My husband Don and I were only married for 4 years and 9 months when he died suddenly from cardiac arrest. We were in the talking/planning/hoping/making changes stages of possibly having a family. We talked about moving out of NJ and into NY, or maybe even moving to Massachusetts so we could be closer to my family and so our future kids could be close with my brothers future kids. Don was working two jobs so that we could pay down some bills, and get into a better financial situation and hopefully move out of our crappy apartment and into something better.
And then he died.
My brother would end up a divorced dad with two awesome kids, and I ended up being widowed at age 39. It took me almost 5 years to even consider dating anyone again, and then another few years of going through some pretty painful relationships before I finally met my new love, Nick. We got married on New Years Eve of 2020, and now here I am, about to turn 50 years old in September – and I will never be a mom.
On some days, it still breaks my heart into pieces.
And on those days, it really helps to look at the lives of some of my widowed friends.
To see all the things they have accomplished after their tremendous losses.
One of my very good widow friends took her pain and started her own foundation in Australia, called First Light. This weekend, they will be partnering with Soaring Spirits to hold the first ever Camp Widow Australia. I could not be more happy or proud of her, and wish I could fly there to witness this amazing accomplishment.
Another widow friend just completed her last round of chemo treatments and is on the road to wellness, after years of watching her husband slowly die from the same cancer. Another widow friend just got her Master’s Degree, all while working, grieving, and raising 2 kids. A widower friend of mine, in his 60s, went bravely back into the dating world after 42 years with the same woman. Another is celebrating 7 months sober following a relapse during a particularly rough night of missing his wife. These people are not my children – they are my friends – but sometimes it almost feels like they are my children, or like I have a maternal instinct when it comes to them, and I feel motherly toward them in some way I don’t know. I’m just so damn proud of them, because I know how hard this is, and seeing widowed people accomplish things and living such meaningful lives is inspiring beyond words.
I will never be a mother, and that will always hurt, and there will always be a huge “what would have been” element to my life that will make me sad. But this community of friends, this family I’ve become part of – it’s hard to describe how much I love them. And watching them crawl through their grief and not know how to breathe again, to seeing some of the things they have accomplished now – well, I’m a proud widow Mama, and I cant wait to see what they do next.
