Cancer Widow/Widower Club

FormerMember over 14 years ago

314 replies
13 subscribers
612115 views

I've decided to create this as it seems that when you lose your life partner, people don't know what to say or family members think they know how you feel. People give me puppy dog eyes and family members feel they need to fill up my time by either visiting me or inviting me to there houses or ringing me to check on how I'm coping.

I feel like i've become part of a club of people that know how I think and feel and it brings me such great relife to talk to strangers that actually have a clue.

I lost my husband 2 half weeks ago and I've felt numb, I haven't cried much and people keep saying I'm strong, Why? I'm not strong I've had 6 months to come to the idea that my husband was so poorly that he was going to die, I cried for two days solid and made excuses to my daughter so not to upset her and each time the chemo didn't work I cried. So I'm not strong I just had a longer time to get my head around the idea that my husband wasn't going to be around for long, I've just got to get on with my life for my sake and my daughters and there is not a day go by that I don't think about my wonderful husband and at night times I cry when nobody is present. I have to go back to work and I can't face it the thought of people saying how sorry they are and giving me sad faces just make me want to be sick and makes me nervous. I'm not one for being the centre of attention and I know this is going to be the case. I find myself through out the day just stopping and staring out of the windows or staring in to space almost like day dreaming but not.

So the widow club is so that you can write down how you feel at that moment. Everything you write someone will probably have felt at some point.

Ash x

FormerMember over 13 years ago in reply to FormerMember

Ashbonce so much of what you say resonates with me . I am now seven months along this difficult road and I have given up on the idea that the grief process has any logic or timeline to it. I have heard all about the stages of grief which to me suggests some sort of progression almost like ''well I have been through that stage now I'm on to the next one''. Instead I just jump from one to the other then back again. I deal with whatever emotion i'm going through as it crops up and don't try to analyse where I am with it. Does that make sense? I don't think anyone should feel that because they have been bereaved for 'x' amount of months that they should be feeling 'x' amount better.

You say your friend has commented on the sparkle from your eyes having gone. Well although I don't say it out loud to anyone my feeling is that I no longer have any joy in my life, which sounds a desperately sad thing to say but it is what I feel and I'm sure it is reflected in how I am with other people now.

You are right, the world has changed for all of us in this situation only because we view he world from our own perspective and through our own emotions so it can't help but be changed when we lose that huge part of who we are.

Hope you can find some moments of peace, comfort and respite from the sadness.

Take care.

Joe

Thewife over 13 years ago in reply to FormerMember

It resonates here to.

I am almost 7 months into the nightmare, what you have stated jfb61 is so true and accurate.

Take Care,

FormerMember over 13 years ago in reply to Thewife

I am nearly 8 months into this nightmare too. Nightmare is the right word as that is what it feels like. It feels like i will wake up soon. Fact is there is no waking up it is how it is.

I feel all the same feelings as all of you. We all share the same terrible heartache.

I myself have no joy in life any longer. I just ask myself every day what's the point in doing anything.

I hope we all find some peace one day......................

FormerMember over 13 years ago in reply to FormerMember

I've mentioned this before I am 5 years down the line on 28th March and my nightmare is never ending!

Yes emotions come and go. The bereavement process described is false because certain stages go on and on and on!

We will never ever be the same we are forced to live a life we can't be happy in because we were at our happiest before this nightmare began and our loved ones were so cruelly taken away from us!

I hope that the next life is as they say it is Heaven because we are all living in Hell on earth!

