All the words I can't say

[iloveyoualways]

Hi Jen, thanks for being so honest. I rarely post my true feelings as I'm over six years out on this shitty journey. I believe my widowhood journey has been very slow and atypical due to compounded losses. I don't want my honesty to scare any newbies but also feel like nobody in my time frame will understand. So I keep quiet. And it eats me up. I have gone through so many angry seas I think that I would know how to navigate them by now. Nope, I don't. Last night I was having a dream with my husband, a very rare one, and I was angry at him because I had to pay for the childcare even though he was not working.

 

I expect negative things to happen now. I find that when I'm anticipating something positive, like my degree or professional registration that I just attained, my mood doesn't match the accomplishment. Like I can't feel proud or happy. There's a man at work who I though that I had a crush on. I only realized my crush when I found out he now has a girlfriend. I was a little jealous. I felt like I had many chances to make a move but he would never be who my husband was so what was the point? But I realize that I've had relationships since I was fifteen and have wanted other ones after breakups. Maybe I don't deserve the happiness that I once had. Or maybe I feel unwanted and ugly now. Part of me can't fathom another loss so I feel like I've turned off the capacity for that emotion. I have very few meaningful relationships but don't feel lonely either anymore. I think that it may be complicated grief in my case but feel like I'm not grieving like I was three years ago.

 

It has gotten a little better these last two years. For me I have taken it a day at a time to stay alive. If I thought too far ahead I couldn't cope. I had so many things figured out in my previous life and everything came down like a deck of cards.

 

I hope that you keep posting as someone understands and may not be able to expresses themselves as well as you. And please know that you are not alone.

[Guest oneoftwo]

Jen,

I'm Eeyoring right next to you, I think this plateau is unending.

I'm a long way out, even other folks on this board have said "oh, just give it time" - not knowing how long it's been. I think this is just it now.

[Jen]

"I think this is just it now." -- Exactly. And that terrifies me. I've never been a patient person; I want things resolved now. I've done the work. I've come to terms with my bereavement. For the longest time, I wanted nothing more in the world than to wake up dead-- but I stuck it out, I stayed around. Yay me, but it looks suspiciously like there's no one waiting to hand me a medal for continuing to breathe.

 

I guess what I'm getting at is... What was the point?? All the anguish and despair, struggling through the abyss when I just wanted to stop-- what was it all for, if this is all that was waiting on the other side?

 

I know, I know. That's defeatist, pessimistic-- it's only been three years, anything could happen. We all know that life can change completely in a single heartbeat. And yeah, that's what I would tell anybody else in this situation. But myself? I can't see it. It feels like I'm running out of time.

 

I do scream sometimes, even if it's just into my pillow or on paper, because it really isn't fair. I had so much capacity in me for love, but nobody wants it. I wish I could just accept it and quit thinking about it.

[Jen]

Struggling today-- hopelessness, self-loathing, wondering why I'm still here. I realize that healthy, well-adjusted people don't feel this way about themselves, but I don't know how not to. I look back at my life and see so much wasted potential-- or maybe just the deluded belief that I ever had any. I try to look ahead, and there's.... nothing. Years and years of the same emptiness. I can't even blame it on widowhood-- I've reached the conclusion that it's an inherent flaw in my mechanism. When Jim was here, he gave me stability, safety, encouragement-- all the things I crave and can't provide for myself.

 

Someone told me once, "We all have to learn to self-soothe." I'm trying, I really am... just can't manage it today.

[jgib]

I was trying to explain to a coworker earlier how I feel these days. I don't miss Jim-- I mean, yes, of course I miss him, I always will-- but it's not the constant ache it used to be. Now more than anything I miss... belonging. Being part of a unit. No matter who I'm with these days, I'm on the outside looking in. I can't imagine ever finding another partner-- I guess it's technically possible, but so is my winning the powerball while getting struck by lightning. Anything is possible... it's just not very likely.

 

People tend to laugh uncomfortably when I express this opinion, but they don't contradict me, either. Lately that's made me very bitter. What's so terrible about me, that nobody could ever want me? I know I think that about myself, but does everyone else have to think it as well?

 

I feel like such a failure in life. I blew my one chance at lasting happiness because I didn't take care of what I had. I took him for granted, and discovered too late that he was literally one in 7 billion. Now I get to spend the next three or four decades repenting at leisure.

 

I know this is not the sort of attitude that is going to get me very far. Self-pity is ugly and pointless. But that's where I am, and I don't know how to get out.

