Vision

I was listening to the audio of Caroline Myss, "Navigating Hope," and at one point she said that the reason people have trouble moving out of grief is that we are too stuck in our pasts. By that she means we keep wanting for our lives to be like they were before. Because that is impossible to achieve, we remain pretty miserable with our lives.

Actually, I think there is a point to this observation. I know that I wish I had my old life back. Trouble is, I am having trouble envisioning a new life. How are we supposed to do this? It is so much easier to want to restore what we had because it was known and we can see it our our minds. How do I look toward the future when I have nothing to throw my anchor into except a blank slate? My anchor is still stuck behind me because it was familiar and good. The future as an unknown is scary and treacherous.

I guess the point is that we need to have hope and faith in the unknown future. And to cast our anchors out before us blindly expecting the best.

You hear all this advice on what to do but I'm still lost. What are the steps we can take to start our future visions? If I come across any advice on this I'll provide an update, but I've been on this path awhile now and am still floundering.

I Want to be a Rock Hound

It was the fourth anniversary of my fated remarriage yesterday. Last year with moving and the year before with going through the divorce, I didn't focus or reflect much on the day. But this year there was extra space in my brain and much of the day was spent remembering the actual day, which was so lovely and full of hope. There was the anticipation of happiness which has been so lacking in my life these days.

I won't dwell on the whys or reasons of the marriage's demise. I deeply regret that my ex wasn't able to hang in there a bit longer. I think we had tremendous potential and it saddens me for the wasted and lost opportunities for love.

What I mainly contemplated during the day were all the activities my ex and I used to enjoy and engage in. We had a good time with shared interests and we liked spending time together.

We shared the Sunday paper on mornings spent at the ball field during the boys' baseball games, while sipping Starbucks. My ex introduced me to Starbucks - I'd never been there before meeting him because I am a tea drinker and thought they just served coffee. Boy was I in for a delightful surprise!

We enjoyed going to a Friday night fish fry in my locality - it became a tradition on our weekends. Since our breakup two years ago, I've never been back and the food was so good! I miss it.

I used to knit while my ex read the paper (he was a paper reading fanatic) and I found a vintage cross stitch sampler of a couple with the woman knitting while the husband read the paper. It was so cute and symbolized us as a couple.

We collected American antique art glass at my suggestion because I wanted us to have a new hobby we started together. We both got very into it and amassed a lovely collection by the time we divorced. He ended up with the entire collection and I wish he had been gracious enough to at least offer me one of the pieces as a memory. Since the divorce, Sam and I started our own little collection and I've gotten some of the smaller, less expensive pieces on my own. But it doesn't compare with the hours that my ex and I spent talking about our collection, sorting, organizing and cataloging it. It brought us a great deal of joy - just looking at it and remembering where and when we found certain pieces.

My ex and I shared the interest of rock collecting and had plans to hunt for fossils, diamonds and gem stones across the country. I had visions of displaying our finds in cases. We also loved to travel and had hoped to take short and long trips around and about.

And gardening! He was into vegetables and I was into flowers. I had ideas of revamping the back yard and turning the patio into a relaxing retreat.

We did some cooking together too. And both of us liked to get dressed up once in awhile for a fancy night on the town. I had hoped to entertain for his co-workers and have family over for big holiday celebrations.

When we read, he shared his news stories and he liked me telling him about the novels I was reading.

All such wonderful and fun shared interests and activities. Thinking of them throughout the other day I felt mostly happy because these are things that charge and excite me. I miss having them in my life. Basically my life is pretty much drudgery with not much enjoyment. When you have all that inspiration and creativity in your life shared with someone and then it just disappears it is hard to cope with that loss.

I want this stuff back in my life but lack the funds, time or partner to share them all with. I want to be a rock hound. I want to find a fellow rock hound to go rock hounding with me. Anyone out there? Chili chef and gardening fanatic are optional but would be nice too!

What I noticed most about my day of reminiscing was how little I write or even reflect of things that bring me happiness. Thinking of these activities brought me quite a bit of joy even thought I wasn't actually doing any of them. I sure need some more joy in my life.

It's All A Crap Shoot

This weekend at the nursing home, a lot of wives were in visiting with their husbands. For the first time, I felt some anger and resentment simmering underneath my kind and composed exterior. I was reminded of the role I played as loving/devoted wife caring for my sick husband the years he was hospitalized and in rehab. These are older couples - one of the men is 93. My poor husband died at age 54 and I was 44. I definitely felt some unfairness with the fact that these couples ended up having more time together than my husband and I had. Their children are grown, there are grandchildren, the mortgage has been paid off. They were fortunate to have traveled and played golf together in retirement. It astounds me when I think about my husband maybe having lived to age 93 - how short his life really ended up being.

