Sorry if this is too long. Its just shy of six months since I lost my husband my soulmate. The person who really understood me and who liked doing the things I liked doing. I am 58 he was 64 and we were just at the stage where we were doing the things we really wanted to, weekends away, shows, eating out together just loving being a couple again after bringing up a family and planning for out retirement.
Ironically I am a trained counsellor and recognise the grief structure but I just don’t see a future. Everything I enjoyed with him I don’t want to do alone. Strolling by a river hand in hand then an afternoon tea in a cute tearoom is not something I can do alone. Waking up and saying shall we go to Buxton for a walk and breakfast and a look round the market? I don’t want to do that alone. I know I am being specific here and its so much more than that the kisses, the cuddles the I love you the things that make life worth living are gone. The cruises we planned, the bucket list items just …gone. My sons and sister hate me saying it as if I am going to do something to myself and I wouldn’t do that to them but I feel so flat and that I don’t want to wake up in the morning without him. Medication has not changed the facts I have no future happiness. We didn’t have friends and I have always been a quite solitary person we were happy as a family unit and as a couple. I tried joining a choir as I love singing but most of the songs made me cry and nobody really talks to you anyway. I suppose I am just moaning here but thought others here might understand how I feel. I just miss us so much.
Hi Debzz, I can relate completely to what you are saying. I lost my wife over 122 weeks ago and my life has been in limbo ever since. She was 58 and passed just 7 weeks after a cancer diagnosis. I find absolutely no joy in life now. I just feel sad and lonely every day without her. How I long to give her a kiss, a hug, hold her hand, talk to her, see her smile, hear her laugh, make plans for the present and the future with her by my side. I now wander aimlessly day to day through this existence in a daze. It’s so hard to take the loss of the most precious person in the world that is taken away from you.
Hello Debzz, I know exactly where you’re coming from. The joy has gone and been replaced by anxiety and utter heartbreak. I was interested to read that you’re a trained counsellor. I have had 6 sessions so far and am beginning to wonder if it’s doing me any good. I pour my heart out, but I know that nobody can really help me.
The counsellor listens and makes sympathetic noises - but what can anyone do? We’re stuck with our grief, it seems. I sympathise with everything you said.
I have found that even when you are around others, grief makes your life a very lonely place. In fact, i think it can feel even lonlier when you are around people who cannot really understand how you are feeling. Well that’s my excuse for hiding myself away anyway!
I lost my partner and his Dad does keep in touch, makes attentive conversation and all the reassuring noises, but i just think that although he has lost one of his sons which no loving parent wants, he still doesn’t know how it feels to have the person you were planning to spend the rest of your life with taken away in an instant…
Every morning it feels like waking up to the same old heartbreak. Here we go again… i think i am going through an angry/bitter/depressive stage 
The six month slump for me,is real. Its hard i did counselling it seemed to work for an hour, yes i could do that. You go back to your empty house and bang. It was good to talk to someone, without fear of upsetting them. Even though i did make her cry.
I go to a bereavement coffee morning, which if i am honest is hit and miss. I have just done this week a volunteering session at a cancer shop. As you know what works for one doesn’t work for the other.
The future is hard to see, you see a show or a gig and shout out do you fancy going to this ? Eating alone is hard. I try to get a coffee out sometimes, but then i feel self conscious. So rant or ramble on here if it helps, we are here for each other.
Dear @Debzz I’m sorry for your loss. My 52 year old husband died in his sleep in March this year.
I understand the loneliness and utter heartache. Every day I wake up feeling numb and just existing because that’s what people expect of me.
The tears come at night when I think “I haven’t talked to C all day…” so I listen to a recording of his voice just to feel that I’m not alone.
It’s the worst. For me, I doubt the heartache will improve - I’ll just get better at wearing my “I’m doing well” mask.
Warmest of hugs to you.
