Hurts more now....

Felt I was doing so well, kept myself occupied, challenges…
Seven months on and suddenly it’s like being hit with a huge fist of grief.
From the odd tearful moment just occasionally to weeping for no apparent reason.
Suddenly don’t want to go walking or carry on with projects, just want to curl up under the bedclothes and let the world carry on without me.
I am not one for self pity but suddenly find am at a loss for how to get out of this black hole I find myself in.
Help!!

In a few hours it will be exactly 52 weeks for me, and a calendar year tomorrow. I almost feel I should be in a similar black hole today, and yet, I’m not. It seems that they just come from nowhere and can take you unawares. They aren’t as frequent now.
It would help greatly if we were able to identify what exactly leads to it. Once or twice I’ve thought it was because I got ahead of myself and began to believe I was doing well. I suppose the higher we climb the further it is to fall. I’ve noticed that I often feel more down after a period of doing something I enjoyed or interested me.
One of my daughters phoned this morning and asked if I was going to mark the anniversary, and I couldn’t think of an answer. Everyday, I feel the loss, so how could today be any different.
I know all the triggers that will bring me down today and I’ve decided to just avoid them. I’m spending the day completely alone. I was supposed to be going walking with a group this morning but, in the early hours, decided not to.
It took me ages to get up and get going. It’s almost like a self fulfilling prophecy.
I’m expecting there to be several more black holes along the path, hopefully not too deep, and that climbing out of them may become easier. I think that just getting out of the hole, and the realisation that you’ve done it, is a cause for some sort of celebration. I find it useful to look back and thing of how I might have grown and become different, and try and find some gratitude for little things.
I was out with a group from WayUp yesterday and some there had been bereaved for ten years and still get rocked back by days like that.

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Thank you Yorkshire lad, knowing that others find themselves in this situation without an expected trigger means I know it’s something that might happen when least expected.
Just have to try to cope with it and keep struggling forward.
To me each day is a marker of what is now lost and can never be regained but I must have a different life, a positive life, in the future.
Perhaps your right if there is a sense of having accomplished something or being proud and thinking I’m doing well then it’s a very long way to suddenly fall back.
It hurts.
I know I’m better than even four months ago but guess there’s a long way still to go and there will be quite a few black holes along the way to climb out of.
I hope today and tomorrow bring you not only sadness but some memories that can make you smile.

Hello12remember, I relate to your feelings. Grief is like a roller coaster. so many twists & turns, and ups and downs. I am a bit over a year on since the loss of my beloved younger Sister. I felt “frozen” towards the latter part of that first year, now the dam has burst, and like you, the tears flow for no apparent reason (although the reason is that we need an outlet for this crushing pain). I understand wanting to hide away, because the world out there often has no patience with us, and the expectation is that we “should be over it by now.” Rubbish I say. We will not be “over” this, all we can hope for is to somehow get through it. You need not feel you are giving in to self pity. I have finally learned that we have every right to all of our feelings, and it is ok to feel sorry for ourselves sometimes. Be gentle with yourself, take care and try to find even moments of relief in any way possible. Do as much as you can, then rest, because grief is exhausting. Reach out to us on this forum when things get too difficult. We understand. May your days get easier. Xxx Sister2

Hello YSL-My thoughts are with you on this painful anniversary. I am sure there will be many triggers, and good for you that you are going to do your best to avoid them. Spending the day alone was your choice and your way of caring for yourself, something so important in our time of grief. I admire your insight into what you need to get through these challenges. Never a straight path on this journey, is it? So many detours, and I often get lost. May you find solace in your precious memories.
Sister2

Sister2.
I have found such compassion and understanding on this site which has helped and supported me throughout this terrible time.
Thank you.

Hello all

Everyone is different in what helps them at the worst time of their lives.

However, I find this relentless expectation that you have to be positive, keep busy, build a new life makes me feel worse than ever.

I was positive on March 17th that my partner and I would have many happy years of retirement ahead of us.
I’ve been busy all my life, working to ensure a good life.
Now I’m alone for the rest of my life.
I have all the time in the world and nothing that I want to do with it.

Yorkshire lad , I wish you well for tomorrow however you choose to spend it. I hope you find some happy memories of your beloved wife.

12 remember, sometimes you just need to lie in the sofa and cry.
Grieve for your loved one not try and blog them out with frantic activity.
Wishing everyone a peaceful night. Jx

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I know exactly how you feel? One minute you’re fine and the next you’re not.
It’s like a rollercoaster you want to get off but it never seems to stop.
Rollercoaster will get smaller and you won’t be going as fast so you can control it slightly better

