Carey

well lookie here. I made it to Friday. Thanks to an angel the power bill got paid while they were still willing to accept the lower amount and now I even have gas in the car and money for dinner. I wont say life is good ... but another hurdle has been scrambled over.

Jen ... you have no idea the smile I have on my face right now and I sure do need it today. I really do try to be a nice person, good friend, generous, you know all the things daddy said I should. My best friend tries, bless his heart, all the time to encourage me and tell me that not everyone sees me the way I do. I think the teeth worry me more than the weight sometimes. I just feel like when Chad died everything spiraled out of control and I've been running around putting out fires, and paid very little attention to myself. I may never know what it feels like to get out of Lane Bryant clothes, but I would like to lose SOME. To quit emotional eating. As far as online dating, at my age and with a job and kids and where I live, there's really no other way to meet people. It's not a large metropolitan area, it's very rural and everyone knows everyone and you marry the people you go to church with, or so it would seem. There's no "hangouts" and even if there were I don't see me sitting at a bar waiting for someone to talk to me. I met Chad on the phone for crying out loud, lol. I haven't had to actively look for someone ..... well, ever. I just know I don't want to be alone, and Chad had actually told me before that if he died before me he didn't care if I was 80 I needed to "get me a man". I know he was being silly, but I really don't think he wants me to be by myself. The kids are 23 (already on his own), 18 and 16. I am adopting 4 cats from one of my patients that's moving out of state so there's my old cat lady starter kit right there ... I got that going for me. lol p.s. Jen, you're beautiful.

how did it go? I hope well. I was thinking about you this morning, I find myself needing to have a show down at the high school myself today for my youngest who is 16 and I am gonna start chanting soon too lol

We stayed with friends last night and put our groceries in their fridge and due to a miracle I think the power may be back on today. I realize I sounded quite frantic yesterday. I can never decide if coming here venting is what I should do, I don't want to sound like a whiner or a complainer, but more often than not I get so much support and encouragement here it's worth looking like an idiot. Thank you to those who responded. I never had a lot of friends anyway. Chad and I sort of kept to ourselves and our kids. My dad died a few years back, my mom and I are completely estranged (another long story for another depressing day lol) I've always just had one or two good friends at a time. My bestie was able to help with a couch to sleep on and a place to put our food, but they are really no better off than me, actually probably worse so I felt bad about even telling him what happened. they couldn't help with the bill but they did what they could and I'm grateful. Anyway, I'm rambling again. I just wanted to say thanks.

I was thinking about you this morning Kim ... wondering if you are ok, hoping you are.

I actually woke up this morning feeling a tiny bit proud of myself. Money has been VERY scary the past two weeks and I carefully couponed my way through getting groceries and having enough left to put JUST enough gas in my truck to get me to Friday morning. I was feeling semi-happy that I had pulled it off. Well guess what? kids just called me at work. Power is off. In the 24 years I have been an adult out on my own I have NEVER EVER EVER had a utility disconnected. NEVER. Much less the fricking electricity. My kids are home panicked. Power company won't budge. It's $206 today or almost triple that when I get paid Friday, which would be my ENTIRE paycheck. Why am I even bothering? I used to be glad that my friend saved me from the time I had a lapful of pills. I thought that was the darkest moment. I thought Chad would be proud of me for trying, for putting one foot in front of the other every day and scraping by and doing it. For him. Really right now I just SO want to lay my head on his shoulder and cry my heart out. Theres no fixing this one. No creative financing, no borrowing peter to pay paul and it's all my fault. I'm a failure, I've let the kids down colossally ..and oh those groceries I bought? will probably rot in a fridge with no power. How do I look them in their faces and admit this? Right now they think it's just an outage cause I was trying to work every avenue I could. Now I'm just sitting alone in my office at my desk with the door shut praying someone here doesn't see the puddle I'm in. My kids don't deserve this, they deserve someone who can actually keep shit together for them. It shouldn't BE like this and yes as much as I want to lay my head on Chad's shoulder I want to punch him in the nose for dying and leaving us like this. Failing that I want to scream but I have to keep my cool and sit at this desk and work for 2 more hours. HOW? how do I do that? I'msorry ya'll ... I'm not asking for help I just needed to vent. I'm embarrassed and ashamed, so there's really no one here in this town to talk to.

