Brenda

If it's not too offensive for this site (and mods, if it is, please delete or edit it), I'm going to send you a "double fuck cancer up the ass without lube" - lost my wife to it fairly recently and I can't despise it enough.  Also sending you huge hugs, best wishes, and she sounds like a strong girl!

So sorry to have to meet you like this, jodiwitz.  You're most certainly in the right place.  Use us as the folks to whom you can say anything, no matter what.  Even those crazy thoughts that you just wish you could tell someone in "real life" but can't because they're too crazy - that's what we're here for.  You'll find no judgment here, no lack of empathy, nobody opening their mouths and saying stupid things to you at the wrong time.

Take care of your immediate needs.  That'll help you take care of your children.  We're here for whatever support you want, at whatever time you want.

Massive hug, and you're not alone.

Gotta go for the all-inclusive package.  The cruise sounds like too much work, plus the norovirus...knowing my luck, I'd be on one of those cruises where everyone gets sick.

Cops or firemen?

Stress is grossly underestimated in terms of its effects on the human body.  Sounds like it could be the cause of you feeling lousy right now, especially given the fact that you've clearly had three years of some of the most intense stress imaginable.

I'm only about six months in (with a few months of dealing with her terminal illness that pushes me to about nine months of stress); I can tell it's taken a toll on my body.  In terms of coping techniques, I'm especially unqualified to coach others; my coping techniques are decidedly unhealthy.  Alcohol, overworking myself to take my mind off things, etc.  Those just add to the problems of stress, even though they do offer (well, they offer me) temporary relief.  I can only suggest perhaps talking to a counselor or therapist; your health insurance should cover this, and they do really help.  If I didn't have mine - someone I can rant to for an hour each week - I'd be even crazier/drunker/whatever than I am already.  Well worth the co-pay.  I might also suggest seeing your family doc for a little pharmaceutical help; a temporary and low dose of tranquilizers might give you some breathing room to reset your system.

Sorry to hear that you're still suffering so much three years after the fact.  Giant hug from one stressed girl to another.

Thanks Skitwin, just as I'd resolved to let it go...

Good to know though, just in case there was anything important in there.  I have the stuff I need (bank info, insurance paperwork, photos, etc.), and the curious side of me is just going to have to get lost.  Nothing good will come from my snooping!

A pipe had burst in the bathroom and flooded the place. . . . Cant afford a plumber so if it's not an easy Lowes kinda fix I'm in trouble.  This week already the fridge died.  The washer has been broken for months.  Im kinda hating on home ownernship at this moment.  Oh and did I mention, no homeowners insurance? (I paid cash for the house, it's not required and always seems like there are more important necessities and haven't been able to get it yet).

Ouch!  I'm so so sorry that you're in such a state, especially with the insurance.

On the bright side:

- There's nothing else that could go wrong at this point, surely?  This must be the low point.

- It's water, not sewage, so it should be dryable, especially since it's summer and you can keep the doors/windows open.  Get a couple of those huge fans to drive some air through the house to speed things up.

Yeah, I know, hardly much of a bright side, and again, I'm sorry to hear that you're having to deal with this on top of everything else.

Decluttering here, in advance of a house move.  She died only earlier this year, so I don't think I've had a chance to really associate too many things around the home with her specifically.  Good in a way, because it's making it rather simple to draw the line as to what I should keep and what needs to go; the truly meaningful stuff is staying with me, while the things that meant little or that only have a tenuous connection to my wife are going or already gone.  I think it would have been far worse if I was allowed to stay in the house I'm in now for years after her death; little things that don't actually mean much might have taken on a whole new level of significance.  E.g. a chair that she once sat in - at the moment, it's like "no big deal", but in a year or so it might be like "oh my god she once sat there so I've got to keep it."

Still the same feelings of removing her from my life though with everything that's given away or thrown away.  It's the tiny things that really get me though, like a credit card receipt that has her signature on, or a Sunday crossword that I found under the sofa that she had only half-finished.

Ok, so my prior career is thoroughly incompatible with being a single parent.  Or a depressed widow.  As in utterly unworkable.  Now, as someone in early middle age, I'm faced with the prospect of having to start all over again in terms of how to earn money.

Life insurance - thankfully! - has given me a little time to sort my life out, but the prospect of changing careers at my age is frightening.  I have absolutely no idea what to do!  College-educated, but rather lacking in transferable skills and experience.

Anyone else have their career destroyed by the death of a spouse?

For me, the reason to move it from one hand to the other was because I knew I wanted to wear it for the rest of my life, regardless of what else may happen to me in the future.

For me, the rings would be too painful of a reminder of all I have lost.

for me my wedding band makes me smile cause it reminds me of all the love we shared.

The thought of the rings sitting in my jewelry box forever, however, was distressing. Around the one year mark, I did have the rings repurposed and made into a unique individual pendant.  The feather is now his "symbol" and the jeweler created a beautiful diamond encrusted feather using all the gold and diamonds from my ring.  It's a beautiful reminder of what was, and also what will be as a rebuild my future.

