Im so sorry for your loss and it’s heartbreaking there are so many of us feeling the same, I am having counselling which starts next week it has taken months on a waiting list, they are supposed to help us look at us and support moving into our new existence which none of us wanted. It’s awful when you feel so vulnerable, I’m the same, I’ve put doorbell and cameras up, panicking about the lawn as I can’t start the petrol mower, worried about finances on top of my health, the list is neverending and yes isolating too, I don’t want to see couples who still have their lives and are twenty years older holding hands down the high street, I started crying yesterday as I went to my husbands grave 2 minutes in the car so I don’t have to walk and had to stop to let an elderly couple pass they looked to sweet but I felt so cheated. I’m sorry I don’t have any advice but know that we have here to chat, our safe space and please chat anything you want too when you feel like it, I’m still lay in bed trying to get up and face the day alone but we have no choice, every hour everyday at a time Im glad you have your brother and children but I know it doesn’t take the pain can sometimes feel like your going through the motions, I worry about my mom and daughter and close friend worried about me as I’ve lost weight and a lot of hair, so I put on a brave face, and all we want is the love of our life back, hugs to you and everyone struggling🫂 xxx
@JD8369 and @Julie333 exactly longer term it gets harder to discuss grief with people, so you feel isolated and go internal. So true i live for my daughter and my granddaughter. i have tried to go to grief groups/counselling and if i am a truly honest with myself, even there after a while you put on an act. The world is now completely different to the the 14 year old who met Linda and knew from the get go she was the one. I am coming up to 3 years this July, and starting to realise what my Linda use to say to me that " I wouldn’t be able to survive without her", which outwardly people only see the strong/functioning /confident me, but inside i am utterly sad and without purpose, as the only one who truly knew me for me has gone.
John so sorry for your loss, yes emptiness is horrible and understandable, I get about medical support I had a heart attack three times at home at age 54 and they missed the first two and didn’t follow protocol. I then due to recovery and trauma didn’t go to the hospital this time with my husband in London to support, I would normally stay in hotels and walk to the hospital each day but I didn’t feel well enough to go, so I understand what your saying, the guilt I feel as I did not facilitate his care, only by phone which was impossible, he came out half the man from procedures that went wrong, or didn’t get done and put straight to palliative care, no treatment at all, I nursed him at home and he died 8 weeks later. It’s a shock he had been ill in and out of hospitals for years and perfectly fine, this was a pretty normal situation that went wrong. I know what you mean when they won’t listen, you know their needs better than anyone, I had the same fighting for a second opinion which nobody would give and medication that he should have been on. It’s so sad and out of our control. Sending hugs 
and know we are all on here because we need to chat and let things out, and keep chatting, Im trying to read I get through a few pages then put down my mind wonders back to my husband,it’s called comfort for the grieving spouses heart by ary roe, I’m finding it useful to engage with my feelings and that we’re not alone in this jumble of emotions feelings thoughts, lost in a world we don’t want to navigate without the love of our lives 
Morning Allen, hugs, it’s so hard, there is no time limit on grief it’s forever there, the loss is loss it can’t be taken back, moving forward into a life without the love of your life is so so hard, and that time thing you were saying yes I understand, it would feel lonely navigating and nobody now aware of the grief, I’m already contemplating that in a few more months or past a year I will no longer be a widow just a person who’s not getting on with life happily moving forward as I should, at the moment I can say “I’ve just lost my husband” later what do you say? You feel the same? I zone out when I’m with people as they don’t give me the joy I got from my husband, the jokes laughter seeing the funny side of everything the obsessive love, not wanting to be apart walking hand in hand sharing everything thinking alike, it’s like a part of you missing and that missing is forever, it’s hard to feel ok at any point in your grief, sending hugs for the day ahead xxx
My husband and I joked around a lot during the day. I was always saying something to keep both our spirits up. We had a dog and cats years back and they were all little characters. They lived to be very old, even though diff. illnesses for all of them. But, I gave them special foods and meds, etc. And, I joked a lot about diff. things they would do. Stuff like that no one else would ever get and it’s a loss, too, the stuff we solely shared together like our pets and their antics.
Yes Nancy we connect in so many different ways , that connection gets broken and can’t be replaced so we mourn for our loss and the loss of those connections we only seem to have had with that one person, I have only ever really felt my real authentic self with my husband, no judgement at all from him, not even with my mom, daughter, friends although I appreciate their love, my husband brought out the real me and made me so happy, I felt so lucky to have him every day I would look out my window and see people walking alone and felt so blessed of what I had, now I feel like I’ve joined those people and have that look, the lonely look, you’ve lost a part of you inside and outwardly, it’s so difficult to know you will never have those moments like you say with anyone ever, everything seems so final yet were supposed to navigate this nightmare 
sending hugs and hope your happy memories are comforting, I try to feel lucky about the 16 years we have and the memories we have, does eat you up a little though