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Life goes on - what for


Marcel

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When my wife's condition got worse last summer I had to give up my position as a manufacturing line manager to stay home full time. After she died I took a job in production, 30 hours per week. Today I was offered the position of supervisor of the department I work in. It's the same job I had exactly 10 years ago. I should be glad to get one step closer to were I was job-wise, but somehow I don't really care. It helps to justify the salary I still receive for my previous position but I look at it differently now. It's not a challenge. Been there, done that, I know what to do.
I may start working full time again and it's nice to have the funds to support my stepdaughter without much sacrifice. Her education costs 400 Euro per month, but as I live a very simple life it's not that bad. She receives some gouvernment funds and her orphan benefits and can support her daily life and still kicks in 100 Euro per month for the house we live in.
So we really got everything we could ask for except my wife and her mother.
Somehow it's easier for her. Like me she saw it coming somehow. But unlike me she can focus on the fact that her mother is where she wanted to be now. And a few weeks ago she met someone who could really be the one to live with. Of course at that age (she's 21) you'll never know, but she's happy. But what about me?
I have a good job and a good income. I have a great stepdaughter who has grown into such a fine woman the last few years. Though my health is not that great I have everything a man could ask for except the woman who should be here to share it with.
I still struggle to get on with my life. Yesterday I picked the wrong movie again. It was about a man who raised his six kids in the woods far from civilisation. Turns out his wife was in a hospital in the city and eventually commited suicide. Talk about triggers. I had a minor breakdown and my stepdaughter helped my through it.
I don't know where I'm going with this. 20 years ago I would have been happy with the life I have now. But back then I didn't know my wife and I didn't know what I was missing. Is it just a cruel twist of fate or am I going to learn something here? All I know is that I'm alone.

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Sorry Marcel that you are feeling such distress.  My Husband passed away just over 6 months ago and the anger I feel over the loss has turned me into something akin to the Incredible Hulk. I lash out at people, it's not right but it's so hard to control. I am also struggling with the oppressive pointlessness of everything I am not in a great place myself at the moment so I am sorry I can't be more positive but I do empathise and send thoughts of compassion.

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Hello Marcel. You expressed very well what many of us are feeling. I cannot imagine the purpose in any of our losses. The loniness is always with us, but the more I have thought about it, there is an extreme deprivation of the loss is a spouse in addition to the loneliness. 

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Marcel. I wish I had adequate words of comfort, of peace, for you. The loss of our spouses is so hard to comprehend, so painful to bear. We are left with big chunks of time to fill. The time we would normally be spending with them. We have love to give, but they are not here to give them that love. So, we grieve instead. We are lonely for their physical presence and the comfort that they could only provide for us. They gave us a purpose for our own lives .Loneliness is the worst, I feel, of this process. We are lonely for that one person who made our world complete.

Young people, like your stepdaughter, appear to have an easier time in adjusting to loss. I don't really know the reason why. Youth, itself, maybe has easier healing, coping capabilities? Maybe it is because their minds are still developing, able to take emotional blows more easily .Maybe their minds instinctually know they have a whole future ahead of them and it is that instinct that provides the will to keep pushing forward? At our ages, we thought we had our future settled with our spouses. Life decided otherwise and here we are, lost, confused, heart broken, alone and lonely. I hope we find solace, peace, purpose ,someday, one day at a time.

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bradley1985
14 hours ago, Marcel said:

I don't know where I'm going with this. 20 years ago I would have been happy with the life I have now. But back then I didn't know my wife and I didn't know what I was missing. Is it just a cruel twist of fate or am I going to learn something here? All I know is that I'm alone.

I am in good health, have a good small business that is growing.  My home for the last 4 years has been in a paradise and still is (Thailand).  I have money in the bank.  If I was in this position 20 years ago (without my wife) I would be having the time of my life.  I would be on facebook all the time with my discoveries and meeting new people every day.  But now?  Now I feel at least similar to you.  I have next to nothing without my wife to share it with.  My son is grown and has his own life.  Sure people say I have something to live for.  I have a ton of things to live for according to the world.  But do I feel that way?  No.  The monthly dinner with my son.  The weekly phone call with my sibilings.  These are what  people say I have to live for.  How about the other 23 hours and 55 minutes of every day?   Even when I am not alone, I feel alone without her.  She is what breathed the life into me.  I know I depended on her too much for my own happiness, but too late.  Thats what I did.

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I don't know what to say...it is the hardest thing in the world to find life worth living, purpose, something good to get up for...we get that by hoping, looking for, anticipation, learning to appreciate what good there still is, and this practice takes great effort.  Keep trying, we all need to...

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