Yes I get it.I started a thread last night when I got home. Do They Know,,,,because it seems like it gets harder to be with people, and yet I do not want them to abandon me so I pay the price when I leave them

Oh Catina, I was just getting off this site but read your post and needed to reply. It's not just you honey. I'm sure this has happened to everyone of us at some point or another. Almost the same thing happened to me two weeks ago. My daughter her bf and I went to Olive Garden which my hubby Ira loved. It was our "go to" restaurant for a celebration. Well this was the first time being there since his passing in June. It felt weird...kind of wrong in a way. I didn't let on that it was bothering me and endured the meal with a smile on my face hoping they didn't pick up on my true feelings. It didn't feel the same or taste the same. As we usually did, we headed over to Barnes and Noble to end the evening with some good books and desert. That's where it happened. A panic attack!!! I NEVER had one nor do I EVER want one again! It just happened. You know all the feelings so I won't go into detail but I needed to get out side for some deep breathing and to pull myself together. I vowed right then and there that I have to be aware of those feelings and to prepare for anymore in case they come again.
Don't worry about what others think. Don't be afraid to let your feelings out. It is healing to do so. Start a journal too. It helps to write your detailed feelings out. Grief takes time and that is it. Sad but true but time is what helps heal. I know you're new to this but try to remember the good times. Rehashing the awful memories does not help. It just pulls you down. You can't and shouldn't forget but you need to remember the love and that he is always with you and still loves you.
And no I haven't lost my friends...maybe some of his and I have lost some of his family members just due to lack of contact. But hey, I look at it this way...would I have picked them to be my friend had we not been related through marriage? Prob not...so, not that big of a deal. And remember Catina, your true friends even if it's just one will still be there. Those that are gone weren't the real ones. Here's a thought too...you control your life. You can't sit and wait for things to come to you. If you want to still keep contact with some of them and they are not calling...well call them then! When they are around, talk about other things as well as your loss. Sometimes YOU have to take the first step towards healing. Right now you're in a deep fog but it will lift my friend....with your help. I'm sorry you lost your love but just remember how lucky you were to have had it. Many many people are not so fortunate to have loved and been loved like you were.
My thoughts are with you dear and I wish you peace and strength
Darcie.

Catina, please be kind to yourself! Yes everything you describe I have been through. I couldn't drive by the VA hospital, I couldn't drive by the restaurants we frequented let alone go in and some of them I still can't. I couldn't go into our favorite grocery store (they tore it down to build a new one). I had to go to Walmart in the midde of the night for food shopping. I still can't listen to most music or watch the shows we watched on tv. I have been on anti depressants for years and I was also prescribed an anti anxiety drug for those awful panic attacks just prior to my husband's passing. And boy did I need them. Have you spoken to your doctor about how you are feeling? I am not a pill taker per say, but I recognized that I needed something at least temporarily to help me get through this. As far as friends and even family, I believe grief makes so many people uncomfortable. They don't know what to say or what to do. They just want us to be our old selves. Even my kids don't get the level of grief I am feeling. We are changed and only those who have crawled this path understand that every little stinking thing is a constant reminder of our horrific loss. I took a trip to Estes Park with my best friend (widow of four years) a favorite spot of my husband's and mine. It was a wonderful trip! But not the same without him there. Nothing will ever be the same! But it does get less excruciating. I know I hate hearing in time. Baby steps etc. It is not an easy or quick process this grieving. It is always under the surface just waiting to show it's ugly head. No one grieves alike, we are all individuals. Our emotions come sneaking up when we least expect it and slam us back down. Leaving my home is hard still at times, coming back can be even harder. Evenings are worse for me, but getting better. I would never had made it this far without this wonderful site. At first I was here nearly daily and sometimes several times a day. I found through reading others posts that what I am experiencing is "normal". I read other's stories and they can make me cry, because I so understand how bleak this journey can seem. You need to be gentle with yourself, eat healthy and drink plenty of fluids. I try to concentrate on the little things, take one day at a time and don't look too far into the future. I know I have a long way to go, but every little moment is an accomplishment. Hugs and Love to you, Michele

I love all the advice I find here, sad we all are here though. After reading alot of other posts I too cry and feel for everyone here. I try not to think to far in the future, but some days its hard to do.

I have had anxiety for a couple of years and Jason always helped me through it. I've been to counseling and doctors. My regular doctor doesn't want me on anxiety meds he says its addictive. He has gave me a couple refills it helps take the edge off.

I think the loneliness consumes me and makes my mind wander where it doesn't need to go. Thank you all for the encouragement may we all find peace and happiness.