In the natural order of things, my husband and I should have had that regular and predictable life these couples were fortunate enough to have had. But we didn't and I know there are other younger couples out there dealing with sick spouses and young kids too. It's all a crap shoot in the end. Bitching out about the unfairness playing out in front of my eyes doesn't get me anywhere.

I saw myself in these wives and I put aside my anger for the extra time they've had and brought out the compassion because I know what lies ahead for them.

Easter 2010

I had a bit of a downer this Easter. It seems with every "holiday" or special occasion that I feel in a funk. Maybe it was prompted by all the t.v. ads showing intact families frolicking around on hillsides covered with blooming spring flowers. Or the ones showing families out on shopping excursions buying their Easter outfits or racing around searching for hidden eggs. Anyway, I experienced those feelings of loss that come upon me during these times. Feeling incomplete and lonely. Feeling that our little family of three is lacking because of the huge hole that exists with our husband/dad no longer here to fill it and make us the family we once were.

These family portrayals on t.v. and in print advertisements depict the ideal or image of what a family unit is. With 50% of marriages ending in divorce there are many other versions of families out there - it would be nice to sometimes see these real families in ads. And part of me is angry for buying into this fantasy. For feeling bad because my family isn't the "ideal," whatever that is anyway. But I guess that is the whole point of advertising. It makes us want that ideal we don't have. But in my case, I could care less about the pretty shoes or clothes - I want the man and life we all once had - when we could have been that cute family holding hands and skipping down the street in our new spring outfits.

I used to go all out for the boys BW (Before Widowhood). They always received huge baskets filled with toys in addition to candy. This year I picked up a token acknowledgment of the day - they each got a package of Reese's Eggs, a crispy rice chocolate bunny and a cookies & cream bunny - grand total of about $3.50!

Again as with Valentine's Day, when I was out and about, all my eyes seemed to pick up on was families with both parents and kids together or couples. Funny how that seems to happen.

I surely did not expect to get hit with this on Easter. This is a celebration that has other meanings both religious and then spring renewal and all. But I guess underneath those major themes is that of getting together and celebrating as family be it with an egg hunt, church service or brunch out.

As with Valentine's Day, I am finding that once the day passed, my mood improved and I felt less pressure surrounding my heart and soul. We survived it for another year at least.

I do wish these days were not so painful. Everyday has its challenges for us. Everyday a sense of loss is present. But on major holidays/celebrations the ghosts that haunt us seem to be more intense. Which is really kind of a slap in the face because to some extent these events exist in our culture to serve as days to lift our spirits and give us breaks from the tedium of our lives.

If Her Husband Hadn't Died...

I wanted this blog to tell the story of a woman who wouldn't be writing it, if her husband hadn't died.

If her husband hadn't died, she would not be sitting in this apartment having had to sell her home for virtually no profit 2 1/2 months ago.

If her husband hadn't died, she never would have married the man who ended up devastating her emotionally and financially.

If her husband hadn't died, she wouldn't be so careworn and exhausted.

If her husband hadn't died, their sons would almost certainly have better grades and be more adjusted (and happier and less troubled).

If her husband hadn't died, she never would have left her part-time counseling job with the county.

If her husband hadn't died, she would not have gone six long years without any kind of vacation (even a mini weekend getaway).

If her husband hadn't died, the vast majority of the household goods owned by the family would not be sitting in two extremely untidy storage units.

If her husband hadn't died, a small family would not currently be on the brink of losing everything.

If her husband hadn't died, their sons would not be celebrating Christmas for the second year in a row without receiving presents.

If her husband hadn't died, there would not have been the financial struggle that has existed and which just worsened with the divorce and Recession.

If her husband hadn't died, this woman would not have had to go looking for another partner with whom to share her life since she wants to be with someone. Happy dating in the land of middle-age flab, sags, grey hair and wrinkles! Not to mention financial and ex-spouse baggage. And all the drama that goes with the kids. Whoo hoo! It is time to party! Oh and then there is all the fun worrying about STDs.

If her husband hadn't died, life would not have been the challenge it has been the past six long years.