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You know, I can so relate to what you are going through because exactly the same is happening to me.
I was determined to not be a poor sad woman. I was strong (or so I thought), I could and would get through this. I had a cry everyday but like you thought I was doing so well. (well sort of). Then I took an almighty nosedive after something in my life didn’t go quite to plan and rocked the boat and then like you didn’t want to do things that I normally enjoyed. I struggled with the dog walks. I didn’t want to go to the allotment but once there do enjoy it. Everything seems an effort and I have to make myself do things. I couldn’t be bothered with the forum either for a while. I haven’t got the luxury of hiding under the duvet but sometimes would love to but my dogs get me up and I am grateful for their help because without them I’m not sure what would have happened to me by now. I feel as if that great weight of grief is now back to weigh me down and wonder if my face gives me away because I do try to be outwardly sociable but tears come on a whim wherever I am I am now longing to go to a remote place with no telephone, internet, or people, just me and the dogs and try to find some peace.
My friend who lost her husband a few years ago told me that it is arriving in the second half of our grief. Accepting that this is our life now. At first we have so much to do and think about. I am reading a book that explains that we have to accept the grief and not fight it to get through it. It says to chant silently a prayer/poem/anything as we sit/walk and eventually we will find some peace and love ourselves again. I’ll give anything a go.
So you are not alone there’s many of us down that black hole and not for the first time but take heart that we will get out of it.
Pat

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Hi YL, I like your thinking on spending the day alone. Everyday we miss our loved one so why should another day be any different. I certainly don’t want to dwell on the final day. I want to remember the good times, our love. I don’t count days, weeks, months.it’s irrelevant, time makes no difference, so perhaps I can blank out the day, on the other hand I could think of it as the day my beloved boy became free of such pain and fear and went onto a wonderful place full of love and happiness. That’s how I like to think of him now.

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I to have slipped down that black hole after losing my husband 8 months ago I though I was doing well, like you pat I thought I was strong and could get through anything, I had a manic 4 months of redecorating all the upstairs of my home, getting the garden in shape, then I felt lost, my purpose had gone, my mood became very low and then two weeks ago my sister died, she was with me and my children when my husband died, I spoke to her every day she was my rock, tomorrow is her funeral and I feel like I have been pushed right back to where I was, can I climb back up, I really don’t know, the way I feel now I don’t feel I have the energy take care x

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I am so, so sorry that you have yet another loss in your life. No wonder you have fallen down that black hole again.
I was exactly the same as you. It took me weeks to sort through paperwork and Brian’s things, shed, loft etc. I also decorated and moved a ton of muck on the allotment. Just as things became easier I had a health scare, something I had never had before, and promptly went downhill again. It doesn’t take much but the loss of your sister must be devastating and I can’t imagine what is going on in your head. Please dig deep for strength to get through this traumatic time. My thoughts and prayers are with you. Take care Pat xxx

YL you have been an inspiration to me as we have “walked” this first year together through this forum . 13/8/18 was the day my husband left home to hospital, never to return home and to leave me on 29/8/18. Where has the year gone? How have I survived? It would appear I have. I hate my new life but function on many levels - I must. I am a mother, daughter, sister, friend and “boss” at work.
Mindset and outlook is crucial to surviving devastating loss. Many a time I have been “swimming” just above surface. For me the way to survive is to live in the here and now - don’t dwell / don’t project and always know you were loved dearly. Thinking of you YL - your lovely wife would be so proud of you. Cx

Hi Jackie I agree with you regarding .expectations when you have spent 43 years with someone as I did with my wife Jane keeping busy working all our lives trying not to bother anyone and enjoying our own company conforming to these expectations makes to me feel worst especially when you are left on your own no children or relatives as I am.
I grieve in my own way trying to live a life as we have always done impossible without my Jane I know but I would like to think it keeps me as close to her as possible .

Fate is what brought us together
Grief is what fate took away.
Kind regards MM69

Thinking of you today YL x

Thinking of you today YL x

To Barbcon-I am so sorry for the loss of your beloved Sister. I came to this site a few months after the loss of my precious Sister. She too was my “rock,” and we also spoke every day, many times a day. My Sister and I supported each other after the death of our Mom. Our siblings shared a history with us, that no one else did. A Sister can be a best friend and a soul mate. Mine was both, and it sounds like yours was as well. Your loss is so fresh, and those early days can be so shocking and confusing. My thoughts are with you today, at this time of such devastating, compounded loss. Take care and post again when you are ready. Xxx, Sister2

Thinking of you today YL
William

Reading your post it does make sense that the first period of grief, for some not all, are spent on keeping busy.
There appears so much to be done and completed in that initial period.
It also provides much needed proof that it is possible to manage on your own but also perhaps fills the mind in an attempt to cope with such a traumatic event.
Perhaps after a manic six months of completing various delayed projects my mind can now deal with the enormity of what has happened, so it’s time to reflect and grieve for a while.
Accept the grief and not fight it as you say.
I shall always miss my wonderful partner and think of him every single day.
My life however, given time, will move on, it will be different but I shall laugh, cry, and I shall take pleasure in events that unfold otherwise what would be the point in living?
At the moment though it’s just too soon and so very raw.

So well said. I too have faith that one day I will move on and become ‘me’ again. I am not looking for a different life, just a liveable life with hope and, yes, some happiness and meaning to it again. I hope Brian will never leave me but if he does then it will be the right time and I will know it. But I will think of him all the time. that will never change. I certainly don’t want to stay like this. I don’t like myself very much.

Love and best wishes

Pat