Loss of my soulmate

Hi Scoot!

It is really all you can do. Just getting up in the morning and putting one foot in front of the other I feel is progress itself. I sometimes still wonder what I am getting out of bed for in the mornings but I do it anyway. I have a little dog so he needs walked and fed and I think if it weren't for him I wouldn't go out at all. So strange it's like a role reversal when Jay was here we were hardly ever at home. Take Care. 

Vicky xx

I was telling my therapist today that I feel like Dr Doolittles Pushmepullme. 

Sometimes I can’t bear being at home. The quietness, the stillness. The emptiness. Being surrounded by my beautiful Valen everywhere I look.

So I go out and walk along the prom and sit in the seafront gardens and talk to the robin who comes to see what I have bought him. And have a cry.
And it clears my head and I feel ok.

Then I get home and I can’t bear to go in. 
I stand outside the door for ages.
I crash back down to the pits of hell.

So I don’t want to go out. 
Because I know how I’ll feel when I get home. 
So to avoid that crash I don’t go out. 

But I can’t bear being at home without him on the sofa next to me or cooking up a storm in the kitchen.

I love my new volunteering job at the local museum. 
Valen would enjoy and embrace what I’m doing. 
It’s one of the few things I want to do, look forward to doing. 
But it’s just utterly hateful getting in and he is not here to respond to my chat about my day (he sits in the conservatory).  

The guilt of having gone out and having a good time, whether the museum, a walk, a concert, a coffee, is gut wrenching. 
But I do talk to him constantly, and after a while I am able to tell him about my day, the robin, the new cafe, the roadworks, what mum said.

What I’m trying to say is…..it’s bloody difficult innit!

Yes, it is. I had a weird day yesterday. We had the apple tree cut back, I started working on garden clearance for the wild flower area. A new bird box, for robin’s to nest in, was put in by a friend in the village. It was a beautiful day. Once everyone had gone, I started sobbing. This carried on for hours. All through the night on and off. What a mess I am in. There is no balance. Every time I seem to feel settled for a bit, I have a sudden grief attack.I just miss my darling Paul so much. Maybe one day it will get easier. Sending hugs to all. Kate.xxx 

Yes I agree it is bloody difficult. This past week, I don't know why has been one of my hardest. Then last night I put on a cd of one of our favourite bands and for the first time it brought back happy memories of when we saw them about 6 times. Of seeing her smile and being so happy when they did her favourite. So early this morning about 7.30 I did a walk. Then I saw a Robin and it started talking chirping at me. And the tears started again. Then like Mrsvt I stood outside my empty house, I say house because without Sue it is not a home crying. I know Friday and Saturday are my worse days because that's when Sue left, but please don't be as bad as last week. 

This seesaw, rollercoaster, roundabout is exhausting.

Im exactly the same with the balance. 
I have a few good days. Just start to think, hope, that I may get a full week. 
And just as I think, that it all becomes unbearable, devastating, black again. 

I talked this through with my therapist and I concluded that for me, everyone is unique, it’s guilt. 
Unwarranted, needless, blameless.

How bloody dare I have fun. Do something for me. Laugh. Go out on my own.  

Survivors Guilt. 

Be kind to yourself xx

I knew I have moved a small step forward, in one small aspect, of this uncalled for nightmare when I was able to spend me first Wednesday night Thursday morning on my own. 

My beautiful Valen was ripped from me early on a Thursday morning. 
I would spend the Wednesday night getting gradually more anxious as the hours wore on. 
As the time drew closer I would get panicky, actually hyperventilating on 2 occasions. 

I stayed at my amazing sisters overnight on a Wednesday for the first 2 months. 
She would come into my room and hold me, cry with me until I settled down.

It took those 2 months before I was capable of being on my own, but with my sister at the end of the phone messaging me for another month.

i have never really appreciated my big sister till now.

Unfortunately I have spent every Friday night and Saturday morning on my own . Like you I start to get anxious and dread what is coming.  Which I think makes it worse. Even when I stayed at my sisters for my Dad's funeral,  I made shaw that I was back on the Friday afternoon.  Tonight is the 8 week mark, and for some reason I am dreading this one worse then the others. I am going to try that album again tonight which worked last night to try and give me some happy memories and not me giving Sue cpr till the Ambulance arrived.

It's funny at my counselling yesterday. I got asked why can't I give myself a little of the love I have given to Sue. I said guilt,  she said we went over this last week, but it's still there. How the fudge can I forgive myself for saying they can turn off the machines.  I know she was gone but that still doesn't make it any easier.  

 Thank you to everyone on this site, you all have been a life line and I am sorry if I put too much on, but I feel like you are the only ones I can turn to.

I know that part of my guilt, the reason why I can’t not feel guilty, though I know I shouldn’t, or should I is because I didn’t do cpr. 
I didn’t even attempt it.
My beautiful darling gentle Valen couldn’t breathe, we tried massage and inhaler, and I called the ambulance.
As I turned to call 999 I saw his whole body suddenly stiffen, tight ridigity. 
I knew instantly he had gone. 
His body totally relaxed and there was nothing there. 
And the horrendous swelling in his neck he had for over 6 weeks had all but disappeared.

So I didn’t even try CPR, though the paramedics and heli crew did until I told them to stop.

I know if I had done cpr it wouldn’t have made a blind bit of difference. 
I knew he had left me. 
He had a DNR in place.

And yet I feel tremendous guilt I didn’t.

And confession. All our families, friends and professionals assume I did. 
I have never told anyone before before that I didn’t. 
Maybe if I talk to my therapist about it I may feel less guilt.

Sorry, but this is the only safe place I have felt like admitting this.

This is indeed a strange path we are on. The same but different path. MrsVT we should both indeed all of us should not feel  guilty but we do  because we loved (Love) are soul mates so much .

 A friend of Sue's got in touch last week to say her Mum had died. I said I was sorry etc. Then she told me her husband had not been with the rest of the family at the hospital when her mum went.

 I don't know why this made me a little better, because we stuck by are partners we were there for them in there darkest and our darkest times. We held there hands,got stuff ready for them. Kissed them and hopefully comforted them. We have to remember we did are best and we didn't run away because it was horrible. 

 We now suffer the heart break and everything else that goes with being a member of this club that we do not want to be a member off.

The music didn't work last night but I will try it again tonight.  That's all we can do try and one step at a time.

Guilty feelings are one of the worst parts of this, and you are very, very early on in the "process". It is absolute s**t - there's no other word to describe how awful grief is, and you need to look after you, and don't let anyone else try to set a timetable for your grief. 

My husband died last April. I wasn't able to care for him at home at the end, as he'd become paralysed, and I couldn't move him. There's little or no chance of home support where I live (Crete), but the hospital staff kept telling me I had to take him home, and I kept telling them I couldn't - it was hell, and I, too, feel guilty. With the best will in the world, I could not look after him alone. He was my life - we were married for 42 years, and relied on each other totally, so I really get where your thinking is taking you. It *is* incredibly hard, and for a while you won't be able to think straight, let alone find any sense in your thinking. I can recommend you look for some help online - I've found the "Grief works" app very helpful, and Megan Devine's book "Its ok not to be ok" - written from a widow's perspective, but she's also a therapist. 

I wish you well, and in kindness.