Mizpah

I hate grief porn.

I would be blunt and clear, and keep it just between the two of you. If it were me, I'd text: "The answer is no. The answer is forever no and will forever be no, and if you want a friendship/family relationship to continue, this needs to be the end of this conversation."

At closer to 7 years than 6, and given that we had no kids, and that I went on to recouple and have a child and a busy working mom life, I would characterize it now more that he's part of me always/constantly, more than that I do actual specific countable remembering. (It used to piss me off so bad early on - and still does really - when people say he'll "always be with me" or "always be a part of me," but it's true. Still, it's really no consolation for losing someone, or for HIM losing his life....) Anyway! There are many little and big ways he's part of my life. I bear his name, so he's in my daily consciousness. A couple times a year, I randomly wear his cologne. I wear jewelry he bought me. I mention things randomly. For example, my sister posted a memory on FB the other day of us and our brother, and I said out loud when I saw it to NG: "That was taken the week I met DH." Or if someone's talking about their favorite this or that, and it was his, I'll say: "That was DH's favorite too." He's always there, but it's casual now. I'm not saying it right. He is a fact of me. A fact of my life. A fact of my past. A fact of my relationship history landscape, a fact of my relationship style preferences, he's a fact of a great man that I have fragments of still, and I've lost many fragments as well. (And yes, he's a fact now, rather than an existence independently.) What was will never not have been, and that's how I approach it now, and that's the comfort. I used to worry about forgetting and losing him more, but I don't anymore. Parts of him are in me and part of my world and life, and parts of him are gone forever. All of him will eventually be gone forever (when I'm gone), especially given that he didn't have kids. I mourned that tragedy - all aspects of it, immediately and deeply and intensely for a long time - and still do in ways, but not in the ways I used to - in quieter, more accepting, casual ways. I hope this isn't upsetting to anyone earlier out. It doesn't feel upsetting anymore, it feels peaceful, though I know that it is also unacceptable.

The nonsense I dealt with because of NG and his son's mom was so bad in the beginning that I now (years later) have a Pavlovian gut reaction (literally) every time I even hear her name, every time she calls or texts, every time she's mentioned. And that's the problem with this, and why you DO get to draw a line - it infects your relationship, your life, your emotional landscape. It adds so much stress and hostility and negative emotions. Not everything needs to be fully aired, and certainly not while on a date with you. For us, it became clear really quickly that the main goal was to limit interaction, limit depth of conversation, limit responsiveness, to the point where he only engages if it involves major parenting decisions or emergency situations. I'd say he probably responds to only about 5% of her text messages. Anything beyond that is just asking for trouble, in our situation. (And keep in mind that our situation is a bit extreme - his son's mom is really really awful and has done terrible, completely abnormal things. Her craziness also isn't solely directly at him - it's part of her interactions with most people. She's just a very unhealthy, malicious individual who thrives off of hurting and causing problems for people. I didn't believe people like this existed, but then I met her.) I think you need to be really clear and maybe even repetitive if you've said something and he doesn't seem to get it. Keep it simple: I don't want this kind of ugliness in my life, in our relationship, in my kid's life. It needs to be limited and kept at bay and not dealt with during quality/together time unless absolutely necessary. It's a little concerning that he keeps engaging in the hostility so much, that he doesn't seem to recognize how toxic and pointless it can be - you'd hope he'd mature past being so drawn in to the disputing. (As for worrying about seeming like her by demanding normalcy and peace in your life, that happened in my relationship. He told me I was being like her once. I was infuriated. I had never been so insulted. Over time, I stopped holding the grudge (he apologized), and over time, he realized that while I may have been similar in that I was someone who was addressing a problem with him (oh no!), my goal was peace and goodness, while hers was malice and toxicity. You need to do what you need to do to create a life that you want, and allowing this to go on doesn't seem like something you can (or should have to) tolerate.) IMHO

Oh, Maureen. There are no words. I'm sitting with you in spirit.