All the best everyone Love Julie XX

FormerMember over 13 years ago in reply to FormerMember

Hello - I don't look at this as a Nightmare as death is something that's going to happen to all of us as some point. I just feel this overwhelming sadness and joy. Joy because I had the most amazing adventure of my life with one of the most amazing people I've ever had the pleasure to meet and spend my life with, and sadness because the journey his taken is on his own. Sadness because this person who touched my life has gone and all the experiences we had together are just memories. Sadness for this young life that's been lost, I have empathy with his life because he will never see the things that I'm seeing and experience our child growing in to a beautiful, intellegent young woman. I wouldn't say it's a nightmare as I know in time the pain will ease and eventually someone will be able to talk about my husband in a fond way without me shredding a tear. I just wish I could stop the emotion biting me on the bum when I least expect it. I'm glad I put this page up as it does give me comfort and Jb61 your amazing your words give me such comfort, its as if we are on the same page of a book and your crying and getting emotional at the same time - Thank you your supportive without even knowing it. On a different note it's lovely outside in the spring looking at the apple and cherry blossom, I love the way the wind blows in the trees and makes that rustling sound it makes me think of a time when situations and life things were so much simpler. Thanks everyone your all great listening to my weird strange words - I write down what I feel at any given moment so sometimes it sounds a bit odd but it's a way for me to get it out of my head. Ash :)

FormerMember over 13 years ago in reply to FormerMember

In this modern World of casual encounters and brief partnerships and relationships I marvel now that there are so many of us who have had such a wonderful life with a partner sharing an almost unimaginable love for so many years . I do also wondeer whast things are going to be like for my nephews who at the age when my lovely wife of 52 years had met and were 'going steady' now describe themselves as 'being in a relationship' . Do they really have the same sort of future together that we enjoyed , smooth rough and lumpy bits, for so long , and now live to mourn . I do sometimes wish we had not had it , would I be so unhappy now ? . But then better to have loved and lost , you cannot lose the memories you have . Akll part of these carzy mixed up feelings 5 months in.

FormerMember over 13 years ago in reply to FormerMember

6 months for me Wiljon. And yes, we do have so many crazy feelings. Why us, why now, would it have been better if we had not loved at all. But then, I think we would have ended up more embittered.

As least we had a lot of years with our partners, and they did not chose to leave us.

Pammie xx

FormerMember over 13 years ago in reply to FormerMember

Well nearly 8 months since my Ken died. Today I began his beloved garden. Myself and our two cats outside in the sunshine, just the important one missing, Ken. Ken loved his garden so so much for years he entered the Cardiff in Bloom Competition and in latter years became a Judge. He judged his last gardens about 3 weeks before he died. My lovely Ken who carried on as long and as best he could.

Working in his garden today was so sad, so comforting but so so sad. I am trying to do things the way I watched him do them. I keep telling him how hard I am trying. For 25 years I watched him plant the garden in spring. We built the garden together, slowly adding different bits different times and different years.

I miss you Ken I miss you so much.#

Carrying on and planting the bedding plants wil be so hard I miss him so much.

I expect you all experience similar things but I just long for times gone by.

Have to go now. Love to you all.xxxxxxxxxJanet.

FormerMember over 13 years ago in reply to FormerMember

I feel the same about our garden. I have always loved my garden.Although Gary left most of it to me, he was always there for mowing the grass, and doing all the heavier tasks. He was always there to tell me how nice it looked after my efforts, and brought me endless cups of tea and coffee while I was working.

Now I am just doing what must be done to keep it tidy. I was so upset to find that several trees and shrubs we planted twenty years ago when we first moved in. I am waiting for family to come next weekend, to take out the larger trees. I just hope i don't get too upset in front of them.

Yesterday i noticed that some of the plants i thought were dead are starting to show signs of life. As that an omen for the start of my new solitary life?

FormerMember over 13 years ago in reply to FormerMember

hi im 16wks into my journey of losing steve. just got back from mexico today. we did it in memory, as i have told steve to go there for years!!! anyway it was lovely, hot but i felt alone felt i had no-one to love me anymore. the kids have been great. but not he same as having your other half with you to share it all. i'm back at work full-time in mid april. it just seems so unfair to have to try and live another way of life when all i want is to go back to my old life. being happy. loved. contented, now i have to take a day at a time.