Widows & Widowers Support Group
This community is dedicated to those who have lost a husband, wife, or partner. Anything is open for discussion here, with the hope that we can focus on grief, bereavement, life after loss, and continuing on after a great loss.
This is something that I think of when I see people posting on here about their losses or just people out and about.
Im sure at one point in our lives ,when we heard the word widow/widower we kinda of thought "older person" who lost their spouse.
I grew up being raised by my grandmother and my mother who were both widows. My grandfather killed himself in 1979. My grandmother was about 59 and then my dad died by a supposed gunshot accident in 1983 ,my mom was 36 .I was 38 back in July and just turned 39 in November.
I think about 3 generations there of deaths. They weren't lengthy deaths. They were quick and they were done.
I often wonder about the age and the nature of the way our loved ones died for both the deceased and widow/widower.
Im not trying to say that an 70 year widow wouldnt miss her husband that died of an illness anymore/less then a 39 yr widow who lost their spouse to unexpected death.
But sometimes trying to have talk with someone whose spouse died of a long lengthy illness is not the same as someones who spouse died suddenly.
I feel sometimes with an illness such as terminal illness you do have a chance to prepare ,almost get a head start of grieving. My father n law had 5 weeks to prepare for his wife death. Im not saying he didn't take it hard but he did atleast get to say he loved her once last time.
My husband died of sudden cardiac arrest. He said this is it and collapsed on to the floor and that was it. CPR didn't help.
I am a nurse in long term care. I deal with death and dying regulary. I deal with terminal illness/hospice patients. A lot of the spouses that have been dealing with their spouses illness have a lot of compassion but at some point their turn it over to professionals because they can no longer physically meet the demands of the illness. But they visit daily/regular until the time of their spouses death. I feel that they still miss their spouses go through most of the grieving process in a different kind of way. Most of it seems like before the spouse passes.
Im sure at one point in our lives ,when we heard the word widow/widower we kinda of thought "older person" who lost their spouse.
I grew up being raised by my grandmother and my mother who were both widows. My grandfather killed himself in 1979. My grandmother was about 59 and then my dad died by a supposed gunshot accident in 1983 ,my mom was 36 .I was 38 back in July and just turned 39 in November.
I think about 3 generations there of deaths. They weren't lengthy deaths. They were quick and they were done.
I often wonder about the age and the nature of the way our loved ones died for both the deceased and widow/widower.
Im not trying to say that an 70 year widow wouldnt miss her husband that died of an illness anymore/less then a 39 yr widow who lost their spouse to unexpected death.
But sometimes trying to have talk with someone whose spouse died of a long lengthy illness is not the same as someones who spouse died suddenly.
I feel sometimes with an illness such as terminal illness you do have a chance to prepare ,almost get a head start of grieving. My father n law had 5 weeks to prepare for his wife death. Im not saying he didn't take it hard but he did atleast get to say he loved her once last time.
My husband died of sudden cardiac arrest. He said this is it and collapsed on to the floor and that was it. CPR didn't help.
I am a nurse in long term care. I deal with death and dying regulary. I deal with terminal illness/hospice patients. A lot of the spouses that have been dealing with their spouses illness have a lot of compassion but at some point their turn it over to professionals because they can no longer physically meet the demands of the illness. But they visit daily/regular until the time of their spouses death. I feel that they still miss their spouses go through most of the grieving process in a different kind of way. Most of it seems like before the spouse passes.
Just a thought
Peace
Darcie
I think we all grieve differently. I lost my husband unexpectedly, like you, to a massive cardiac event. No warning and no history of heart disease. So I had a lot of shock. My best friend lost her husband to cancer after a four year battle. Maybe not so much a shock, but she was still not prepared for him to die.
In the end, grief is grief is grief. We all come to it from different angles and different stories and with different ways of coping. But we still all grieve and have the scars. Just in different ways and in different places.
Hugs,
Val
I compare that to how my father died - his third battle with cancer. I was with him everyday (I along with Momma were his carers and I was Momma's main emotional support), through the whole fight to save him. We never gave up until right at the end. The last words I spoke to my father were, 'I love you Daddy.' He had a chance to say 'I love you too.' We also had no unresolved issues. No questions left unasked, no apologies for mistakes unsaid. He even had Last Rites administered - three times! And for Daddy, death was a release. Nothing was left undone or unsaid.
I think the differences are in the parts of grief. Grief is not just one solid homogenous chunk. It has a thousand facets. If the loss is quick, some facets are huge - like the anger part of grieving. The shock and denial are large as well. When the loss is long-time expected, I think the sadness and hopelessness is deeper, because at the back of one's mind is the thought that 'we did everything imaginable and according to the doctors' instructions and not even modern medicine could save him. Nothing will ever work.' There is a different kind of bleakness and pessimism that goes with the long-term loss I think.
The exhaustion is the same but hits at different times. With a long-term illness, by the time the death has occurred, you are already completely spent. When it's sudden, it's like being dropped off the Empire State Building - splat! The shock is extreme, the confusion is extreme, and a few months into it (post-death) the exhaustion flattens you.
I think a lot of it is similar but hits at different points in time and with different intensities. Does that make sense?
I am sorry all the women in your family went through such tragic losses. I am the youngest of the women in my family, and the only widow. My mother died 10 years before Cliff did. None of my sisters were widows. None of my colleagues or friends were widows. I was 50 when Cliff died. I expected he would die first, but thought we would have at least another 10 or 20 years. He was only 55.
I could be completely wrong, but these are the things I have observed in my own experiences and here at DS over the last 8 years. I hope it helps shed some light.
Love and Hugs,
Martha
I see both sides of dying suddenly or long illness or at what age, they left us, but it is just hard to compare. Either way it's devastating !!
Take care JoAnn
the shock is disorienting and yet also So heavily present that it is somewhat protective. it lifted to let me feel screaming agony, and then descends again to cover me with disorientation, confusion, and inability to Do actions. it is like mental & emotional paralysis.
anyone who thinks a more elderly spouse should more reasonably expect sudden death is purely oblivious to the depth of decades of attachment and inter-dependancy that a married couple develops on each other. The separating lines between us have disappeared in most ways. I did not have a separate life. only 'some' separate time. Big difference. trying to adjust to his absence is tortuous without immediate family (adult kids etc) coming over and you going to see them to temporarily interrupt feeling amputated from your other half.
I am sawn in half. Who in that condition can function in normal ways?
I think, the after death separation issue does not discriminate between slow death and instant death. for, as people say, even if you 'think' you are ready, you are not. Actual separation does not happen until after death. it's not something which begins being adjusted to until it occurs. our minds are not the same as emotion. nor is dying the same as dead.
and gone.
Peace and ((hugs))
~John