When I'm 64 - birthdays and anniversaries

Losing a partner
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Colette should have been singing ‘When I’m 64’ yesterday, she was born on 5/5/55 which everyone thought was a little bit special.
So yesterday was the first birthday without her. I went for a walk with my son and daughter to one of our favourite places, Bickerton Hill, it was very emotional.
In the afternoon we had a party with friends and family to celebrate as Colette would have wanted us too.
It is 13 weeks now, so far i have had the anniversaries of: our 1st date, our engagement, moving into our 1st house, (still there) 38th Wedding Aniversary and her birthday.
It’s not getting easier but i’m coping. I have had great support from family and friends, i check in here quite often even though i’m not a great contributor.
Following sugestions from other people here i started a journal which helps me.
I find the whatsyourgrief.com website very useful as well.
Here’s a couple of quotes:

  • in the face of significant loss, we don’t “recover” from grief -
  • when people try to assess how they’re doing in grief, they make the mistake of comparing themselves to the person they were before the loss (who, btw, you’ll never be again – and that’s okay) -
    After 13 weeks it’s still terrible, but i’m functioning, i’m not ‘happy’, but i have a little joy in my life with my son and daughter, i feel that maybe i do care a little whether i live or die where as before i didn’t.
    It will hit me later, everyones gone home now and i’m on my own. I’ll play some music which will set me off.
    Thanks for reading my meanderings this far…i think maybe life does go on ?
    What do you think ?
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I think that life goes on pretty much as it did but we become different and our relationship with life changes. I suppose our reality changes all the time but we’ve been shocked into something different which means we need to learn fast.
Your post sounds very positive and I don’t think you can overstate how important that is. Just surviving is enough for now and you can build from that platform in time, slowly and carefully.
I wish I could remember the date of
our first date. I’m not sure I realised it was a date and that I’d been “chosen”.
I’m much further on than you, as it’s almost nine months since Carolyn died and I can look back and clearly remember the stage you are at. It would seem that for some of us the old adage about time being a healer could be true, but I doubt we will ever fully heal. Maybe we wouldn’t want to.

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Hi Kieran im so sorry to hear about your loss im pleased you have had a few kind moments it’s been six months and ten days today since my soulmate of seventeen years fell asleep in my arms aged 39 three months before his 40th birthday we had our future mapped out dreams and hopes to grow old together utterly truamatised and devastated witnesing it all happen in front of my eyes all I can say is take as much care as possible please your in my thoughts Adele x

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I’m sorry to hear about your loss I don’t think at any age you can heal your soulmate the one true love of your life in my thoughts take care Adele x

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Hi
I lost my husband of 46 years on 18/12/18 two weeks after his 69 birthday and yes life does go on, like you I have had my firsts, first Christmas, and yesterday my first anniversary, sobbed my heart out, but like you I have children who have been supportive, I still send texts to my husbands phone (alternative to a journal) I try to keep busy and engage with people and like most people I am coping, but I do hope that one day I will find real joy in life again as I did with my husband, I hope you do to good luck

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Thanks YL, i’ve read some of your other posts and replies and you are very caring for other people in here. ps I only know our 1st date because it was on Easter Sunday 1978.

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Thanks Barbcon, i really needed to communicate yesterday as everyone had gone home. Your reply was lovely. x

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Hi Adele, thank you for replying it means a lot and helped me through a difficult evening. Hope you find Nora McInerny of some help. x

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Morning Keiron, I’m coming to the end of a year of 1st anniversaries. Today is the last day my husband left our home for the last time when he was admitted to hospital. Last year he was 70 in the February (we are both very young for our ages) we had our golden wedding anniversary on Good Friday , we only had a quiet day just the two of us, I was receiving from total knee replacement surgery so postponed our trip to Turks and Caicos until later in the year when I was able to fly long haul. He passed away 19th May, 38 hours after the consultant told me further tests revealed a malignancy, thankfully Alan was never told. Exactly 2 months from the date if our wedding anniversary I was attending his funeral.

I didn’t celebrate Christmas, just made dinner as through it was a Sunday lunch.

New years eve is my birthday and we always went away to a Blackpool hotel for the new year break, I wasn’t going to go but decided I would, been going to the same hotel at new year for over 20 years, we had made some really good friends, some of which came to his funeral, they made sure I wasn’t left on my own, we always dined together and watched the entertainment together. It was hard for me to go but I did it, I spent my last time in the room we always had, it wasn’t easy but was something I felt I had to do. I owed it to Alan to be strong and celebrate my birthday without him. We’d been together since I was 15, and last year’s birthday was the first I’d spent without him since my 16th which was the first I spent with him.

Yesterday was the anniversary of the last bank holiday he spent on the earth plane, I’m a great believer in the spirit world, always have been aware since I was 4 years old.

I’ve lost interest in so many things I used to enjoy, I still take Winston (my daughter’s pug) and Ada my little pug for walks 3 times a day, some days I’m ok when I’m out with them, some days I have to turn back after only a couple if yards. It’s just taking it a day at a time. Some times its tsking it an hour at a time.

I dobt see very many people, Alan was an only child he was close to some of his cousins, but not heard from any since his funeral, likewise with my brothers and sisters, they’ve got their own lives and busy mixing with their own friends and families.

