Hello everyone. I joined today because I feel the need to talk to people that have experienced my situation.
I lost my husband of 31 years suddenly and unexpectedly in early January - not even 9 weeks ago.
Initially there was the utter shock with frequent flashbacks to that night, a sense of numbness. My children and their partners were amazing but they all have to go about their own lives. Now the funeral is over I feel worse. The planning, organising and sorting is mostly passed. I’m left with the feelings of never again. I will never see or hear him, hold him or be held. Our future is gone. He won’t see our children get married or have their own children. Our youngest will graduate without him there to proudly watch on. The loss is felt across every single aspect of my life.
I’m naturally a resilient and positive person but this is testing me beyond any normal limit. It’s just so relentless and exhausting
Hi i lost my soul mate 2 weeks ago. I feel the pain your going through. Im struggling with what ifs terribly.
It’s an intense all encompassing emotion. One that fills every aspect of your life. It’s going to be very raw and almost unbearable at present. I think my grief will never ever leave me, but I’m having to trust that I will find ways to live with it as I’m sure you will too, in time.
Sending you hugs, strength and empathy
It really is awful isnt it. Is there anything that makes it feel better for you ?
Accepting offers of coffee etc from friends helps for a while. I talk about my husband all the time to everyone. That can be hard. People don’t always feel as if they ‘should’ talk about him for fear of upsetting me. I’ve almost had to coach people as to how they can best support me with my grief, by showing them repeatedly how much I need to talk about him.
Only someone who has lost a partner will truly understand your grief as it’s like no other. I’ve lost parents and friends but nothing compares to this because it affects every single area of your life, both now and in the future. You’ve even lost the person you shared your past with too 
I’d been with my husband for over half my life.
Do you have support around you?
I’m so sorry that you have lost your husband. Life is so unfair and cruel. Reading your post could of been me writing this a year ago. I was with my husband for 31 years married for 25 years. Just celebrated our 25th anniversary before my husband died suddenly and unexpected at the age of 53. I have a son of 23. 14 months on life has changed, it will do as now I got a new life which I didn’t want. The best advice I was given was to take one hour at a time and not to look into the future as we don’t know what the future holds and can’t control the future like we couldn’t control the past. 14 months on I still miss my husband terribly and I do find the second year harder as the first year I was in shock and in a haze.
It does get easier but depends on how you want to choose your path. I didn’t want to sink so decided to swim by keeping busy and going back to work as a distraction. Luckily I have some good friends who are understanding and supportive. I hope made some friends on here who is at the same place as me and we meet up regularly though some of us live the other side of the country. Some of us who live closer are off to benidorm in may. This new life isn’t easy and I do have days that I cry and scream but they don’t last as long as the early days. Cry and scream when you need too… grief is like a roller coaster with waves and a little trigger can set it off. Mine is music…
I do hope that you have got a lot of support.
Take care and big hugs Xx
I have my daughter shes 25 shes a good distraction. My son is 14. Its so difficult my partner was found passed away by the police after another friend asked for a welfare check. He was surrounded by bottles of vodka and had written a song / poem (he was a song writer) it was about his death. He had a health condition and his friends believe it was just a song (loys of songs didnt relate to his life) and that his health condition and binge drinking took him rather than suicide. His friends and family believe he was the happiest hed been in a long while. I cant stop thinking that i did something wrong. He told me loved me and that hed been on a bender the week before he was found passed and messaged me 5 days before he was found saying that his health condition had flared up again but he was ok.
Oh that’s particularly difficult. 
I know it will be hugely difficult, but try not to feel guilt - it’s a very tricky and damaging emotion to deal with.
People have told me “be keen to myself”. To be completely honest, I have no idea what that really means or what it looks like, BUT if you are able to chose a path that leads you though this in as positive a way as possible, I do believe that this is a way of showing kindness to yourself. Accept support and social events as much as you can, but say No if it’s too overwhelming. I say yes to daytime, but I cannot go out in the evening yet because I can’t face coming home to an empty house.
Eat, walk and talk about your partner, cry when you need to but don’t feel bad if you find yourself laughing at a good memory.
There is no right way to proceed through this but allow all emotions to come. You will be much stronger than you perhaps think x
Thank you. I feel so terrible that other people are hurting in this cruel world too.