Because nothing's simple now. With exes and late spouses, with kids, with the loss of innocence regarding how bad it can hurt to lose someone we love (whether to death or a breakup) (I've been really stunned to learn that, despite my opinion that nothing can hurt like death, that I can still hurt really f'ing bad from relationship problems - and that's not even death or a breakup), with permanently remaining love for our lost loves, etc., etc. It's super complicated. Not just that, but all the worries and fears are normal - what if our differences are too great, what if someone gets hurt, what if I get excited and then disappointed? I'm glad you've found someone you like and who also likes you. It's lovely. I hope you will let yourself enjoy it as much as you can - my therapist used to say, "Allow yourself good feelings."

Yeah, to a certain extent it's like having a spy in the house. Our summer vacation came with NG's son bringing a film camera he wanted to bring back to his mom's for film developing - taking pretty candid, intimate family photos of us all the entire trip. And she sent him with a cell phone he used the whole time but wouldn't let NG see (he was SIX). He was recording us at times. She also dropped him off hours late, so we got a late start on a really long drive and were sitting around all packed like WTF. It's hard. It's just hard.

I think it can be a little different for everyone, depending on circumstances. For example, I had to move at five months. That move made my first year different than it otherwise would have been. It was extremely painful, but also a bit renewing once it was over. For me, six months wasn't too bad - I think I was just recovering from the move and liking my new spot. But for me, eight months was nearly unbearable. As for doing things differently, as soon as he died, I tried to live according to a really strict routine - saw it as my only link to sanity/reality outside my head. I got sunshine and worked out and ran. I took long walks on weekends. I went to synagogue weekly. I visited his parents weekly, then every other week, then once a month. I went to the cemetery once a month. I wrote a lot. I went to therapy twice a week for eight months, then once a week. And I did all of that for a good two years. It must've been a control thing, or I felt so crazy on the inside that I wanted my life to be really stable on the outside. I'm wishing you peace and comfort and solace.

Holy F That's really all I've got. Lots of sympathy from another dealing with similar baggage-of-NG's, for more than four years now (for three I've had her blocked). Still wishing she'd "get help or go away." Luckily for you and me, we're us and we're not them (the crazies). Keep being awesome. xoxo

Something I don't understand is everyone's impulse to assess and evaluate everyone else, offer commentary on how others live and feel. I'm not saying I don't do it. It seems to be a social pastime, nearly universally, irresistible. But why do we do it? Why do we measure others with our own yardsticks? There are things about my life and personality someone else could never understand, just as there are things about others' lives and personalities I may never be able to understand, and yet we superimpose our own ideas onto them, and them onto us. And then we let it sink in, we use it to hurt ourselves and each other. Why do we absorb others' opinions, when we know it's a flawed system? Why do we seek approval when we know that someone else can't know the full truth of our existence and inner workings? Are you crazy? No. Are you "more normal" than people tell you? Probably. Is it their business, the intricacies and emotions of how you deal with loss and the circumstances of your life and past? No. From your description, it sounds like you're running your life really well. You sound super well-adjusted. It doesn't sound like you're having problems with grief. It sounds like you're engaging in remembrance. All people are broken and damaged to a certain extent. I say, as much as you can, let the opinions of others slide right off you like you're water resistant and they're the rain.

This was one of the only grief books that didn't bother me. It surprised me, because it's religious and I'm not, and it still was the best one in my opinion. It's short and easy, but has gems in it that make you think, "Yes! Exactly!" It's his journals in the time just after his wife died (she died of cancer, so not sudden, but I lost DH in a completely unexpected accident, and it still resonated). Extremely relatable.

Do they know you're seeing someone? Can you talk to them about it?

