My Story

I was married for 6 1/2 years to a man that was a philanderer and when I finally got enough I left him and moved to TN.  We divorced not long after and I started my new life as a single mom.  I dated one man and it didn't work out and after that I prayed and said God, if You want someone in my life You will have to put them there, I give up.  I met a man online and we chatted and had fun, we talked a lot.  We were talking about meeting when I started chatting with another man I met online.  He was local, where the other was not.  We talked a long time and I joined the singles dept at church.  Mitch, the local one, and I became good friends and I was still talking to the other guy as well.  When the first guy started to really want to meet me, another friend from out singles group asked me out but he wasn't my type and I didn't know how to tell him no gently.  I went to Mitch and asked him what he thought and this I will always remember, "I can't give you an opinion."  I looked at him and said why not.  He said "I don't want you to go out with him, I want you to go out with me."  Mitch and I had gone to movies, had dinner and lunch out and had dinner at my home and went to concerts.  So in the next few days I prayed again and asked God who it was I was supposed to be with.  I got a definite answer.  He gave me Mitch.  Our love of each other was based in friendship and respect.  Even when things were so hard, we stuck by each other and we made it.  The last year starting in May 2013, things were so difficult.  He had a stroke in the hospital when he rejected his transplanted kidney.  We didn't know that.  His personality changed so much, he was mean to me and to the kids and even the dog, whom he really loved.  I didn't find out until his last hospitalization that he'd had the stroke.  He had several more severe strokes the night I put him in the hospital the last time.  He had severe brain damage and would never wake up.  He had made it clear that if anything happened to him that he didn't want to live on machines that I would not let them put them on them.  But I did at the insistence of the doctors and when it became apparent that he wasn't going to wake up it was the week of Christmas.  We decided to keep him on the machines until after Christmas and then remove them.  Our daughter's didn't want to go to the hospital to see him and I supported them.  I wanted them to remember him the way he was, not the way he was at that moment.  He was not there.  It was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. I am a universal donor and I said I would give him one of my kidneys but, because of an illness he'd had in the summer, they said he couldn't have another transplant.  He told me then that he didn't want to live anymore.  He didn't want to have to have hemo-dialysis the rest of his life, he hated it.  After that, he just gave up.  The last time he got sick he waited for days before he would let me take him to the hospital.  He had to be taken to a local one because I had to call the ambulance.  I think he wouldn't let them help him after I left.  He was fine and talking and when I got there the next morning, he was not there.  His body was but he wasn't.  They had not put him on oxygen or an IV which was odd.  I think he wanted to die and he found a way to do it on his terms.  It doesn't make this any easier.  I feel like he gave up on me and our daughter and my daughter.  He decided to leave us.  That makes me angry. He left me by myself to struggle raising our child alone.  The anger gives way to pain so deep that it takes my breath away.  I pray that with time it eases.  That's the other thing that drives me crazy, the people around me that hasn't lost a spouse don't understand why I am still grieving.  They expect me to be okay and I'm not.  I try to hide it but it will come out sometimes.  One girl I work with keeps trying to set me up with other people and I just look at her.  I don't need a relationship.  I don't want another man in my house.  Having said that, I do miss the companionship and friendship with a male.  I wish for a friend that I can talk to and do things with.  All of my female friends are married so....their lives revolve around their families.  The only exception is when we have girls night and that is infrequent.  I hate not knowing what to do and most times not having the motivation to do what needs to be done.