This is not some joke or fiction. It is all real and I do my best to convey what is happening in my life honestly. Why? Maybe it will end up helping someone along the way. Maybe my tale will let others know that grief doesn't stop after the first year. And for some of us, the secondary losses of financial hardship, divorce after remarriage and only parenting take a far greater toll than the actual death of our spouses. I hope maybe to somehow get through that women like me fall through the cracks because we don't qualify for any financial assistance but that what we earn on our own isn't enough to raise the children that were left behind for us to bring up on our own. I hope to depict that it is a very hard and lonely road for some of us to stumble along everyday.

New challenges abound. If we remarry and move, how will that impact our kids? What about the kids who have led a less than stable life in their formative years? How screwed up will mine be having been rejected by their mom's second husband so soon after their beloved Dad died? Everyone says kids are resilient and will come out just fine. But I'm not sure I believe that anymore. No one seems to remember the kids or the widow after the first few months. But where was the magic wand that was supposed to be waved to have made it all better? Do people honestly think that with the passage of time everything just turns out? It doesn't for some of us, nor is being an only parent the best thing for kids. They need and deserve to be raised in a family or at least within a loving network that provides support to the widow/widower and the kids. But for some of us without much family, our lives become isolated and we parent on our own out of necessity. It is a very hard job to undertake. No one sees the underlying stress and strain that results from this relentless job.

It snowed this morning and here again comes my greatest fear of the winter - that I will fall and break a leg and there will be no one to assist me with the kids or my recovery. I will myself not to get sick every year because I cannot afford to.

I wish I were not this woman whose husband died and that the following years had not led us to this point. I wish you had all gotten to know the woman I was before stress and strain left me jaded and pessimistic and so down all the time. I wish this were not my real life and I was just making all this up!

If My husband hadn't died, I wouldn't be in front of this computer screen, all of the crazy events of the past years would have never happened and I would just be a normal, middle-aged soccer mom who had never even thought of the screen name Widow-in-the-Middle. Tonight I just so wish I was that normal, middle-aged mom. I want to pretend that I am for a little while.

Reality Check

GF jokingly told me today to take a break from blogging since life is pretty hectic. Then he added that my posts have been pretty depressing lately and maybe I should try being a bit more positive. He was half serious and wasn't being mean - I got a huge laugh out of it. But hello, this is a grief blog. I would hope those checking in know that from the get go and aren't expecting cheeriness, right?

I think the whole point of blogging is to be real and honest. And for some of us, this place we have created is one of the few where we can let it all hang out without feeling guilty or having to pretend something that isn't.

Yes, I am sad right now. The prospect of moving while offering a new beginning is still a huge loss for my sons and I. We have already been through the wringer in having to navigate unexpected change. Staying in a familiar and well-loved environment has been the one constant we have been able to hang onto over the past years.

Moving for me would mean that I would finally have to admit that my life didn't turn out as planned. Never in a million years when I married 18 years ago, did I ever have the thought that 12 years into my marriage, I would be a widow at age 44 with two school-aged children. Somehow keeping the boys here in this community has been a way of making some of the life I thought I'd live still be a reality. Maybe that has all been an exercise in futility?

Today I am grateful for:

1. Tater tots - what a creative idea!
2. Those mini pizza egg roll things my sons like and I also used to love as a kid. Another great idea.
3. The Burger King Angry Whopper. While I don't eat beef or burgers, I still give credit for a unique marketing idea.
4. Ice cream sandwiches. Another cool product!
5. That old standby of grilled cheese and tomato soup. As long as you have bread, cheese and a can of soup in the pantry, there will always be a guaranteed decent lunch or dinner!

Dinner Around the Kitchen Table

I am feeling utterly drained. I don't think I've restored myself from helping Guyfriend (GF) move last weekend. Going to school four days a week is more tiring than I expected. There is homework and tests to study for, as well as reading. I am finding that my mind works more slowly than it did some years ago - or maybe the fatigue has a contibuting factor.

The drive to school is about an hour each way - lots of time to think and reflect. Especially on the situation of moving and marriage. I am wondering if all that reflection is also adding to my feelings of exhaustion. Everything is coming down at once! GF has been at his new job training in Detroit this week. I asked him what are some of the things he has been learning and he mentioned open and closed communication which is pretty funny because we also talked about that in my classes this week too! GF told me that he listed me as his emergency contact with the title of fiance. I laughed about that because he has never formally asked me to marry him. Rather, he has said that we will get married in December if I move. I don't doubt his feelings for me or his honorable intentions in the least. He is the real deal - genuine, honest and true to his word. Probably a good guy to have around when the going gets tough.

