just one month ago

[MartyT]

Dear ones, I gently invite you to read Why? Why Me? Searching for Answers in Grief

[Guest]

I need to correct a previous post.  It was Pete Seeger and NOT Bob Dylan who wrote Turn, Turn, Turn.  Obviously I am not as smart as I think I am. 

[kevin]

This is same period

Edited March 27, 2016 by kevin
ommission

[Gwenivere]

7 hours ago, WolfsKat said:

In the space of one year, I lost my big brother......then my beloved Ma......I got through it because I had Connor with me.....then, Connor is taken?  Had I not suffered enough?  Had I not bled enough?  WHY this unending buffeting of pain and loss?  I have no answers......

Sadly, Kat, there are none that I have found.  Often now I find I am not so caught up in the whys but the how's.  How do we keep going on considering what has happened.  Especially without the very person that was always there to help us before.  We are the ones that face losses now alone.  Before we were a team when they happened.  And who is there for us for our biggest loss now?

[brat#2]

Exactly Gwen, the other losses I have had in my live were big, but I always had someone, daddy when mom died, Dale when daddy died.  The thought of the pain I'm suffering now, just scares me if and when another big loss comes around and I have no one to face it with.  I have been wondering "what I have done in my life" that I'm being punished so much in the my life with this pain.  I'm assuming there is no answer, since it doesn't seem any of us can figure it out.  I feel like I'm in the holding pattern too just waiting until I can see my love again.

Joyce

[Guest]

Joyce-

As painful as this is I really do not feel like Deedo and I were or are being punished.  Punishment in my connotation indicates some force is exacting retribution for an offense or transgression I might have committed.  Cancer killed my wife; cancer is indiscriminate and there was nothing she or I have done to warrant this as punishment.  Therefore I am not being punished, i have suffered a huge loss.  While I am very spiritual I am not religious in any sense.  I can't fathom a power who can create the Universe in all of its magnificence using cancer as a punishment.  The way I see things people are born and people die and for the most part we mortals lack controls over the latter.  Because one person beats cancer while another doesn't is not an indication that the former was more favored while the later deserved punishment.  My Deedo died, not because of what she or I have done but because she lost the cancer lottery.  All there is for me is not to try to understand WHY because there is no answer and even if there were it would not help me through my grief; but to try my best to try to make it though each day until that day comes when I can start to smile more than cry.  At least that's the way I see things.  But, as of right now, I also feel like I am "in the holding pattern just waiting until I can see my love again."

[brat#2]

Thank you Brad for helping me see things in a different light.

Joyce

[Guest]

❤️

[Gwenivere]

Joyce, I also don't feel I am being punished.  He, we nor I did anything that would deserve that.  Death comes for us all but we don't think about that when things are flowing smoothly.  It only became an issue when it was imminent and all options were exhausted.   I'm not religious either so cannot see this as something an entity decided upon.  It was nature.  A friend of Steves had the same cancer and is cured.  It was actually Steve pushing him to be tested that saved his life, caught it earlier.  Anyway, I know it's hard not to feel,singled out because when this does happen, we are so alone and our minds want to make sense if it.  It wants an answer so it can be satisfied.  Sadly, it drags us along thru this search when we have bigger issues of the heart that need tending to and only so much energy to work with.  

[brat#2]

Gwen, thank you.  I know I'm not being punished truly and that we didn't have any control over it and that he or I have done anything so bad in our lives that we deserve to be punished, it's just sometimes it just feels that way.  I know we can't live forever and knew it would come someday, but just not so soon which makes it hard to accept.  Not that you can ever accept losing the most important person in your life.

Joyce

 

[hollowheart]

23 hours ago, brat#2 said:

 The thought of the pain I'm suffering now, just scares me if and when another big loss comes around and I have no one to face it with.  I have been wondering "what I have done in my life" that I'm being punished so much in the my life with this pain. 

I also feel I'm being punished. Rationally, that may not be so, but I didn't have a great life to start. Some of my main joys in life came from hanging out with my sister. It didn't take much to make me happy. So to now have to suffer this devastating loss and tragedy, to think of her losing her life so young. I think WHY?!? Haven't I struggled enough already?

