The lie

[John/Wendy]

It’s the day after my first Christmas without you in 31 years. It’s 2018. The worst year of my life. It’s been storming all day. Dark and wet and so gloomy. I visited Mom this morning. Driving home I just kept loosing my grasp on my reality and dealing with this deepening, sickening grief. I’m so tired of crying and not being able to accept that your gone. I try to talk with you and imagine you can hear me. I walk in the park and pretend I can feel your hand in mine as I walk alone. I write to you and try to convince myself I’m getting this all under control and I’m doing ok. I’m not. It’s a horrible attempt at a self serving lie. I promised you so many things before you left. I really did think I could deliver on them. You know how much I want to stay and be there for our kids and grandkids. But what you never understood is how much “YOU” mean to me! You will always be my LIFE. I simply cannot live in a world without you. I don’t want to die and I definitely won’t kill myself for our children’s sake. But, staying here without you is unbearable for me. My heart isn’t broken, it’s just gone. You have it. I’m not cut out to go on alone without my Little Angel. My world is over. I’m no good for our kids. This sadness is like your cancer. It’s taking me out quick and I sure as hell don’t want share it or spread it to our family. All the supporting messages and conversations and books, articles and posts are meaningless to me. Just temporary lies I keep telling myself will eventually sink in and take hold. I’ve made peace with God. I don’t blame  anyone for our suffering or where we find ourselves in life and death. We made choices that brought us here. I would have loved more time with you and can’t wait to be with you again. Heaven or Hell or anywhere as long as I am where you are. Our kids are strong they are doing far better than I am. You raised very resilient young women. I know they will do fine in life. I also know they will take comfort in knowing we are together again for all eternity. Please don’t be mad at me for loving you to much. Please don’t hate me for wanting to leave our children. None of this is what I ever wanted. I just know I don’t want to be here without you. I pray I’m with you soon. 

[Moment2moment]

I read what you wrote here and I get it completely. First Christmas for me too after 28 years.

The way you put it-"the lie"-struck me as so appropriate a way to characterize what it feels like living (or should I say "existing" ) like we do. Nothing seems real and there is nothing to look forward to except one more day of being without them.

Hugs and caring thoughts your way. May you find some peace.

[John/Wendy]

Thank you. Healing to you and yours as well.

[foreverhis]

You both said it so well.  This was my first Christmas in 35 years knowing that he won't be with me again.  The only other time was unavoidable, he was with our girls when I couldn't be, and I knew he was coming home.

This year it was just another almost unbearably painful day.  A few months ago, I wrote to our daughter that there were no words for me to explain how it feels, how it is to go from living to just existing or to have our warm and loving home become merely a house.  I try to tell myself things will improve, not get better exactly, but not be so pressing every minute of the day and night.  I tell myself that I'll be able some day to let some joy back into my life, but that's the kind of hopeful lie I think we have to tell ourselves in order to get up each day and keep breathing.  If I didn't tell myself those lies, I don't think I could get out of bed at all.  And maybe, just maybe, someday they will no longer be lies.

I also will not intentionally leave this life because our girls deserve to have their mom and grannie with them a while longer.  But I don't care about living another 20 or 30 years like I did before.  In my heart, I want to be with my love.  He was my everything.  I've come to fully understand that the risk of deep, binding, life-time love is that the loss is that much harder and painful.  My husband was also taken by cancer.  He tried so hard to stay.  We tried so hard to get him through it.  But the bastard won.  (Sorry if that word is a no-no.)

John, I am so sorry you too find yourself here.  What you have written to your wife is heartbreakingly lovely.  I won't say I know how you feel because our grief is unique to each of us.  But I do understand the pain, the anger, even the guilt (if you feel that).  I only recently found this forum after floundering around for nearly 5 months.  I don't think any of us know how to do this.

I have found that the members here will not judge us and will not tell us how we "should" or "should not" feel or say or do anything.  Each of us is on a journey we neither asked for nor wanted.  The members here have been nothing but welcoming and sympathetic.  Please come here for whatever you need, even when it's just to "scream."

 

[Brazil Man]

4 hours ago, John/Wendy said:

I’m so tired of crying and not being able to accept that your gone.

Me too. I can't accept that my wife is gone. Gone is such a bad and terrible word.
I also lost my wife to cancer and this was the the first Christmas without her after 30 years.
She is gone too. Sorry for us.

 

[KayC]

I read your beautiful poignant letter to your wife, I feel it...I think any of us could have written this a month out.  I felt despondent at that time, I remember it.  So many years have gone by.  I didn't see it was possible to adjust to living without my husband, my dear sweet husband, he was my world!  I talk to him every day, every day he's uppermost in my thoughts, every day since June 19, 2005 I have missed him.  My heart longs to be with him again...but I must wait.  And meanwhile I have my children and grandchildren to be here for.  I have my dog and cat to take care of.  

