I have been trying to analyse why we all seem to feel such despair apart from the obvious loss we have suffered. I think however much we loved and cared for our loved ones their ending just wasn’t as perfect as we would like to have planned. If they died unexpectedly we may feel we let them down in some way or weren’t there for them. If they were ill we torture ourselves with what if’s and could we have done more. We go back over what we could or should have done and ask ourselves ‘why did they have to die’. We loved them so much that we wanted everything to be perfect for them so that we could relax and feel contented that we did everything we could. We probably did do enough but not enough to satisfy us. Perhaps it’s survivors guilt - why are we still here and not them. All these questions can keep the mind over-active and over guilty. does anyone else have any thoughts on this.
Hi Jean I think we all go over and over it in our heads. We know deep down we done everything we could to help our husbands but we may always think this way I hope not. In our conversations we know we did still doesn’t stop us thinking. Sending love xx
I agree, I have a lot of guilt about if I should have ignored the 999 operators advice and moved my husband’s head and cleared his airway instead of chest compressions like she said. That I suggested pizza for tea the night before and that on a long walk the day before I got tired and so when my mum lost her hat my husband went back to look for it and when he came back with back pain I know now that was the start of his fatal heart attack but I let him take his cocodomol and didn’t push harder. I also made him a cherry brandy which probably contributed and we had scone with clotted cream for supper instead of our usual boiled egg.
I know logically none of it matters now.
Today I had a long thinking session and I was thinking would it be better if he just had hated me and done something dastardly like run off with another woman so I could hate him too. would that be better and I’d cope better? I don’t know.
I don’t feel guilt, just terrible sadness, I really did all I could for him and I was at his side, also looked after him at home as he wanted. His passing was very peaceful and at home. Of course I relive his last breath with me but he is no longer in pain and no longer worrying about me. He hung on because he didn’t want to leave me. He always looked after me, at least it was my turn to look after him. Bless him, he always put me first even before our kids. God I miss him, i did promise him I would carry on with my life and I must keep that promise. Take care and love to everyone Margarita
I read somewhere “you only feel mis-placed guilt if you have a loving & caring nature = good wife”.
I feel the same as a loving caring=husband .
Quite right, I should have put wife or husband or partner.
We so overthink everything and its just automatic and we make ourselves feel bad. I also find myself saying what if ----and we should have --and trying to change the outcome with things we should or could have done and we make ourselves feel ill with all these thoughts .I try to tell myself to stop thinking like this as there’s no good outcome from it but its hard. . We need to be kinder to ourselves and know that we did everything we could at the time We just want to go back to our old life and accepting this won’t happen is just too much sometimes and we so want to change it -love and strength x
No offence intended by the way xx
I love your post. Plans, plans, plans. Regrets. Timing missed. Trust misplaced. Vulnerability and terror ignored. I don’t know. I really don’t. I’m going to light a candle in a quarter of an hour and hope it adds up to something.
To Trac. Yes we definitely overthink everything. When you think of how we who are left are suffering at the moment it makes you wonder if they had the better bargain. They may have been ill or in pain but we were there for them so they would have felt safe. They will not be there for us, and do any of us feel safe at the moment? We loved them and saw them safely to the end of their days. We definitely do feel misplaced guilt and hoped we could have done more. I struggled with that for ages and kept replaying it in my head. I still wouldn’t want him to be here now and to one day have to go through what I am suffering. Let our loved ones rest in peace and let our hearts slowly begin to heal. Love to you Trac.x
hi Jean. I agree with everything you have wrote, i lost my sister on may 29 she died of pancreatic after being diagnosed in August 2019. she died in a Hospice in whittigton Lichfield. it was not suppose to be like this my sister Tracey just went in there for a blood transfusion it was safer going there than going in to hospital because of covid. So Tracey was in for 7 weeks and because of lock down we did not see Tracey for 3 weeks and that really gets to me just when you need your family you are unable to see them.