepted Grief will be with me forever, but not a 24/7 pain........my alternatives are 1/ do nothing, hope things improve 2/move closer to family 3/Open my house to a tenant 4/ re-engage socially sometime this summer..........It's like the Oscar Wilde quote about existing and living, I am existing now, but my plan will be to try re-living my boring fulfilling life again.........I know Angela would smack me one if she thought I was in this "Funk"  indefinitely.............To proceed forward and keep my options open , I have concentrated on Purging the house...... closets, cloths, old bedding, and Coats(target is 1000#)..........This definitely helps if I sell and move or stay put........Hope I don't repost the same thing in 5 years.....have a good day...

[WolfsKat]

Kevin

I am in the same situation.  I'm going back to work soon, and although I'm not crazy about my job, it is of financial necessity for me to return. While it will be stressful (it always has been, now that will be compounded) it will give me back some form of structure to my days, which I believe I need.  But I do have some "goals". One is to definitely move closer to my family (they are all in Michigan, I'm in FL), but that will be dependent on my being able to get a job transfer w/no loss of F/T status, very hard to obtain. To clean out/sort things with a eventual move in mind (you pare down more if you focus on having to pack up everything for a move!), to once again start selling on eBay...have not done so for about 3 yrs, but I did well at it, and, when I do move back, to search for someone in my situation who would like to have a mutually beneficial, platonic shared living arrangement.  I don't think any of us can/should "do" the first item you listed....."do nothing, hope things improve"......they won't, not unless we do something, even if at first only "baby steps". We are the ONLY ones who know what is, and will be, the best way for us to try to make some sort of life for ourselves now, in our horribly altered worlds.....hopefully to achieve, if not total happiness....a modicum of contentment and stability. We all may be just marking time until we can rejoin those we lost....I SO get  that feeling, but we should also seek to find a way to get through what time we have left in his life, with some sort of peace.

[hollowheart]

56 minutes ago, WolfsKat said:

 but we should also seek to find a way to get through what time we have left in his life, with some sort of peace.

This is what my friends have been telling me since this happened, but hearing it coming from someone else enduring painful grief sounds much better. People were telling me to do this before I wanted to hear it or think about it and that was the problem.

It's good to want to find some sort of life again. Time doesn't heal wounds, as someone said on the show Nurse Jackie "Time is a thief"  But time does give you a bit of space to sort out some of the insane thoughts in our minds. I know there are times I thought "I'm tired of being sad, I'm tired of talking about being sad and lonely."  But it's like having an epiphany--you do what you do when you are ready to do it.

[Margm]

We have always tended to have good insurance, or rather continued insurance with the State of Louisiana's Group insurance.  I don't know what I would do with Obamacare, and find it makes insurance companies, the IRS, and medical facilities richer, but like Jindal, of Louisiana, it is a joke played on the poor.  I have found if you wait, they will finally pay more.  I don't know how or why this happens,  For myself, I had a bill for months of $175, and in the midst of 2015's most terrible year, I finally opened one that was sent every month, and it was less than $1.  They had to spend more for stamps to send it each month.

Yesterday I got the supplies.  I will return to THAT house, I will leave the care of my mother with my daughter and sister, and I will quit procrastinating and put THAT house on the market.  It, and anywhere else was only a home if Billy was with me.  I will for the first time in 12 weeks be alone.  My son has a family also in California that needs him right now more than I do.  I just find I must hurry and "make it on my own."  Not a happy experience, but if I don't make that first step, the whole dambdable journey won't begin.  

[kevin]

Wolfskat, your post brought a smile to me , plus you increased my vocabulary a modicum............I always use the "do nothing" case in my problem solving approach......amazing how many times your stuck there. One of my inputs will be a garage sale or two(after you go through the work of setting up one, might as well have two)......I think I'll print off some of these alternatives and plans , and post them on the Fridge. Helps my Focus................I will use August 2016 as a milestone/report card day......have a good one...