I hope you continue to come here, to read, to post, the grief site I turned to back in 2005, which I am on still, it was a lifesaver to me, knowing there are others that understood, that were somehow making their way through this, it gave me courage for another day.  I hope this helps you too.

[Sunflower2]

These feelings still return even into 16 months without him.  I'm finding tracking the time he has been gone is not working well for my healing.  Not ging to even try to figure it out because it is what it is and its different for all of us. 

Your shared rawness is what we all understand so deeply. I remember those months of initial rawness. As I look back I don't even know how I survived but somehow we do. xo

Even in intense grief work toward finding the best resources that are available to you and work for you.  You will know.  The most beautiful healing connections are human. A touch, a smile an acknowledgement of you is the most human form of healing,  Reach out.

My thoughts and warmth is with you.

 

[John/Wendy]

Thank you for all the encouragement and shared thoughts, memories and pain. I don’t know if it makes me less sad or even madder at this death thing knowing there are so many people living with this horror. The truth is the deeper the love, the stronger the pain. How is it so many people throw love and relationships away and yet here we are, the ones who would die for one more day with our loves? Life is beyond cruel to me these days. I will never understand God. I try to tell myself in the history of the world, how many people are even givin the chance to love like we did? How many young people died to young in wars or desease or just never found love? I guess we should be thankful. Looking back at all the photo albums, videos and shoe boxes  filled with memories I keep telling myself.., “it went by quickly”..”You won’t have to wait long to be with her again”. But each day is so long now. Not being able to look at any type of future without her in it... it’s hell on earth. “Nothing seems real” someone said in a reply. Thats the new truth. So... another day... here we go... good luck and healing thoughts to us all. I’m off to the park to walk and talk with my wife.  It may be a lie. But it’s all I have.

[foreverhis]

3 minutes ago, John/Wendy said:

I’m off to the park to walk and talk with my wife.  It may be a lie. But it’s all I have.

I do not believe that talking to our loves is one of the lies we tell ourselves.  I believe that my love hears me; I really do.  It's simply that he can't answer me right now.

My husband and I abandoned, I guess you could say though that isn't quite right, organized religion many years ago.  But we didn't stop having faith in many things.  We had faith in each other, in the overall good in people, in a unifying collective.  While we do not worship a specific deity, we do believe there is something greater than ourselves and that there are things we cannot know.  We often talked about what you might call everyday miracles.  That is, things that we could not explain or quite understand.

If I'm wrong, I will still have the comfort of my heart knowing I will always love him.  Maybe that's the greater truth.

[John/Wendy]

13 hours ago, Brazil Man said:

Me too. I can't accept that my wife is gone. Gone is such a bad and terrible word.
I also lost my wife to cancer and this was the the first Christmas without her after 30 years.
She is gone too. Sorry for us.

 

I’m sorry for your pain. I know some of what your going through. Cancer is the added misery of death. Only those of us who had to watch our loved ones go through it and all the crap we are left with in our minds, know this special kind of hell. The worst thing so far in all this is watching my poor daughters deal with all this. I am so angry at knowing they and my grandkids won’t know my wife’s smiles and laughter and hugs through the coming years. The images of this past year ( my wife only had 9 months from her breast cancer diagnosis until her death) must haunt them as much or worse than they haunt me. I’m sure there’s hope for us, hang in there. It sure doesn’t feel like it now but of all the things I know, I know our loves would want us to live, love and go on. 

[Sunflower2]

4 hours ago, foreverhis said:

My husband and I abandoned, I guess you could say though that isn't quite right, organized religion many years ago.

There's no right or wrong with your decision! You can have a strong faith or be an atheist. I have witnessed both having strong connections with their love ones.

 

4 hours ago, foreverhis said:

We had faith in each other, in the overall good in people, in a unifying collective.  While we do not worship a specific deity, we do believe there is something greater than ourselves and that there are things we cannot know.  We often talked about what you might call everyday miracles.  That is, things that we could not explain or quite understand.

Beautiful!

