My family and friends are wonderful and caring but can’t be with me all the time. I am conscious that the children are grieving too and being strong for me.
We were married 41 years and disagreed on most things but never went a day without telling each other we loved them.
I fill time but the loneliness is getting worse and now I have started to dream. In every dream I am trying to get to my husband and I can see him but not reach him and then I wake agitated.
People ask if I am ok, and I am on a practical level but not emotionally but it’s only 8 weeks and very sudden.
Sjc, your timescale is the same as mine, insofar as it is eight weeks (and four days) since I lost my wonderful wife.
We were married for 51 years, a few more than you.
I fully share your appreciation of friends and family, and your concern for their grief too.
Similarly to you, my wife and I would have independent opinions and views which neither of us were backward in expressing, but we both knew how deep and totally meaningful the mutual love and respect between us was - and still is.
I feel that my love for my wife is unique, personal, and so her loss is utterly overwhelming.
Familiar words of condolence will no doubt be extended to you by others on this forum as they were, and are, to me. The kindness, sincerity and shared understanding of experience which lies behind them will, I hope, provide you with a little comfort.
I have always been considered to have a reserved, if not withdrawn, personality. I am very wary of overfamiliarity in any dealings with people and particularly so in the few internet forums that I have ever subscribed to - I am concerned about personal security and I always disable PM options, for example, a rule that I have absolutely no intention of breaching.
That said, I was struck by the fact that your opening post could almost have been written by me.
Thank you Edwin for taking the time to reply.
At the moment the feeling I have from this forum is that it settles my mind a little to know that others have similar thoughts. At least it helps to know that I am not going a little bit mad.(that is how I feel at times).
My husband was the more reserved until he knew someone and then he becomes the funny joker. I would talk to anyone but found it hard to post here because it seemed odd to put my thoughts into words that strangers would read.
In the quiet times I can’t imagine ever feeling good again. Motivation to do anything is lacking. I do push myself mainly for my little dog who is only here because John wanted him.
Thanks again
I haven’t had many dreams, at least none that I remember having. Mind you, I hardly dare going to sleep because each and every wakening brings anew the moment of realisation that she is gone.
I first posted here a little over three weeks after my love died, and just a couple of days after her funeral. I suppose that I was looking for something, anything, which might help in some way that I could not specify. At first I didn’t think the forum provided it - it was just full of tales of misery which were not relieved by repetitious answers. Much as one may sympathise, why expose oneself to more unhappiness when one is burdened with more of one’s own than Is bearable ?
At one point I counted 16 widowers and widows in the immediate area of my village, (and I missed several in that count) and it seemed to me that these people, who I know and who knew my wife, could offer the information and support that might help. Surely better to talk to them than what I think I described as “disembodied electronic entities” or something similar. I don’t think that went down terribly well in some quarters, and I am sorry for that because I never, ever want to cause anybody any hurt ever again no matter how slight.
The early advice was to keep reading the forum even if I didn’t post. I now guess that I’d give that advice to you too, as I am now a compulsive forum reader. Putting my finger on just why it helps (if indeed it does - I’m still not 100% sure) is difficult. I suppose that I ration my posts, not least by deleting many drafts before sending, having spent a lot of time composing them !
Motivation to do anything is lacking for me, and then I find myself stressing about those things I should do, but haven’t.
We (so hard to say “I”) have two dogs, a big ‘un and a little ‘un. Whilst I walked both together off lead in the mornings (we live on Salisbury Plain) my wife would take the little chap on his own around the village in the afternoons, whilst I took the big girl for her necessary long leg stretch. My wife, with her little dog, became a much loved feature, and my mobile ‘phone wallpaper is a b/w photo of them sitting on a bench on the village green, with the little fellow doing his “shake hands” trick.
I say we and don’t think that will change. Everything in my life we did or chose together and so it will always be we.
I expect there will be times to come when I have to do something on my own, maybe that will be when I say I.