[WolfsKat]

1 hour ago, hollowheart said:

Time doesn't heal wounds

Oh, we've all heard that phrase..."Time heals all wounds".......what a crock of....manure!  No, it most certainly does NOT.....the scar of our emotional wounds will always be with us.  But, time will assist in the wound "scabbing over"......we just have to learn how not to pick at that scab and reopen the wound.....if that makes sense.

[Margm]

Makes sense

[MartyT]

Someone once observed that waiting for time to heal grief is like having a flat tire and just waiting and hoping that someone will come along and fix it. In and of itself, time does nothing. Time is neutral. It is what we DO with our time that makes a difference. And doing nothing is as much of a choice and doing something.

[Margm]

Marty, I am gonna use that quote some time or the other

[Guest]

I've always told my kids "When you find your self in a hole the first thing to do is to stop digging."  I'm a strong believer in if something is not working then stop doing it and try something new.  My only trouble right now is two part: 1 - following my own advice; and 2 - Figuring out what I need to do differently.  Nobody is able to fix me, this I know; I've said it over and over.  I just don't know yet how to fix myself.  I will grieve for Deedo the rest of my days but I have the rest of my days to live and I need to decide if I will live those days or simply allow my grief to force me into merely existing.  I choose the former; but yet again HOW????

[kayc]

Perhaps the thing that took me the longest was finding purpose again.  I've talked to many grievers and I see them either keeping so busy they don't have time to think (avoidance) or struggling to find some meaning in life, getting motivated.  Those who found a cause dear to their heart and put effort into that (volunteering) seemed to benefit because it drew them out and they found some sense of purpose, reason to get up in the morning besides "I have to".  Many found that hobbies and passions they used to have do not hold the same interest for them.  Finding someone to do those things with can rekindle a spark.  We seem to need a balance...both time to grieve and learn to live alone, and also time to be out among the living and giving of ourselves.  Finding that balance that works for you is an effort that can take time.

Brad, your attitude is right on, and I have no doubt you will find your way.

[Guest]

Kayc

I think your advice is spot on.  By nature, I have prefer solitude or sharing my solitude with someone near and dear.  Within Deedo we would revel in our aloneness, whether it be hiking/backpacking in our younger days, dinner for two, movies, or quiet evenings at home.  We always reveled in each others company and never found that lacking.  While we are comfortable in social situations there was never a need for that.  Of the two of us Deedo was more comfortable in a social situation.  I could fit in but never really reached out.  Now, if I'm to move on it will need to be with me initiating which will require reaching out past my comfort zone.  There is a hiking club that is right up my interest alley only when I hike I prefer the chatter of jays and ravens to the chatter of people.  As Shakespeare said "There's the rub!"

[Gwenivere]

I had a grief attack this morning at 2am.  I'm not so foolish to believe I am over this, but for a couple of days I thought I was doing OK.  I couldn't just sit and cry AGAIN so I mopped floors and cried.  Thru off my routine but didn't care.  I don't even bother to look for triggers anymore as it doesn't often help.  It just happens.  What was interesting to me us the thoughts that come as things settled down.  I'm paying more attention to what it is that is uncovered by these attacks beyond the obvious that everything felt 'wrong' besides he is not here.  That is the only thing I remember feeling when it hit.  That this was wrong.  Where the hell is he?

What I wanted to know is where or IF he is.  Many of us have posted about this before, but it really hit me this morning.  If he still exists, does he miss me?  Will I see him again?  Or is he off on some new journey I could never comprehend regarding an afterlife or becoming a part of some universal energy pool?  If his life force was snuffed out, I want to know that too.  Of course, there are no answers to these questions.  But I realized if I could know the answer, I feel I could move approach this grief differently.  Even if it meant he moved on to different things and may not be waiting for me.  It's wanting so much to know something I can't so I can work thru this with a mortal mind.  I want him to still love me as he did, of course, but I have always been a person who wants the truth.  There is no way of knowing that truth until I die too.  And if there is nothing there, well.....that will be that.  

