u/Skippy1221

I don’t know why. Today is not a special or significant day. He’s been gone almost 15 months now. Today it feels like he is still alive. It feels like nothing ever happened. He CANT be gone. How could this have actually happened? I see him in my memory as if he is going to come back any moment. I long to be with him again so strongly that it makes me nauseous.

I had to just let it all out today. The cries the screams the wails. The wimpers and the moans and groans. The neighbors probably hear me and think I’m insane.

In the beginning I thought I just needed to make it “through”. That there would be some “other side” I would eventually reach and then it would all be okay.

I started dating someone new and he’s really great, he’s been an absolute trooper dealing with me and my grief. I feel very lucky to have him. But I thought that would also “fix” me. I thought it would make me better. It hasn’t.

I miss my best friend. I miss my other half. I miss living without grief. And I’m getting caught up in all the “whys” again. Why did this happen to him and to us? Why didn’t he deserve to live several more decades? Why didn’t I deserve to grow old with him? Why couldn’t we have just had that ONE thing?

I find that alternating bites between each side helps keep the filling from falling out. Anyways, that’s how Iv always eaten tacos

I want to say THANK YOU to everyone who responded to my 1 year memorial post and photos yesterday. I got so much more support than I imagined and everyone’s words meant so much to me.

I’m struggling so much more today than I did yesterday. I guess it doesn’t shock me. That’s how his birthday was for me too. I did okay the day of but the day after I was a wreck.

I feel like I have been thrusted back in time to when it all happened. I haven’t had a day this bad since January. Somehow I thought I would be okay since Iv been doing much better the last few months. But no, I’m having the hardest time. I feel physically sick. Like I’m dying too. I need my Cody back. I need him so much. I can’t bear to never see him again. Cries.

I understand it’s not going to be applicable to everyone. It definitely wouldn’t have been for me in the early days of my grief. But at nearly a year since his passing, this resonated with me.

“We must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is waiting for us”

I’ll never forget him, I’ll never stop loving him, I’ll never stop missing him. But he is never coming back to me in this lifetime. And I have to accept that and be willing to let go, and forge a new path forward. And I have been. Iv worked extremely hard to not let this destroy my life. And by the grace of God, or whoever, I met someone special who understands and supports my grief. I have a chance at good life still, despite losing my other half. But that can only happen by letting go of the life I had before, and the life I thought was my future. It’s a new future now, and I want to be happy.

Is there ever a single day that goes by when you don’t think of them? I imagine that I will NEVER go a full day without thinking about him. Even if I live another 65 years. But I have found that I think of him less than I used to. I used to think about him every single second of every day. Mid conversation with people about things completely unrelated to my grief but I would be thinking about him. It was never ending. Then I started noticing 5 minutes would pass where I wasn’t thinking about him. Then 10, then 20. Iv probably gone an entire hour where I didn’t think of him now.

I don’t want a day to ever pass where I don’t think of him. But what will it be like in a decade or 30 years?

Everything so far has been all the “firsts”. First holidays, first birthdays, etc… but now, with only 5 weeks left to go before I come full circle, I’m starting to feel like everything is the lasts. The last 5 weeks we spent together, the last photo we took together, the last hug, the last kiss. The last time I heard his voice. I don’t want it to be a full year already.

And I’m not even mad about it. I’m a pretty empathetic person and I understand that he is only trying to relate to the biggest loss he has ever endured. Which happens to be a breakup, BECAUSE he cheated on her which is a whole other thing.

I know he doesn’t understand and I know he means no harm. But it just bothered me after the fact. I don’t see this person much at all so I don’t feel the need to say anything to him or defend my loss.

But it got me to thinking: Why are some people like this and others not? Before my loss, any time I heard about someone losing their significant other I NEVER once even thought about any breakups I had in my past. Like it never even crossed my mind that my super hard breakup that took me a year to get over in 2012 was in any way relatable to someone’s spouse dying.

Then you have these other people (and we hear about it a lot) who try to relate their breakups to our losses. It’s not in the same ball park. That person is alive. They are living and experiencing life, no matter how much it hurts you that they no longer want to be with you. My Cody is in a box. His body doesn’t exist anymore. He’s ashes and there’s no talking to him, there’s no seeing him, there’s no hope, there’s nothing left of him on this earth but memories. He doesn’t get to grow old, he doesn’t get to play his guitar anymore or go swimming or watch the football games. His life is over and mine forever shattered.

I just thought of this today. I’m only 35, I am seeing someone new and he is lovely. If someday we get married, am I still a widow? I don’t mean in the legal sense. But just, in the life sense. Does being with someone new override that? Can you be a wife and a widow at the same time?

