MAX74,
Sadly for me there are too many trigger songs. The words you quoted are so on point, and the comment about driving in tears happens to me often. I know my agreeing with you doesn’t make your hurt any less, but I just want you to know I understand in my own way what you feel. I am at 13 months and I am unable to move forward and each day seems worse than the one before. Take care, John
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I feel your pain
It’s so hard and heartbreaking I can’t listen to bbc radio 2 as me and my husband listened every day
I just can’t do it I’ve still got all his clothes and shoes some people think I’m nuts!! But I’m not ready for that part yet no way
Take care
From
Deborah
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Here we are another milestone, my first Easter without Jean, and I feel awful. simply awful. Bad memories keep flooding back.
Last year was the start of the end in my opinion. Taking the grandchildren’s Easter eggs over to my Daughters, I was holding her and the Eggs and as we approached a slight incline in the driveway I let her go so that I could free an arm and in that split second she fell over and badly gashed her forehead, eye socket, nose and top lip etc
I will never forget, it’s imprinted on my mind forever. The only comfort is that people with Alzheimer’s sometimes do not feel as much pain as normal but needless to say that the whole family was mortified. We did take her
to the Urgent Treatment centre.
It’s all these episodes and there were many of them that makes me so so sad and haunt me. I can’t get these things out of my mind. I suppose that eventually things will improve, but for me it will take a long long time.
Someone said to me the other day that I’m trying to live my life now as if Jean is still alive. I think their right. I do the same shopping, have the same meals, I talk to her, I go out to the same places. I have two towels out with two flannels.
Everything is as it was before Jean went into her final phase in hospital. I just can’t at the moment stop myself. I know it’s got to change but I have a block at the moment.
Sorry to rant and rave and go on about it. I just wish that I could occasionally forget, but I can’t.
Yours emotionally
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MAX74,
As someone who lost the most important person ever in my life, I understand some of what you say. I am at 13 months and nothing has gotten better for me. My loving wife was not suffering as Jean was from Alzheimer but her Mother was suffering dementia and we had our episodes with her. I can’t seem to move forward at all without my loving wife. So I come here and I vent and write what I feel and I think that is what you are doing as well. I am no expert but keep doing it if it helps in any way even if you are not sure it does. We need to express our feelings and the people here do understand, at least a little in our own way. Take care, John
Thank you John9 for your comments.
Here I am sitting in bed with a cup of tea, listening to Jean’s voice, thinking of past times, looking at a photo of her. in absolute bits. The tears are coming out and saying “ Jean I miss you” a couple of times.it is so so difficult and tortuous. What have I got to look forward to now ?
Sorry
Max74
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Hi Max,
I’d imagine you would feel very bad letting her go and her falling over…
Sadly mist of us remember all the things we regret the most over the nicer memories.
I watched a series called the vampire diaries and they have the ability to turn off their emotions when they feel heart ache, an ability I’m sure alit of widows would contemplate.
It is hard letting go and accepting they have gone, and I guess no-one can tell you when you should do that only you can decide that.
We all know I suppose we need to move on and start a new life(easy said then done)find new hobbies, a new purpose, new friends, it is scary starting over again.
Our old life as we know it is over, but we still have a life to lead and none of our loved ones would want us wallowing and not living.
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Thank you Lostinlimbo for your comments I hear what your saying.
For me Jean was my world, in my opinion my only shot at a loving marriage, and after being with her for 56 years and married for 51 years I cannot see how I am going to better that. She meant everything to me and more and having to care for her during her last 7 or so years without support , although indescribably tough at times, brought us even closer. The trouble is that I can’t discard or move on from if you like my old life now or possibly for ever. The memories
are too many, varied and vivid and the trouble is if I started to forget the past I would consider that I was letting her down. I not only loved her but cherished her, and nobody could fill her shoes.
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MAX74,
I sadly understand and agree in my own way. I was with my loving wife for 35 years and married for 34. She was my everything and without her I am lost, I never had the chance to be a caregiver to her like I was to my friend and MIL but would have done anything for my loving wife. Take care, John
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Hey Max,
Although we both lost our wives we are certainly not in the same boat.
