Today is one of those exquisitely beautiful, bright autumn days. With temperatures that would feel “just right” on a mid-summer’s day, but with the added benefit of a gentle breeze to doubly kiss my bare skin as I sit now, in the garden, writing this piece. I have been out on a “long run”. The kind of “long run” I do in the run-up to…
widowed questioning
Damned Either Way
So I missed a week. I didn’t have a blog post for last week and I felt bad like I had let a bunch of people down in some way. I mean, I know it is a voluntary thing but I don’t like missing deadlines and I don’t like making an excuse. I create pressure that doesn’t exist. The sink is full of dishes. The carpet hasn’t been vacuumed. I…
To My Beloved Husband
To my beloved husband, Chuck D, as we approach the 6th anniversary of your memorial service, which we held 6 months out from your death… I know I did everything as perfectly as I could in those few short weeks between finding the cancer, our hospice time, and your death. I know this more than I know anything else in my life. And yet… Doubt…
PROOF
Is Don proud of me? People always tell me that Don would be proud of me. Its a nice thought. I hope its true. I really, truly hope that its true. But how can I know? I want proof. I want evidence that he is proud. Concrete evidence. Or when I say, That I wish he knew about such and such, that just happened in my life, and someone always…
Determination vs. Distraction
In all honesty, this week has been pretty good. I mean I have had my sad moments and the little things that remind me of Tin have shown up here and there. What I’m noticing though is that my reactions are changing. What used to immediately bring up tears and sorrow now brings up tears and a little smile sometimes a chuckle. I’ve noticed this…
Grief and Widow Questionnaire
My mind takes me into weird places, since being widowed, and today I imagined filling out a questionnaire, titled What has grief taught you? It would emphasize the importance of filling this out with no filter, thank you very much. How long have you been widowed? How I’d pose the question: how long since your entire world exploded and evaporated?…
Get in the Casket and Die Too
The other week I saw this meme on Instagram about dying and not wanting the person you’re with to be happy afterwards and about how they should get in the casket and die too. It was framed in a “funny” way and meant to be a joke but I didn’t find it funny at all. I felt defensive, like it was an attack on me and other widows who have fought…
Where Are They?
Where are they… The ones we loved in life, love still, in death? Where do they go when they leave our sides? Do they exist in a far away Universe, Unseen and unseeable? Carried only in memory, That shows itself in the wind, In clouds tinged with the colors of a sunrise or sunset? Do they see us as we wish for them? Do they hear our cries of…
Inane Distractions
Recently, the cable through which my house receives both TV and internet had a major fault. It lasted 4 days. …and I nearly lost my marbles. Part of the reason was that I needed to log onto the work system to download the latest files for school, but part of the reason was that I have come to rely on the television to provide an inane,…
A Long Strange Trip
I lost my husband on February 17, 2013. Mike had a heart attack in his sleep; he was 59. I was about a month away from my 45th birthday, and we were a few months away from our 14th wedding anniversary. I found him that morning. It was the single most shocking and horrible thing that’s ever happened to me. The past 439 days have been the longest,…
Grieving for Two
After two and a half years of feeling this soul-changing, earth-shattering loss, I just realized something sort of huge. Well, I always knew it, but I just stopped and actually thought about it, and now I am able to put it into words. It is this: I grieve on behalf of my husband more than I grieve for my husband. I hope that makes sense. I…
The Game of What If
In just a couple weeks, I’m coming up on 3 years. That realization along with the hormones of pregnancy has really been a lethal – and emotional – combination. I found this old post from my blog that jumped out at me as something I’ve been thinking about lately and thought I would share. Maybe someone, somewhere out there might connect with this…