One thought has kept coming back to me over and over this week. My mind reviews the movie in my head titled, "The Widowhood Years" and what makes me most sad out of everything is that in these years, my sons and I have rarely eaten together as a family around a table. The last year of my husband's life, we got into this habit of eating dinner in the van on the way to see him in the hospital (to save time, convenience, etc.). After his death, we started eating in front of the t.v., or I'd make and serve dinner at odd hours because of sports, or we'd eat at the location of the sporting event we were at. Later, when my parents became so ill, we sometimes ate with my mom or I ate on my own and the boys ate beforehand. Just a mishmosh of throwing together meals, a lot of times on the fly.

I guess I equate the dinners the four of us used to share around a table, like a normal family with what is normal and should be for children to experience growing up. After my husband's death there was no normal. I know there are lots of ways to parent, lots of ways to live, lots of way to do things. There are probably a fair number of intact families out there eating around the t.v. most nights. But that was not what I ever expected would happen to us. Certainly not from a dedicated mom with her master's in psych. - of all moms, I knew better.

But as we all know, life doesn't go according to plan and we end up doing the best we can with the situation we face. And that leaves me today, a tired, depleted, middle-aged mom with a chance again at love struggling with balancing my own needs against what is best for my boys. In any case, for me the toughest grief I have had to face has not been the death of my husband but everything that came afterward as a result of his death. Like the lost routine of eating around the kitchen table.

No Guarantees

It was the third wedding anniversary with Husband #2 yesterday and I had a hard time of it throughout the day. Thinking about all that has been lost and what could have been, especially when contrasting it to where we have landed (now living in a lower income apartment complex - and I have to face admitting it - I am borderline poor - my income from cashiering at the big box store is minimal and my pension from my first husband puts us marginally above the poverty line. Until I gain full-time employment, we are poor).

Both husband #1 and #2 made very good incomes and had recession proof jobs. I married each of them with that partly in mind. But let me tell you - nothing guarantees protection from where we have fallen. I thought that after all of the grief and hardship following Husband #1's death that I was immune to more suffering. I remarried three years ago believing I'd been given a second chance at happiness and that it could never be snatched away from me. I was sorely mistaken because here we are.

It will take extreme strength and courage for me to pull myself up from the bottom of this new reality. I did sign up to take that Certified Nursing Assistant training 5-week program which starts 10/26. I am confident that once I complete that I will find full-time work during daytime hours which I need for the boys. Then, I will start honing in on getting back into my field as a mental health counselor. I am in survival mode. Three years ago this was not even a remote possibility in my mind. I was the new wife of a man making a salary of over $100,000. I didn't take this for granted - I was still caught up in all the chaos of caring for my parents and trying to deal with moving my boys. I never even got much of an opportunity to enjoy being a new, remarried wife. The contrast between that old life and this new one is so painful I can't write about it anymore.

Just another loss, another burden of grief to face and somehow tidy up so I can get on with my life and put these sorrowful memories behind me.

Today I am grateful:

1. For washing machines and dryers (even if they are not my own).
2. For fresh smelling laundry detergent.
3. For dryer sheets that reduce static.
4. For being able to wash in hot and cold water.
5. For having enough clothes to wash in the first place.

Waltzing off into the Sunset

I have three close friends, all of whom are divorced, two female and one male. My guy friend's ex-wife initiated a divorce from him in the fall of 2007. Their divorce was finalized in March, 2008. She started dating at that time and remarried March, 2009! She is moving out of state at the start of August and taking my friend's 11-year-old son with her. It was extremely fortunate that the company she works for in Chicago just so happened to have an opening in their office in the state her new husband resides. So she relocated without having to look for a new job. She and her new husband also just bought a house together.

This situation irks the heck out of me for a number of reasons. It so reeks of unfairness that I want to scream! For one thing, ex-wife isn't a knock-out or anything special in the looks department. She once weighed 240 pounds and has acne scarring on her face. She did not go to college. Apparently she has lost some of the pounds but isn't thin. I suppose that isn't what gets me upset. And these factors shouldn't matter (but somehow they do).