This is all speculation on my part if it would help, but I truly think it would.  If I knew I would see him again then yes, waiting that out would be hard, but I would know at the end there was something for me when this body fails. If he has moved on, I can kind of grasp the 'higher evolution' of a much more complicated plane.  If there is nothing, well, that kinda solves things too because it would just be over.  But because I AM stuck in this physical world and don't have the faith many have, I fall into despair wanting to know.....Steve, do you still love me?  I know he did, hear that all the time.  I got that.  If he is gone, well that would be tough, but still something to work with.  Then again, if I could just stop getting caught in these thoughts, I'd take that too.  As Marg once reminded me about that old saying and adding a little twist...grief life's a bitch and then we die.  

 

[scba]

This questions are my questions dear Gwen. I wish I had an answer to one of them. I am too rational but this approach is not of help some days.

 

[Gwenivere]

8 hours ago, WolfsKat said:

 I don't think any of us can/should "do" the first item you listed....."do nothing, hope things improve"......they won't, not unless we do something, even if at first only "baby steps". We are the ONLY ones who know what is, and will be, the best way for us to try to make some sort of life for ourselves now, in our horribly altered worlds.....hopefully to achieve, if not total happiness....a modicum of contentment and stability. 

I only have one criticism about this choice.  I spent all last year doing things I planned out and while, yes, they accomplished tasks, they didn't bring much fulfillment.  I got so much done I amaze myself looking at the list.  This year I have decided to make the list again for upkeep of yard and such, but find I am do better not making any plans for me.  I've pretty much always approached life impulsively since quitting work and what that required.  Perhaps it it because when I am 'doing nothing', I am really doing more than I realize because I don't have a map laid out for where I want to be.  Of course this would be needed if I planned to move as you are, Kat.  I am finding where I want to be (mentally) matters little.  It's that darned time thing.  I can't say by such and such time I will now start being more social.  I already am in little ways I remind myself to see.  And in others ways the opposite because they just aren't for me at the time .  I've just never been good at doing anything I don't want to, even  before the grief entered the picture.  I thought I would be a hermit over the holidays and wasn't.  But they were all last minute decisions.  Plans make me tense being alone now.  Having a partner brings more motivation.  I do better giving myself permission to say no way and sometimes am pleasantly surprised I go screw it and head out the door.  Just my nickels worth.  Criticism meant only in the kindest of ways.   

 

[Gwenivere]

13 minutes ago, scba said:

This questions are my questions dear Gwen. I wish I had an answer to one of them. I am too rational but this approach is not of help some days.

Ever find yourself wishing you weren't a rational person?  Then we could do road rage things, act like crazy ladies and never think twice about it.  The freedom!  

[Margm]

56 minutes ago, Gwenivere said:

Ever find yourself wishing you weren't a rational person?  Then we could do road rage things, act like crazy ladies and never think twice about it.  The freedom!  

What are you talking about Gwen?  I just drove about 165 miles and I am one crazy lady.  I don't have a rational cell in my body.  I am back in Arkansas, thinking Arkansas killed Billy, and that sure is not rational.  Right now, rational thinking sometimes is overrated.  

[Guest Janka]

There´s no one who can explain the love that we feel but it really exists...no one who can see the air in our lungs but we really breathe...The more we can love,the more we can trust...Please,start to believe and forget all of those questions having no answers in your minds because all of those answers are in your hearts...

I always believe and will never stop!

With love Janka

[Margm]

Janka, I was brought up on magical, mystical, imaginative things.  In my mind, even though I had not seen them, ghosts were real.  My son coded twice on the operating table.  He had been shot.  The first time he coded, he said he went to a dark place, seeing nothing but dark, but the next time he was in a place of light that he knew everyone but could never understand how he knew them because they were not like anyone he really knew, but he still knew them.  And, he did not want to leave, but they made him. He thinks he opened some sort of portal that he was able to converse, or see, what I call ghosts.  I have a friend, have known her all my life, she owns her own business, is a wonderful Christian lady and she has "spirits" living in her house with her.  Billy knew I cared for this woman, she is a lifelong school friend, very human, not a wild woman at all, and she has had many lay people visit her house to help rid these spirits. She has had a priest try to rid her of them.  They do not harm her, they just aggravate her.  So, she built a new house thinking she would leave them behind.  Nope, they followed her.  They must have been in something that she moved from one house to the other.  Billy did not believe in the supernatural.  He did not believe our son conversed with spirits, although these were supposed to be spirits from the "bathtub gin" time in Hot Springs, AR, where many gangsters visited.  Our son was a DJ in a bar and lived above the bar in one of the very old buildings.  Funny, they did not scare him, although the first one he saw really scared him.  He felt it meant him harm.  No rational people supposedly believe in the supernatural. We all know I am not rational.  I do wonder though, I wonder if Billy believes in it now.  I hope he does.  Myself, I cannot get my mojo working right, but hope to in the future, because I dearly love magical, mystical, wonderful thinking.  And, if I have said too much, consider the source. 

