If You're Going Through Hell

[Margm]

I cannot walk as good as  I could two years ago but I'm sure it is the weight too.  Honestly, you have to have some sort of push to make yourself do that and I'm sorry, but my health improving is not a big enough push.  Maybe I just want to eat myself to death.  I had lost weight after Billy left, so you know I put a lot on fast.  Don't care what I wear or makeup either.  I cannot pretend I'm fixing up for him and don't care to for myself........and definitely not anyone else.  Gotta push myself somehow.

[kayc]

15 hours ago, Gwenivere said:

Kay, I miss walking so much without so much pain.  It really helps and I sure see that now.  What frustrates me is I didn't choose this, it chose me.  I was active my whole life up to the last year and a half.  I watch people walking and envy them now.  I do what I have to to get around but lord it hurts!  I'm glad you can keep it up.

It has been very painful for me to walk in recent months since my fall, but that's getting better now,  I can imagine how much you miss it, I would feel the same way if I couldn't walk.  As it is, sometimes it's very hard with all that I have going on with my feet and my knees, and sometimes my back.  Sometimes the walks are shorter, sometimes they're slower, but so far, I still go on them.

[kayc]

15 hours ago, Marg M said:

Maybe I just want to eat myself to death.

I have a sister who is doing just that, I term it "passive suicide".  She doesn't put a gun to her head, but with her depression, she doesn't want to live, she smokes even though she has COPD, and has her candy bar drawer in spite of her Diabetes.  It's hard because I don't want to lose her but I don't get a choice in it.  And she hasn't even lost her husband!

[Margm]

1 minute ago, kayc said:

I term it "passive suicide".

Cannot deny that, which puts "us" in a very real conundrum.  Do we eat ourselves to death?  What then, do they charge more for cremation?  My body will soon provide a living flame with this fat.  Cannot be buried, I don't know that many men that could hold the coffin.  

I used to enjoy walking, but I did have Billy at home that I could call if my "problem" happened.  I walked a road called "Golden Road" which was the country road one over from our Circle Drive home.  I "cheated" by cutting across the preacher's yard because if I went to the end of the street, the pit bull got after me.  Dixie (our Golden Retriever) once got me down on the ground and I knew then age had crept up on me.  I could not get up.  All she wanted to do was love me and kiss me to death.  After that (she was only about 8 months old) we gave her to a family with two kids that jumped down on the ground with her and they all played.  I could not play,, and she never even looked back driving away.  Billy could have trained her not to jump up on us, but he had lost his dog training impetus.  That used to be a hobby of his.  The dog was for our granddaughter, who really did not want to take care of an animal, we found out.  

I have come so close to death myself, I now know it as a real thing, and I cannot pay more for a pet deposit and monthly rent.  You think walking on concrete is tough on the legs, and it really is.  Walking the dirt roads was not as tiring.  Excuses, excuses, excuses.  I have about five pair of Sketchers, so that excuse won't pass. (My daughter buys me shoes, I don't). She and my mother were shoe crazy.  I have to do it.  I know I have to do it just so my back does not hurt so often.  And, what back, "in its right mind" could handle carrying around these hips all day?  Gotta have pain.  Can I blame it on my "low residue diet?"  Nope, cannot do that.  My legs work just fine, so far, but I do see the writing on the wall, and the footsteps behind me get louder.  No excuse, except death by eating.  Gotta change, if not for myself, for my granddaughter.  She told me (and she went in with me) when I was having my blood drawn, that mine worried her more than hers being drawn, and she has a pretty good hold on beginning hypochondria.  

[kayc]

When George died they did consider weight with cremation price, don't know if it goes by range or what.  If so, I'm in trouble with my dog, he's a big boy, but he's worth every penny.  My kids are in trouble with me too, although I'll leave more than enough to cover it.  