The first out of the blue thing he did, we weren't even married. I lived in Fort Worth Texas when I met him on the phone. He lived here in my hometown and was the roommate of one of my friends. We talked for many weeks on the phone racking up some outrageous phone bills. Long story short he wanted to meet in person and asked me to meet him halfway, in Tuscaloosa Alabama. I had a 4 year old child and was 24 at the time. I really wanted to meet him but the whole idea made me nervous. We kept talking about it, and one night just being silly I told him if he would go get my dad's permission first I'd be glad to meet him. A few days after that, my mom called me and said there was someone at her house that wanted to talk to me. She handed the phone off and Chad came on the line!! He had gone over there and met my dad (can you even imagine, because he hadn't even seen ME yet?) and talked to both of them and they actually said they'd be ok with me meeting him. I was floored. This was before cell phones and email and texting , I didn't even own a cell phone. Neither did he. We had no idea what the other looked like. I still have the picture my mom took of him that day on their patio, him with the phone up to his ear talking to me, smiling I just thought that was pretty amazing.

Oh honey I am so very very sorry I have tears in my eyes. I have never underestimated the bond we have with our furbabies, the comfort they give and the joys they bring.

My first anniversary without Chad was actually 1 week to the day he died. Oh and I got flowers at work from him. Yaknow, after he died. UGH that was horrible. So I tell myself, I've been through that and come out on the other side, any other ones can never be that bad again. But yes, usually no one will remember your wedding anniversary but you and your spouse. I can't even remember how I got through 2014's anniversary, so it must not have been too terribly traumatic. But I will always honor that day that we were married and never forget, no matter who comes around , if any one does in the future. I am glad you were able to get through it better than I did Justin ... I know what you mean. I got married Thanksgiving weekend and so many years thanksgiving overshadowed it. And for the past two Novembers the added drama of the holiday season without Chad and the fact that he also DIED Thanksgiving week ... well let's just say I'm not a fan. At all.

If you don't get satisfaction from the teacher, suggest including the principal in the meeting. In this day and age you can't tell me that teachers should not be more sensitive to things like this. Actually if she'd been a teacher for 30 years it would have made more sense for her to be so insensitive. I just don't get it, but totally unprofessional. The damage is done and I can't imagine how she could fix it but I would still request that meeting. If for nothing but to make sure it never happens again.

I've wanted to write about this for awhile, but I never can find the words. I find myself with a lull at work here today and I'm staring at my picture of Chad on my desk and the cloudy rainy day outside and I feel ...... despair. I've never had much self confidence about my looks. Now I know years and years ago I actually was pretty, even thin. Didn't think so then, but wow what I know now I'd give anything to go back to looking like that. I married Chad when I was 24. I had already had one child, and thought I was ginormous (HA!) but he loved me. We had two children by the time I was 26. Then for 13 years I worked a VERY sedentary job as an at home medical transcriptionist. He was an alcoholic, I was a foodaholic. It was my coping I guess, who knows but I gained a LOT of weight. But he still loved me, still said I was pretty. In the time since he got laid off and I lost insurance, I've had several dental emergencies I just couldn't do anything about. I've lost two teeth ... thankfully not in the front but one is still somewhat noticeable and can't afford to do anything about it right now. A few others are in bad shape and I worry. My health for sure isn't great right now and I worry that it's just all toooo much ... literally ... for any man to ever want me. I've had a couple dating experiences on the websites and they have been terrible. Let me preface this to say I am NOT prejudice in any way but I have a lot of black men propositioning me on the websites, talking about my "booty" and "juicy curves" ... very sexist very almost pornographic messages. And when I say a lot I mean really a lot. The few guys I actually talked to for awhile ; the one I actually thought had potential was a pathological liar about the craziest stuff. There's been many a thread here about the oddities of online dating, so that's not what this post is about. I just fear that I'm ugly and no one is going to want me like Chad did and I will never have anyone again. My best friend is a man. I am very close with him, his wife and their girls. I spend a LOT of time with them and really if I keep going the way I am, there's no room in my life right now for anyone but them and my own children. I almost wonder if I did that to myself on purpose, but now when I think about going out with a man, I'd rather be with John. He tells me I'm pretty, He tells me that the right man will "appreciate" my body type because there are men out there like himself who do. Maybe so ... but I haven't run into him yet. I feel fat and ugly and unlovable. Honestly, yes Chad loved me and thought I was pretty, but there were times he wanted to open our marriage to other people, or he would want me to tell him stories of made up things so he could get excited about sex with me ... there've just been a lot of things in my life that have not helped my self esteem and I feel vulnerable. Like if I trust a man, it's just because he wants sex and when he gets it he will leave. Or that the only men who could ever be interested in me are sexist jerks. I realize there are things I can do to improve the situation, like lose weight. I lost some when Chad died, but then when I started hanging out with John and his family I put it back on because I was happier. I still have a sedentary job and my back/knees make it so hard to exercise. And somehow food still is a coping mechanism for me. I can't afford therapy or counseling for that. I've colored my hair and wear more makeup and I try to dress better ... but I just really really hate my self image. Has anyone here ever had a similar problem at all? Any suggestions?