I see nothing left in my life but waiting for other big losses like my parents, facing that alone and then being right back in the devastating loss of grief and then truly being alone in life.  I can't help but feel like I am being punished with that kind of future.

[Guest]

Aloneness is the status quo for most of us.  Granted, some have people who surround them but they are still alone because grief is so isolating.  When I am here, I am alone.  When I am with my family, I am alone.  Don't get me wrong; they adore me and I them.  But they cannot fathom the depth of my pain, nor I theirs.  This time of grief, for however long it persists, is our time to find out who we will be.  For some people my age and older it is convenient and comfortable to make the new reality the reality we see right now: alone, sad, empty.  For others new energies are found, new interests, new socializations, new romances.  Some will learn to cope, grow and move forward while others find complacency in where they are now, I don't believe they find contentment but it does become a reality for them.  I don't know yet where I fit.  I strive to attack grief with as much energy as I can muster, throwing every idea I find at it, but still if given a choice of staying home or joining a group for lunch, I'll choose the former; I'm more comfortable here.  If choosing between the local hiking club and hiking on my own, I'll hike on my own; again comfort level.  

I'm rambling and going nowhere - this started out as a "The future is what we choose to make it." thing.  But it got lost; way lost. All I know is I don't want to be so alone but I also don't want to make friends yet.  I don't know what I really want so until I do I'll hike by myself.  By the way my Charity Miles app informed me that I am nearing the 1,000 miles hiked mark all in the eight months since Deedo died.  I guess hiking alone is in my comfort zone.

[brat#2]

Brad

I totally get where you are coming from.  We are at about the same time in the journey and I'm more comfortable being alone too.  I'm not even sure how to, at this point in the journey, to make the changes that need to be made to find who I'm going to be in the future.  I'm sure one day we both will find what we need in ourselves to "make new friends" or hopefully find who we can be.

Joyce

[KATPILOT]

Rambling isn't going nowhere Brad. You still touch upon a lot of points as you go. When I was walking in the wrong direction once, someone told me I was doing that.  I asked them if the world was round, then I told them I'll get there.

I think there will always be times when we will still need to be alone in our grief. Throwing everything into attacking grief is a tough task. It's a monster who eventually gets bored with you and disrupts your life less and less.

Joyce, the magic words are "one day".  Grief is a journey. I said before it's also an adventure. We change and adapt and one day we realize we are not the same as when we started. You understand what it means to try and hold onto the future while not forcing it. You still get there.

[Margm]

My granddaughter lost an acquaintance.  She was only 16.  It was cancer.  Billy was the only daddy my granddaughter knew.  She was his heart and he covered himself with knowledge of the math's for her homeschool.  He would work on a math problem, Google facts until he knew why and how to teach her so she would understand.  If she missed a problem he would not give up until he understood.  Yes, he was obsessive compulsive.  So she asked me yesterday "why?"  I had no answer.  I am a Christian.  I grew up under unbelievably strict circumstances and I spent 15 years in psychotherapy believing my cancer was a punishment.  Billy did not believe this way.  He wanted me to have my faith.  There are men and women a lot smarter than I am who have faith and believe in God, a lot smart and smarter than me that do not believe.  Even with my history, I have to have faith.  I won't have any peace at all until I find it.  I cannot concentrate for any length of time yet.  I have no answers.  Why do 200 die in plane crashes.  Why all the deaths from terrorists?  There are no answers. 

[brat#2]

Katpilot - thank you for your kind words and encouragement.

Joyce

 

[mittam99]

On 3/27/2016 at 0:57 PM, brat#2 said:

... the other losses I have had in my live were big, but I always had someone, daddy when mom died, Dale when daddy died.  The thought of the pain I'm suffering now, just scares me if and when another big loss comes around and I have no one to face it with. 

That's an interesting point, Joyce. And for a lot of us on the north side of 60, there are less and less people around to give us support.

Shortly after Tammy died, I had a conversation with my niece. Tammy and her had become quite close and talked often. She told me that Tammy's dream was for her and I to die old and gray, holding hands in our bed.