[Margm]

Well, I guess that gives me another reason to live, gotta take off the fat so I can go faster.  (literally)

[Margm]

I really try hard to ignore "slights," silly little things that bother me that someone might say.  I do not know what is happening to my life.  Maybe a little fog has lifted.  I'm not saying I have "found a cure" for this horrible grief, but something has happened.  I think like Rose Kennedy said, time does not heal the wounds but they develop scar tissue.  We all know that is just a metaphor, not a real condition.  But, sometimes, you grow to accept he is not going to return home.  You look to the sky and  ask "why?" but the sky does not answer. Then you say "I know you did not want to leave, I will just love and miss you all of my forever's."   And, yes, I will cry, but not like it used to come.  I do this often.  

When Billy left I could not concentrate to read.  My love of books is legendary.  I love my Kindle, but there is the book of poems by Walt Whitman (one of them), and one by e.e. cummings (and I love his leaving off capital letters), and I want these books to hold in my  hands.  I will wear reading glasses.  The feel of a book is something a book romantic has to do, and I have a romance with books.  

Joan Didion has a new documentary on her life on Netflix.  I have many authors I admire tremendously.  Do not tell me bad perverted things about them, I want them up on that pedestal of my own imagination.  Joan Didion's book "The Year of Magical Thinking" was one of the first books I read after Billy left. You see, I could concentrate on life that I was living, someone else living the same life, I could comprehend.  This book was written after her daughter died also.  You will have to watch the documentary to understand this.  But, I have to warn you, watching Joan interact at her age (I think 82), it was painful for me to watch, but I had to do it.  I did it for Joan, for myself, and for all people like "us" on this forum.  There is a line drawn.  On top is the people with sympathy, on the bottom are we the people who have walked over the burning coals.  Joan walked, still walks, and suffers.  She still writes also.

I will call them  "Billy's friends" that slighted me, I felt real hurt from this.  But, also, that hurt is forgiven because I understand.  I am a reminder of things to come.  Just like in "The Christmas Carol," I am the ghost of things to come.  I will go to the nursing home close by to bring flowers to one of those friends.  After I had talked to them to let them know Billy was gone, this lifelong friend of his had a stroke and is being fed with a tube in the NH.  His wife comes every morning and leaves late in the evening.  My heart  is with her.

Sometimes you figure out that life is not all about us.  I know I have mentioned this.  One of Billy's first cousin's had passed away.  (silly me, I still thought of all of us as young).  The man's sister-in-law  was my dear friend that we had lost touch with.  I got her phone number.  She was so happy to hear from me, for a few moments there was happiness in our voices.  We caught up on our life (Right before Billy got sick), and then our voices drifted off to sadness.  She had lost two sons and another of Billy's cousin's, her husband, to an auto accident.  She was remarried now, had a semblance of happiness, a new happiness, and I was a reminder of an old happiness and in between of horrible grief.  We promised to keep in touch, but we never will again.  See, sometimes we get our feelings hurt when that is not meant to be the reason we are "brushed off."  We are a terrible reminder of things to come, things other people have to face, and they know it.  It is not meant as a slap to us, it is a sadness, they hear the footsteps louder when we are around.  We cannot avoid this, but we can greet them, if we have to, with warm regards,  expecting nothing from them. Show them we are okay, show them we still put one foot  in front of the other, show them we are not afraid, then just walk on by.  

This past week we lost four friends of mine and my friend's families.  One was a son that is my son's age.  My heart is heavy, I don't want to be a reminder to people, I prefer to be an example, maybe not of hope, maybe I cannot find a word for this, maybe I will just be me.  (Lord help us all).

.  

[MartyT]

2 hours ago, Marg M said:

I don't want to be a reminder to people, I prefer to be an example, maybe not of hope, maybe I cannot find a word for this, maybe I will just be me. 

