• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
Widow's Voice

Widow's Voice

  • Soaring Spirits
  • Donate
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • YouTube
  • Home
  • Blog
  • Categories
  • Authors
    • Grace Villafuerte
    • Emily Vielhauer
    • Diana Mosson
    • Kathie Neff
    • Gary Ravitz
    • Sherry Holub
    • Lisa Begin-Kruysman

Fearing More Loss

Posted on: April 15, 2018 | Posted by: Sarah Treanor and Mike Welker

Death has been on my mind a lot the past week, and I don’t even know why. There haven’t been any major milestones or triggers. No birthdays of people who are dead. No death anniversaries. No real explanation, yet I’ve been unable to shake these shadowy figures in my mind. The haunting things I know will one day happen to more people I love. And to me. And it just plain sucks.

It could be something as small as not getting good sleep lately, or the muscle strain I’ve had in my neck for the past 3 weeks that won’t seem to subside… or even just the lingering winter weather that will not seem to go away here in Ohio.

I suppose the one thing that has been a trigger was an email from my aunt – giving me some old lab results about cancers my aunt and grandmother had. It’s information I needed for sure, but still hard to swallow. They both survived their breast cancer, unlike my mom. Still though, it makes it very likely that either my sister or I, or both of us, will one day be told we have cancer too. It’s quite possibly the most terrifying thing imaginable to me… facing this particular disease showing up in some way in my life again…

It probably terrifies me even more to imagine my sister getting cancer. Or my brothers. While most people fear their parents dying – since mine died young I didn’t have as much time to anticipate their not being alive. Not the way I do with my siblings dying. And then the whole thing spirals into thinking about my best friends getting ill or dying. And of course my new partner too.

Normally these sorts of things are passing thoughts. Most days when they pop up, I’m able to fight them off… tell myself I don’t have any control over any of that so it’s best not to spend time worrying. And usually that works. But lately these thoughts seem to be getting to me more. Or feeling more real maybe as I am now leaning into the second half of my thirties.

After so much loss already, it’s hard not to fear more of it. But I guess that’s the struggle for all of us. No one is immune to feeling their own mortality… especially after what we’ve all been through. On the days when the fear gets us, it just really sucks. What else is there to say? I know you all get it.

For now, I’m trying to focus myself back on the positives… trying to get my head out of all the worry and fear that doesn’t serve me and to things that bring me joy and help me relax. After all, there’s no sense wasting precious time on all the “what if”s. It’s not always easy, but I will keep hope that tomorrow will be a better day.

Categories: Widowed Emotions, Miscellaneous

About Sarah Treanor and Mike Welker

Mike and Sarah are both widowed and are now in a new relationship together sharing about their experiences of living on with grief and new love.

Mike lost his wife Megan in 2014 due to complications from Cystic Fibrosis. Together they had a daughter, Shelby, whom you will hear of often from Mike and Sarah as she embarks on her teen years.

In contrast to the lifelong illness they dealt with, Sarah lost her fiance Drew suddenly in 2012. He was a helicopter pilot and died in a crash while working a contract job across the country.

What you'll read from Mike and Sarah will be both experiences from their current life and love as well as the past... "To us, it is all one big story, and one big family. Now being over 5 years since we lost our partners, the fresher wounds are healed, but there are still fears, triggers, sadness... and there is of course still profound love. Love for the two people who brought us together and for each other. With their love surrounding us, we continue living, learning, and loving on."

TO LEAVE A COMMENT ON A BLOG, sign in to the comments section using your Facebook or Gmail accounts, or sign up for Disqus.

Primary Sidebar

Footer

Quick Links

  • Home
  • Blog
  • Categories
  • Authors

SSI Network

  • Soaring Spirits International
  • Camp Widow
  • Resilience Center
  • Soaring Spirits Gala
  • Widowed Village
  • Widowed Pen Pal Program
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • YouTube

Contact Info

Soaring Spirits International
2828 Cochran St. #194
Simi Valley, CA 93065

Email: [email protected]

Phone: 877-671-4071

Soaring Spirits International is a 501(c)3 Corporation EIN#: 38-3787893. Soaring Spirits International provides resources with no endorsement implied.

Copyright © 2025 Widow's Voice. All Rights Reserved.