Struggling

Hi Mike

Thank you for the soothing words. 

This community is the only place we can be open. Its not same talking to friends. They listen a bit and say you will be ok. Or they say i am here for you anytime you want a chat. But they are not. They all have their own lives.

I am staying in the hotel tonight where my husband worked. They are so kind here and let me stay here. I went to swimming pool earlier tonight. Was swimming a bit then set in the whirlpool. But as you say, anywhere we go we still feel alone. Nothing seems to cheer me up. Someone tried to chat with me but i tried to avoid the conversation. 

After swimming i went down to the restaurant but suddenly i turned arround and ordered room service instead . Just wanted to disappear. 

Came back to my room and rung my sister who lives abroad. Had a long chat. Now the night is here again. Normally I would be sleeping at this time but not now. Just don't feel i want to sleep. 

Somehow i will have to find a new regime as soon i will have to go back to work. Dreading of it already. Before we always used to call each other at lunchtime when we both were at work. And when i finished work i rung him that i am on the bus and be home soon to cook dinner.

Yes, i hope too that the life will get easier for all of us soon. 

I wish you all a good night sleep and good day tomorrow. 

Sending you all my hugs

Andrea xx

Hi Mel 

My GP, seems reluctant to give me many sleeping pills. I really need one every day, as my shift work /days /nights /Afters 12 hour shifts and now 8 hour shifts plus grieving has made it impossible to get any sleep at all. I will see her again soon and try and get some more. 

Trying to go through the grieving process without sleeping is waring me down. I agree with everything you say. 

Hi Mel , I am also just back from uk after visiting my sons   I am trying to catch up on all the posts but it is getting a bit confusing. I will sort it out eventually. I got back today and one of my sons and his partner came back for a couple of days. But the house still seems empty. 

I live in west cork near Castletownbere   Wicklow mountain was one place my wife wanted to see. 

Take care 

Mike 

Hi Mark haven’t heard from you for awhile just wanted to know are you ok and how are you doing. 

Mike 

Hi Mike 

I've been on nights this week, not sleeping still. Impossible to switch off. I've got a couple of sleeping pills left, my GP only gave me 10. I take one at the weekend. I had a blood test Thursday, I've become anemic since my wife passed. I'm on iron pills now and I've got to have another blood test in a couple of months. Just goes to how losing your spouse can run you down. If I hadn't gone to donate blood a week ago I wouldn't be any the wiser. I don't mind losing weight as I could do with losing a couple of stones.

Walking into the house after work or anytime for that matter is a killer. You still expect to see her, it's automatic to look up as if she was there. 

It's been 7 months now and I think to myself, how have I managed to get this far. I feel for all the retired widow's /widowers, as the empty lonely day's must seem to last forever. At least work fills 8 hours of the day or night. I haven't booked any time off yet, as I wouldn't know what to do with myself. I was happy simply being with my wife, I didn't need any interest for myself. I'm sure everyone agrees that simply being together was all that mattered.

Just taking it one day at a time Mike. 

How have you been this week. 

Hi Mike, Mark, Andrea, Anne and anyone else who is struggling,

I’ve been visiting family in Dublin this last week, due to go back to the UK early tomorrow morning and to be honest I am absolutely dreading it. I’ve been living a completely false reality, pretending my Mark is at home waiting for me while I visit my little Irish nephews and nieces. I don’t want to go back to our house where it will hit me that he is gone. Where it will be silent and lonely and where I can’t escape from missing him.

I am already feeling so anxious and scared and lonely. I have to collect Mark’s ashes on Monday and bring him home to our house. I can’t even believe that is going to happen because I don’t want to believe he is dead.

It was 8 weeks on Thursday since he died. I hate it. I hate the thoughts that flash into my brain, the sudden picture of my empty future. I want him back. I need him back. I miss him so much it still physically hurts me. I am so so sad for the life he has lost, for all the things he won’t do. I absolutely hate this “new” life. It is not a life, it is a horror story.

I want a hug from him, I want him to fix this, I want it all to be ok. But it never will be. How can we possibly ever be ok again?

Fiona 

Hi Fiona,

Yes we would all like the reassuring hug and a few words from our loved one and it does look like it will never be okay again but you will eventually get to grips with the new reality. I didn't collect my husbands ashes for ages eventually the funeral director got so sick of seeing them that he delivered them, I admit that I was saved from going into that building or even into that area again, I haven't been past it since he died 8 years ago.

What you feel is like an open wound I have said this before but sometimes you can find some clarity if you talk to a counsellor or a bereavement service, sweet as he was my husbands younger brother was in a state of denial about his loss and talking to him only seemed to re-enforce my sense of loss.

I have a empty house as well but now I value the things we did together in this house so there is life eventually...

D

Hi Fiona I returned from uk to Ireland on Thursday but my son and his partner came over as well so at least it wasn’t an empty house I was returning to, but they are going back on Monday so it will be back to silence and emtyness .

l collected Winnie’s ashes about a week ago, it was a strange feeling but a kind of comfort to have her home again. I have a nice teardrop blue urn to put them in. I also have a hart shaped locket with two silver rings around it the hart holds some ashes and the outside ring has an inscription on it which says always in my hart I have taken the inner ring of and put her wedding ring there instead. 

Like you I miss her so much it really hurts, there is no future that I can see of . I also hate this new life we have been stuck with. I hope it can get better because it can’t get any worse . We all had so much to look forward to now we have nothing. 

Mike 

Hi Fiona 

I feel for you duck. At only 8 weeks, surely you are still in a state of shock. I was, but it took my GP to tell me this. Everything you are feeling, I /we all feel. We all go through the same thoughts, worries, fears and anxiety.

When I collected my wife's ashes, I thought I would be a mess. But I don't see the ashes as being my wife . Jayne is in my heart and soul for ever more, not in a box of ashes. The box sits on our bedroom chest of drawers, waiting for her son's to scatter them wherever and whenever they decide to. I'm letting them do so as I would scatter them in North Wales, where we loved to holiday. They have their own ideas where to scatter their mother's ashes and I'm allowing them to do so because I'm that kind of guy.

Taking one day at a time is the best I can manage duck. I now don't put pressure on myself to do this that or the other, but to simply go with the flow as my sister tells me. She works for a funeral director in Wales.

You are at the beginning of the grieving process and it's incredibly hard. I'm 7 months in and don't know how I've got this far. Take some  comfort from the group as I do. I'm sure we all do.

Say how you feel, we're all here for each other. 

Hi Fiona and everyone,

Oh you were in Dublin? We could have met up for a coffee :-) Perhaps the next time.

I know what you mean. The first few times I returned home from some time away with family and friends I felt the very same as you. I was dreading my future and wanting Paul to come back and make everything okay again. But, believe me, over time these feelings are going to change. You will feel a little better and will have learned to cope with the sudden thoughts that come into your mind like "I don't have a future" or the anxious feeling. This is because every minute of every day you are going forward a little bit. You don't have to think about a future is what I mean because the future evolves out of every moment naturally. Does that make sense?

Please let us know when you are at home and post here whenever you feel it is right.

Love, Mel.