This is such a profound statement, Marg ~ and I, for one, think that you just being you is enough. I think you are quite wonderful, just the way you are, and I've a feeling I'm not the only one who feels that way.♥ 

[Margm]

[scba]

4 hours ago, Marg M said:

 See, sometimes we get our feelings hurt when that is not meant to be the reason we are "brushed off."  We are a terrible reminder of things to come, things other people have to face, and they know it.  It is not meant as a slap to us, it is a sadness, they hear the footsteps louder when we are around. 

The thing is, we did nothing to deserve to be brushed off or be "that kind" of reminder to others. 

[Margm]

6 hours ago, scba said:

The thing is, we did nothing to deserve to be brushed off or be "that kind" of reminder to others. 

Ana, I think my post was meant for myself, maybe for people a lot older than you are.  

I honestly do not know what I would do with rude people that constantly aggravate me with something concerning my life or Billy's death.  I keep thinking about the lion not paying attention to what a sheep thinks.  I could tease a little and tell you I am from the deep south and our cultures are sometimes different, but then I'd give the impression of old southern belles with their big beautiful dresses on and their mint juleps in their hands.  I think my southern is so much different than that.  When I went to the sheriff's office for routine question  (my asking the question, not being questioned), I had to put my purse through the x-rayer and I did have to take out my cute little fillet knife in its pretty blond scabbard.  Now, they did not think anything of me having that.  They thought it cute.  But, I am no southern belle.  I am a deep south, paper mill town redneck, and I don't stand on ceremony.  I've never hurt anyone, but I do not suffer idiots either.  Not more than once.  I would suggest you do the same.  Personally, I liked #4 of Marty's suggestions to tell people that aggravate you/them/us.  

In real reasoning, people leave me alone because they worry more about my demise than my mental attitude.  

I hope those people leave you alone or you learn to tell them the next stop they can exit.  No, we don't deserve anything  bad said to us, but our loved ones did not deserve to leave either.  

I have no answer for this grief, but maybe worrying about my 18-year-old, maybe the imaginary scar tissue, but I have some tolerable days sometimes.

Billy was a better mama and daddy than I was.  He was a natural nurse.  Tonight in the ER, I tried to conjure him up sitting on my 18-year-old's bed.  I don't have the patience he did and when I worry it tends to come out like anger.  It is helplessness for not being able to take care of her health problems.  

[Margm]

I found a picture I can live with.  We both retired in 1997 to RV.  Family called us to stix and brix house and not being homesteaders, our home was there for family and not just for us to live in.  Even on cold icy days we hiked the mountains of Arkansas.  We used trekking sticks, one in each hand.  Lots more stability and you could pull yourself along when you thought you could walk no more.  We did about 16 years of this before Billy's back would not allow him to go very far or take rocky roads.

I look at this old bridge (over Brushy Creek) with the iron sides and wooden floor and Billy is on one side and I am on the other.  That is where we are right now, but I will join him on the other side when the time comes.  Those red pants.  They are the Arkansas Razorback's colors.  He had 2-3 pair of them and wore them every day.  I sleep on a lot of pillows.  Two pair of his pants and his Tee-shirt that he would wear "to town" are between my big pillows.

I like to think that Billy is just on the other side of the bridge.  He had to wear the hats in winter, spring, summer and fall.  He had skin that would develop skin cancer so easily.  Him and his hats.  They were a part of him as much as his shoes.  His favorite refrain was from Dr. Seuss "do you like my hat" but he was not quoting, I had to like his hat.  It was asked many times a day, many times a week, and his hats are next to his beautiful wooden urn.  I liked his hats, but I loved what was under them.  

[kayc]

21 hours ago, Marg M said:

We are a terrible reminder of things to come, things other people have to face, and they know it.  It is not meant as a slap to us, it is a sadness, they hear the footsteps louder when we are around.  We cannot avoid this, but we can greet them, if we have to, with warm regards,  expecting nothing from them. Show them we are okay, show them we still put one foot  in front of the other, show them we are not afraid, then just walk on by.  

