Two years - relearning to live

Well, it’s two years since B died and, no, it doesn’t seem possible. How can all of that time have passed without him? How can I no longer be able to say, “my husband died last year”? And yet here I am. To be truthful, although I couldn’t see how it could possibly do so, life does carry on and I no longer think about B all of the time. I can go out now, have a good time, and really enjoy myself. Admittedly, the underlying sadness is still there but it is less potent, and I haven’t had any more of those terrible dark, crushing times of misery, for which I’m thankful. There are still the occasional bad times but, on the whole, they are shorter and I bounce back more quickly. Whenever I feel sad, I just also try to feel grateful for what we had and, generally, that helps.

It no longer feels like yesterday that B was here, though. I can feel the ‘realness’ of him slipping away and, I guess, this is the natural process of grief unfolding, which is probably good but, if I’m truthful, I don’t like it. A friend, also recently widowed, told me a little while ago that she wanted to hold on to the pain as that is her link to her husband. My immediate reaction was “Oh no, I just want the pain to go”, but I get it. I do wonder, though, isn’t it possible to have one without the other? I want to be able to remember and not feel sad, and I can do that now for at least some of the time, but I don’t want B to just become a fading memory, though, of course, that’s precisely what he now is (there’s that strange language again, because he plainly ‘isn’t’!!!). But, ‘we’ happened and I still want to be able to ‘feel’ the real B. I still don’t quite know how else to explain this, but it’s something about not wanting to lose / forget the true essence of him. What I haven’t yet worked out is whether not being sad means letting go of that ‘realness’. I hope not. (If this doesn’t make any sense, don’t worry I find it hard to get my head around it, it’s more of a heart than a head thing!)

A while back I became aware that it would be easy for me to get stuck in either memories of the past or (unrealistic?) dreams of the future. Neither of these seem good places to be, or at least to stay in for any length of time, although each of them can be very tempting, especially in the low times. So, I try to live in ‘the now’, acknowledging the sadness when it appears and then doing my best to let it go, but also being grateful for the small blessings that come my way every day, and accepting and enjoying the happy occasions when they arise. There are some things I could do without, though. Apparently, there is a phenomenon called ‘grief brain’ and, on occasions, I am perplexed by the thoughts that my brain produces. For instance, I could be loading the dishwasher, something I’ve done so many times since B died, and suddenly the thought “I wonder how many times B did this?” will just pop into my head (why, and what does it matter?!); or I could be standing at my window looking at the daffodil bulbs coming up and the thought “I planted these when B was alive” will just appear; or walking along the street, “B walked along here so many times”; or, worse, if I’m away from home, “I wonder if B has texted me”; etc, etc… I’m not thinking about anything in particular and then ‘ping’, I’m taken straight back to the loss of B by the random appearance of a strangely (mostly) insignificant thought that manages to carry so much weight. Why does this happen? Perhaps they are just a reminder of the depth of our relationship in the mundane times as well as the special moments. But, if I’m truthful, though, even though it seems to happen unconsciously, I suspect that they are just a way of hanging onto B, and yet I could do without their sudden appearance, colouring those ordinary everyday moments…

You may remember that at this time last year I wondered how the second year was going to be. Scarily, I had seen several warnings that it could actually be harder than the first. Well, the answer, for me at least, is that it hasn’t been worse (how could it possibly have been?), though I’m not sure it’s been better. It has just been different. The shock and the numbness have worn off but I have noticed that now I can get unusually anxious at times and the silliest of things can stress me out. On the other hand, I have been less raw and less emotionally volatile. In the first year I was just trying to get to grips with all the change that was happening in my life, trying to keep my head above water. This year has been more about accepting the reality of all that change and trying to learn how to live with it, accepting that not only is B not here but that, somehow, I have to get on with the rest of my life, and actually live the rest of my life. It’s been about learning to live with the presence of absence. I think, perhaps, this is the bit that most non-grievers don’t get, and yet for me that feeling of absence, that emptiness, is still with me a lot of the time. It’s not just about being on my own, or even B not being here (in some ways that would be easy, like him being away at a work conference or similar), but rather how his not being here still impinges on so much of my world, and how this reality still makes itself apparent in some way or another every day. As Gail Caldwell put it, “What they never tell you about grief is that missing someone is the simple part” (p.9).