Oh honey I am so sorry!! We got a puppy just a few weeks after Chad died. His name was even chadder (a nickname Chad had when he was young). He was for the kids to "help heal". What actually happened is that when he was five months old he got out of the house one morning, I didn't know he was out and he ran under my tires as I was leaving for work To be the one that did it made it even worse. I'm so very sorry about your Peri. I don't underestimate the effect our animals have on us, and the love we have for them is very real

The last time I ever saw Chad was at the airport. He was on his way to Saudi. I think i've told the story on here before, but in a nutshell, he was never very demonstrative in public but that day i had the most amazing "send off" . They allowed me to go to the gate with him and we snuggled and talked for 2 hours and then when it was time for him to go, two times he went down the jetway and came back to kiss me It was like something outof a movie, people were clapping and crying. I don't know if I can ever go back there. I can't even imagine.

CBB ... there is nothing okay in a world where you lose both a spouse and a child. Crushed doesn't begin to describe what agony i'm sure it is. Wish there was a way to truly send hugs through cyber space because I surely do not have the words but my heart aches for you

I dreamed Chad found someone else in Saudi and faked his death and then changed his mind and wanted to come back and we were faced with paying back the saudis and social security and all kinds of bad juju ... oh AND he was drunk again. Think I'll pass if those are the only kinds of dreams I can get of him.

I HATE those. they stick with me for days. so yeah, fuckin dreams ... I'm sorry hon.

I guess I have been weaning myself. I started out with my eternity band, my past-present-future and his ring on my left hand. I'd been wearing those three for YEARS. He couldn't wear his as a jet engine mechanic and it was getting beat up on his keychain. I took to wearing it so then on the weekends or when we were out together it was right there and he could wear it and then put it back on my finger when he went to work. I actually had to pawn two of them at one point so got used to wearing just my past/present/future. When I got the others back, I gave my daughter the eternity band for graduation and she wears it every day. I have his ring on my right hand. I did buy a pretty Pandora ring intending it for my left ring finger, but I'm just not there yet. I don't get why this is so hard for me. It was just there 17 years in one fashion or another, I can't just let it go

TS is so right. Start posting, KEEP posting. The YWBB didn't invent itself overnight. Where do you think those hundreds and hundreds of posts came from ? Don't think what you have to say is irrelevant. Take for instance that Gates of Hell thread at the other board. It had been dormant for years when I stumbled on it and it rocked me like nothing else had since the day I became a widow. I NEEDED that post!! Whoever put it up years ago had no idea I'd stumble on it and cry tears of Oh MY GOD there are others, there SO MANY others that had this kind of relationship with their spouse, so many that watched addiction ruin their lives. I felt like an albatross. Until I read that. So while you think what you have to say is not relevant now because I guess most of us here have been widowed at least a year or so ... you never know how you will bless someone years later.

