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.
Tomorrow it will be 7 months since Keith died. I thought I've moved on as those "tearful" moments come less and less, as I accepted the loss and the fact that I am now single, as I focus on my life and make plans for the future.
Yet I still have his name on my contact lists - in my phone, email, Skype, Whatsap. I keep his voice messages, saving and re-saving them in fear they can be accidentally deleted. I still keep a jar with the stew Keith's made about a year ago. I don't think after all this time it's good to eat even though it's been kept in the refrigerator.
When and how one moves on?
I don't have any video - I wish I did. I do have his voice and his guitar playing on tape, and those are pretty precious to me.
How do we move on? Slowly, in small steps. It took me months to finally throw out his stupid corn-nuts off the kitchen counter.
Letting them go is so hard.
Love and Hugs,
Martha
You saved the last meal he prepared for you? I thought I was bad saving the last love note Kelly gave me. I don't know what to tell you. It's going on 2 months now. We still feel Kelly everywhere in our lives...in California even. An old colleague of hers happened to recognise my son at the Waterfront Café on Venice Beach. We live in Florida. What are the chances? And no sooner did we sit down to eat when we were waited on by Justin's old babysitter we had in Houston two careers ago. Pieces of our loved ones--and yours--are everywhere, they follow us. When my first wife died in the north tower on 9/11, I found that loved ones die very slowly in our lives. You discover old messages on the answering machine. You find notes of encouragement tucked into your shoes. You notice that coffee cake she was so proud of making in the frig that you felt was a rock, but you were too afraid to break her heart telling her. You get a call from the travel agent confirming your vacation in summer to Hawaii--fully paid by her. You get monthly magazines from Woman's Day even at your new address. You find her sock clinging to your old suit. Her friends come to visit you not knowing she passed away. Years later, her attorney asks for your help in settling an account you knew nothing about that was designed to give you the holiday of your dreams on your 50th birthday. It hard. Loved ones die slowly and are never forgotten.
for me its been about a year and half. I have a few precious videos but the one thing, like you, i have, is the last jar of my hubbies homemade spaghetti sauce. Mama Mia! he was 100 Sicilian and his sauce rocked! I"m keeping it frozen until I decide on what special day i may use it. That will be the day that i know i am ok with my loss. I guess it will be in there forever :-). thank you for sharing and like Rick said, don't eat that stew!
I think you will always want those reminders of his voice, his cooking, etc. but will at sometime not need them everyday.
PS. I moved our bed into a guest room, still close.