What really gets me is that since her son has been an infant, her mom resided with them and provided the childcare she and my guy friend needed to be working. Grandma also bought them the lovely four bedroom home they lived in. Needless to say, grandma also cooked, cleaned and shopped. "Not that pretty ex-wife" never had to parent on her own, manage a home on her own or even shop or clean by herself. She never had to arrange carpooling or to take her son to the emergency room or doctor's appointments on her own. AND SHE ONLY SLEPT ALONE FOR A YEAR!!! Excuse me Universe - but there are a heck of a lot of women out there handling it ALL on their own and sleeping in their own beds. And they're tired and want to be loved again by someone.

"Not that pretty ex-wife" took away all the spots ahead of her - she didn't pay her dues - she cut in front of the line! Maybe it is harsh and unfair for me to think of all of this (and I've never even met her) but she doesn't seem to deserve another shot at happiness so soon after her divorce without having really suffered much, if at all. This woman hasn't been much of an active parent, with my guy friend and grandma handling far more of the hands-on parenting. So not only does she get to waltz off into the sunset to her new life, but she gets the kid too!

The one aspect of all of this that is the most glaring is that she never really had to sleep alone. Just a year. It is going on six years for me (seven if you count the year my husband was in the hospital most of that time). In terms of all I've had to live and survive through, my number should be the one called for some happiness right now. Not some woman who selfishly is tearing her only child away from his dad and kicking out her mom so she can do her own thing.

Maybe I need to take her lead and be more selfish myself - when I had that chance I ended up losing my second husband because I chose to care for my dying Mom and concentrate on my sons. Why doesn't that count for anything? I'm living at a low economic level, no one is sharing my bed and we're faced with moving into an apartment (so I'll have to get rid of over half of our current possessions). This woman's new house has a hot tub and six acres of land. Just doesn't seem balanced, right or fair in the grand scheme of things. But what, if any of the past years since my husband's death have been?

Maybe what I am trying to uncover in all of these words is that "Not so pretty ex-wife" doesn't seem as deserving as me or the other widows out there who have been pulling more than their weight. It is hard not to compare oneself to someone who hasn't had to endure as much struggle and hardship and seemingly has an easier life.

Today I am grateful:

1. For the opportunity to see one of my son's pitch and the other catch together in tonight's baseball game, which they won.
2. For the compliment one of the moms said to me tonight, about how handsome and nice my boys are. I replied that I thought they'd turned out pretty well and she told me I'd done a good job (ON MY OWN!).
3. That we did receive an offer on the house today (and the house has only been listed a week).
4. For my youngest son telling me that living in an apartment will be better for us because we don't need all the room in our current home.
5. For having a good girlfriend to call and talk about the house with - and hearing her tell me that everything I've done in the last year has been accomplished on my own without the assistance of anyone. And that I should be proud of myself.

Mourning Dreams and the Future

When I was first dating my second husband, I told him that some of the grief over my husband's death was from what was lost for the future. All the dreams that we had shared, that would now not come true. For me that included retiring to Wisconsin, which we probably would have planning to do in three years when the boys graduated from high school. It was also our dream for our sons to go to college in Wisconsin.

My new husband told me that this observation had a profound impact on him. It had never struck him that you could grieve for what hadn't yet occurred. I am finding myself now grieving all of what has been lost in my second marriage - the plans, hopes and dreams we shared.

It is funny because I was doing something in the family room and an old episode of Frasier was on - a show I did not watch. This one had Frasier taking a call from a woman who had broken up with her boyfriend eight months before and could not seem to move on and get over him. Frasier pointed out to the woman that she was mourning the life she wasn't going to have and she needed to let go of that dream and move on.

I came across similar advice in a book I was reading by life coach Rhonda Britten, author of "Fearless Loving." She also proclaims that those of us grieving what we hoped for the future, need to let it go and concentrate on our lives in the here and now. She says, "It comes down to a willingness to get over what you think should have happened and accept the reality of the present moment." Very well-said, wise words but as I keep on finding, much easier to think about and agree with than actually follow.

I read books like this and I think the expectation is to be able to adapt the new way of acting right away - but in reality it is a long process. Some days are better than others. So you reflect on the vanished dreams and mourn them and then try to shift back to the present and focus on that. A back and forth, give and take road, weaving and curving instead of going in a straight line.

Today I am grateful for:

1. Still having a job (they haven't fired me yet).
2. Being able to sleep at night.
3. That I haven't had an emotional breakdown.
4. That I can still smile and laugh.
5. That I can think of the dreams I had with both of my husbands and feel tremendous loss that they will not come true but also gladness that I even had them in the first place!