You must be 70+ whereas I’m only 47, I was only with my with 26yrs you doubled me… So I completely understand it’s far more harder to find a new life for you then it is me.
In your shoes i wouldn’t have a clue what I’d do, my age helped me I guess knowing I could live another 40+ years I certainly couldn’t just wallow and let life pass me by, but regardless of what you want from life now if anything at all I really do wish you the best, I certainly don’t envy you and for what it’s worth I really am sorry you lost your Jean.
Take care Max.
To John9
Thank you for your reply. It’s only words I’m afraid that I can give you. but I am genuinely sorry for your loss. I understand how you feel. Your love for your wife comes through on your replies. Life is so cruel in a way, you love someone so much, you go through life’s experiences. you invest everything you have with your partner and then the most indescribable, most horrible thing happens and you loose the most precious thing in your life. and then you have to carry on with a pretend smile on your face. with people saying things like “ How are you” and you feel like shouting back “ How do you think I’m doing”, but you don’t.
You go into this unimaginable different world, you feel grief, tears every day, you can’t take in what’s happened and you have to somehow soldier on. Well I’m sorry but at times it’s too much to bear. I admit it that I’m going through it like I guess you are. It’s horrible and unfair. As I’ve said before and I am not ashamed to say it again, that I would have gladly gone at the same time as Jean, but I know that firstly, I didn’t and secondly that it’s not possible.
I just suppose somehow I’ll have to soldier on.
Best wishes and regards to you John9
Take care
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MAX74,
You are correct, I would have gone at the same time as my loving wife and that was they way we thought it would be. It should have not been for at least another 20 years based on my loving wife’s family history, she shouldn’t have died at 53. I have said it and will again, I don’t know how or why I am still alive. I have been under stress for 13 years and extreme stress for the last 6 years and it was worse after my loving wife died. I do soldier on and I try and coming here and writing about my loving wife does help me. Nobody knows the future but the present is hard. Take care, John
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I am not looking forward to May 15 as it will be the anniversary of Jean’s…… I can’t even say it let alone write it.
I’m dreading it. I feel that I want to hide away.
I feel absolutely devastated at the loss of Jean. I have an overriding sense of sadness and grief. Caring for her like I did has made her loss impossible to accept. If someone had said 7-8 years ago that I would have to look after Jean, 24 hours a day, give Jean her pills, wash, dress her, toilet her, console her when she cried, look after the household chores, monitor her condition etc, I would have said that I don’t think I can do it, but because she meant so much to me that I did it but it did my own health no good at all.
As a carer I feel the loss intensely as caring for her became my whole purpose in life, especially during Covid. Sometimes I question did I do enough ?
I feel alone and a times lonely
I feel lost as the pillar of my life and best friend has gone
I feel that I am drifting
I find it difficult, no impossible to accept that I won’t hear Jean’s voice again
I talk sometimes to her
I am emotionally very fragile
I say a goodnight and a prayer every night
I live my life currently as if she’s still here
I haven’t moved anything that was in place before she left to go to the hospital
Her clothes are untouched
I replicate our previous life
I cannot move forward and I feel that time has stood still
I find it very emotional when I think ahead to a special event or Birthday and I realise that Jean will be missing., it makes me feel very sad and I have to hold back the tears.
Sorry to rant on and let it all out
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MAX74,
You have to let it out as I do, because keeping it in is not good. As I said I cared for others but never got the chance to care for my loving wife. Now it seems as if my entire purpose is gone because within 8 months every one I did provide care for died and my loving wife and all 3 of our dogs died within an 17 month period also. It is so hard for me to understand why it has all happened and it is hard for me to process. It is why I am here so I can vent, write and attempt to make some sense of all of this. Take care, John
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Thank you for your kind words.
