Harriet4bill and jamfaz, 3 and 4 week is so very recent, the earlier weeks, however long that is, are unbearable, it is the hardest battle that you can have, its been 17 weeks for me and a sort of numbness has set in, it’s like treading water, waiting for the next stage whatever that is, throughout it has been a constant see saw, roller coaster of emotions, some days it can still be utter crap, other days a little more less intense, problem is you never know what the next day will bring, I do find I am now more capable of dealing with the practicalities, if not the emotions and I try to be a little more positive but even that is hard, my heart goes out to all that are suffering this awful situation, I hope your pain will be a little less as time goes on, we all have to deal with it in our own way, you will not believe it at the moment but you will find a way.
Take care and look after yourselves.
Hello, i also list my partner to Leukaemia after a 15 month battle with AML. Its been the worst ever rollercoaster. I do feel so very sorry for you having been through it myself. Harry lost his battle 22 days ago. Im lost xx
Today is being a bad day. Sitting here in floods of tears - not wanting to be here. I just want to be with Bill, the absolute love of my life. I can’t stand him not being here. I don’t know how to carry on. 
I’m so sorry to hear how you’re feeling. Things must be really tough right now, but please know that there is lots of help out there.
You may find our Grief Guide helpful to browse as you can start by selecting how you’re feeling and it will offer suggestions on articles and resources to support you. Grief Guide also has a journal and memory box that you may like to use to collect your thoughts and remember Bill. Please do take a look.
Shout is also contactable by text, 24/7. You can text REMEDY to 85258 and talk to them about anything.
You can also make an appointment with your GP and ask to be referred to counselling or other support services in your area.
Take good care,
Kate
Sue Ryder Online Community team
Hi Harriet
I really understand how you feel and I can only offer my comfort to you.
I want to be with my husband but I know that can never be.
Maybe at the rainbow bridge hopefully.
I have tried to get on with things at our home but it is so difficult.
I look at our lovely garden and see those jobs he did and I find now so difficult.
I see people going out and about together and I really miss that.
No more simple trips to the garden centre followed by coffee and cake.
No more simple daily chit chat how can that just be gone.
Nothing really helps.Today is thirteen weeks since he left and I find it so hard to deal with.
I expect you like me go over and over the last time we were together.
I understand so offer you all the love and comfort we all of us need.
I loved our trips to the garden centre. My husband had problems with his knees so we bought a mobility scooter and he loved zooming around the centre. We laughed because I would very often lose him and spend minutes trying to see where he had disappeared to. Usually finished off with a coffee. Now all that has gone and I don’t think I will ever be able to visit that garden centre again - too many memories of really wonderful times. I love him so much and would have given him the world if I could 
Harriet, you did give him the world, that’s why he was with you!
My wife was the one who did the planting and we spent a fair bit of time at the garden centre’s and I have tried to continue it this year and like everybody I find my loss unbearable and at first I couldn’t face the garden because she wasn’t “here” but I couldn’t accept that, I felt she was here, she is in my heart, mind perhaps even spiritually, I do talk to her (mostly in my head!) and I find this will settle things down when things are starting to get out of hand emotionally.
Yesterday I was asked to go over to my sister in laws, just for a few hours sitting in the garden catching up, she lost her husband, my brother 20 years ago at a relatively young age, i hadn’t been in much contact for maybe 10 years as she was in another relationship which ended in his suicide but I don’t think the relationship was that good as there seemed to be little grief in the end but now we are making up for the missed years, particularly with my nephew and niece, it was all very pleasant but when I drove home the tears flowed, I guess I was thinking things over and it was all wrong, for me anyway, their lives were in a different place now. mine is crap and my wife was not with me, it was a tough drive home, luckily short and I was so grateful to get back home, lock the gate and I am relatively comfortable back home, sort of with my wife, I find that the house and home is where I am now most comfortable, I want to leave here less and less and don’t know if this will become a problem, it is strange how we are all different, I read about so many bereaved on here who cannot bear to be at home on their own and that must be awful.
I do hope those who are struggling with being in their homes on their own will find a way to reconnect and at least find a little comfort, from a little start it can only grow.
Sorry for the ramblings but sometimes find it a bit difficult to put into words what I am thinking that may be a little comfort.
Take care.
Thank you swift for your thoughts. I can’t face the garden yet, although I did do a little this morning, but ended up in floods of tears. I am best in the house, not wanting to go out. I know I will have to overcome this but not yet. I have never, in all my life, felt so heartbroken
Monday morning and still the tears flow uncontrollably. It’s a lovely sunny morning and I “hate” it. We should be working in the garden, sitting having a coffee while we decide what to do. Instead, when I tried yesterday I just ended up in floods of tears because I had no-one to talk to, no-one to mull over ideas with, no-one to give advice and no-one to laugh with when it doesn’t quite work out.
I’ve got things to do inside so that’s what today holds for me. Still no-one there but I can just about cope with it. I really don’t want to do anything 'cos I can’t see any point to it but know that I must get on with things. Never, in all my life, did I ever think I would feel like this. I knew it would be hard losing my husband, who was my life, who I loved so so much, but it’s almost unbearable. My stepson and stepdaughter have been supportive but they are getting back to their own lives and families and as I don’t have any children of my own I’m basically on my own. The neighbours have been good. Two of them also lost their husbands, albeit a while ago, but they do understand.
My husband and I did everything together. I’m not a very outgoing person and have never found it easy to join things on my own. I really don’t know how I can carry on without him.
It is so very hard. But my friend who is six years in tells me the pain does ease and is not as raw.
Someone told me ‘Just put one foot in front of the other - one day at a time’ easier said than done I know. But what else can we do??? And hopefully the pain will ease for all of us.
