How to live, and how

[howtosurvive]

Hello, All,

 

I lost my wife, who is 32, about 4 weeks ago. She passed away after giving birth to our baby boy. The baby boy is doing ok at home, but he lost his mom, and I lost my wife, forever. I am still in shock and numb, and I can't feel anything. I am deeply sad, and outrageous. 

 

My wife just graduated with a PhD last year, and her career as a professor at a university just started. She worked 6 years for her PhD, and she spent all the weekdays and weekends on her research, and she just had her career started. Now, everything is gone.

 

We have married for 10 years, and we know each other for 12 years. She is my everything, my love, my soul, my sunshine. I want nobody, but her. I talk to no one, but her. She is healthy according to all the standard, she does not have any disease, and she does not have pregnancy diabetes, nor hypertension, neither does she smoke, or use any drugs. I was in the operation room when the baby was born, but my wife never had the opportunity to hold her baby. She passed away in the operation room with no family member by her side. The last conversation I had with her was "what's wrong?" when I noticed she felt uncomfortable in the operation bed, and she told me" tired and exhausted".  I was kicked out of the operation room when the situation got worse.

 

Everything is a nightmare, and I can't accept this. Mom should be safe after giving birth to a baby, and a baby should have their mom with them. 

 

How to live on, and why is this happening? Why?

[Lise Renée]

I’m so sorry for your loss. I also lost my spouse unexpectedly on June 16 while celebrating my birthday with all my friends. He was also 32 and I was celebrating my 33rd bday. He was killed in an ATV accident on our property, exactly where we had plans to build our new house this spring. Even though we have both lost our spouses, I can’t even imagine how you’re feeling. I’m almost at month 6 and it hasn’t gotten easier except that I’m not using alcohol and cigarettes to cope as much as i did at first. I have found a great therapist and grief support group, hope you seek this kind of support as well. All I can say is that you have some hard days ahead and it will all feel like a blurr. Hope you all have friends and family to help you through this .... I can’t imagine going through any of this without them. Another suggestion is to read about grief and spirituality/ afterlife (this was a whole new perspective for me as I didn’t know what I believed in before he died), it has definitely brought me some piece of mind and comfort - seeing a Medium also helped .... Also, don’t think about accepting the death, we are both far from accepting ... we’re still in disbelief and we will be for a while. Just take it one day at a time and don’t think too far ahead ... that’s what I keep telling myself when I wake up in the morning while I prepare for another hard day. Feel free to message me anytime, I’m sure we could somehow help each other get through these scary emotions.

Take care.

[Toosoon2.0]

I'm so sorry you both had to join us here.  It will soon be six years for me, but I remember reading posts on the former iteration of this site who were like five or six years out and thinking, "There''s no way I am ever going to survive that long!"  Yet, here I am - a lot of changes for sure but  - still standing.  While this page is not as active as the old board was, I highly recommend getting to know some other people in your same time frame/age bracket.  Among many others who reached out to me, I found a diverse group of people early on and we messaged, texted and talked for hundreds of hours on the telephone for probably the first two years at least - our life stories and our circumstances were and are very different but our experience of the trauma of being widowed young was not - they "got it" when no one else did.  I also met up in real life with widows and widowers who live near (or near-ish) to me - the first time I did this was at about 6 months.  I was terrified, deeply grieving and never thought I would laugh ever again - but at that three hour lunch, I laughed more than I probably had in the prior two and a half years during my husband's illness and after his death combined.  Though not as often anymore, I still message with my online group and other widowed friends and still get together with them and the local widow(er)s around here from time to time.  I needed this support system badly those first few years.  I am certain others here will agree - they honestly talked me away from totally falling apart (which also happened) more times than I can count.  Sending you both wishes for peace and virtual support.  

Christine

[MR]

Sorry to see you both in this club.. Its been more than 2 years and life has become little normal. Still miss her but breakdowns are less and now have more control on life and emotions. Please take care of new born as he needs you the most. Drink lots of water and always eat something. We all are here to help each other. One day at a time helps.

Edited December 14, 2018 by MR

[tmwenger]

Wow. Every time I read a new post my heart breaks. I'm on here because this time of year always reminds me of when I was in the throws of grieving.  It's hard. I would focus on taking care of you and baby. Trying to find a why may be hard. Know that no matter the why here you can find others who have asked the same question. We get it,  at least in part. Love to you. It sucks, but keep going, it can get better.

[geminigirl]

First let me just say I'm so sorry for your loss and my heart breaks just reading your story. My husband died 2 1/2 years ago in an accident leaving me to care for our then two year old daughter alone.

 

In the very beginning I thought the pain would never go away and it still hurts but I'm surviving. It took awhile but I even have good days now and someday you will too. Raising my daughter alone has been a challenge but also a joy and today I can say I'm doing alright and mean it. 

 

For now though just take each day as it comes and don't think too far in the future. I know it hurts so much but just hang on and when you don't think you can take any more just hang on a little longer. Hold your sweet baby and make it through another day.