Hello, it’s coming up to 18 months for me now. Every day I wake up and think of my wife, I talk to her, think of her opinions and try to fit them into my present. I think of her wishes for me when she was ill and how she wanted me to move on, find another way of living. My wife was my world, and I assume that I was hers. Her words in her last months have helped me so much in being able to carry our love forwards, but I am here now and she is not and I believe that she would support my choices. I construct my own future, my own life. I’ve come to understand that this is what she wanted for me: make decisions, make the effort, see the world as I see it, not through her eyes, but through mine. It’s the gift that she has given me: to be myself, the person she loved. Why would I try to be anything else? Take your partners love and allow it to set you on your course, live the life they would have wanted for you, not the life you feel you should live for them. It’s freedom, and when I think of my wife, I know she would be happy with that. Know yourself, go where you want, do what you do, I know in myself I can ask nothing more X
Good advice, I’m weeks of a year and I know I need to find a new way to live but not at a stage where I’m ready too yet
@Sah28 All i can say is work at it, and if you are keep going, keep working, keep thinking, keep trying to make it work for YOU. It’s really what my wife wanted for me to do. I’ve been out walking in the Scottish Borders with a very good friend of both my wife and I, a widow in herself. Our friend and I keep going, keep building new ways of living, we both agree, know, that its what our partners would and did want for us. We walk the paths, think of them and keep going x
It’s nice to hear that, I’ll keep trying I have to for our kids (22,19 and 12)
@Sah28 keep trying for yourself, if you can sort that, and you can, then you will be so much more to your kids. I’ve found if I believe in myself, find the person that my wife believed in, the rest just comes and, for me, it becomes magical and easy. Sorry, hope this helps, but it really gave me something to work with. I was loved for a reason x
@Walan Thank you for those wise words and encouragement. I am only 12 weeks in. At present I still see myself as Steve’s Girlfriend, I don’t see that changing for a long time. But eventually I know that things will need to change and I will make it happen.
I have also come to acknowledge that we are/were all once completely separate individuals/identities to our spouses and now that separation from them has become a physical reality through death, it’s time to become one with ourselves and discover who we are again. I want to live my life now for me and not a ‘part of’ or ‘for’ anyone else. I will always love and miss my husband but that is now where it stops. It’s not about what he wanted for me, it’s what I want for me. When we are born our umbilical cord was cut and we were released from any attachment, free of bonds and in the same way death too releases us. Love is indeed freedom and doesn’t tie us to anything. Pain and heartbreak is always about an ‘attachment’ I have a heart full of love for my departed loved one’s knowing they will always reside there but my soul is free to live only through myself …erm very philosophical for a Sat afternoon lol
Thats made me cry … i miss him so much atm but youre right they would want you to live your life i know … 16 months into this and i been so emotional last few weeks but ive been a bit poorly last few weeks - it makes you wonder how much of a toll this grief takes on our bodies ! Was never poorly before 
been so hard without him here to lean on :(.xx
Bliming heck yeh that is philosophical! Lol … but youre right we have to live our lives ! Its just that i not got a damn clue where mine is going !!! It feels so unstable and unclear … i hate it ! I hated that before i met my husband and i hate it now … being married was best thing that ever happened to me ! I loved it … xx
I went out last night with a friend and her husband, it was a good night and I had a few drinks, danced and enjoyed myself, when I got home the deafening silence hit me like a ton of bricks along with the realisation that I want to start over and meet a special someone who I can share my life with. I know it may not happen but the fact I am open to it left me a bit surprised. I don’t know what that scenario will look like, either a close companionship or relationship, who knows but I want a future. He will never replace my husband but I still have love to give and to receive, none of us can see around the next corner but knowing we are open to explore all possibilities gives us hope.
I also think single life as a lot to offer to… the marriage bit doesn’t bother me as long as I know I am with the right person for me. At the moment life is a mystery until we follow a path…
Really ??? Aw … you were really agsinst it a while ago and im same i want to meet somebody too…its too lonely by yourself isnt it ? Xx
Yeah to be honest I never in my wildest dreams thought I would say that but another possibly 20 plus years alone is too daunting…x
Its hard though to imagine not being part of that person anymore! Struggling to be a single person again without that person who made you feel complete and one with yourself. My loss hass only been 3 weeks. I deal with loss in my job. Ive had training to deal with it. But nothing prepares you for the big gaping hole it leaves in your life. I hope you can take some time to care for yourself x
Its so hard isnt it and youre right nothing prepares you for it ! Its too personal. No amount of training. I read a book called languages of loss by sasha bates who was a psychologist and she lost her husband and struggled so much too. Xx
Yes, very true! No amount of reading on grief changes how you’re feeling. Everyone’s grief is different from them . You just have to find your way through the maze and hope things will get easier as time goes on. Ive experienced grief before when my dad died 10 year’s ago. But its not the same to spending your life with your husband or partner. Its a very different loss. Xx
It certainly is completey different losing the person you spent everyday with … its flipping awful x
You should read that book ! It might help you ya know - personally i loved it ! So insightful x
Good morning Debbie, Your comment really grabbed me in that my wife gained her masters in psychology and spent many years as a qualified counsellor dealing mostly in person centred and NLP disciplines, she gave time to cruise bereavement in the early days among others before we moved to Spain where she again practised for private clients and provided free counselling sessions for relatives of those in a cancer hospice in Malaga.
In the seven weeks that we had to talk before she died we obviously discussed what I might do,how I might survive without her and when I said to her what is the one thing that you would advise me to do she started crying after which she said " even with my vast experience I can’t think of just the one thing because I know what is coming,and that’s why I hoped you would go first,"
Needless to say since then the only positive that I feel from losing her, and today has been yet another of relentless tears,is that she isn’t here going through this. My wife was a highly respected practioner within her profession but at the end as much as she loved me she knew that in this instance there wasn’t any preparation that would help.
In my lifetime I have been around the block a few times,sat with a guy for almost an hour after he shot himself with a twelve bore,I’ve got through some pretty tough times like many people on here but when you lose that one very very special person that completes who you are then the world changes and nothing can switch it back. That’s the size of the task for all of us on here.
Hope you are okay,you take care.x
Aw … morning. Sunny here but feeling sad today… glad you liked my post … have you read that book? Its brilliant and might help you too especially if your wife was a psychologist ? Sending you hugs as sounds like youre having a tough day too - its the bank holidays that do me in tbh… i hate them without him here and you’re right the only positive is that they dont have to go through this … my husband thought i would be ok ! How wrong he was ! xxx
Thanks Deb, my name is Nye by the way. Big hugs xx