Just can’t stop thinking about you my darling, I feel like a pressure cooker so full of my love for you but it has nowhere to go and sometimes seeps out in tears and heart brake and others explodes out in a whole tsunami of despair and emptiness. What do I do? Everywhere I turn to try and grasp on to something that might help me cope, there’s nothing, there’s no help, there are no clubs or groups round here and even the doctor has told me (in a very blunt way) that grief is life long for people, ring him back in 4 weeks if I really feel the need too. I miss you so much, you’d just fix me in a second, you’d know what to do and what to say
Sending happy memories and hug reminders - here if you need
X
@Karenlouise - I really relate to your words. The love inside us for those we have lost is still there, in huge amounts. It has no where to go, it seems. I let it out here by talking to T all the time, seriously - all the time. It helps, it is a release. What you have here is a community of people to hold on to, my friend. We know what you are going through. We are you club, your tribe, we are with you. Sue Ryder I think offers some counselling and the Good Grief Trust should be able to signpost you to something reasonably nearby. If that fails - you have us, on here, always. Hold tight. Sending loads of love.
Oh my goodness this is the first post I have replied to - I can’t tell you how much I empathise with you right now. My husband died last October and I feel so lonely and lost. Even with people around me! I keep thinking he is going to come through the door any second too!!!
Obviously the GP needs to learn a little empathy, I know it’s hard and they have to stay tough at times but sometimes they need a little empathy. Sending you so much love and many hugs.
I don’t know how you do it but I end up putting that smile on my face and try to be positive but I seem to do it for others not just for me!!!
Sorry I have ranted and I didn’t want it to become about me and not about you!!! I think this is a lifelong journey now and I feel your heartbreak :adhesive_bandage: that’s kind of what I wanted to say. Take care of you xxxxx
You haven’t ranted at all, grief is the most lonely, horrific, heartbreaking and painful journey I’ve ever had to travel on. I didn’t choose it and neither did my amazing husband, it’s just thrown at you. It turns up and rocks your whole world upside down. Most of the time I function for others, then in between I grieve or go into the deepest darkest places that exist inside me and don’t want to be a part of life anymore. All three places are exhausting physically, emotionally and mentally. I have all this love but my husband isn’t here to give it to. I feel like a pressure cooker ready to explode most of the time but I am frankly to frightened of letting go because I’m not sure where it will lead me too. Every time I reach out and try to do something positive like join a yoga class, speak to a doctor, focus on a half term holiday etc there either are no groups, the doctor pays lip service and listens to me, but doesn’t hear what I’m saying or there are just so many memories the fact I can never make any new ones with my husband are just so overwhelming that you start to feel like why even try??? But somehow we are all still here, doing it. I have no idea at this time how, but we are here giving one another support. Love to you all
Thank you I needed someone to be kind and understand me today. I am a huge football fan and went to football today with one of our sons which I would do under normal circumstances! Steve supported a different team to me!! Always a lot of fun in our house! He was Tottenham I am Arsenal! It kind of linked us too! In a weird way as we loved the banter! … sorry I’ve digressed!!! I had a fabulous day with our middle son - we have 3 sons 32,31 and 29, but driving home I just became emotional as we were driving where Steve and I had driven - coming back off holiday with friends and by the turning we would have got off to take them home. So I cried - I hate doing that in front of the boys because o should be strong. Everyone says be strong but I don’t want to be !!! I want to curl up in a corner with a bottle of something and rock!!!
