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It's been a month since he went away...


Andie-J

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  • Members
Posted

My sweet husband, John, died exactly one month ago today. It was sudden and unexpected and it has rocked me to the core. He was only 45 years old. One morning I was kissing him goodbye as he left for work, and then a few short hours later his co-worker was calling me and telling me to get to the hospital. When I arrived at the hospital, I learned he had collapsed from a heart attack and that he was not breathing when the EMS arrived and had to be shocked. At the hospital, he was barely hanging on and they were breathing for him with a tube. We lost him only a couple of short hours later. My whole world was frozen in a single moment. I am a widow at the age of 42. And what makes this even more heart-breaking is that John and I were newlyweds, married on May 29, 2016 after having dated for only 5 short months. How can this be reality? We had both found the loves of our lives in one another, were on a whirlwind of romance and looking forward to sharing a lifetime of happiness, and he was stolen from me. As the shock of this nightmare starts to wear off, I still find myself incredibly sad, confused, lonely, and just plain heartbroken. I read stories of people who lost their spouses after many years of marriage and I find myself wondering if it is even fair for me to feel so devastated when John was only in my life for 9 months? But then I think that is the real tragedy in all of this - that we had such a short time together here on earth and were robbed of our lifetime of happiness. When will this ever stop stabbing my heart and make any sense?

  • Members
Posted

Andie-J----I feel your pain ---I am so sorry. You have every right to grieve and feel all the emotions no matter how long the relationship. If you believe in destiny, believe that you and John were brought into each other's life for each of you to feel love and enjoy happiness for those months.

Prayers and hugs to you. Keep posting, you came to the right place.

  • Members
Posted

I agree with KMB, your feelings are just as real as someone who has been married for years. Also as I have started my journey of healing, I have seen that losing my fiancé may never make sense, but I can cherish what we had for a lifetime. 

  • Moderators
Posted

Andie,

I'm so sorry you lost your husband and so young at that.  My husband was barely 51 when he died of a heart attack...also a shock and unexpected.  We'd known each other 6 1/2 years and had been married 3 years 8 months.  I've had some think I didn't lose as much as they did because they were married 50 years, but that's not true.  It took us our lives to find each other and we were so happy with each other, and it felt like a huge gyp that our lives were stolen from us so soon!  While someone who has been married 50 years may struggle more with how to live independently because they've been so entwined for so long in who does what, etc., still, to rob a young love with all of their hopes and dreams leaves us feeling it is so unfair.  We would have loved 50 years together!  We would have loved 20.

Your grief is very valid.  Our love determines our grief, not quantity of time.  I know someone who was married a long time and felt relief when her husband died because he was a drunk that beat on her...she never married again and enjoys her freedom from abuse.  It's not always quantity of time, it's more about quality of relationship, and that can be young or old, a long time or a short time.

My heart goes out to you in your grief, it's hard, but with great time and effort we learn to adjust to even this.  I hope you've got a good grief counselor.

  • Members
claribassist13
Posted

Andie, 

I can relate to the unfairness you are dealing with. It's absolutely awful that you had such a short amount of time with your love, and nothing will ever change that. 

At some point, we just have to accept what time we did have. We learn to be grateful for every second. 
I often feel cheated because I didn't get to marry my fiance before he was taken from me. 
We all could have loved our significant others for years and years to come. Some of us to do not get the opportunity to do that with them physically here. 

Our devastation is different from that of couples married 50 years. They had so many chances with their significant others that you and I will never have. They grieve for what they had, for what was left of their future. We grieve largely for the things we have yet to experience, the things we don't even know exist yet. 
Your grief and the level of grief that you feel is perfectly valid. Having only known John for 10 months has no relevance on the depth of your love for him. Time doesn't make a person known. 

Keep feeling all that you are feeling, and keep reaching out. 

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