I'm so sorry you've hit such a rough patch. Made me wish we were all sitting around together in a comfy living room chatting instead of on computers. As for dating, I think some single people are looking for "fun," and no-strings-attached sex or dates or companionship, and some are looking for a relationship and true closeness and a future. And some of the former leads to the latter. You asked about relationships. I'm in one now, and was in one other dating scenario before this one - no more since DH's death. I've never done on-line dating. My first post-death experience was a very traditional situation, in which I crossed paths with someone at work (not a co-worker), and we chatted, and he asked me out to dinner, and we met for dinner and he paid and we talked and he walked me home. The next date similar, a few later he kissed me. He was very respectful and just a great guy - much more ready for a relationship than I was (I warned him from the get-go of my situation and limitations). He was just great, and I wish someone like him for all of you who are looking and hoping. I met NG, expecting it to be a purely friend thing (he was a widower I reached out to to pay forward all the support I got here - and we'd texted completely devoid of any romantic or sexual anything for months before meeting IRL). I was not expecting it, but it was clear from our first meeting that he was interested in hooking up. It kinda threw me. A couple get-togethers later, we started sleeping together, we thought or decided it was casual/no strings/non-exclusive, but looking back it seems ridiculous because by the time we first slept together, we were already quite close - how could there not have been complexities? Ok, that was rambly. I guess my point is that different people are looking for different things at different times - I was ok with FWB situations back then, and you are not (and I don't think I would be now if I were single). I think all you can do is be honest about what you're looking for and stick to that, reject what you need to reject. I didn't know what I was looking for - I didn't think I was looking for anything, I was just taking things as they came and trying to go with my gut in each scenario. I knew I was starting to feel alive again, I knew I was looking for a big change, but I didn't have a specific vision or goal. I just knew I wanted more from life than I had.

We had a New Year's tradition of staying in and going to bed early (DH didn't drink and I always hate big drinking holidays, though I love social drinking), but we'd always wake up really early on New Year's Day, take a long walk together before most of NYC woke up, and have an early breakfast/brunch at a restaurant we both loved (he always ordered the same thing and loved it so much - he just enjoyed the *#(%# out of life in all its little details and ordinarinesses). Many would think it's so "lame" to miss the big party holiday, but it was always so lovely and cozy, and the next morning felt like we were the only two people. Was always such a great start to the year, together.

I think it would be lovely for you to reach out, if only to give her the comfort of knowing that whatever rejection(s) she may have felt were not about her. It's a kind thing to do, and hey you never know, maybe she'll give you another chance.

I hope his family's doing ok. Love to you, Maureen.

At one year, I felt exiled. Exiled from grief. From social recognition of grief, and from the structure of grieving (part of the Jewish tradition involves saying kaddish or the mourner's prayer for 11 months and then again at the one year anniversary of death, and then every year on the anniversary), so at 11 months and one year, it was kind of "the end" of the heavy ritual grieving). I felt exiled. Like I'd done all the firsts. I'd done all the dates where I could say, "last year on this day we were....." I just felt exiled. I wanted back into the first year. My family came with me to say kaddish on the one year anniversary and in the midst of it I just collapsed into sobs. It couldn't be over. It being over was him being over all over again. One year is really hard.

I went back after a couple weeks. It was mainly to avoid continuing to sit and cry all day, staring at the river, sitting on a bench. I started to worry I may not remain sane if I didn't at least pretend to be part of society. I really needed that. Looking back, I don't know how I did it, and all I remember is getting on the subway, clutching my little packet of tissues, and two of my friend/co-workers meeting me at the subway at work, to walk me to the office. I was a mess. I truly had no business pretending to be functional in any way whatsoever. But I needed to have structure and routine and a place to go. I was lucky though - everyone I worked with knew and loved him, AND I was able to modify my responsibilities to do only mindless work for a while until I could think again. It's hard. It's just so hard.

What you describe sounds very normal to me, unfortunately. I've heard "the only way out is through," but them being dead is forever, so it's kinda more like, "the only way through is through." You WILL feel more stable eventually. But it takes a very long time. (It's different for everyone.) And sometimes you'll feel a tad better only to feel worse following that. As for feeling like you can't survive it, I'm sure many/most of us were there, though I honestly (mercifully) can't remember much of the first five months (and, like you, I lost a lot of weight). It feels physically unsurvivable. I always call it "bearing the unbearable." Do you have a therapist? I strongly advise it. Working through things you've learned afterwards gives you even more to work through and resolve. There's loss, there's trauma, there is new information, there's just so much hurt. I can't emphasize enough how much I leaned on having that time to just empty the contents of my raw feelings in therapy. I credit lots of therapy early on with helping me heal more healthily and long-term. It also helped me to write, get it all out, I needed to get it out of me, and it was an ever-renewing spring of pain and sadness. I tried to get sunlight and be active - I knew that my insides were a very dark and complicated place, and I needed to counteract that as much I could with simple, basic, good creature stuff like sun and endorphins and sleep and hydration. I'm thinking of you, and I'm so sorry for all you're enduring. You will survive this. We are all next to, ahead of, and behind you on this path. I used to look at the first widower I met after losing DH, and chant in my head: "If he survived it, I can survive it." Edited to add: From what I do remember, the first few days/weeks contain the worst feelings I've ever known or imagined. You're not crazy for feeling so bad (maybe you're not wondering that, but I was). It's natural.

