My Widowers Journey

When one loses their significant other, especially when it’s the love of your life, the emotional roller-coaster becomes even tougher. I’m now going on month 10 since my darling wife left this world. However, this month comes with another date, our anniversary.

I used every bit of willpower to get through the holidays. For those in this situation, does it seem that the holidays go on forever? Now comes the date of our wedding anniversary, then her birthday and one-year marker. I don’t know how others handle it, but this part of the journey feels like I’m “bracing” for the hurricane of dates to come and go.

Many people have said that, “it doesn’t get better, it just gets easier.” I’ve heard so many “dates” on how long before you start to feel better, or at least somewhat functional. The majority have said it’s about a year-and-a-half. I’ve also heard the second year is the worst because you start losing your support group. The other ones go out to three years and I’ve heard of those struggling after five years and longer. Perhaps I can get more insight to this one too.

I read where the dates of anniversaries, birthdays, etc., mark the passage of time in this what I would call an unwanted journey. Prior to this last week, I thought that I could get through the rough time a little easier as I try to prepare and brace myself.

A quick lesson learned as you can never prepare, no matter how hard you try. This last week was one the worst. Trying to escape the overwhelming sadness that will blindside you is not possible. There’s a lot of truth to the saying, “you can run, but you can’t hide.” I’ve been running as fast and as hard as I can, but there’s no hiding.

One way I’m trying to cope is to do things “out of the box,” or out of my comfort zone. I am trying to do what I can to ease the pain, but realize I just have to “sit in it.” But, once the big dates have passed for year number one, I’m going to take a two-week cruise around Europe, something I would have not considered prior to all of this. I don’t expect to feel better overall, however it’s a different environment which makes for a distraction.

The month of May is one of the big “dates.” Her birthday was on May 8 and she passed late on the night of the 24th. Looking back, it’s almost hard to believe that one year is almost here.