Mel you need to be strong for YOU! My husband took his own life almost 17motns ago. I felt like I had to be the strong one and guess what. It almost killed me. Be strong for you my friend!

I'm so sorry for you and your friends and their families but most for you.
I too tend to be the strong one, the one who does what needs to be done, who doesn't fall apart. I think it's my way of coping as well as my nature. I always told my husband I envied those women who people always looked after, why couldn't I be like that? He just laughed and said it wasn't me.
I do notice though that when it gets overwhelming I get sick - I think that's how I give myself space.
No message there, just reflecting. We all do what we can and what we have to. I hope if you need or want to take time and/or fall apart, you have the space to do that without getting sick or scaring people (I have noticed that because people know me as the strong one, any suggestions from me that I may not be can be met with alarm - and then you're back to the comforter role - sigh)
Be strong or run away and hide if you want to. Whatever works.
All the best. Sandy

Thanks. Sandy, I guess it's just in our nature. I don't know when it happened but I can so identify! I've even had family tell me that they never ask me how I am doing because they think I am so tough. They didn't think I dealt with loneliness. Well, news flash! I'm human! I don't know what it is, but it sure would be nice to have someone ask me occasionally if they could be strong for me.
(And I am sick. Stupid head cold or allergies or something.)
Back to being the strong, silent one.

I have always been the strong one around this family. I lost it bad when my 37 year old sister died. It was embarrassing. I feel the more people we loose, the less feelings you have. When my mother died, my best lifetime friend,then my dad died, then my great grandson, my mother-in-law. All one right after the other. Then the ultimate blow. My husband... So the last 8 years, a whole family seems to be wiped out. Two years now, and holding strong. A nephew 9 months ago...I feel sad about this, but I also feel like I am cold. Sandee

Mel I am so sorry you have to go through all of this One loss is bad enough, but enough is enough for you. Sending many hugs!

I can so relate to this. We do what we need to do to survive. Sometimes that means that we lock our emotions up and just get on with what we have to do. I am also in that phase now, feeling nothing, just doing. I don't like this feeling of nothingness and no emotion, but it enables me to keep going and do what I have to. As well as grieving for my husband, I am working full time in a demanding, stressful job for employers who can't understand why at 7 months, I'm not ''over it yet' so I have had to shut down to get through each day and do what I have to do. My reality is that I have to work, I have to get through each day and I have to build a new life step,by step, day by day. This is my reality, no one is coming to rescue me, if I want my life to be better, and not get worse, every day I have to do what needs to be done. It takes a lot of energy, I find I am exhausted by about 10.00 at night and so fall into an exhausted sleep for about 4 to 6 hours each night.

Hi, Mel . . .

I, too, seem to hold up incredibly well during the actual crisis. Then weeks (or even months) later it hits me like a freight train.

Wishing you the peace that only time can provide. . .

Bandi

Mel: It's called tempering the steel. Unfortunately, my father died the same year that my husband did. Everyone expected me to collapse, but I carried on, made funeral arrangements, started the long term care of my mother, who has dementia, alongside my brother, and DID NOT SHED ONE TEAR. Everyone marveled at my strength, but for the most part, it was a combination of numbness and a different awareness of death. I was no longer unaware of the fact that death comes for us all. Before 2011 I had blocked that knowledge from my mind, after 2011 impossible. Be kind to yourself and give yourself some space to mourn.

Hugs,
Val

Mel, I wait until I get in my car and then I wail my eyes out. I cry about the loss of the love of my life; the loss of my partner; the loss of someone to hold my hand; someone to fall into and be enveloped by their arms; someone to go out to dinner with whenever I want to; someone to give me a goofy Valentine's Day card that always cracked me up....I start crying when I leave the garage at work, pass the re-hab hospital where he had another stroke and then I talk/cry/sob/scream all the way home!!!!

I thought I was getting better when I bought a book-on-tape and one of the people in the book is named Morey! What-the-heck!!!!!

I come to you guys, share my life - because, I think that most folks in my life are pretty sick of hearing about it. They remind me, "you've already told me that!" Or, "here you go again!" Charming!

No one really wants to hear from the "Merry Widow!" Not that I'm always so "merry!"

Damn it people, I've lost my other half.....how am I supposed to function only being 1/2 a person?

Mel, we're in this together and I totally understand what you're going through! You don't have to be tough for me, I promise you, I know EXACTLY what you're feeling!!!!

Roz

I get "but you are so strong" line all the time. Well I am sick and tired of being strong!! Just once when someone asked "are you alright" I want to scream NO AND I WILL NEVER BE ALRIGHT AGAIN!!!! I lost both my mom and my husband in a short 9 months. They were my rock and soul mates. The loneliness is terrible. I need to find something to bring happiness or joy to my life. I feel like I am going through the motions while dying a little each day.

I only have one sibling and my father left and they are neither in good health. My sister is having health issues and I find myself disregarding them.

I wonder if the push down of stuff and feelings is part of our defense mechanism, that we just can't take anymore. Pay me know mind I am not myself these days.

The greatest pain of my life was losing my husband. I lost people before and after. I don't think it's so much about strength as it is about getting used to death. The first death's I experienced were a shock. Now, I'm in my fifties. Many people have died. It's not shocking anymore to hear of someone in their fifties who dies of cancer.

I saw an old man in his 100s interviewed once. They asked him about aging. He told them one of the things you have to get used to if you want to be his age, was death. He said you'll watch everyone you love die. Even your own children.