Gill.
Hi Harriet, our experiences are very similar except I am now 3 months further down the line, I have been out this afternoon just to pick up some bits, I think I am ok being out until you introduce people into the picture, I suppose its seeing and comparing what seems to be their happy lives as couples, families etc to mine that is pretty crap, there was one elderly ladle sitting on a bench in the shade outside the church, heavily engrossed in a book, in fact she may have been asleep and I wondered if she had or was going through all of this, I wouldn’t have been surprised, anyway, time to leave for home and again the tears started, I know part of it is the thinking and thinking again, recalling memories or thinking of what we would have considered very trivial things will start us off, this time I think there was more to it and that is that part of my shopping was sorting a problem out at the mobile phone shop and needed my attention and I think for the first time the death of my wife was not at the forefront of my mind, this came as a bit of a shock, along with the guilt of how could I allow this to happen?? this causes tears, of course it shouldn’t but does, so you do move forward from the absolute all consuming hell of the early weeks to where I guess I am now, i also find I do not recall easily what I went through early on, I know I did but that is now losing its intensity ( I think this is the body and mind trying to protect, the same happened when I lost my son 20 years ago) and has been replaced by a whole lot of sadness and weary, how long does this last? I have no idea it is still one day at a time, I just hope that I can handle the guilt that now seems to be creeping in, so despite what we are convinced of at the early stages, it does change and I guess it’s not the same for everyone but it does change, so one day at a time, get up, go to bed and almost imperceptibly the raw pain becomes a lot of sadness.
Hi Swift,
You are right,even the most trivial things sets us off,I had strawberries (shop bought) for the first time this year,for years we went to the local farm for a couple of punnets of pyo,one for a cake and the other after dinner with ice cream,this year the strawberries were nice if a bit salty (if you get my drift).
Take care Ron.
I lost my lovely husband just under a month ago. I understand your pain because I am in the same state. I have days when I think I’m coping but then I’m suddenly not. I keep seeing our regular selfies and feel heartbroken. I get a lot of family support but stlll feel profoundly sad. It helps to share this grief with others who feel the same and I hope it helps them too.
Hi @Poll6
I’m so sorry for your loss
Its very early days for you so you will be up and down. On the rollercoaster that is grief you will have many highs and lows.
I too have plenty of suppoert but it doesn’t stop the pain and heartbreak. Posting on here has really helped me. Talking to people who really understand is invaluable
We all help each othet.
Sending you a big hug x
Hi swift and to all of us here this morning,
I did all the planting in our lovely garden and my husband did all the watering and he often grumbled as it took so long and he worried about the water bill
He did the weeding a big job and was fond of what he called the flame thrower.
I wouldn’t attempt that.
Now all of of those jobs are mine and I find them so hard.
The hose has gone haywire and I lugging watering cans.
Hard to enjoy the garden now and I don’t feel like sitting out there on my own
I have phone calls daily and a few visits a week.
However they while welcome Yes it can never ever ever be or make up for loss how can it.
I was looking at the back of a cupboard yesterday and came across a big jar of mincemeat .
I had meant to make sweet mince pies at Xmas but we had so much stuff in all homemade I didn’t get round to it.
That sent me into floods of tears who would have thought that.
He really loved my baking and now he can’t ever have it
Comfort and hugs to all xx
The everyday things make me cry. I’ve just cycled to buy fruit and veg., about a mile away. My husband would see me arrive home, take the shopping in and put my bike away in the garage for me, before we had coffee together. Now I’m crying because I miss him so much. He was healthy and strong. It doesn’t make sense.
I am so sorry,
I can identify with all you have described.
The jobs they did, the things they liked to eat, grateful for company and contact with others but it is not the same connection we had with our loved ones.
There are so many parts to grief. Some take us totally by surprise and hurt us very much.
I suppose all we can do is experience them and then try to occupy ourselves somehow,
I am sure so, so many of us on here understand.
Sending a big hug.
Love,
Rose xx
Like you I can’t face sitting in the garden on my own. We had small plans for it and now I just can’t see the point of doing anything apart from keeping it tidy.
I look in the freezer and see food we’d bought for the two of us. My husband loved cooking and tears fall because he’s not here to enjoy our meals.
I tell myself there’s no point in sitting here crying my eyes out because it won’t bring him back, which ends up with me thinking what is the point to anything and again the tears are there.
I know it’s only 5 weeks since he passed away but I really cannot see a future without him. My stepdaughter phones me every evening and tells me I’m doing well. I know she means we’ll and has been supportive but she doesn’t see me during the day. She doesn’t see the loneliness, the tears which sometimes feel overwhelming.
Before I met my husband I had spent 22 years on my own. I’ve been there, done that, got the tee-shirt - I’m just not ready to face it again. I love him so much and miss him more than words can say.
Before my husband died we got a puppy as Philip thought it would give me a reason to get up and go out after he died, we were thinking of getting one as our old dog died last year. We thought we would have the summer left together with it but Philip died just a few weeks after we got him. Yes it does get me out and people say how lovely you have a dog for company but I want to shout and say a dog doesn’t make me a cup of tea when I get back from work he doesn’t say it’s ok I will drive when I have to go and visit my family he doesn’t say everything is ok when it isn’t I’m sorry but it’s not the dog I want although I do love it - I just want Philip back.
Hi Liro and everyone else on this thread,
It is so helpful to be able to share and express how we really feel about losing our soulmates. The pain of loss is indescribable and even when we become distracted momentarily and are reminded of normality, it is always there in the background. I don’t know how long it will take me to be able to look at a photo of happier times, without dissolving into tears. What we are feeling is the price of having truly loved.
I am grateful for this page and send everyone a big hug.