sounds so pathetic doesn’t it? I just feel so alone and everyone else has their life going on: Steve’s mum rang me today as she has issues - she has 2 other sons! But she rang me to discuss them! I just want to be left alone but I don’t want to be alone! I feel very complicated atm! And I keep waiting for Steve to come home and it’s been nearly 7 months so I know he’s not going to but I keep thinking he is. My heart is broken
:adhesive_bandage: and my head is completely confused! On top of all this our eldest son and his wife are due their first baby in the next week or so and as much as I’m excited - and everyone tells me how wonderful it is and it will make things easier - I am heartbroken that Steve isn’t here to meet his grandchild
am I so horrible to have these thoughts? I am 56 and my life is over
Hi @LouLou65
First of all you’re not horrible, so get that thought out of your head. You are spot on when you say grief is confusing and complicated. I find it feels like a beast, lurking, always lurking ready to swallow you up. You’re coping well one minute, well as well as you can expect, if you keep yourself busy constantly distracting your brain to avoid the grief, to push it back or hold it off. Then it arrives, for me usually over nothing, I might be in Ian’s workshop in the bottom of the garden and I’ll look up and have a memory of him stood looking down at me crafting something out of wood, it’s just the space he stood up on the decking but in my eyes I see him there looking, smiling and usually chuckling at how difficult I would be making sawing a piece of wood. Then he’d come over and show me how to do it and guide me through it. I can’t help myself at the moment I keep going there to re-enact that specific memory, even though that gut wrenching sorrow and sadness follow with the floods of tears quickly after. It’s like I’m prompting myself to self-harm. I just can’t help myself. I have two lovely sons and a great step son, like you I’m in my fifties (51) and simply can’t bare it. I know I’ve got a lot to live for, I’ve got friends and family, I have a nice home which we worked hard for and I’ve got a future. Ian would want me to live every second to its fullest. I absolutely know all this, but, when the grief comes big and strong, all that goes, it just disappears and I get all consumed with not wanting to be here, not wanting to get on with it all because “you’re getting on with it all” for others, not for yourself. Living feels empty, functioning, pointless, going through the motions for everyone else, as it makes them feel better. But for me, it’s simply torcher. Torcher that I visit every single day and night. I know that no-one can fix it, change it, make it go away. I see no end to it because we searched for one another all our lives and once we found each other, it was 100% love, I know it sounds cheesy, but I can’t explain it any other way, we just loved one another as much as two people could. I feel completely helpless without him. I definately feel that the day my husband died so did I but he’s gone and I’m still here. I genuinely feel that it will never go away and the realism of that just reinforces my complete hear brake. I have no answers, I struggle with each and everyday, I have no idea how long I’ll have the strength to keep moving through each day but I know when the dark spells come, they seem to grow more and more intense each time. The trouble is, dying doesn’t frighten me anymore. I keep reaching out for help and support, I reach as hard as I can in the hopes that when people say you learn to carry the grief in a less painful way, that they are right. Only as the days unfold one at a time I may learn the answer to this - unless the dark comes for me to strongly. It’s just a horrific place to be, I have learned that grief does alter it goes from such sadness, to life threatening, to allowing some happiness filter in, to practical household problems,
@Karenlouise I know that feeling of reinactment going over specific memories and hearing the voices the laughter - and panic when I can’t really remember a date and time very well
It is always a shadow and I’m not sure what ever happens to it in the long run
X
Beautifully put, I’ve just had one of those moments. Just been remembering Doug when he was coach driving made me smile thinking of him. Then just half an hour later sat having lunch, looked at his empty chair and the tears are falling. Grief is fickle, you just don’t know when it’s going to hit you. X X
I’m sorry I sound so doom and gloom, I don’t mean to. It just all pours out sometimes, but you guys don’t need my sorrows. Grief is the hardest journey ever, you don’t even recognise yourself anymore. Love to you
Sorry it’s been a tough day - it’s been a tough day here too -
I watched something set in the 90s and all the music and soundtrack of the time got me triggered and so full of memories - how mad is that ? Totally out of the blue
X
But that is what we are on here for, to listen and share and encourage and cry together.
No one needs to say sorry for how they feel and are in pain and struggling. Love to you all
That’s so very sad . I am further down the road - over 2 years now . Also much older as I was 70 when my hubby died . Never easy BUT I had more years and hubby met and loved our nine grandchildren . SO you are in a very different place to me . I still feel terribly sad but cope by focusing on my family and trying to help as best I can .
I do hope you still have a future with your lovely sons and forthcoming grandchild . Yes there are very sad days when you miss your man like crazy BUT there will be joy I promise you .
Take care and sending hugs and caring thoughts for the years ahead
I lost my husband 6 weeks ago. Totally unexpected. I’m just eaten up with this overwhelming guilt. I should have done something, why didn’t I tell him more often how much I love him. How funny he was. How much I needed him. Just everything. My life is so empty now. Yes I have family but they get on with their lives & as much as I love them - they are not who I need. I need my husband.
Hi @Patz144, I’m so sorry for your loss. We all feel that guilt, I often think back to the last day my husband was with me. The what if’s, why didn’t I call the ambulance sooner, why didn’t I say a final goodbye to him while he was still talking to me, because I never dreamt that he wasn’t coming home.
The guilt can eat you up, I should have said I Iove you more and not got annoyed over silly things.
If we all could just turn the clock back, but we can’t. You just have to be kind to yourself and remember you do love each other and that will never stop even though he is physically not here. Just hold onto that.
We are all here for you
Debbie X X
We all have guilt whether a sudden death or after an illness ! No loss of our soulmate is ever easy BUT a sudden and unexpected death is doubly sad .
It is such early days so be kind to yourself and take an hour at a time . Discover the times in the day when you feel your very worst and focus on those times by finding something positive to do - a walk in the fresh air - a chat to a caring friend - coffee and cake - music ! Anything and if it makes you cry so what it doesn’t matter !
I wish you strength for the days and weeks ahead and don’t look too far ahead just focus on the now ! The guilt will stay but will soften . Our husbands loved us and no one can take that away .
Sending love