I lost my darling partner on 1st January this year very suddenly he was only 55 ( I no longer feel the need to give a reason as it seems irrelevant?! I don’t know if anyone else has found this He is gone I don’t even care why now) I returned to work Monday for the first time and everyone being very kind and gentle with me and in the moment it does help in some ways but I have this constant feeling that I just don’t want to accept this new version of my life. It’s all so wrong he should be here. I didn’t want this. I go to the supermarket after work come home, walk our dog maybe with my lovely son and his finance who live with me/ lived with us i phone my mum, do some household bits……. So yes I am doing it all but I just want to scream out that it’s not my choice. I don’t want this. I just want him back with me. Before I went back to work it felt safe in my grief bubble but now It feels like I’m leaving him behind and I don’t want to. Any advice or understanding would really help 
I haven’t gone back to work but I think similarly to what you are feeling, sometimes people say to me I’m really strong, I think but I don’t want to be, I don’t want to do this. I just want to be living my ‘old’ life, with my husband, moaning about work etc. I’m sick of feeling sad every day, crying etc. I am coping but I just don’t want to be experiencing all of this, of course. Who would want to be in our situation!
Yes I totally agree I’m so sick of people telling me I am doing really well……… I know they mean well but I don’t want to hear it. I am not doing well. I’m surviving for everyone else in my life because what other option is there but I am very far from doing well. This is just unimaginable that this is the only way life can be now……
I hear you Gina23, and Im fed up of everyone saying im strong. Im not strong anymore that went the day I lost my beloved husband, he was the one that made me strong.
Its been 3 months since I lost him, I gave up work a week before the funeral and haven’t gone back. The last few days ive hit rock bottom and just want to give up.
I miss him everyday and struggling without him all I want is to be with him, im not living my life anymore im just existing waiting to be with him again
I also returned to work on Monday for the first time after my husband died at the end of October last year and whilst I enjoyed seeing everyone (and everyone was super nice) I just felt really strange, like thinking towards my colleagues ‘my life is so different now but yours are all the same?’ The after- work routine was also so different to how it used to be so that felt really odd too. I suppose it is like everything and I will adapt to this new norm?
Yes it just feels so odd that I don’t have him to tell about my day. I have found this week really hard as being busy and distracted at work just means when I leave all the raw emotion just catches up with me like a tidal wave of sadness and realisation that this is all it will ever be. Had a awful trip to Waitrose after work just watching couples chose their weekend meals. Broke down when I came home. My son and his fiancé out tonight and tomorrow night just another reminder that it really is just me now. I just want him here where he should be
@Poppet1973 yes I don’t want praise I’m not strong or brave or doing well I am completely lost and heartbroken and do t even know what I am doing most of the time. Just existing in a world I don’t understand anymore
Gina23
I am back at work, although not full time. I get too tired.
I find it a bit of a distraction, but to be honest, but i don’t really want to be there. I am going through the motions there, but don’t want to be at home in a place full of memories either.
Accepting this as the new norm is really hard. Coming home to silence is horrible too. None of this is any of our choice…
who would pick this. I would not wish this on anyone.
I found work was a distraction and gave me a different focus. It was something I did without him before (even though we had worked together early on, but at a different company) and therefore I assured myself it was something I could do without him again. I’m in my 50’s and cannot afford to stop work.
But you are absolutely right that the grief then consumes me in waves the times when we should still be together - the evenings & weekends. I dreaded Friday nights for a long time- that feeling when you finish work and are looking forward to some down time together, that is no longer. I have thrown myself into exercising at the weekend and just take my time doing monotonous things (shopping, cleaning, cooking) trying to pass the time. Life was a rush before - trying to do everything, how I miss those times now it’s gone. Take care,
I understand what you are saying about being in a grief huddle. My passed 1st January suddenly at 54 and i’m terrified of going back to work. I know i need the routine but my job is stressful i’m a nurse and I don’t know if i will be the same empathetic person anymore
I gave up work a week before the funeral, I told my boss that I didn’t know how long it would take to get my head sorted and it would be better if I leave. Its been 3 months since I lost my husband and ive just given up.
Hi Poppet1973
You mustn’t give up. You have got to try and give yourself a reason to get out of bed in the morning. I know my wife would hate me to give up, and i understand that getting out of bed is tough, i too face that every day.
I don’t know when this is going to get easier, but i know i have to try and get some normality back into my life, even though it hurts.
Please try and find a way to get yourself going.
Sending big hugs and wishes your way.
I work with people living with dementia and also worried I find I am the same empathetic person with them but my tolerance for other people is definitely less. I am able to care for them but I find every else’s conversations so pointless. It’s not easy being back in a work place environment and I’ve had a few moments where I have become overwhelmed and had to disappear to the loo for a few tears.
Thank you, believe me I’m trying everyday to carry on without him, but its hard knowing im facing the days alone.
My husband would put his arms around me and give me a hug when I’m feeling like this. Thats what I miss, the hugs, kisses and him knowing what to say to cheer me up.
Hi Poppet1973
I get it. I miss the hugs, the stupid conversations, the day to day things, rather than things like holidays. It’s the simple, ordinary and seemingly mundane stuff that i miss.
It is hard to move past this point i know. I have had a bad day, not with the things you would think, but other things, like semi flooding the kitchen because the waste pipe on the washing machine had popped out from the waste pipe, and angry drivers on my way to work, to a bird crapping all over my car on the way to work. Not badly, but enough to reduce me to tears because she is not here to talk to about it.
Just felt like things going wrong for no reason today. She would have found most of it funny and laughed at me, and made everything good, but sadly that didn’t happen.
Thinking of you, and sending my best.
I’m totally get what your saying i miss the hugs the laughs all the things other people take for granted . I wish i had all of it back i miss him so much
People told me i would miss the small things, and i never understood it, until now.
Thank you and the same to you
I would give anything to have my husband back even if it was just a minute, just so I could hold him one more time.
@Poppet1973 i know just to have one more conversation one more cuddle one more smile. I just want to hear his voice just one more time. But then we would have to loose them all over again. This is so hard and people just don’t understand how lost you feel when that person you shared your life with and silly stories from your day is gone. Everything becomes so pointless