@Jules24 i’m so sorry for your loss. I just wanted to say I’ve felt exactly what you’re currently experiencing. My husband died very suddenly from an aggressive cancer which came out of nowhere and ripped him away from his family even before finding out his full diagnosis. Looking back I realise I was in full shock mode and going through the motions of planning the funeral, like you, gave me something to cling to. The aftermath of this time was like falling into a void and was very difficult but I can appreciate over two years down the line that this was the path I needed to walk as I needed the time to learn new life skills in order to cope with this new life that I have been thrust into. I totally understand what you’re saying about people going about their own lives and I felt that keenly and would regularly sob back home about how alone I felt, still do occasionally. However, and here’s the glimmer of hope that I’m finding now, if I surround myself with people who get my situation because they have faced similar trauma I feel something within me changing, like a new life opening up to me. It’s not a life that I would ever have imagined but it’s a life that I’m building and beginning to be proud of and that gives me a reasonable amount of happiness to keep going onto the next fulfilling experience. By talking about life changing experiences to people who get it I find that I’m able to inject positivity into many parts of my life whilst still embracing the ongoing pain of grief which can still catch me out but doesn’t necessarily floor me as much as it used to. Keep going @Jules24 keep laying the foundations and keep reading and posting here as there is so much support x
I am just two weeks into this horror after losing my husband suddenly to heart failure. The funeral is in two weeks. I have three children, 14, 12 and 8. I have moments where I believe we will one day make a new life then days like today when I feel like it’s going to swallow me up and kill me because it’s so so so awful. I hate that this is my new life and I long for the old life we had so much that it physically hurts. I don’t know how to find a way through this. I would like to meet up with other people who are going through the same but it’s overwhelming trying to even figure that bit out!
Cattia.
The pain is unbearable with so many unanswered questions but you really are not alone and people have lived through this experience and come through the other side.
@Bryher I was just reading your story and very similar to mine. I’m so sorry that you you lost your husband in a terrible way.
My husband suddenly and unexpectedly died December 2022 from undiagnosed kidney cancer which was in both kidneys and a massive rear saddle pulmonary embolism. He was 53 years old. I did CPR on my husband. I got a phone call from my son to say that dad my husband had collapsed, time I got home he was gone. I was there before the paramedics and ambulance. My husband was working the day before. His CT scan was due the day he died. I previously cancelled his CT scan from the Thursday to the Sunday as he had just started a new job and didn’t realise that the CT scan was urgent. I really did suffer a lot of guilt by doing that and always wondered if my husband went along on the Thursday and they saw the blood clot would he still be here now. I guess I will never get answers … big hugs xx
My husband died of sudden heart failure too. It’s so shocking to lose them in that way. One minute here, the next not.
Your GP should offer you counselling and signpost you to local grief support groups for face to face help.
Meanwhile, although I only joined this group today, I can already see how helpful everyone is.
I think the trick is to be open to talking . I’ve found it helpful so far. It’s my way of keeping my husband ‘with me’ 
@Hazel.1966 your story is very much like mine. My husband died on the morning that he would have received his diagnosis from a pulmonary embolism caused by his cancer and my daughter & I ended up performing CPR before paramedics took over. He had just turned 53 and we had been talking avidly the previous couple of years of all the adventures we were going to have in retirement in the future. Like you I carried guilt over many things following his passing but I know he wouldn’t want me to keep torturing myself. He would definitely say please move forward and find happy times. I’m so happy he was in my life for so long, we met at school aged 15 and he was such a stoical man who also was working the day before he died. I heard him helping a colleague on the phone who was struggling with a work problem and even though I knew how tired and ill he was he insisted on reaching a solution whilst on the call, so proud of him and I’ll live my life for him too x
@Bryher yes your story is nearer enough the same as my story. Because my husband didn’t have that chance to have a CT scan I always wondered if the blood clot was there or travel up that morning suddenly. I never noticed my husband becoming ill and losing weight until 3 weeks before he died. I got him down the doctor’s but sadly too late. I do wonder if he didn’t have the blood clot how long would he have had left. I guess it’s all the IFS and buts. I also think how can you get to stage 4 cancer and not know about it. People say he lived his life without knowing he had cancer. Do you know if your husband blood clot was sudden or had been there a few days? It is so sad as still both young men who life has been robbed…Big hugs xx
I just wanted to say to all the mums on here - happy mothers day !! And youre doing ok you know !!! We are all doing the best we can in a difficult situation ! So well done xx
Thanks. Had a lovely spa day with my mum. She loved it. The sauna, steam room and jacuzzi was just lovely and it helped my sore throat no end !! xx
@Hazel.1966 @Bryher so sad reading your stories as they are similar to mine. My partner of 18 years died a week after his 54th birthday. This was 3 months ago. He hadn’t complained of being ill although he had a very bad chest but didn’t see the doctor as he hated anything like that. I found him passed away when I came in from work in the evening. And had spoken to him in the afternoon and he seemed his normal self, I had to do CPR but knew I was too late. I understand the guilt as I have that thinking I should have been home earlier or not at work at all, or noticed he was ill. The post mortem said he died from COPD and 2 heart conditions which he wasn’t aware of. I’m now having Cognitive behaviour therapy through the NHS as I have ptsd from the night he died. I think it’s helping a bit. It is helping me to have better memories of his life rather than think about his death all the time. But life is so hard , I still can’t face going back to work but I can’t stay off forever do have to face up to it soon.