I wanted as much despair as possible to happen as soon as possible.

Oh for heaven's sake, thanks for making this sooooooooo difficult!  Every one of you in this entire thread is talking perfect sense, and I've still no idea what to do.

I did test something this morning: my wedding ring on my right ring finger, and her wedding ring on my right little finger.  The two could touch; sometimes, when I'm missing her terribly, I'll tap my ring (still on my finger where she put it) against her ring, which I keep in my jewelry box.  I'd love to be able to do that as and when, but still look to the future and have my left hand free.  I miss her like crazy, but I'm young too (or I think I am) - certainly too young to spend the rest of my life mourning a loss over which neither one of us had any control.

Sometimes, I wish that the rules for death and grief in western culture were spelled out with a little more rigidity.  I can see how everyone doing what they please works in some cases, but I'm someone who finds the whole process rather stressful and confusing.  Tell me that I have a year to the day wearing black, a year before I'm supposed to take my ring off, a year before I'm supposed to start dating again.  The freedom to figure this stuff out myself is one additional problem I really don't need right now.  (But in a good way...)

Sorry to hear that BIL went fishing and could have taken you and baited the hooks.  Would have been a great way to spend the day.

But sounds like you made the most of it.  Awesome that you went for the tattoo.  And you got through everything in one piece - well done!

And doesn't sushi make even the worst day just that little bit more bearable?

Thanks ever so much for all the replies.  Some great suggestions in there, many things I'd never thought of before.

I think I'm going to do the "move it to the right hand" thing.  Worst case scenario, I put it back on the left hand again...

So I have a date picked out for when I'll take my wedding ring off, but it's less than five months after she passed away.  Feeling horribly guilty about even thinking about this step, but I also don't want to be held hostage by it for the rest of my life.  It's gonna feel odd, no question about that, but is it a betrayal of her to take it off so early?

It's not like I've got anything or anyone waiting in the wings.  No new girlfriend, no next marriage waiting to happen (not that it ever will).  Nothing like that.  Just want to keep taking steps forward in life as best I can, and this is a baby step I think I can manage that will signify to me that yes, she's gone, but I do have the rest of my life ahead of me and it would be a waste to spend it going all "Queen Victoria" and mourning for the rest of my life.

And I guess I could put it back on when I feel the need to, except I've never taken it off voluntarily before.

Thoughts?  Put it on my right hand?  Wear it around my neck (although a sturdy and secure enough necklace would look huge and ugly.)

(Ignore.  Said too much.)

OMG, they're doing it again.  The f**king in-laws, they just can't leave me and the kids alone.  They are literally making my f**king blood boil!  The last thing I need at the moment is more unnecessary stress, and that's precisely what they're doing.

You guys don't need the details.  Wanted to vent, that's all.

But about to wring their necks!  Grrrr.

Giant hugs to both you and cousin, jlp.  That disease took my wife away and there's nothing I'd like to see more than someone kicking it's fucking ass.  Wishing you all the absolute best.

Thanks for the advice.  100% right, as ever.  Time to let it go.

This is awful, but I'm going to throw it out there anyway to get it off my chest.  In going through my wife's stuff after she died, I found that she had a secret email account.  I can't get into it and it's killing me - I don't know why.  (Well, to be honest, I suspect she was using it to communicate to others about me during a rather difficult period in our marriage.)  Tried using the usual passwords we had for such things, but none work.

I always trusted her 100%.  She expected the same of me, although I think she thought I was being secretive most of the time (which is just in my nature.)  Now it turns out that she may have had a hidden part of her life.

This is eating away at me.  It's like I thought I knew who she was, but now I'm not entirely sure that I did.  Of course, I'm suspecting the worst.  Chances are, it was a harmless backup email account that she never used other than a couple of times to sign up for Ebay or something where she didn't want all the spam going to her regular account.

I know it sounds weirdly paranoid, but it bothers me.  It's asking questions that I know I'll never find the answer to, and I want to remember her for the amazing person she was, and not me thinking she was somebody I never really knew properly.  And even if I did get into that account, what would happen if there was stuff in there?  I'd regret knowing, I'm sure.

Drop it and move on?  Investigate further?

I know, this makes me sound like a crazy bitch of a wife, and maybe it's just grasping at straws to find out more about who my wife really was deep inside.  To be honest, the right thing to do would be to drop it and move on, to remember her for her smile and kindness and cuteness and wit.  All the good things.  Knowing anything bad at this point would only hurt more and wouldn't change the past whatsoever.

Yeah, going nuts I guess.

Is this section for discussing spouses who died because of suicide, addiction, mental illness etc., or is it also somewhere that surviving spouses can discuss their own experiences with suicide, addiction, and mental illness because of what happened?

