The best part of me is gone suddenly

[Sc39]

It has been 8 days since my husband died suddenly of medical complications after surgery. He died at home because the doctors said all was well and he was recovering great. Not so. We have 3 kids under 10 years old. I am totally lost...completely broken...shattered. i loved him for 18 years, we had been married for 10 years. We celebrated our 10th anniversary only last month. I am in disbelief that the love of my life, my soulmate, my best friend, my confidante, is no longer walking this life with me. I miss his kiss, his arms around me, his smell, his body. I hurt every time i remember that he will never again wrap his arms around our children. They had a wonderful father, the very best, and i am broken that they lost him and the chance to grow up under such a man. I am taking anti nausea tablets on mornings to manage, and the mild sedative effect is helping to quell the racing heart and anxiety. I cannot function...i lost 15 pounds in 7 days. I can barely move from the couch except to bathe or use the washroom. Right now i feel only a deep, profound, unbearable heaviness and loss...and i feel like the tears wont come anymore...my soul is empty. I want to cry today because the heaviness and pain is more than i can bear and i want to drain it, even if just for a moment. I keep aaking myself why me...why us? I hate it when my married friends come to visit...it is so unfair that half of them do not have the kind of love we did and yet they are still together...their husbands are still alive. There is terror when i think of the endless stretch of lonliness...the empty days ahead. 

[LJCM]

Sc39, I am so sorry for your loss. You sound so much like me. I know there is nothing I can say but rest assured that you are not alone (although it sure does feel like it).

My beautiful husband and best friend died suddenly from a workplace accident 2 months ago. We were together since I was 15 and I am now 33. He was 35. We have 2 young children and we were married for 11 years. 

It's hard and I miss him so much. I think I am still partially numb and in denial and I just function daily for the children. I really just want to sleep all day so I can wake up from the nightmare. 

Stay strong and my thoughts are with you..... 

[KayC]

5 hours ago, Sc39 said:

It has been 8 days since my husband died suddenly of medical complications after surgery. He died at home because the doctors said all was well and he was recovering great. Not so. We have 3 kids under 10 years old. I am totally lost...completely broken...shattered. i loved him for 18 years, we had been married for 10 years. We celebrated our 10th anniversary only last month. I am in disbelief that the love of my life, my soulmate, my best friend, my confidante, is no longer walking this life with me. I miss his kiss, his arms around me, his smell, his body. I hurt every time i remember that he will never again wrap his arms around our children. They had a wonderful father, the very best, and i am broken that they lost him and the chance to grow up under such a man. I am taking anti nausea tablets on mornings to manage, and the mild sedative effect is helping to quell the racing heart and anxiety. I cannot function...i lost 15 pounds in 7 days. I can barely move from the couch except to bathe or use the washroom. Right now i feel only a deep, profound, unbearable heaviness and loss...and i feel like the tears wont come anymore...my soul is empty. I want to cry today because the heaviness and pain is more than i can bear and i want to drain it, even if just for a moment. I keep aaking myself why me...why us? I hate it when my married friends come to visit...it is so unfair that half of them do not have the kind of love we did and yet they are still together...their husbands are still alive. There is terror when i think of the endless stretch of lonliness...the empty days ahead. 

I am so sorry.  Those of us here, we can relate to what you say.  My husband and I met in our mid-forties, it seems we waited a lifetime to find each other and we meshed so effortlessly, we clicked!  We had the most amazing love, as you describe, our communication was excellent, we understood each other, had faith in each other.  I knew him 6 1/2 years, we were married 3 years 8 months.  He'd just turned 51, and we didn't expect this in a million years.  It's been 13 years he's been gone and there isn't a day goes by but I miss him, my love has grown if anything.

I want you to know you will get through this.  Our grief doesn't have an expiration date, we miss them the rest of our lives, but we do eventually adjust to what it means to our life, we learn to develop our coping skills.  It takes much time to process this grief, give yourself patience and understanding as you go through it, just as you would to a friend.  It's good to learn to be your own best friend.

You have children and they will keep you busy.  Don't feel you have to wear a mask for them.  If you show your feelings around them, they will know it's okay for them to show their own feelings.  There are children's books to help you navigate this with your children.

http://www.griefhealingblog.com/2011/11/using-childrens-books-to-help-with.html

There's also books to help us with our own loss and grief.

https://www.griefhealingdiscussiongroups.com/topic/3836-grief-bibliography/#comment-29429

Right now you're likely in shock, feel overwhelmed, anxious, scared.  The single best advice I got was to take a day at a time.  Sometimes you might have to break that down into an hour or a minute.

I wrote this based on what I've learned on my grief journey, I hope something in it helps you navigate your own journey.

TIPS TO MAKE YOUR WAY THROUGH GRIEF

There's no way to sum up how to go on in a simple easy answer, but I encourage you to read the other threads here, little by little you will learn how to make your way through this.  I do want to give you some pointers though, of some things I've learned on my journey.