It's funny, I've gone the opposite way and my hips can attest. I never cooked much during my marriage. Chad actually did WAY more of the cooking than I did. Here in the past 7-8 months or so my best friends and I have been combining groceries and sharing meals to cut down on expenses and it has worked pretty well. Along the way, I found out I can actually cook?!: lol and the more I do the more I explore and try different things and I keep amazing myself. Still deathly afraid of the grill though. That ain't happening. Have 16 year old son for that. But I bought a griddle and have been amazed at how good steaks and burgers and stuff turn out cooked on that thing. Secret is in the marinade and not over-cooking. I guess by teaming up with another family,I'm cooking big portions and everyone enjoys and compliments. If it was back to just me and Katie and Jacob we'd be back to lots of scrambled eggs and Stouffers

Adulting sucks. Just plain sucks. I had to leave our house and bought a doublewide, a 1999 doublewide at that.It was immaculate and pretty and well taken care of though, so I unhappily bought it. My teens are singlehandedly trying to destroy it. There are holes in the walls in their rooms. They've broken tile in the kitchen, scratched the linoleum, spilled bleach on the carpet, let the cats make messes ... you get the picture. And the bad thing? I don't give a flying ****. I want to care, well sometimes I want to care. I just flat out don't. Hate the house. Hate what it represents. Hate that I'm back in a trailer so I try to be away from it as much as I can. So that being said, I give you major kudos for even taking the step to do anything home improvement wise. I can understand how you feel like if one more thing goes wrong you'll scream (and probably no one will hear). I probably wouldn't say anything to the guy myself just because I've lost my gift I used to have for confrontation, but I really hope you talk to the installer and find a way to make it right. You shouldn't have to be unhappy with service you paid for and I'm sure it wasn'tcheap. He's not doing you any favors, you are paying HIM. And word of mouth is bad for contractors, etc. so maybe let him know you could tell SOOO many people how unhappy you are with your kitchen.

I think what we are forgetting here, is the main thing I think new widows want is to feel they are not alone. That others DO feel that despair, loneliness, emptiness, panic, etc.... so when we are sitting here not replying because we can't offer advice, or constructive advice ..the support they are looking for is not for us to solve their problems. They are looking for comraderie to let them feel they belong SOMEWHERE and that they are not an alien now because they have been widowed. WE are worried about whether anyone would be interested in what we have to say, that's not our responsibility. Be yourself, speak what you feel, help when/if you can, just be there if you can't. Don't get offended if someone doesn't snap up your advice and say "EUREKA she just fixed my life!!". It's a sounding board. We come from so many walks of life and unlike a lot of message boards where the common denominator is a common interest or something that ties people together, the only tie we really in all of us across the board is that we lost our spouse. So you have so many different view points and that's OK. We shouldn't worry about what we say, if this was the place we want it to be ... we wouldn't be afraid , yaknow?

It stuck with me all day yesterday. I guess attending that funeral this week impacted me more than I thought it would. But I haven't played the song again. The irony is I listened to Pandora the rest of the day and "Im Already There", "see you again (carrie underwood) " played within the first hour. I guess it was just one of those days. He was so goofy sometimes, and I picture him with his ball cap on backwards sitting in the car singing that song, he would always "sing" the musical interlude part too. God I miss him.

I went to Virginia with friends a couple weeks ago and bought myself a charm bracelet. It was the first money I spent on myself in probably 3 years. I also got a little charm to go on it that's a English double decker bus with a union jack on top (I LOVE all things brittish, and England was my favorite part of Busch Gardens that weekend). That little jingle on my wrist every day makes me so happy, I LOVE it. Cant explain it, but I'm excited about getting other charms for it, etc. and I have a charm on it that is angel wings with a pearl, in honor of Chad and I rub it between my fingers like a touchstone sometimes. Sill I know but sometimes it really is the little things.

I guess I have no sense of self preservation. I met Chad on the phone and after about 2 months he wanted to meet halfway (I lived in Texas, he lived in NC) and I went ... BUT ... I made him go meet my parents first lol. I told him if my dad said he was ok I'd meet him. I still can't believe he did that. But honestly, doing a background check may start things off on the wrong foot. Online dating has brought such a new element to all of this, but if you stop and think, when we were meeting people before, we didn't feel like we had to go back to their birth certificate. We got to know them and went with our guts, for the most part. I think meeting in a public place where there will be a lot of people and not giving out personal details until later is as much safeguard as I would feel the need to do. I love that you asked for your LH's license though That's real moxy! lol

oh ... and did I mention, they used one of mine and Chad's wedding songs in their wedding? And they knew it??????