Marg,

You are a dear.  I wrote off all of the "friends" that weren't.  When George died, I figured it wasn't about them, it was about me and what I had to live with and when my "friends" disappeared, two of my best friends not even bothering to attend his funeral, others with their hands out...what??!!!  But you, you are considering their feelings.  Twelve years later, they're long gone.  I want friends that are reciprocal and caring, where we can BE THERE for each other.  Otherwise, I'm not interested, don't waste my time.  I've always been that friend to others, I expect nothing less in return.  I wish you well, you're a very caring person.

[Margm]

Oh Kay, I have had to write off no one really.  My two couples, that were our young married best friends, they were the ones who "slighted" me and yes, it did hurt.  But something was off.  My male friend (Billy grew up with him), he did not even acknowledge I was there.  This was my bear-hug friend from years ago.  I had to sit back and analyze why he treated me this way.  I knew something was off with him, it was not the person I remembered.  A vacant look.  Lately, they almost lost him to a strep illness.  We are not kids anymore.  He was the oldest at 80 now.  And the other couple, he is not expected to survive.  He is in a nursing home after two strokes.  My little "slights" were small gnats compared to their fighting for their life.  Who am I?  Certainly not the Queen of grief.  I almost feel like typhoid Mary.  I know it is just our age and their health.  I did not bring this catastrophe to them.  But, still I feel so bad, just like bringing happiness/grief/grief to my friend who had lost two grown children and her husband.  I know she still cares for me, but I am a reminder of happier times and I wish her only happy times with the life she has now.  

I realize how fortunate I am on so many fronts now.  I am devastated not to have my better half.  I am a one legged half a person, but I am learning to walk with the crutches that are in my life now.  I will never be whole again.  Some mornings I still reach for him, then I wake up and get directly out of bed.  Those days of enjoying laying in bed left when he did.  But, I had him for 54 years, and so many were not that lucky.  I truly wanted to go first, I am not as good a person as he was.  I am here for a reason and God only knows that reason.  I certainly am not an exception to any rule.  And my friends.......I still have all my high school friends, can you imagine from 1960?  Can you imagine such luck.  We are all close because we, the most of us, have already gone through this grief, and we are there for each other.  I worked for three hospitals really, but in-house in only two of them.  I still have my coworkers, and we keep in touch.  And my saving grace neighbor Hettie, the one who brought me through the worse times, my accountant, my psychiatrist, my life saver.  When I left, we knew it was for good, she even shared my feelings for leaving.  I miss her, but I won't go back.  She knew I wouldn't, we talked about it.  

So, being slighted, being rebuffed, no, none of us deserve it, and you were wise, if they do not help your feelings, if they bring you down, they are no use to you, or anyone else on the forum.  We did nothing to deserve bad treatment from anyone, and that is why the anatomy of your backbone is most useful.  Let them see your backside walking away.  

[kayc]

You're lucky.  I could list all the friends that disappeared, the list is lengthy.  I made a new best friend, we were there for each other, great friend...then she married and moved away several states.  Other attempts at new friends are slow go or didn't materialize.  

[Margm]

Kay, I moved "back home" because my "new" friends were my coworkers at the big hospital I worked/retired from.  They were "new" but about 20 years into friendship now.  My newest friend was about 10 years into friendship.  This gal was a keeper, but she and I both knew living there hurt me so bad.  I left her, with her blessings.  She does not do computers.  Then, probably the best friend I ever had I met at MD Anderson.   We talked daily after she and I got back home.  I will forever see her in my mind.  She lived in West Texas in a small town.  She only lived two years with her cancer.  We went into the treatments holding hands with Billy and her husband, Larry,  holding our purses.  We held each other up through barbaric treatment they used in 1982.  We were together though.  She was two years older than me and I thought she was beautiful.  I can still see/hold her in my "mind's eye."  She  crocheted me a round tablecloth and sent it to me.  I wanted to go to her when she was dying but had a sick child.  I picked out a rather large wooden plaque,  blank wood in the shape of a tree, my son painted it to look like the tree I meant it to be.