• Take one day at a time.  The Bible says each day has enough trouble of it's own, I've found that to be true, so don't bite off more than you can chew.  It can be challenging enough just to tackle today.  I tell myself, I only have to get through today.  Then I get up tomorrow and do it all over again.  To think about the "rest of my life" invites anxiety.
• Don't be afraid, grief may not end but it evolves.  The intensity lessens eventually.
• Visit your doctor.  Tell them about your loss, any troubles sleeping, suicidal thoughts, anxiety attacks.  They need to know these things in order to help you through it...this is all part of grief.
• Suicidal thoughts are common in early grief.  If they're reoccurring, call a suicide hotline.  I felt that way early on, but then realized it wasn't that I wanted to die so much as I didn't want to go through what I'd have to face if I lived.  Back to taking a day at a time.  Suicide Hotline - Call 1-800-273-8255
• Give yourself permission to smile.  It is not our grief that binds us to them, but our love, and that continues still.
• Try not to isolate too much.  
• There's a balance to reach between taking time to process our grief, and avoiding it...it's good to find that balance for yourself.  We can't keep so busy as to avoid our grief, it has a way of haunting us, finding us, and demanding we pay attention to it!  Some people set aside time every day to grieve.  I didn't have to, it searched and found me!
• Self-care is extremely important, more so than ever.  That person that would have cared for you is gone, now you're it...learn to be your own best friend, your own advocate, practice self-care.  You'll need it more than ever.
• Recognize that your doctor isn't trained in grief, find a professional grief counselor that is.  We need help finding ourselves through this maze of grief, knowing where to start, etc.  They have not only the knowledge, but the resources.
• In time, consider a grief support group.  If your friends have not been through it themselves, they may not understand what you're going through, it helps to find someone somewhere who DOES "get it". 
• Be patient, give yourself time.  There's no hurry or timetable about cleaning out belongings, etc.  They can wait, you can take a year, ten years, or never deal with it.  It's okay, it's what YOU are comfortable with that matters.  
• Know that what we are comfortable with may change from time to time.  That first couple of years I put his pictures up, took them down, up, down, depending on whether it made me feel better or worse.  Finally, they were up to stay.
• Consider a pet.  Not everyone is a pet fan, but I've found that my dog helps immensely.  It's someone to love, someone to come home to, someone happy to see me, someone that gives me a purpose...I have to come home and feed him.  Besides, they're known to relieve stress.  Well maybe not in the puppy stage when they're chewing up everything, but there's older ones to adopt if you don't relish that stage.
• Make yourself get out now and then.  You may not feel interest in anything, things that interested you before seem to feel flat now.  That's normal.  Push yourself out of your comfort zone just a wee bit now and then.  Eating out alone, going to a movie alone or church alone, all of these things are hard to do at first.  You may feel you flunked at it, cried throughout, that's okay, you did it, you tried, and eventually you get a little better at it.  If I waited until I had someone to do things with I'd be stuck at home a lot.
• Keep coming here.  We've been through it and we're all going through this together.
• Look for joy in every day.  It will be hard to find at first, but in practicing this, it will change your focus so you can embrace what IS rather than merely focusing on what ISN'T.  It teaches you to live in the present and appreciate fully.  You have lost your big joy in life, and all other small joys may seem insignificant in comparison, but rather than compare what used to be to what is, learn the ability to appreciate each and every small thing that comes your way...a rainbow, a phone call from a friend, unexpected money, a stranger smiling at you, whatever the small joy, embrace it.  It's an art that takes practice and is life changing if you continue it.
• Eventually consider volunteering.  It helps us when we're outward focused, it's a win/win.

(((hugs))) Praying for you today.

 

[Sc39]

The pain is intense. I miss him so much. It is not fair, this life. I find myself asking what kind of god takes away the best father children could have, and the love of someone's life. He was only 38...he was supposed to be there to see his daughters graduate, get married, have kids....we were supposed to grow old together, hold our grandchildren, travel the world some more. Thinking of the years stretching ahead is overwhelming. The empty days, the empty hours. I dreamed him twice and it is hard when i wake up and he is not next to me. Everyone keeps saying you have children, focus on that. But, the children have a place in my life, and my husband has another. I can't fill the void he left by focusing on the children. Nothing will fill that void. I feel cursed in this life, like god has turned his back on me....i even question if there is a god. I wish i could get a sign that my darling  is still out there somewhere..my heart broke when my daughter said she would give anything in the world for just one more day with daddy. 

[KayC]

Your anger and questioning are normal.  I think we've all felt it, even those of us who were strong in faith.  I don't blame God for taking George because I don't look at it as Him taking him...I look at it as death is part of life, we simply don't expect it at this age, our expectation seems to be that we should get X amount of years and when that doesn't happen, we feel gypped.  Look for a sign, it might be something small but meaningful, I've had them, but for the most part I go on faith...the faith that he still exists, the faith that we will be together again, that maybe just maybe he can hear me when I talk to him...