 

Thank you. All of you. *hugs* It helps to be heard.

 

I can certainly say, in all honesty, you are not alone.....

[Jen]

Hugs to you. I wish I knew a solution. All I know is that I'm lonely as hell and I don't understand what I have  (or lack) that makes me basically invisible to other humans. On the bright side, I have two new kittens to cuddle...

[jgib]

I went the puppy route.  They help, A LOT!

Enjoy the kittens and connecting with them. Coming home to my little dogs is the best part of my day now.......

[Raymond]

Good Afternoon, approaching a year here shortly.

 

Jen, grief is an echo of ourselves.  Unique to each of us.  Incapable of comparison for this reason.  Your love for Jim forever sings in your heart.  So it must be.  Mayhap a new song will come along  . . .  . mayhap not. 

 

I've written before here that you don't have to die to stop living.  A fog everyone here understands all to well.

 

My grandmother, who passed at 99, always explained a problem shared is a problem halved. 

 

Keep sharing Jen . . .  and I hope a melody will arrive.

 

p.s. a kitten's purring is very melodic 

[Jen]

Raymond, thank you for posting this. It feels ever so slightly hopeful, and even though I don't trust hope, I appreciate its presence-- elusive and transient as that may be.

 

The kittens have grown large enough and bold enough not to want to cuddle much, so my daughter took matters into her own hands last week: I came home to a very friendly, very energetic, very awkward, and very large German Shepherd mix puppy! If nothing else, she doesn't let me sit still long enough to brood...

[beth_krkswidow]

I'm not at 3 years, so I may have nothing to add. 1 year and 3.5 months.

 

You are widowed so by default you belong here. Sorry. The "new normal" is anything but normal.  There is nothing wrong with you as there is nothing wrong with me despite what all the DGI'S have to say about that. They all have the miracle cure. They have no clue; and I'm sorry, God, but I spend much time hating them.

 

Nothing I say or anyone else says will ever help. What helps is knowing that, scattered across the globe, there are a few of us unlucky souls who understand - because we're in the same hell. not the same spot in hell. But the same hell.

 

Warm hugs

 

Ps. I had read only page 1 and didn't know there were 2 more pages...  A puppy!!!  Wonderful!

[Bambi]

Jen you sound like a totally amazing and wonderful person who has been crushed by the horror we're all struggling with.  I too cannot seem to care about anything anymore but don't want to post my "doom and gloom" through some misplaced pride I guess you'd call it.  Ridiculous.  I have no living family and my DH Steve's family have been vile so I've disconnected.  Friends have drifted away, fed up with my rollercoaster emotions and lack of social involvement.  I feel judged by numerous moronic people for not being "over it".  I've withdrawn from almost everyone and spend most of my time when not at work with my best friend, my dog.  He doesn't judge, doesn't ever get bored with me, want me to be someone I'm not, tell me to "get over it" or ever be embarrassed by my tears.  He gives me more comfort and more love than any human out there (other than my darling Steve of course!).  I am sure he can read my heart.  I know I sound insane.  I know its probably not healthy.  But I know it gets me through the day.  So love your kittens and your puppy and know they will love you back unconditionally. 

[beth_krkswidow]

23 months coming up. Yes I'm better in a lot of ways. Yes, "it" has gotten softer, as was predicted by the wids further out when I first came here, utterly shattered ,destroyed  and brokeb. But other days I just want to crawl in the grave with him. Really I do.

You are not abnormal.  I think we're all crazy. Widowhood entitles us to that.

Just sending hugs

[EternallyDying]

Jen, you say all the things I'm thinking, ALL of them.

And I'm farther out than you.  I don't know if I've really posted at all on this site, I was a newbie on YWBB before it got shut down.  I wandered into chat one night, I believe the same night Maureen heard the terrible news about her PolarBear.  And was so grateful to find others going through what I was.

 

Sometimes I feel I'm manageable, other days I still feel like Beth said and want to crawl in the grave.  Then I feel terrible because I have family, and kids who I know need me.

 

I don't know why but lately, times have been so much harder, my DH was a really special man, but as time went on, not really a good man.  I've found so much out over the years and have so much love, hate, sadness, and unresolved feelings about betrayals that will never be understood or mended that many days so feel I'm back at the start.

 

I know those kinds of things don't relate to you,  but the rest of my feelings are right in line with your post.  I hope you're doing good, and thank you to all of you for still being here.