We made our pilgrimage to her grave site in West Texas.  Larry remarried before I could even call him to offer  condolences.  God says not  to judge people,  so I will go with what Juanita's mother-in-law told me, "he was so lonesome."  He married before the ink on her death certificate dried.  

And the cemetery.......well, I hated Juanita, my beautiful Juanita would be buried in a dry "Boot Hill."  It was a beautifully well kept cemetery with those tall skinny  West Texas trees.  It was the only green oasis in that town.  I placed my  plaque on her grave.  I had written, Scott had painted:  "We met under the tree of life; she was sunshine at a dark time; I knew her forever; forever was not long enough."    

[Margm]

Tom, I talk to Billy.  I used to pray to Jesus and would wind up talking to Billy.  Today, looking at the sky with its beautiful white clouds, last night looking at the moon (I always talk to Billy when I see the moon), I finally said "Well Jesus, I've known you a lot longer than I did Billy, but I'm sure you played a part in our staying together so long, so you are just going to have to be satisfied listening in on my conversation with Billy, and if you can help me right now, please, please do."

Our granddaughter (the light of Billy's life, and he was the only daddy she ever knew) lives with us (well, that was a slip, there is no us, she lives with me, but I think of Billy as us still).  She is adopted.  Her bio-mom was an addict, a street addict.  She spent the last three months in jail thank goodness, but my granddaughter has physical problems because of this.  She is a very private little girl and I feel like I am letting her down telling this, she wants to stay private.  We sat in the ER the other night and I just tried to conjure up Billy, but I couldn't.  So, I asked Billy to please help me.  And, when I am talking to Billy, I am talking to Jesus too.

 

[kayc]

16 hours ago, Marg M said:

well, that was a slip, there is no us, she lives with me, but I think of Billy as us still

I think so too.  

And I talk to George all the time.  They probably wouldn't let me live on my own if they knew just how much!

[Autumn2]

Kayc. Brought a smile to me when you said “they probably would not let me live on my own if they knew just how much”, yep I can relate!

[Gwenivere]

Having one of those days when everything is a frustration.  I was trying to set up my new health care insurance link online and it said I had.  I had been holding off till I had an ID number.  Somehow in have an account and it is now locked out from too many tempts to log in.  It wouldn't even let me create a new one.  Being the weekend, there is no customer or tech support.  Now I am all frustrated and stressed out because of the grief weight on top of it.  So many things I could let go of when Steve was here as he would say 'let it go and deal with it later'.  Can't seem to do that for myself.  So another attempt at a calm day down the drain.  

[Margm]

Well Billy Ray, I just finished doing "your job." (turning the clocks back), and I like clocks on nearly every wall.  He was so specific when things were "his job" and did not want anyone else to do them.  I did not know how to run a dishwasher, that was "his job."  So, I have run it once or twice now, but prefer the old fashioned way.  (my old fashioned way is to leave them in the sink until they are needed, then I wash them.)

I'm back to reading my "Grief, One Day at a Time" by the genius Alan D. Wolfelt, Ph.D.  We have not heard from Gin lately.  And, there are so many of you that have been absent.  Maybe people cannot get a word in "edgewise" through my word salads.  

Mornings are my "by myself" time (but three mornings a week I occupy a comfortable, soft chair in the entrance of Bri's school.  They think of me as an old alumni anyhow.  I was, so was my mom, and my daughter got her nursing degree at this school.  I felt like a knot on a log for awhile,  but they consider me as part of the furniture, I guess.  I am welcome, and Bri knows I am close.  This world scares her, people scare her, all due to her bio-mom's use of street drugs.  The counselor says to let her take her own time, she will work it out.  I admit, sometimes I get pushy, but that does not work with her.  I won't do that again.  

