It saddens me how many times I’ve written a letter like this. I saved the most recent one to post here, in the hopes that it might help someone else someday. Details have been slightly edited to protect privacy.
You don’t know me, but I am so, so very sorry for your loss.
My husband died of a heart attack in front of me, and while I can’t ever understand exactly what you’re experiencing, I’ve experienced something very similar and know how much pain you’re in right now.
There isn’t much I can do for you from afar, other than give you unsolicited advice (which you *do not* have to read, and which you can take or leave), and listen if you need a sounding board. Please feel free to write back if you need someone to talk to. And don’t bother responding at all if it’s too much to deal with right now. I just know how much this sucks, and my heart hurts every time I learn it’s happened to someone else.
Here are some things that helped me get through the awfulness. Like I said, I won’t be offended in the slightest if you ignore everything I’m about to write, but maybe some of it will help.
1) Breathe. Drink water. Eat. In that order. That is all you need to do right now, and when you feel lost, just remember those three things.
2) Find a community of other widows to talk to, either in person or online. Or just one widow. It helps so, so much to have people to talk to who understand what you’re going through. And anyone who gives you that BS about your not technically being a widow because he was your boyfriend can just go ***insert expletives here***.
3) Your grief is going to last a long, long time. Other people’s interest in and concern for your grief will not. If you have it in you (and I know this is really hard), try to make a list of the things you need help with and then let people help. If you wait, the help may have moved on to the next crisis.
4) You may find that your friends list changes. I had a really hard time being with people who expected me to be back to normal after a few weeks, or who expected me to do things with them that I used to do. But some people who weren’t close friends before surprised me by sitting on the floor with me in silence, or making me food months after he was gone. It’s also okay to tell people to go away, and that you want to be alone.
5) Talk to him. Do this however you want—talk to him out loud, write him letters, write to him in a journal, send him emails—whatever makes sense to you. I wrote to him in a journal every night for over a year. It really helped. Corollary: screaming in the car can also help.
6) Grief is sneaky, and much more cyclical than it is linear. It’s often described as coming in waves. At the beginning, after one giant tsunami has bowled you over, the waves are coming fast and frequent. Over time, they start to let up, and you might even catch yourself smiling once in a while between the waves. The waves eventually get further and further apart, but they’ll always be there, and they will bowl you over when you least expect it. How long it takes before you can stick your head up for air is different for everyone. There’s no timeline, no right answer. Just do your best to breathe.
7) Related to the above: it’s okay to smile, and it’s okay to laugh. Even right now. The first few times you catch yourself doing this, you may think you’re dishonoring him because you’re not completely sad 100% of the time. It’s okay. Laughing and crying are very closely related, and it’s totally normal to go right from one to the other.
8) It is 100% completely okay to not be okay with being alive right now. This is a hard thing to describe—I and many widows I know wanted to die, but weren’t suicidal. Like, I really, really couldn’t imagine how I would go on, and I really wanted to die. But I wasn’t suicidal—I didn’t actually want to act on that feeling. It’s a weird thing to describe and maybe you’ve already felt exactly what I’m talking about. Just know that it’s normal and it’s okay. What’s not okay is if you start actively fantasizing about all kinds of ways to follow through. If you find that starts happening, tell someone. Get help. What you are going through right now sucks beyond any kind of suckiness you will likely ever feel, but you will eventually start to feel better if you can just hang on.
9) I survived by getting a calendar and a Sharpie and just telling myself I had to make it through one day. I didn’t have to live beyond that—I just had to make it through the day. And I put a big black X on each day I made it through. The more X’s I got, the more I wanted to stick around. And eventually I didn’t need the Sharpie and the calendar.
10) “The only way around it is through it.” It is so, so, so awful. The only way to get through is one day at a time, one minute at a time. But you will get through eventually. You don’t even have to believe that’s true right now. Just believe that you can make it through the next minute.
Sending you lots of love and virtual hugs.