Every week goes by and I think it will get better, but it doesn’t in fact it gets worse. It could be because the Anniversary of my wife’s passing is approaching. and to be quite honest I am dreading it. I would like to do my own thing on the day but I’m sure that my Son & Daughter will be wishing to remember which is understandable but it will get very emotional and tearful. I go to the Crem every week to change her flowers and read a poem and say a prayer, and generally talk to her and not wishing to leave to come home alone, without her. The prayer I say is the one below
It’s so so difficult to express how I feel right now, devastated - yes, traumatised - yes, tearful - yes, why me - yes, can I join her please, all these things and more.
Take care all of you
Best wishes
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It’s been a few days since I last put some words together on this site. I just wanted to take stock of where I am in the grief cycle. The 1st Anniversary of my dear wife’s passing is looming closer now . It’s now just a couple of weeks to go. To say that I’m not looking forward to it is an understatement. It’s weird because in a sense I can’t believe that all this happened a year ago and also facing each day has been a grief stricken slow nightmare.
To friends, neighbours and even my Son and Daughter I find that I’m putting on a brave face, trying to show them that I am coping but in reality I wish that I had been joined with my dearest. How are you supposed to live on without your dearest wife. companion and best friend, I find difficult if not impossible to cope with. A lady from a small bereavement group that I go to every two weeks. where we walk and talk said to me and another gentleman that we both have not yet accepted that our wives have gone and that we expect them to walk in the door. Well I know that she’s right. I just can’t or won’t accept the fact, that after knowing my wife since I left school 56 years ago and being married for 51 years, that I can’t or will not speak, touch, look after or hold my wife ever again.
As I’m writing this I am very tearful and I’m feeling distraught
Enough said
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Hi Max
Reading your post just echoed many of my own feelings. It will be a year in June that Ian passed away suddenly. He was given a year but was gone in seven weeks. My life died the same day his did and yet it still seems like yesterday for me.
We were together for over 40 years and I’ve never understood it when people think I can put all that behind me only after several months. I still text Ian twice a day and tell him my plans or how I’ve spent my day. I’m still hoping I will wake up and find that this nightmare has ended.
I wish I could give you words of comfort but I’m not sure there are any. Just look after yourself and know that you are not alone.
X Julie
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MAX74,
I was wondering about you and hoping you were doing as okay as any of us are with this grieving. I can empathize with you and your comments. Sadly I am all too aware that my loving wife is never coming back to me. I knew that the day I received the call that she had died so suddenly and had to drive to see for myself. But knowing that my loving wife is not coming back to me has not and will not make this any easier for me. I am sorry to say that it is 415 days for me and each one is harder than the previous. I know that every first I had to deal with I was warned would be hard, but for me it isn’t any easier the second time around either. I wasn’t with my loving wife as long as you were your wife, but it crushes me every day and every night being all alone without her LOVE and support. I hope that the support you receive helps you in at least a small way. Take care, John
Julie,
I don’t know why people think that we can recover at all, let alone quickly. I was chatting the other day about the fact that for 35 years, my loving wife was the center of my whole world. She was the only reason for me to exist and now how am I supposed to start doing things differently. i hate being all alone and with all of my other losses I have no real purpose anymore in this existence. I keep hoping that each day I have fulfilled whatever reason I have for still being here and I can finally go and hopefully be with my loving wife again. If not then I just want to go and end this hellish existence. Take care, John
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Oh my sat crying and literally screamed why, I’m so sad It hurts so much. It would have been my husbands birthday tomorrow and 12 weeks since he died. I’m not coping right now it’s getting herder and I’m scared.
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Hi Griff
I’m so sorry you are having such a difficult time. I remember sat at home crying and also screaming ‘why’. I think I shocked myself that I could actually be screaming but I was ………
Life has dealt you such a cruel blow as it has to all of us on here. Ian passed away suddenly last June. He was given a year but seven weeks later he was gone.
We all grieve in our own way and in our own time, but remember you are never alone. We are all here for you and will support you in whatever way we can.
Please take care of yourself and just take each day as it comes, just like I am still doing even after 45 weeks.
Thinking of you,
X Julie
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