Don't want to intrude on what would obviously be a very personal space for those who lost someone because of these unique issues, but struggling to find a place to discuss how the loss of my spouse triggered all three in myself.

A good night of sleep put some distance between me and yesterday's events.  Still can't stop thinking about it - and I've got a thousand things I need to be thinking about other than this stuff - but the initial "wft?" has started to ease a little.  All the advice and support given here is really appreciated, and far more than I've ever received from my wife's family.

I'm hoping that in a few years, I'll be settled into something of a new life, sitting in my little garden on a warm evening in a far away place with a glass of wine and (perhaps) some great new company, and I'll be able to look back on these events with half a smile and say, "Yeah, those were some strange times, but I got through it in one piece."

Hugs to you, TooSoon.  As someone in the process of dumping SIL, FIL and MIL to protect my kids from their nastiness, I can vouch for the fact that it is a rather unpleasant process.  Severing family connections, while necessary at times, is never a pleasant or easy thing to do, and it's causing you a lot of stress at a time when nobody needs this kind of additional stress.

Not sure I have any positive advice other than to let you know you're not alone, that in-laws are disposable when they threaten the welfare of your own children, and that your first responsibility is to do what you can to protect your kids from those you don't feel are appropriate company, no matter what relation they are to you.

If you think you and your daughter would be far better off without SIL's influence, then make a break.  If it makes it easier, tell FIL that you're going to adhere to his wishes, but once he's gone all bets are off.  Sounds harsh and I wish more than anything that death always brought the survivors closer together instead of ripping families apart, but as many have told me, I've got to do what I think is right for my children, regardless of whatever evil SIL, MIL and FIL think.

The in-law saga continues.  Not content on cutting me off after my wife's death earlier this year, one of them has now written me the nastiest, most horrible letter I've ever read in my life, essentially blaming me for every single fucking problem in the entire family.  Just as I thought things had settled down into an uncomfortable, silent truce, this fucking idiot decides not just to open up all the old wounds, but also to slash a few more fresh ones.  And I'm not sure why.  Yeah, I get it, the family doesn't like the fact that my wife liked another girl.  Big deal.  But in this day and age, and after what happened, I simply cannot understand how anyone would so aggressively push me away.  Were my wife alive, she'd have gladly told her own family to go fuck themselves.  Sadly, she's not here and can't speak up for what she felt.  Instead, they've unleashed the most backward homophobia I've ever heard.

I don't get it.  I thought that us leaving each other alone was enough, that they'd driven me far enough away.  But I guess not.  There's some on my wife's side who clearly want to chase me down and harass me.  They are nasty, bitter people.

Sorry for the filthy language, but I can't find any polite words to use under the circumstances.

Giant hugs back at everyone here, which is turning out to be a lifeline.  I always thought it somewhat weird to have "online" friends, but you're all becoming rather helpful in getting through some of the difficult times.  Time for me to rethink the idea that contact has to be old-fashioned to be worthwhile, because I honestly get more out of my visits to this site that I would have got from visiting half of the people I once knew in real life before my wife passed away.

That said, I've got to get out and meet people at some point, although I'm in the process of moving house and kinda don't want to put much effort into forming new relationships only to have them lost immediately when I relocate.  But once I'm settled down in a new location, I guess it's time to figure out where other young widows and widowers congregate and make myself known to them.  I imagine that they're the only people who won't think I'm absolutely crazy and who will understand what we're all going through.

After she died, I became hopelessly lonely.  We were each other's best friends, and the downside is that now she's gone, I have very few people around (like none) I would actually consider my friends.  My wife was the person I wanted to spend my time with, and I did just that instead of hanging around with college friends or work friends.  But now, there's nobody I can call, nobody I can talk to, nobody who I can possibly rely upon to even try to help plug the massive hole she left in my life.  I just didn't ever put any effort into building good friendships outside my marriage.

I'm not even sure I know how to make friends, it's been so long since I needed to even try.  Really wish I had one or two good friends before I needed them.

Life's too short to waste it on energy sappers.

"Energy sappers" is a very polite way of describing my in-laws, who seem intent on making my life a thousand times harder than it needs to be right now.  Given the fact that I married my wife, not them, they're top of my list of people to distance myself from now that she's gone.  (And I'm sure they feel the same way about me too.)

Thanks gracelet.  I can't wait for that feeling of a genuine smile.

Interesting that you mention you weren't sure what your sense of purpose was when your spouse was alive.  Looking back, I can't think what mine was either.  I mean, I was just happy (?) being married, having a normal (?) life, trying to be a good (?) person and spouse whatever.  It's almost like there was no sense of purpose needed, no higher calling or meaning necessary to feel fulfilled.  Maybe I'm looking to regain something that I never had in the first place, making it seem all the more impossible?

And if the purpose of life is as simple as trying to be a good person (which I'm fairly sure it is - everything else meaningful should follow naturally), then it's a standard that's well within my reach.