I am sorry you are caught in another wave.
Leonard seen the real you, trust his judgment and love.
hugs for now.

Even after 2.5 years, the what should be is still in the back of my mind all the time. I especially have those thoughts this time of year because we loved to camp with all our friends. Well, they are all still camping and I'm sitting home watching TV. They all invite me to come out to visit them at their campsites, but I think that would be even harder. I have to consciously try to make myself think about something else when those thoughts come up.

Nessie from KY

I am at 11 months and I still can't get my arms and head around the "never" monster. All that was and what should have been...gone and it hurts like @%#&. This is part of the roller coaster ride of grief. It's ok to be angry and cry and scream if you have to. Be kind to your self, you are still in the early days of grief.
Sending you gentle hugs and prayers.
Blessings.
Sharon

I just can't believe all of this pain! We are such a pathetic group of people. I don't know if we can or ever will get past this insanity. That's what it is - insanity!!! I never dreamed the human spirit could endure so much. "You" try sooo hard to get through the days, weeks, months. It's a never-ending uphill battle. Pain and sorrow is just coursing through our veins. I feel so sorry for every single one of us.

Onemorehug I dont beleive we are pathetic people we are people that loved with all our hearts. Truthfully I would rather love with everything I have and lose it rather than never expereince it. I beleive the great pain we expereince is the flipside of the great love we also got to expereince. Does it make it easier. Definitely not. Chillipepp
like Jewells said I am so sorry you are caught up in one of those terrible waves of grief again. When they hit me and they do with full force I remind myself it is short term and I will level off on some level. No one could endure the full pain of grief 24/7 and as I was told that is why it happens in waves. Letting go of what could or should have been truthfully I still struggle with. The loss of what we thought our future should have been is a huge secondary loss when we lose our spouses. Wishing you peace.
Gerald

I wish Leonard had been my husband. He wanted to get married and have a family and I let my fear hold me back and I would give anything to have the chance to make it right. He never gave up on me and after the last few months apart I was finally overcoming that obstacle and we were mere days away from moving forward again and he was suddenly gone. I hate myself for the terrible mistake I made and keep wondering if I had taken that next step with him as he wanted, if his death could have been prevented. I don't know how to let that go.

I agree. I cannot see when I will ever stop thinking about what should've been. My wife and I lived our lives for each other and our children. I feel like everything I ever did was for her and the good of our family. I am now living for my boys. However, the motivation to get up and do things is just not the same without my wife. I still feel like I am just going through the motions and trying to survive. I pray every night that she will come to me in my dreams. I just can't accept this life that I am living. I hope this gets better someday. Thanks as always for listening. This is where I come for some peace.

I get so caught up in my pain sometimes, but I don't ever forget that everyone on here is hurting. And I am so sorry for all the pain everyone is experiencing. From the bottom of my heart I wish I could undo all the hurt for everyone. xo

You are not alone in wishing you would have done something different, or wondering if you could have prevented it.
Wayne and I were also not married, but lived as a married couple for 8 yrs. It was a sore topic every time someone brought it up because I wanted to get married years ago, but was waiting for him. I started hinting that it was bothering me and that I wasn't going to wait forever hoping it would happen. On ou 8yr anniversary we had a perfect romantic night and I thought he would, but he didn't. I kept my cool for a week them finally made a BIG deal out of it. I told him i was done waiting for him to grow up and We argued. Of course I loved him too much to ever really give up. But we continued to argue about it often for 5 months before I lost him.
We were not fighting when we last spoke, but i was at wk and could not get away. i had to tell him i couldnt talk and ill see him at home. I am very thankful that we always ended every call with "I love you" and parted with a kiss, even if it was just to go to a different room. But I still worry that he thought I might really leave. When I got home and found him I was too late, but i found myself telling him "I'm sorry, I'm sorry" begging him not to leave me alone and telling him I would have never really left. Like i felt like it was my fault and if he knew maybe this wouldnt be happening. I would give anything to make sure he knew I would have waited forever.
This happened right before x-mas, but when I had to call his best friend to tell him, he sent me a pic of the ring Wayne had picked out And told me how he was going to propose for New Years. This made it much worse.
I know now that there's nothing I could have done, i guess there nothing any of us could have done different to prevent it. but I too, still hold a lot of anger at myself and also a lot of anger mostly with God.

Ohhh....I'm in tears again, for you. I totally understand the regret wishing for a chance to make things different. I am so very sorry...its a small measure of comfort but hopefully the fact that your last words were I love you eases some of the regret you feel. I fully believe he knew you loved him with all your heart and you being upset only stemmed from your desire to become one with him. I hope that the knowledge that he felt the same even though he never had the chance to tell you is of some comfort to you. You loved and were loved in return. Hold on to that! Xo

The pain on this thread is evident and needs to be said. Even those who are no longer in the throws of acute grief have our own waves to get through. The waves are gentler now, or we learned to get past them and that is what you are doing. You are releasing them here and we understand. The future will be painfully changed for each of us, yet the future will come as it does for us all. There is no stopping the seasons of life or death, but we are resilient and with each tear we arise stronger and more capable of living tomorrow. Sharon

I myself am having a bad day... so hard to manage this pain that we feel , it is so overwhelming . Since my husband died this is the worst pain that i have ever felt and there is no hope in sight...

I'm sorry lasvegasgirl. I understand how you are feeling... It can be all encompassing and seem never ending but try not to give up hope. I think it is only with hope that we can survive these dark days. I feel your pain and I am very sorry. Hold on, don't give up. Xo

Oh yeah--the "what should have beens" and "what could have beens" are killers. I'm coming up on three years (on New Year's Day) and I still have some real moments of despair over both. I see pictures of friends and their travels and vacations and happy moments and it's like a knife to the gut. I really am happy for them--but it's hard not to think "we should have been doing that right now--we COULD have been doing that right now". He wanted me to retire while we could still go and do things and take a few trips--we should have been able to spend lots of summer evenings on the lake by a campfire--we should have been able to take that trip back to Florida, just the two of us--we could have been driving through the beautiful countryside in the fall. There are so many things I wish we could have done--and that we wanted to do--and I find myself just having a good hard case of the WHY's. I guess it's normal--I know it's understandable--so I give myself the ok to feel that way at times. I would never begrudge anyone time and travels and joyful times with their loved ones--but sometimes it's hard to handle when I feel bombarded by pics ans stories from friends and family who are doing all the things we "should" have been able to do.
Hugs

I am 19 months along on this journey of grief and would like to share something with all of you who are in the deepest throes of grief. I, too, was where you are right now, once. I thought the pain and the meltdowns would never end. I thought I would never get "better." When others, who were further on their journey than I was, promised things WOULD get better, I wasn't sure I believed them. I am telling you, from my own experience, these people were right! At least, partially. I don't feel "better", but I DO feel different - a good different. Time (how I hated that word!) passes and helps ease the pain and causes the meltdowns to occur less frequently. Please take care of yourselves, do whatever makes you feel better, get plenty of rest (sleep is better!), eat whatever you can manage to keep down and know that this nightmare will eventually fade.

Hugs,

Terry