[John/Wendy]

Albert Einstein called it “spooky action at a distance”. Two particles intertwined at even a unknown distance. I believe, we who have had the privilege to know true love, are forever intertwined with the other. It is a force, ( as a Star Wars fan would call it) that binds us with everything and each other without boundaries of time or space. That’s why we have all these feelings of daja vu. We are experiencing a part of a life we were meant to live with our intended partner. It can’t be broken, we will forever be affected by the others “force” or “love”. It is our “gift” from our creator. Science can’t explain the existance of something they call “dark energy” that makes up 98 percent of the universe and is responsible for the energy that is expanding the very same universe for what some say will be eternity. I say we already know what that energy is, and that it has been mislabeled. It is our love. Our gift. Our loved ones who have moved out into the universe. We are still with them, they are with us and we all move the universe in a positive, creative loving direction. I take comfort in that. Call it God or whatever you chose. It is our “Gift”. It is hard to grasp when we can’t see our loved ones, but we are never truly seperated from them. Death by definition is a separation, it is just physical separation. We are energy, we just have to embrace that and the love that surrounds us that we can’t see, but can feel, remember and interact with. I know it’s deep. But we are swimmers. Dive in. Love to all.

[ModKatB]

I think that our loved ones are near and while we may not see them you can definitely feel them. I had to go to the dentist and have some teeth pulled but it was hard for me as I have issues with tight spaces and not being able to move. While I was sitting in the chair I was talking to Billy in my thoughts and as they started working on me I felt a warmth on my hand like someone was holding it and the light right above me got really bright for a moment. I calmed down and was able to get thru the dental work with no problems. I honestly feel that it was my husband by my side that day. Love just doesn't go away and those feelings and memories are ours forever.

[tlc]

Hi John,

Since Terry left this dimension, I have become obsessed with what happens next. NDEs and multiverses, life after death and string theory and other dimensions. One thing that I am sure of is that there is more to this than we are able to comprehend. I have had signs, inexplicable things happening. I know that Terry is here, there and the strange thing is that I am here and there too. Guess what.. I can't wait to be there with Terry!

[Moment2moment]

3 hours ago, tlc said:

Hi John,

Since Terry left this dimension, I have become obsessed with what happens next. NDEs and multiverses, life after death and string theory and other dimensions. One thing that I am sure of is that there is more to this than we are able to comprehend. I have had signs, inexplicable things happening. I know that Terry is here, there and the strange thing is that I am here and there too. Guess what.. I can't wait to be there with Terry!

I too do not see them as "gone". They are just in a level of existence different than ours.

I too have had signs of her presence and I have actually heard her call my name out loud. That was once right after she first crossed over.

Other signs are subtle and often I hear her voice inside my thoughts, especially when I talk out loud to her, which I do often. We were the kind of couple that completed each others sentences and thoughts.

After 28 years we acquired many of each others speech patterns, habits, appearance, and flat out identity as a "we".

Not to say that we were not strong individuals together because we were. But we were definitely soul mates, connected at the heart and soul level. Those connections remain unbroken. 

I have no doubt that we will be together when I pass and I in no way fear death. In the meantime I know she wants me to fully live out the years I have left and when it is my time then she will escort me over.

Knowing this, I do not despair. I feel sad and miss her every second of every day, but I do not despair.

In the meantime, "Live, love, laugh", as they say.

Love, Lily

[KayC]

I love the posts in this thread, very deep and insightful!  You all mirror my heart, my thoughts.  We continue learning to live with them in this new way and connecting with them.

[foreverhis]

5 hours ago, Moment2moment said:

Other signs are subtle and often I hear her voice inside my thoughts, especially when I talk out loud to her, which I do often. We were the kind of couple that completed each others sentences and thoughts.

I put a Pickles comic strip up on our fridge years ago.  My hubby and I used to joke that there must me a hidden camera and microphone in our house.  This particular one is the husband asking things like "Have you seen my..." and "Did you pick up..." and she answers him before he can finish his sentences.  We did that all the time.  There's a scene in the movie "Broadcast News" where one character says to another something like "Meet me at the place near the thing where we went that time."  Yep, we did that kind of thing constantly.

But even more, my hubby had this mojo thing where he could literally pick up my thoughts, complete sentences, before I said them.  These were often unrelated to the previous topic.  I would joke to him it was simply rude because that meant I could never lie to him.  Our daughter used to say it was fun watching us with what she called our "couple's things."  Those little gestures, in jokes. looks, laughs, and just everything that connected us so deeply, but that only have meaning to us.  I miss everything about him, even the little things that used to annoy me.

I talk to him all the time.  Sometimes when I'm thinking about something, trying to figure out how or what to do, an answer will pop into my head.  Mind you, it's in my own "inner" voice, but I can all but feel the idea coming from him.  And even if it's not, I don't care.  I'll say out loud, "Great idea.  Thanks hon." (or similar).  I've always talked to myself out loud, but now it feels like I'm "talking" for both of us.

 

[KayC]

We did that too, we not only could finish each other sentences, but it felt we were on the same wavelength, our thoughts were almost coming from one mind instead of two, we always got each other, related.

[Sunshine247]

Love is eternal. Love doesn't die when the body does. It lives on. We just have to learn how to live and love in separation. It's not easy, but it is possible.