Dealing with being alone

Hi , I know you'll have heard this many times, but it's early days. The thing you need to watch for is to avoid a deeper drop in mood. Could you, even though you don't feel like it, persuade yourself to go out with a friend? My late friend's husband felt the same and he said that when he managed to force himself to go out it changed his life. I think what he meant by that is that the deep, low mood he'd been in started to lift. It's not going to improve instantly; grief doesn't just go away, but if you could allow a chink of light in there, you might find life still has one or two reasons for making it worthwhile.

Thinking of you,

Thankyou for your message and I take on board what you said. I’ve made a pact with myself that I’m going to make an effort to socialise more I know it will help but it’s scary. Thankyou for your thoughts. 

Hi Stevenage man,

I'm really sorry to hear about your wife Jackie passing. I recently lost my Dad to cancer and I really worried about my Mum being on her own after he passed. They were just 6 months shy of their 40th wedding anniversary and had been together since they were 15.

For the first couple of months after my Dad passed Mum didn't want to do much but me and my sister gently encouraged her to meet with friends, we spent a lot of time with her too. It was tough for her, the drive wasn't there of course and understandably so. 7 months later she is back driving after 20 years, out most days with friends or family. She realised that she had to keep busy to distract her mind as much as she could. We are still all struggling with the impact that losing Dad has had on us but we are doing our best to live our lives as he would have wanted. It's brought us all closer together and has shown us that life is short and to make the most of it. 

What i'm trying badly to say is to give yourself time, you must feel so raw and lost right now. This must be incredibly surreal and I can only try to understand how hard it is losing your wife after 35 years. If you don't feel like doing something that is entirely your call but try not to shut yourself off from the outside world, friends and family. They love you and want to spend time with you. And there are always people here that are happy to chat such as myself. 

Take Care,

Dio

Thankyou for your message it means a lot. To be honest I made the effort and did have a couple of social evenings that I survived with friends. But as if it’s a conspiracy against me the world changed and I now find myself unable to go out even if I wanted to. These are hard enough times for everybody but the timing for me couldn’t be any worse. I won’t let it beat me tho I will get through it, just sometimes I just want to curl up and cry, so I do. I have a brilliant family and friend network so I know I only have to pick up the phone. I know it will get easier but she was my friend , wife, lover, soulmate and it’s very hard to accept I’ll never see her again. It helps writing this tho so Thankyou again for your message.

The timing of this crap virus really doesn't help. It's great to hear you have brilliant family and friends and it's great to know they are there but it's also difficult as they will never truly know the extent of your pain. All i would say is to talk to them even if you can't go see them. Talk about how wonderful your wife is. It does help. 

Curling up and crying is good for the soul as much as laughing out loud is. I did it a hell of a lot when my Dad was diagnosed and also many times after he passed. I can't understand the pain of losing your soul mate, that must be so incredibly hard. Just please try not to be hard on yourself. I'll check back in over the weekend if you want chat, or just rant, i don't mind. 

Dio