Alas, that wasn't meant to be. In my life I really am alone. Tammy's family in Illinois never really contacts me, my sisters (who live here locally) are wrapped up in their own world and I don't really have any close friends. Like I said, Tammy was truly all I had.

[Margm]

Mitch, it does not matter how many people are around us, we are still alone.  That might be our forever.  I gripe because there are some circumstances I could do without.  We are all learning tough lessons in life. I was numb, I liked the numbness.  Unfortunately it didn't last.  All the people around me do not help.

[KATPILOT]

I think Mitch it's sad when your brides family disconnects with you. I had a similar situation after both her parents passed. They don't realize or give much thought to the fact that you were someone who was and still is very special. You took care of her, loved her, gave her joy and happiness at the worst time of her life. They miss out on talking with the one who was closest to Tammy.

One fact is that you had yourself as well as Tammy. Then after she left, you couldn't see "you" anymore. We tend to lose ourselves when we lose the one in our life that was so important. You still have you even if it feels like a shadow of who you were and Tammy is just waiting to see you find yourself once again.

I think that applies to many of us.

[brat#2]

Mitch, I was young when my mom died, 19 years old, and wasn't really that old when daddy died, 30 years old.  I too lost all contact with Dale's side of the family when he died and I only have 1 bother who is 10 years older than me and lives in Illinois.  So I know what it is like to have little support.  But like Marg said, I think this journey of ours is just that ours and ours alone.  I don't think having a lot of people around me and/or support would make it any less painful or difficult.

katpilot - you are so right, we are still here but just a shadow of ourselves and that in itself is hard to understand and embrace.

Joyce

 

[Patty65]

35 minutes ago, brat#2 said:

 But like Marg said, I think this journey of ours is just that ours and ours alone. 

 

 

This was my first "holiday" even though I am spiritual rather than religiously celebrating it.  I thought I would be ok, but on these holidays Ron would actually convince me to slow down and really take the day off and we would have so much fun. we'd find a resort and pretend we were tourist, or drive to the other side of the island. It is/was so brutal.  Not a single soul called me.  Its how "just us" we were. I worked like 16 hours alone, opening the store alone, closing alone -- I had told all staff we'd be closed.  I sobbed anytime there was an empty store, which was a lot. Better than driving off a cliff, which was on my mind a lot, and even though I could never do that to our daughter, it didn't stop it, or all the images of him in the last days and minutes.  it is ours alone and honestly, really really honestly, I don't know how many of you have survived as long as you have. You all are so strong.

[scba]

Dear Patty,

I'm sorry you spend your day alone and yes, we understand the thought of finish it once for all, but you stopped, you have a reason to live, whatever that is, today that reason is enough. With time the haunting images of the last days won't have so much power and presence in your everyday life. It is impossible to believe it now. I didn't believe it. You will learn to cope with them, but there is not a manual, you just learn.

I don't know how I survived the first year and I'm not strong, and If I am, we are and you are. One day at a time, one hour and second at a time.

[brat#2]

Patty, I know the 1st holidays are very difficult.  I'm sorry you had to go through that alone.  Yesterday was the last of the "first" holidays I've spent without my Dale and it was difficult and I didn't think I would make it through any of them, but I did and you will too.  I don't know about being strong, but with the help of the people on this forum and just like Ana said, one day at a time, one hour and second at a time is the best any of us can do.  The images of his last days will become less and less and eventually you do start to remember the good images.  Hugs

Joyce

[hollowheart]

1 hour ago, KATPILOT said:

 We tend to lose ourselves when we lose the one in our life that was so important.

This. Exactly. And it might be why I stay so mad. I feel like I'm floating in space, can't get a grip on anything. When I was job searching it was a similar feeling. That "what do I do with my life" feeling. My therapist tries to help me get centered, but it's not really working.

I have lost that "life spark" and I think knowing that I have lost myself, lost that fun, joyful part of me that always made everyone laugh, that always had a funny way of putting things---is gone. And it's very troubling to me knowing that how I once was is also gone forever.

[scba]

Yes, we must also mourn the loss of our old selves. It is very hard