How to still carry on a year later

Hello Babeinthecorner, 

I am so sorry that you are feeling so low right now and I wanted you to know that I’m listening to you. Have you felt like this since you lost your husband or have your feelings been up and down? I do think your feelings are normal but I am distressed to hear you suggest you wish to join your husband.  I don’t want to say anything to add to your distress but do feel maybe you need to talk this over with your GP. There are things I feel I could say to try and persuade you towards a more positive attitude but I’m wondering if you could maybe do with a period of medication just to support you through this very difficult time. 

There are a few things that help me to remain positive but they may not help you. I sometimes drift over to the ‘Incurables’ group . Initially this was to try and gain some insight into how my husband might have been feeling during his illness. I recall

reading from a lady there about how much she wished to live long enough to spend some time with her grandchild. I tried to think how lucky I am to have a grandchild even though I have lost my husband and can’t share this part of my life with him. My grandchild has become my joy in life- he is new life and hope for my future. I suspect this might not be helpful to you right now and in your very dark place you might not be able to find any joy. But I feel with some help from your GP maybe you could very slowly regain some hope for your future even though it will never be the future you hoped for. I hope I’m not offending you in suggesting this ; medication isn’t for everyone but I for one have found it is helping me to cope over the most difficult time of my life. 

Please know that everyone here is listening to you and does understand your feelings. Please seek more help; one day we will all

die but every other day we wont! There are lots of people who care for you if you can reach out for more help. 

Im sorry if none of this seems appropriate to you. Please keep talking on here. Others will have different things to

offer I’m sure. 

Carol x

Tracey,

   I am new to this, i'm not qualified to give advice to anyone. Hell i don't even know what to tell myself but, one thing i do know is that you cannot let bastard cancer take another loving soul that can be avoided, and cause even more pain than it is now.

False smiles and  "i'm ok" and "yes she is fine thanks" is all I've been saying for nearly three years and i'm still saying i'm ok to anyone that asks even though we have not even had the funeral yet.

none of what i can say i imagine is going to help you one bloody bit, but you are not alone. You, I and i expect many others feel the same, well i do anyhow.

There is always sunshine after the rain.(deep and meaningful clap trap, its normal grey and gloomy for a week)

Don't know where that came from but i'll stop talking shite now.

Just don't give up x

I apologise for concerning you Carol, I appreciate your lovely words and I was just feeling low. The evenings are the hardest because we always spent every night together talking about the day after he had been work, we were inseparable. I am on medication and they help a bit, but I am waiting to talk to a counsellor so I will let you know how I get on. Thank you again for your lovely supportive words

Tracy x

Grampy66 I am sorry you are going through this too and thank you for your kind words. I will try my best, as I have told Carol my nights are the worst, but I am going to get a bit more help. I hope you can get through this too.

Tracy x

Hi Tracy

Just checking in as nights worse for me too.

I'm  thinking of you and hope there's a day ahead that gives you better times, memories and you feel more peace and calm. Hard days hard times I'm not a year yet. Still coming to terms with this situation I've found myself in. Just wanted to say if we can help we're  here on this forum xxx

Hello Tracy and Wife0f26years 

I am sorry to hear nights are so bad for you both. I’m feeling a bit numb right now as I had my mums funeral today which was upsetting and a huge reminder of my husbands funeral

too. I have family here for Easter but expect once they return home, I might be also struggling again. Do either of you wish you were more busy in the evenings? Would that help? I feel that I don’t want to go out then; I want to stay at home away from people although I know that’s when I feel so alone. I’m thinking over a colleagues suggestion to join an online group for widows and widowers called ‘Way Up’. Apparently it offers online chats like this but also regular coffees out, day trips, even holidays all for people who are widowed. It might not be for everyone but I think if we each knew even just one person in our situation, an evening out sharing our stories and experiences might be actually beneficial and stop this isolated feeling. I find being around friends can be quite exhausting no matter how well meaning they are because unless you’ve been in this position yourself it’s hard to truly understand. 

Anyway, just my thoughts this evening. Wishing you a more peaceful evening and a good nights sleep. 

Carol x 

Hi Carol and all,

What you are saying, Carol, about meeting up with people who are widdowed as well sounds like a very good idea. I have actually been thinking about setting up a meetup group here in Ireland called WAY - like the UK-based Widdowed and Young organisation that we unfortunately don't have here - and suggest exactly that: to go out for coffee during the day, to go out for a glass of wine in the evening, to go for walks or whatever else people would like to do. I think it could really help us to feel less isolated as if this tragedy has only befallen us.

I sometimes like to go out in the evenings with friends. But as you say it can be exhausting because they just haven't been where you have been and haven't experienced what you have experienced, so it's difficult sometimes to make them see your point of view of things or even to talk about yourself because you don't want to tell them things they just don't see.

Love, Mel.

Hello Mel- that sounds like a good idea. It might be that if you got in touch with Way/WayUp you might be able to start the group in Ireland under their umbrella? The holidays etc they organise are open to anyone wherever they live but as you say it would be the more local meet-ups that could be so beneficial too. 

Carol x

hi Tracey I list my husband in may 2018 so not the full year for me yet but like you I wonder when is it all going to feel a little bit better. I have been away for a weekend last month but felt guilty going away without Ger we always went together. Sometimes you get a physical pain and everything seems so bad but you feel you cant let other people see how hurt you are and it is easier to say yeah I'm all right but sometimes you have to say no I'm not ok and it is fine to say your not ok. You lost your husband and best friend and it feels and hurts like hell but we will come through this if it takes another year or another twenty year we have to hold onto the knowledge that at some point in our lives in the future we will be ok and to take all the help we are offered now and maybe someday we will be needed to offer that help to someone else and as we have been through it we will know what they're going through.

so sending you hugs and love mary

Hi everyone,

It's interesting for me to read that many of us seem to feel guilty for when they enjoy something because their loved ones can no longer enjoy those things. I have never had this feeling. I think it's because I know that it is neither Paul's fault nor mine nor anybody else's fault that he is no longer here able to enjoy life and that it was the illness that took him. If I know stop enjoying life myself, wouldn't that make him even more sad because then he would not only have lost his own life but also contributed to me losing mine? Don't get me wrong, I am not judging any of your feelings or anyone here at all, I am just curious to see that I have never felt this way. I am sad that Paul is no longer here to enjoy life of course, but guilty for enjoying what I can enjoy now I have never felt.

Hope everyone is doing okay this evening.

Love, Mel.