Widow's Voice

Widowed Suddenly

Eighty-sixed from Life

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This time buying feels different.  It feels like I am attempting to fix a wrongdoing.

The wrongdoing being Mike’s death…  Moving is a big step in the direction of righting my alternate life.  It is forward motion.  It is acknowledgement of the permanence of his death.  It is necessary and it is a good thing.  This move is about me.  It is my decision.  My choice.  My sale.  My purchase.  It is about my family and our future.  And, I should be excited about it.  And, I sort of am.  I am just not altogether overjoyed.  I am a bit blaise and this should not surprise me because I have been operating in apathy for 4.3 years now.  The move just really brings into focus how deep this indifference is embedded in my psyche.

Moving…

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And, in the familiar setting where my old life played out I was able to grieve for all that I lost.  I let my loss seep into my bones as I walked down the familiar streets of our neighbourhood.  As I wandered through the aisles of our grocery store I allowed all the sadness his death caused to drip from me.  I drove around our town and tears streamed from my eyes, day after day, as I said goodbye to the future we never got to live.  It has been an excruciating 4.3 years, but I am better for allowing myself the time to properly say goodbye to my life here.  I am now finally at a point in my grief where I can be at peace with the past and I have accepted that the future will not be the one I anticipated living.  I can move now.  I am done with this place.  I have taken what I can from it and now there is nothing left here for me.

I Accept…

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Being widowed has forced me to become accustom to being “lost”.  I have veered off the main road and I have become fairly self sufficient travelling off the beaten path.  I’ve always been independent; and, generally, I can excel under pressure; but, Mike’s death has made me even more effective in the face of adversity.  I have made solid decisions on unstable ground and I have grown somewhat comfortable being ‘off kilter’. 

These days, I choose to take the road less traveled because I enjoy the solitude, whereas, before the silence would have been unsettling to me.  With time and experience, I am less afraid of being lost.  Mike’s death is teaching me to handle the unexpected and unwelcome in life.  And, sometimes I resent this lesson, but I still choose to learn from it.  What else can I do?

 

For all it’s taken from me, widowhood has also given me an unshakable belief in myself. 

 

The Evolution of Grief part 2 (of many)

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Once my grief settled into me, I was able to move through life in a far less clumsy way.  As counterintuitive as it sounds, by allowing my grief to make a home within me, I was finally able to free myself of it.  With grief housed safely inside me, I was able to live with more agility.   When I let both my grief and my unbridled, wild hunger for life to coexist within me I found a type of peace that had eluded me previously.

Coexistence is the only peaceful way I’ve been able to manage my grief.  This last year, I have allowed my grief to “be”.  To be part of me.  To be within me.  I must emphasize, grief is not who I am; I am so much more than Mike’s widow.  But, undeniably, my grief is part of my psyche.

Cemetery Thoughts

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Currently, most of Boris’s ashes are interred in a cemetery in Atlanta. I did not think this was something Boris would have wanted at the time, especially considering the hefty price tag. He was too practical and untraditional. However, his mom wanted to have a place to go visit him and she wanted that for […]

Food Grief

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I have a personal blog and I wrote about the topic of food and cooking in October 2019. I decided to revisit it and update it as some time has passed, but similar feelings remain. I follow several grief-related social media pages and participate in groups through Facebook and Instagram, etc. Through these accounts, I […]