[Guest Janka]

Dearest Margaret,

I fully understand what you´re talking about.I also experienced some things between these two worlds that I can´t describe here as it´s very hard to talk about.The best friends of mine and one priest were the ones who know all of those things that happened to me and helped me through to find this new life I´ve been living in more than 1 year.Since I got the proofs of the life after life,of good and also bad things acting between,my belief is so unshakeable that everything is clear to me,my life got a new sense and I´m absolutely sure of being with my beloved Jan again.It´s all right again and there´s no one to change it as I´ll stay living like this for the rest of my life.Everything I do,I do for my beloved man Jan,for us two,for being with him as one in the heaven for eternity.I believe you and everything you´re talking about.

God bless us all!

With love Janka

[WolfsKat]

10 hours ago, Gwenivere said:

I only have one criticism about this choice.  I spent all last year doing things I planned out and while, yes, they accomplished tasks, they didn't bring much fulfillment.  I got so much done I amaze myself looking at the list.  This year I have decided to make the list again for upkeep of yard and such, but find I am do better not making any plans for me.  I've pretty much always approached life impulsively since quitting work and what that required.  Perhaps it it because when I am 'doing nothing', I am really doing more than I realize because I don't have a map laid out for where I want to be.  Of course this would be needed if I planned to move as you are, Kat.  I am finding where I want to be (mentally) matters little.  It's that darned time thing.  I can't say by such and such time I will now start being more social.  I already am in little ways I remind myself to see.  And in others ways the opposite because they just aren't for me at the time .  I've just never been good at doing anything I don't want to, even  before the grief entered the picture.  I thought I would be a hermit over the holidays and wasn't.  But they were all last minute decisions.  Plans make me tense being alone now.  Having a partner brings more motivation.  I do better giving myself permission to say no way and sometimes am pleasantly surprised I go screw it and head out the door.  Just my nickels worth.  Criticism meant only in the kindest of ways.   

 

Oh, Gwen.......That's the whole point of this.....each of us, has to find our own way, in our own time.....and do as much, or as little as we feel we can do!  Some will most certainly wish to just "be".....taking each day as it comes, with no set expectations, no plans. And that's as it should be, if that's what that person needs/wants. Although united by grief, each of us is an individual....my way would not be another's way....but we are both getting through the grief in the way best for us!  I "have" to make some plans, as, bluntly.....I'm broke. Medical bills, both Mom & Connor's services.....and being off from work due to my leg injury for 4 months (unpaid....still fighting to get my disability pay from Walmart) gives me no real choice but to have to make plans....if I did nothing, I'd have to add being homeless to my list of problems....and that is a choice I'd never make.

[Guest]

These are questions that I ponder frequently.  People will tell me that Deedo is with me.  That's great sometimes when I am being strong but I don't want her to see me hurting since it would hurt her too.  I do really hope she is waiting for me and our concept of soulmates is accurate; my fear here is that she is off on a new life in a new reality and just like we can't remember anything before we were born, she can't remember this life.  But then if that's the case I won't remember her when I move on either so I guess that isn't so bad.  Not what I want but it could be worse.  And of course if there isn't anything then I won't know it either.  So I choose to believe we are soulmates, that we will be together whatever the future realities hold.  When I die, I believe she will be the first energy source I meet and we will once more be we.