Hello Debzz. I fully understand how you feel I lost my husband of 53 years 2 years and 5 months ago . I still feel so lost without him I go to various clubs and they help while I’m there and I put on a face which says I’m doing ok but as soon as I get home the desperate loneliness is there all I want to do is tell Chris all about it. If he were still alive I wouldnt have gone as we did everything together. I like you cant go to places we went together and can’t think about ever going on holiday again my Counsellor said try a Singles holiday but I think what is the point as Chris wouldn’t be with me. I feel I am trying my best and all I can say to you is the life I have now is not the life I thought I would have nor the life I want but it is all there is now and I try to think Chris would want me know that he is still with me in my heart if not here beside me and I’m holding his memory to me. I hope you can find some peace in the coming months and years as I do the pain is still with me but perhaps in a small way not so intense. Sending you a virtual hug.
Thank you, all of you. Its nice not to feel alone even though this is a club I would want nobody to join. I do believe in counselling , it saved me after the death of my son 11 years ago because no one else wanted to hear how desperate I felt, they wanted me to move on whereas the counsellor listened to me. But I know it did not do anything else for me because deep sadness cannot be fixed by anyone else. We heal as much as is possible to do so in our own time and a good counsellor can encourage communication with the outside world and a space for us to cry without masking our feelings which we tend to do with the people we know.
I thought I had reached rock bottom when Aric died but my husband and I had each other to talk to and we supported each other. After a couple of years we started to move forward making plans for the future and just carrying our sadness with us. I just feel so empty now. Thank you for listening,
I can identify with a lot of what you say. I too find that there’s not much meaning in life now - we were a team and I feel lost without him.
I’m only at the 2 months stage, so I can’t give you much in the way of solid suggestions, but I hope you can find some meaning in life and, meanwhile, sending you hugs and strength.
Hi
I feel exactly the same lost my wife a few weeks ago ,we were like 2 peas in a pod
She was my future my life.
Like you said i cannot bare to go anywhere without her with me , we use to call at a little cafe in town for breakfast sometimes
But i cant imagine i will ever go in there again now!
Its the thought i cant do the things we use to do together anymore it just hurts too much
X
I’m so sorry for your loss. It’s so tough especially when you’ve been in a close knit family, and just when you’re finally starting to have a little more spare time to enjoy being just the two of you. Like you, we were at a similar stage in our life and mostly spent time with our boys or having a coffee, walk or trip to the garden centre. It is those things that are the things you miss most, just sharing the day to day, not the big things. Don’t give up hope, the day to day does start to feel more ‘normal’ but just not the same. It’s two years now for me and I still can’t quite believe he’s gone and I’m still grieving. Sending love and hugs, you will get through this with your lovely family behind you. Take care xx
Hi Debzz,
I think you are incredibly brave.
It’s been 4 years since my Husband passed suddenly, it took 19 minutes, minutes I will never forget! I was 61 and he was 66.
My hubby had just retired, he lost his father earlier in the year and made a decision to stop work.
5 months he lived to claim his state pension, he’d worked so hard all his life. I was furiously angry that he’d been robbed, we had been robbed.
My heart is still broken, I’m terrified constantly worrying about the up keep of my home ( I had to downsize due to finances)
I still feel I cannot live without him, he was my world.
HI Thank you for your kind words. I do get through the day but as you say nothing will be the same again I have to create a new normal . I am now 8 months in it still feels like a nightmare. One day at a time I guess xx
Hi IzzyDizzy Thank you for the reply. I too am terrified at the finances and angry he paid all his life for his state pension and never reached it. He was robbed of his retirement and he had worked so hard all his life it was so unfair. I don’t believe our hearts will ever heal, I just push on hoping I will feel happy again one day but as I said earlier I cope one day at a time xx
Hi Nigel3 It is those small cosy moments we had with themthat hurt the most. I am eight months in and I now function and get through the day. I hope you feel more able to cope soon xx
Thank you. Keep talking on here it really helps to talk to those who understand . I am so sorry you have joined this dreadful club xx
Hi
Sometimes i feel ok and think ,thank god im getting over the worst and i feel better
And then the smallest of things and im back where i was
Just takes something i see or a memory of her and the tears begin to flood totally out of my control.
Ive gone from a normal happy life to nothingness .we should of had many more years
I was 10 yrs older than her i was hoping i would go first .
And she could have the house and go travelling .
God gives with one hand and takes away with the other