Oh Catrina. Yes, I have been there and it's not a good place. I had to force myself not to hibernate in my sadness and tears. I wanted to stay home to avoid returning to this empty house that used to be my salvation in the storm. Take life in pieces dealing with what you can. I also recommend Journaling the feelings you have. I wrote him (and God) how I felt and although it caused tears and exhausted me I was better for releasing the feelings.
Remember that you are with people who understand, we have/are suffering with you. Sharon

Catina, I think a lot of people experience that. I know I have, as well as the other posters. At this point, I always have an exit strategy when I accept an invitation. If things get too rough, I beg out. It makes sense to consider some new friends as this experience changes us so much. A lot of things just don't fit anymore.

You Know what, Catina? You tried. That was a baby step. I know anxiety well. When it rears its ugly head, it can be devastating. You did the best you could.

What others think doesn't matter. They have no idea what you're going through. You haven't lost your friends. They're just uncomfortable right now. If you have to snap out of your grief to please your friends, they were never true friends anyway.

I have not talked to a lot of my friends since the trauma of my husband's sudden death, but I know if I called them at any moment, they would be here for me. I will not put myself through even more anxiety trying to act normal when I don't feel it.

You'll find a job. Just try to take it one minute, hour, day at a time. I have a lot of trouble doing that, but it helps so much when I do.

Take care.

Hugs,
Linda

I'm at 8mo +3 weeks and have not yet eaten in the restaurant that my husband and I went to most often. and I have to park behind it to go to other things EVERY week.
so, you tried far more bravely than me.

Hi Catina, I agree with the other posters here who have said that you've been brave. Our losses are five days apart, and though people do grieve differently, there are also some similarities. The anxiety is really intense, and mine follows your same pattern of setting on in the evening.

I haven't been able to brave a scene like the one you describe.

Familiar places are on my avoid list. But also even in new places, if I am faced with anything more than the most superficial interactions, I melt down into tears. I left a coffee shop the other day with my forced friendly smile starting to melt into a grimace and tears flowing out of my control.

I grieve the very hardest in just plain missing him, his delightful, colorful, rich, laughing, gentle, masculine, at times goofy, at times wise companionship. I want him with me. That he is absent now, that time continues on with him having stopped, hurts. I want to stop, too, so I can still be with him.

That's not all of it, though. D's passing has changed me, deeply, deeply, altered the person I was. It was like I was on one certain trajectory, and I knew my personality pretty well. I knew how I felt about things, and I knew what was important to me. With the shock and pain and grief of this tremendous loss, I am on a new, unknown trajectory. My personality has changed. It has a gravity to it, a realization of the finality of his absence from physical life. I do not feel the same about things as I did before, and the things that held importance to me, are not important to me now.

So in conversations with friends, I realize, through this weird mind haze I now live in, that they are still relating to the person I used to be. I can see that as they come to realize I have changed, this new me is quite clearly very saddening for them. This is anxiety provoking for me. I don't want to make them sad, but the sheer brute force of these shifts in me are simply what they are, they're massive. I cannot fight them. Honestly, it's all I can do to finish the dishes or open an envelope. I can't manage my grief as well as their discomfort. And they cannot manage my grief - they have their own lives and troubles. None of them have had this type of premature, intimate, devastating loss (thank God and may they never.)

Only one close friend has had the stomach to stand by me unfailingly, bless her to the ends of the Earth and beyond.

Another anxiety provoking problem is my age, which is very close to yours. I remain committed in my heart still to my promise to D, my devotion to him. And yet so much time remaining in life now looms before me as if it's a threat, really, a wasteland of torment ahead, to bear the pain of today and to somehow make my broken and sorrow filed way into a bleak and meaningless future. This is how it feels, and I have learned that no one, **no** **one,** can really hear this. It's pressing, and urgent within me, a fearfulness and sadness.

So, the most anxiety provoking thing I've had to endure is making the awful mistake of confessing this feeling and getting "consoled." It's so painful that I am sorry I spoke and I learned that to protect myself I can't speak of this again to those who tell me, "you're still young," "you'll find love again," "time heals all wounds," "you'll get through this," and one time ... ergh this one was the hardest to smile through... "he'll send you someone else to be with." I lost it as soon as that one left, couldn't even hold my body up, just collapsed.

It's horrible to be alone with it, but even worse to hear these "promises." These words contain no understanding of who me and D were to each other - are still to each other - as I painfully, radically, and unpredictably change without him.

I suppose different types of people feel differently about "comforting" words. I find these types of comforting words unbearably painful to endure. So, it's better for me I don't share my true feelings, and therefore I don't any longer, but I bring this up because it's another source of my anxiety. I thought it might be for you as well.