So, I started dating again a few months ago. Things are going great and he’s super supportive of me and my grief. And for a long time I didn’t have dreams of my late fiance. Only a few shortly after he died and then they stopped.

But now recently I have had a few dreams where him and my new boyfriend are intertwined into the same person. Sometimes they look like one or the other but I know it’s both of them. And one time I knew it was both of them but they were in the body of a man I have never seen before.

Why is this happening? I also had one where I put my late fiancés hat on and then I became him.

Maybe you are the problem? Ever looked in the mirror and examined why you can’t find and keep a decent partner?

Then they try to argue that times have changed since 20+ years ago. As if everyone used to be a good partner and nobody ever cheated or lied or decided to look for greener pastures back then.

I started seeing someone only 6 months after my loss. Happened organically and I wasn’t looking to date people.

We’ve been dating for 4 months now and it’s been 10 months since the loss. Iv told my closest friends and my parents and my LH’s aunt and uncle. My in laws are deceased. Everyone has been pretty happy and supportive of me but I know my parents are kinda having a hard time. But they want me to be happy. I’m only 35 and 34 when he died.

I’m scared to tell other people, like my coworkers and my biological father. I just feel like I’m going to be judged because it’s so soon. And I don’t know why I care what they think. This is my life and I was the one who lost everything. I’m just trying to keep living and find happiness where I can. My new partner is incredibly supportive of my grief.

But I feel, isolated still. I was/still am isolated from my peers in the sense that they can’t understand this type of loss. And now, I feel isolated from you guys and the in person widows group I go to. Because I found someone new and so few do. Or it takes much longer. Or they don’t want to and can’t understand me wanting to.

Certain aspects of the grief I no longer relate to. Like the constant loneliness. The need for human touch. I still miss my LH like crazy. I still feel like I need him. But I also have someone to spend my weekends with now and I’m out doing the things I love again with someone. Like hiking and playing games and exploring places.

It’s like I have a normal life again. But I don’t want people to think I’m just healed now. That I don’t still grieve and bawl my eyes out. And I don’t want other people to feel sad. I guess I don’t feel deserving of being so lucky yet so unlucky at the same time.

When he was alive I used to think “geeze, how in the world did I get so lucky!?” And then the complete opposite when he died. And now I feel lucky again to have found someone wonderful. And why do I deserve any of it. The good and the bad. Or is nothing about deserving and all just random chance?

I think I need to tell some other people in my life but I’m terrified of the judgement. But I don’t want to keep hiding from them. I don’t want to say “I’m doing okay just trying to stay busy”. I want to be able to tell them I went on a hike with the new person I’m seeing. I want to tell them about how we went whale watching. I want to tell them we went to Cherry Lake. But instead I lie and say I just hung around by myself over the weekend.

How can I stop worrying about what they’ll think and just live my life knowing their opinion doesn’t change my life?

So I work in a prison. I’m not an officer and Iv been there for 9 years and for the most part never had any problems.

Today I was walking across the yard with some mail in my left hand and after I passed a group of inmates on my left they all started shouting “damn I woulda put a ring on it too! Ya I woulda put an even bigger ring on it!” Bla bla

This kinda thing normally wouldn’t have bothered me too much in the past but considering the context I just lost it. By the time I got off the yard I started to cry.

Oh how I wish I was still looking at the fish.

We had a gorgeous little betta, vibrant red and blue. I knew his time was coming to an end. One morning he was dead. I got sad and Cody hugged me and then I simultaneously cried and chuckled because I was crying over a fish. Cody dug a hole, we told him he was a good fish, and said goodbye.

Not two months later I had to say goodbye to Cody too. Completely unexpected. And now when I look at the place where our fish used to be, instead I see his urn. A box that says “In Loving Memory, Cody S. Miller 1990-2024”

It feels surreal. Like how can this be? How badly I wish to see that fish again.

Iv been thinking a lot about something my dad said to me when I was still pretty early to this club. A big component of my grief was the frustration that nobody understands.

I have VERY few friends who have ever had a tremendous loss, and NONE who have lost a spouse. I felt so alone. I wished they could just understand how horrendously painful and life shattering this was for me. Would never wish it on anyone but at the same time I wished they understood.

And I remember my dad telling me, “you don’t need anyone else to understand to be able to get through this”. It’s stuck with me, because he was right. I ended up meeting other widows although they’re all old enough to be my mother. They understand and that is helpful. But all my friends from before the loss don’t, and that’s okay!

I finally let go of being concerned with the fact that they don’t understand. There’s no way they could and THAT has no bearing on my journey and my healing. I have to work through my grief from within, and accept the fact that this IS my life now whether I like it or not, I don’t have a choice anymore except where I go from here. I have my own inner strength to continue living and grieving and building a new life, and it’s okay that none of my peers understand any of it. I don’t need them to!