Dark place

[Blue green]

How long are we expected to live in this dark place? When is it "acceptable" to talk to other people and have feelings other than sadness again?

[Mrskro]

Oh Blue Green; 

 

Isn't that the question?  Unfortunately there is no acceptable, the one thing I've really learned along this journey is there is no right and wrong except for what we determine is right for ourselves!   

 

For me it was around 5 or 6 months, an ex contacted me out of the blue and invited me to a concert, a band we saw together a lot of years ago was touring.  It was then that I realized, while I wasn't ready for a full on relationship I didn't want to be alone and sad and could see myself opening up to the idea. 

 

The light eventually cracks through the darkness, the smiles come more easily and laughing becomes second nature again. 

[Wheelerswife]

I met my second husband 6 months after my first husband died and married him a year later.  My second husband has been gone for three years now, and I think that I am close to being ready to meet someone new.  It is all different for us...even different within one individual.

 

Maureen

[Mrs Reader]

I think am crawling out of the dark place just now, and it feels wonderful. I am almost seven months out. I am seeing men around me, I am secretly thinking about online or any dating. I want to have my legs hairfree and toenails done. I want someone to look at me and like what they see. I want to go to dinner with a man.

This all makes me so happy and so so sad at the same time. You know. But finally I feel alive after six dark months.

 

[Mizpah]

Throw out the words "expected" and "acceptable," and do what comes naturally.  I have widow friends who started dating and going out within a couple months (and also dearly loved their spouses and missed them horribly).  I'm not saying it makes sense for everyone (for me, I dated for the first time after 15 months, and it was very upsetting for me), but there's nothing wrong with it.  We are social and sexual creatures, and we crave companionship and closeness.  It is ALWAYS acceptable to have all kinds of feelings.  Always.  Our conception of the emotional landscape is so simplistic and not at all realistic.  We contain all kinds of simultaneous and contradictory feelings.

 

If I misunderstood your question, and you meant when will the darkness inside you lift, then that's different for everyone - and usually very gradual. 

[Blue green]

"It is ALWAYS acceptable to have all kinds of feelings.  Always.  Our conception of the emotional landscape is so simplistic and not at all realistic.  We contain all kinds of simultaneous and contradictory feelings."

 

This is so well said. Thank you all for your insight. I miss my husband every second but I also know that I don't want to be alone for the rest of my life. I think I let society's misguided and inexperienced expectations weigh me down. I have to do what's right for me.

[mbanyard]

I miss my husband every second but I also know that I don't want to be alone for the rest of my life.

 

THIS is it EXACTLY. This is exactly how I've been feeling and I've been terrified to do anything about it. (I even started to make an online profile and deleted it)

 

It's a scary place to be, for sure. I'm glad I'm not alone....but boy oh boy this part is really hard too!

 

MB

[Mrs Reader]

Oh shit. Yesterday I was full of hope and looking anxiously forward, today I am not interested in anything except having my DH back. This is exhausting, going back and forth both.

Are you guys doing this? One day over the moon about all the possibilities that this new life would maybe bring, and the next day just devastated about all the lost love and dreams that are gone now.

Is it my body wanting one thing and heart the other?

[Laura1612]

Mrs. Reader,

 

Oh yes. I felt like I was moving forward and the last two days have brought me back to awful. Crying all the time, not getting to work on time. So yes, I think this is normal!

 

Laura