So most days it’s just Winston, Ada and me.

Didn’t set out to write another volume of war and peace, the words keep on flowing

Blessings
Jen☆

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Morning Jen, thankyou so much for taking the time to write, i am so sorry to hear about your husband Alan, i’m sure he was a wonderful man. I’m well impressed to here you started dating when you 15, that is so lovely to be together for so long. I posted earlier about our 1st date which was Easter Sunday 1978 and when we got together, but thinking on i actually met Colette on a blind date on Xmas Eve 1971,i was 17 and she was 16, i was spell bound but she wasn’t that impressed so nothing happened and we were friends until she realised the error of her ways, haha. Ooops i’m really rambling now. Thanks again for caring. Love to you. Kieran x

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Thank you. I think this forum is full of caring people. We are a community.
I can see how Easter Sunday works there. Easter Monday 1974 works for me, the day we married. Fortunately the day of the month works well as it was the 15th and Carolyn’s birthday was the 15th of a different month. I have to carry a list of birthdates for kids and grandkids. I dread being asked how old they are.

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Thankyou Kieran in my thoughts x

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Dear Kieran
Just read your post now
I don’t come on here so often now
Lost my 60 year old husband Mark suddenly last year when he got up to go to work and suffered a sudden cardiac arrest .
Through CPR and emergency medical interventions he was resuscitated, taken to hospital , given stents but died in ITU three days later after numerous further cardiac arrests …never having regained consciousness
The shock is tremendous
Our lives are can be turned upside down in an instant
We have three daughters from early twenties to early thirties and they and their boyfriends have been so supportive of me and of each other . It does help doing stuff together even though I feel like a spare part sometimes . But I know they love me and are missing their dad as much as I am in their own different ways
Life does go on
It has to
It’s the only thing that helps me
Helping them in their lives and taking a more active part in running our family business
The children and the business are my husband’s legacy and I feel I am honouring him by taking care of them
We all need to find reasons to carry on because this grieving process is tough
Coming onto this forum really helped me a lot in the early days when I was crying so hard I sometimes didn’t know what to do with myself
I don’t cry so much these days . Not because I miss my husband less …I think I am missing him more as time goes on and the reality that he is not coming back sinks further in …but because crying gives me a massive headache and doesn’t bring him back
I try to do something constructive everyday whether with the business , the children or whatever
Find whatever gives you comfort
I have even taken to hugging a tree . I know . Crazy but whatever helps

Sending you hugs and strength to cope with the loss of your lovely wife Colette

Romy xxx

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Hi Romy, thanks for your lovely reply, Colette was ‘off Flint’ as they say up here, so a Welsh girl like yourself ?
I am sorry to hear about Mark’s sudden passing. I know how devastating it is.
I’m surviving with help from the open and caring people on here and my close friends and family.
I like your idea of doing something constructive every day, keeping busy helps me as well, but sometimes - quite often actually - it is hard to get motivated to do anything.
I do have to remember to give myself a break.
Love the tree hugging :slight_smile:
Hugs and love to you and your girls xx

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I’m a Denbighshire girl ☆

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nos da :slight_smile:

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Yes Kieran .
I’m a Welsh girl like Colette but South Wales not North
I did live in North Wales for a year in my early twenties through work . A place near Rhyl called Bodelwyddan . I used to go exploring the North Wales Coast by train and inland by bus on my days off but haven’t visited there for years now . There is no quick way to get from south to north …too many hills !! I used to travel by train and change at Crewe I think …it’s a long time ago now .

Hope you have had as good a day as possible today. I have done my usual stuff . Feeding horses , walking dogs and checking on the business . Not amazing stuff but it helps . And anyway I don’t get much choice because it all needs attention …every day …which is both a blessing and a curse …but mainly a blessing unless I’m feeling knackered .

Normally at this time of year we would be working out when to go on holidays . We have got a place in Mallorca but the thought of going there without my husband is not appealing at the moment . Don’t think I could handle it but that might change as summer goes on . Hopefully my daughters will visit . At least I have someone who will check on it for me . So much stuff needs attention when everything is turned upside down and the main man …my husband …is missing .

Anyway will truck on .
Besides tree hugging I get very excited when I see a magpie …as one of them was pecking on our bedroom window the morning after my husband died . I’ve always loved those birds even though they are meant to be unlucky . They look very dramatic to me and now I take it as a sign that my husband is near and approves of whatever I’m thinking or doing at that time .
A year ago I would never have dreamed of hugging a tree or getting excited about seeing a magpie . Isn’t it strange what grief does to us ?!

Find things that give you comfort and just go from day to day . And like you said make the most of the support from your close friends and family and the people on the forum

Goodnight
Romy xxx

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It’s our 27th wedding anniversary today. I’ve sang to my husband and put 2 cards up (kept from previous years). I’ve studied the handwriting in the one written by my husband and it looks so familiar. I like that.
Just needed to share the date with someone xx

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Denbighshire, Cheshire and I’m in Shropshire - all fairly close. I travel through Denbighshire lots because we love holidaying in North Wales and as for Chester - my favourite place to shop. X

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Thats lovely you kept cards we always did In my thoughts Kate take care of yourself as much as possible Adele x