Widowhood

This year more than any I can feel healing going on for me and I only say that to show that there is that hope to cling to. Winter and Christmas are bloody difficult times. For many here this is their first Christmas since the world stopped turning. The rest of the world keeps spinning but ours stopped on a particular day, on a definite minute.

Hi Handsome, How have you been. You must be so fed up with me talking to you ALL the time, so I figured another letter might be nice for a change. I hope the postman in your universe is more reliable than ours. A birthday card for you arrived yesterday. It got delivered to the wrong house (together with some pretty vital stuff) and it took more than 3 month to get here. I’d make that a speed of less than one centimetre a day. That is slow. Even for Ireland.

How do you make an introduction that's not boring. My name is Susanne and I found this site only a few days ago. (OK, that is boring) I only put a short "Hi" in the members forum and got ever so lovely responses very quickly. I also offered to write a blog for you. When my husband became ill I set up a FB page to keep our friends informed, instead of having to call or email everyone separately. Yes, I'm lazy. Very soon I started writing longer pieces, and I realised quickly how helpful this was. The support I got in the comments from our friends, most of whom live quite far away, was immense and became a lifeline. But I also noticed writing things down helped me to cope better.

Helping Children Cope with Grief by Rosemary Wells When my husband passed away suddenly in a traffic accident, I was faced with the terrible task...

Inspirational and encouraging quotes for someone who is widowed, along with the known name of who said it: "The greater the love, the greater the...

So. I'm off work on sick leave. Again I have found my inner self being in conflict with my work self. Stress and anxiety. How to cope? Small steps forward led me back to an activity that had been a joy to me throughout my life. I've rediscovered my love of reading. I joined the Galway City Library recently. For free. Hundreds of books from A to Z. I was going to substitute a novel instead of doing more therapy. I was taking a big chance but it's working.

It piddling rain here in South Galway and I'm in my living room covered up with a soft Pennys throw. It's darkish outside and it really feels like winter. Maybe we've bypassed autumn all together. I've been making pot after pot of my not world famous apple & ginger chutney. So, it must be autumn. Right!! The house is so quiet. Even Daithi the cat is staying nearby. I think he and my dog Lola feel the loneliness of the empty nest that I'm surviving in. Denis the goldfish hasn't really changed his routine so I'm pretty sure that he is oblivious to my plight.

When my husband was in ICU I would come home from the hospital feeling tired and wired up too. So, sleep was out of the question as my mind was wandering around the world and back. So much information and anxiety! The house was eerily silent compared to the whirr and click of the machines which were keeping my husband alive. Having decided to go to bed I switched on the TV to watch BBC and Sky News. After a few nights I realised that if I left the news programme on but decreased the volume then I would drift off into a peaceful enough sleep. I finally got into that sort of routine at night. Listening to news presenters was an ideal but weird kind of sleeping tablet. During the day I would drive into the hospital to meet the ICU teams and visit Dave. It was difficult to see him there in a coma and hooked up to machines. He was just a shell of a man or so I thought.

Raging against the dawn. Why now? Why me? I’m overwhelmed and feeling angry just about everything. I can’t understand why I’m so angry with life? It’s six years later after the death of my husband I am angry beyond any bounds every day and often at night. I am twisted with rage against the world. Can’t understand why this is happening now after all this time. My therapist advised me to let my feelings out. Free them and they would set me free. I answered by saying I was not an angry person. I accepted the trials that life put in front of me. I was a world class avoider of all things menacing and confrontational.

I'm trying so hard to make sense of my World. This post may be an exercise in naval gazing. I make no apologies for that fact. Definitely a deep, dark look at the way I now view the world. There are plenty of opinions and advice given to us when we are bereaved: You'll get over it. Time heals all sadness. You'll find someone else. You've got to get on with things. You should be better by now surely?