I believed I'd never have real feelings for someone again. I didn't think I'd be alone forever necessarily, but I thought it wouldn't ever reach to the center level inside me ever again, I didn't think I'd ever feel that magnetism, that draw to someone that is of course part lust but part something more - more than personality, more than sex, more than compatibility, more than emotional attachment. I thought that died with him. It didn't. I thought all my (unconceived, unborn) babies died when he died - I thought I'd never be a mother. I now have a 3 1/2 year old. I thought I'd never leave the City (except *MAYBE* for another city). Now I live out in the country and we're about to buy land.

It makes loads of sense, and I'm so sorry for all you had to go through. I said as soon as the accident happened that I refused, would not, did not want to, remember DH for death and loss, that I wanted to remember *him*, but it's impossible. It seeps. The end of the story, the "what happened," it has so much power. I can't think of him without thinking of death, young death, what happened..... the shroud, as you put it, the death shroud, and now I'm thinking of Jewish burial rituals.... The "what happened," creeping and colonizing, taking away from the "who he was" and "what we shared," it's one of the biggest robberies, injustices. xoxoxoxo

Oh gosh, this post made me so happy to read (and not just because you're understatedly hilarious). I hope you're enjoying this as much as I'm enjoying it for you! I have no advice because I seem to always move fast, and I think it's mostly because I only have two categories: this isn't/you aren't worth my time and I must escape this very moment, OR I like this/you and could do this forever and ever. A thought I wish I'd had back when I started my first post-death relationship: don't freak yourself out by all that a tiny casual comparison could bring, because there's a simple and huge common factor in your DH relationship and any future relationship: you. Don't make too much of anything until you've factored that in. And: yes, there is risk and pain in caring and having feelings, but I can say - having had a deeply rocky phase in my NG relationship - I can say whole-heartedly that it's worth it. It sounds lovely. I'm wishing you all the best in this, and in your enjoyment of it. xoxoxo

DH was very easygoing and "life's too short," whereas I was a stressed out worrier. He'd always say, "My baby's driving herself cuckoo." It was true. It still is. After he died, I thought maybe I could pay tribute to him in some spiritual way by becoming more like him. I did for a while, but I think it was more that I'd become indifferent to whether I lived or died that only seemed like easygoing-ness. As time has gone on, I've seen that his assessment was deeply true about me. I wouldn't say it annoyed him - he was too easygoing to get annoyed - and it doesn't "annoy" me, but it does make me sad for myself (and self-pity annoys me!).

I too have trouble with extremes. As a full-time working professional with a lot of professional responsibility, a long commute, a 3-year-old daughter for whom I'm almost entirely responsible, a partner with really long difficult hours, a partner who's a widower, etc., etc., I spend most of my time being super competent, and trying to be even more so. It's exhausting. There's no wiggle room. There's no relief from ultimate responsibility for all things. We went out this weekend, just the two of us, and I said, "I absolutely cannot drink much tonight. You know how the earth has a crust and a mantle, etc., well, I'm more like a thin crust, and just beneath it to the center is thick, burning lava rage." I'm not sure how much of this is widowhood-related, except that my life with DH was far easier and had way less struggle and way fewer tasks that fell on me, and we didn't have kids.... Anyway, my point: I know what it's like to have an emotional/temper hair trigger. It's not pretty. My goal this year is to find patience. I think that even though it's at times hard for those around me because of this rage, it's way harder to actually be me and carry it inside. It's not like, "I can't continue like this," because I absolutely can. I just really would prefer not to. I'm not sure how to find the path to betterment in this regard. I'm open to wisdom

I'm so sorry. I hope you and your brother can bring each other some comfort somehow. We're here for you. I'm so sorry.