When you lose your beautiful husband to sudden and shocking death at age 39, just four years into your happy and flourishing marriage, one of the biggest things you are left with is something that I call “the knowing.” What is the knowing? It is having the knowledge about a whole host of things regarding life and death, that your previous self had…
Widowed by Illness
Mass Confusion
Quite frequently these days, as I begin my 3rd year without him, I find this particular quote sent to me, or posted on my timeline. Grief is a stage through which we pass and not a place to linger. Okay, I get that. I even agree with it. But it doesn’t help me a damn bit to read it. We are told that grief is an individual process with no…
Catching a Glimpse, I Think~
I’m so sad that Chuck died and I don’t know anymore if it’s sadness that is emptiness inside me or emptiness with sadness and there is a burning wish in my soul to force myself into some semblance of feeling again, of connectedness again. In the last few weeks I’ve caught a glimpse, I think, into the world of soldiers and Marines who return from…
Words
Twisting. Writhing. Hurting. Shrieking. Vomit urge. Nerves on skin. Racing pulse. Butterfly stomach. Dislocated. Disoriented. Discombobulated. Longing. Yearning. Starving. Reaching. Empty arms. Full heart. Meat-slicer in chest. Passion with no place to go. Love with no release. Wandering. Roaming. Searching.
The First Mother’s Day
Two days ago, I experienced my first Mother’s Day without Megan. Had you asked me back in January how I would have handled it, I would have expressed sheer terror at the prospect. At that time, just two months since losing her, all I could imagine was that I would be an emotional train wreck, and would probably have just called my mother and…
Here and Not. Me and Not.
I know I’m not actually a split personality. I haven’t disassociated from my body. There is nothing really wrong with me because what I’m going through is normal. I know this. This grief, though. Whoa. My brain sometimes slips into my consciousness the suspicion that maybe I am a split personality. Or whatever word it is that would…
My vs Our
Driving to the supermarket last week I had the overwhelming feeling that this baby is very much an addition to our family. To Ian and I’s family. Although in no way is the baby a replacement for Ian, as the pregnancy progresses it feels like Ian is less distant now. There is a feeling of completeness, not end, not ‘over it’, but very much…
This Point
I reached a point in these last few days. I need to stop looking (albeit unconsciously) for this sharp cutting edge of grief in my body to stop. I need to stop looking for that elusive something that will take it away. Cut it away as carefully as a surgeon’s knife, leaving my body and heart as intact as it was for my 24 years with him.
This day. Today.
Today is 2 years since my beloved husband Chuck died. I’ve always used the word died since he…died. Don’t care at all for the other, gentler words. Not at all. I need the harsh words to remind me that he is indeed dead because there is a part of me, somewhere inside of me, a part I can’t identify, that just doesn’t believe that he’s dead or…
Believing….or Not
I’m not in denial. I know Chuck is dead. I feel it…have felt it…in every part of my body since 2 years ago, April 21. He’s gone. Gone, gone, gone.And yet, I swear that there is still a part of me that doesn’t believe it. That can’tbelieve it. How can he be gone when he and I were so connected? How can it be that I’m walking on…
Setting a Standard
Shelby needs to have an example of what a caring, devoted man, father, and husband should be. She is a mere 8 years old, but I believe most readers here will understand when I state that, well, I might not be here by the time she’s 18. It’s a cold, hard truth that should never be swept under the rug or glossed over, and I can unfortunately…
Idle Thoughts as I Approach 2 Years
I’m in total disbelief not only that Chuck has been dead for 2 years but that I’m still alive. How is it that I haven’t died of a broken heart? I’m going to counseling. Dr. Shima is going to do EMDR and aural acupuncture, both to assist in (hopefully) dispersing the block between my emotions and intellect. That block, she surmises, is what…