Today Mr. Wolfelt quotes Buddha.  "If your compassion does not include yourself, it is incomplete."  Then part of his (Wolfelt's) words are this:  Many of us are good at being kind to others yet pretty bad at being kind to ourselves.  If there is one habit we need to break during our time of grief, it's this one.  And this is one habit I have a hard time breaking.  If I lived back in the dark ages, I would probably whip my back with that hand held bunch of thorn bushes.  

The word "Compassion" means "with passion."  Let's care for ourselves with passion---physically, cognitively, emotionally, socially, and spiritually.  And let's let others care for us with passion too.  

While I am at Bri's school, if people will leave me alone, I get in my reading time.  That is my biggest gift to myself, time to read.  

I want to take one red rose to the nursing home, to Billy's lifelong friend's room.  I have doubts about that.  A live rose wither's and dies.  I don't want to bring something of that significance.  My grandmother said not to put those silk flowers on her grave.  I cannot bring his wife one of my grief books, though she will need it.  Yet, his wife is a better Christian than I am and my friend Wanda finds solace in her religion.  I cannot find it like that.  I wish I could.  I'm not there yet.  I wish I was.  "If wishes were horses, beggars would ride."  

[kayc]

23 hours ago, Marg M said:

My grandmother said not to put those silk flowers on her grave. 

Another reason I want cremated.  I don't want my kids to feel obligatory about tending a grave and visiting it.  They will remember me, grave or no grave.  On their holidays I want them to have relaxing time with their families...that is if my daughter gets to have a family someday.  Still heartbroken about her situation.

I don't think it's your word salads, Marg, it feels like people are contemplative.  I read everyone's posts yesterday but just felt quiet inside, didn't post much.  So much going on that is on our minds.  I hope everyone checks in just so we know they're okay.

[scba]

5 hours ago, kayc said:

So much going on that is on our minds.  I hope everyone checks in just so we know they're okay.

Checking in.

Yes, so much going on in my head, in my brain and all the rest.

I've been watching "sad movies" over the weekend. Joan Didion wrote:

"Visible mourning reminds us of death, which is construed as unnatural, a failure to manage the situation.

“A single person is missing for you, and the whole world is empty,” Philippe Ariès wrote to the point of this aversion in Western Attitudes toward Death.

“But one no longer has the right to say so aloud.” 
― Joan Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking

 I've a strong headache today but came to work the same. I'm such a fool. Maybe I didn't want to stay at home alone with my mind racing. 

[Cookie]

26 minutes ago, scba said:

Checking in.

Yes, so much going on in my head, in my brain and all the rest.

I've been watching "sad movies" over the weekend. Joan Didion wrote:

"Visible mourning reminds us of death, which is construed as unnatural, a failure to manage the situation.

“A single person is missing for you, and the whole world is empty,” Philippe Ariès wrote to the point of this aversion in Western Attitudes toward Death.

“But one no longer has the right to say so aloud.” 
― Joan Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking

 I've a strong headache today but came to work the same. I'm such a fool. Maybe I didn't want to stay at home alone with my mind racing. 

Checking in and find comfort in being able to come here and share with everyone.....hugs to all

[Cookie]

On 11/4/2017 at 5:58 PM, Gwenivere said:

Having one of those days when everything is a frustration.  I was trying to set up my new health care insurance link online and it said I had.  I had been holding off till I had an ID number.  Somehow in have an account and it is now locked out from too many tempts to log in.  It wouldn't even let me create a new one.  Being the weekend, there is no customer or tech support.  Now I am all frustrated and stressed out because of the grief weight on top of it.  So many things I could let go of when Steve was here as he would say 'let it go and deal with it later'.  Can't seem to do that for myself.  So another attempt at a calm day down the drain.  

So sorry Gwen.  What you're talking about is very frustrating and grief does make it just that much worse.  I find myself having much less patience than I used to especially when dealing with techie things, and it all seems so meaningless in the face of having lost your most special person....a little like an unusual torture.....