By chance, I came across the work of Thomas Attig who describes the grieving process as ‘relearning the world’. Bingo, that’s precisely how it feels! I have to say that I much prefer this to the term ‘getting used to the new normal’. To me, the latter implies that ‘normal’ is a state that has to be attained (and what’s normal, anyway?), but as I move forward my world continues to change and my head knows that this has to be right even if my heart has trouble keeping up. My grief has changed but, whether I want it or not, it is still part of my life. It’s now part of who I am but it is not static, it changes from day to day, week by week. Attig wrote that grief is about "finding our way in the world ... learning how to be and act in the world differently in the light of our loss” (his emphasis, p.107). He wrote about the worlds that a griever has to relearn: the physical world (which might include objects, places, health, etc); relationships (with the living, and with the one who has died); our places in space and time (coping with changing reference points; the sense of past, present and future); our spiritual places in the world (beliefs and purpose); oneself, or one’s identity (or who we are as individuals). This makes so much sense to me as all of these things have changed for me, and it feels like this is what I have been slowly coming to terms with over this last year, though it sometimes feels as though the learning is only just beginning. One thing I do know, I have changed - I am a different me now.  

I still struggle with my sense of purpose – it comes and goes. There’s that niggling feeling that I am doing a lot of things, and many of them nice things, but what’s the point of them all? I don’t quite understand this, as I’m not sure it was any different when B was alive, except we did things together. And it’s not as though I am not doing (at least some small) things to support others, but I still have that sense of emptiness that comes and goes. This has made me question my faith and the meaning of life (doesn’t everyone?!!!), but I hang-on in there trusting that this will pass.

It has been much harder to talk about B and to share my grief with others this year (even though both are so helpful), to let them know how I feel. I think there are several reasons for this: it feels self-indulgent – there’s a fine line between grieving intentionally and wallowing; I don’t want to be the black cloud bringing everyone else down; I don’t want to bore people, i.e. ‘oh no, there she goes again’, or embarrass them; I worry about people judging me, thinking ‘she should be doing better than this by now’ (despite the fact that I know that it doesn’t matter what others think, that there’s no timescale to grief, and I know that I’m actually doing okay!); but, if I’m being completely honest, perhaps largely because it feels as though most others no longer seem to appreciate that presence of B’s absence that I continue to feel. So, in that respect, the second year has been harder and I fear I have failed in my promise to myself to be honest about my grief, at least with others. Of course, there is also something here about our cultural and societal norms and how we deal with dying, death and grief in this country, but I won’t go into that now! From what I gather, though, it’s not just me, others also start to hide their grief, perhaps for all the above reasons. Plus, for me, there has also been the danger of comparison - how am I doing compared with others who are grieving? Why do I even think this? My brain knows that we all grieve differently and in our own time, and yet some part of me is envious of those who seem better than me at letting go of the pain but, perhaps, they are just better at hiding it than me!?! 

Then there’s the guilt! Not infrequently, I have found myself singing in the shower, or out having a good time, or just feeling happy, but then I’d remember and feel guilty! I remind myself that it’s not logical and that there is no need for it, that B would be happy for me (and what does that matter, he’s not here!), and yet the guilt can still hit. How can I be happy without him? But I am learning that I can be… 

There’s also been all those second ‘firsts’ (!) – Easter, his birthday, my birthday, our wedding anniversary, Christmas, New Year and, of course, today. Some of these have been easier, some harder. To be fair, it is usually the run-up to the day that is harder than the day itself, but some dates are difficult to avoid. And, of course, some less remarkable but noticeable ‘firsts’ still appear now and again, usually it’s visiting a place or doing something we used to do together, but they hurt a little bit less each time and I guess there will be fewer of these as time goes by. 

So slowly I move forward and sometimes I am able to deliberately lessen my grasp. I have removed all the posts about grief from my social media - initially they were beneficial in validating my experience, but more recently they have just become unhelpful reminders. I have taken down a couple more pictures of B and have got rid of a few more bits and pieces of his. I have started new activities to give me new things to think about. The day after our wedding anniversary I removed my wedding ring (after all I’m no longer married, I’m a widow, in that strange position of still being ‘Mrs.’ whilst also being single). In one way, this is such a little thing (no one else seemed to notice), but in another it felt so huge and at one point I did have to fight back the feeling that it was a mammoth betrayal of B and what we had had together. But, as I just try to point out to myself, I know B would want me to get on with my life and to be happy, and that does help. 

The second year since B’s death has shown me that I can survive without him but that grief takes as long as it takes, no matter how much I want it to stop. It has shown me that my life will never be the same again, for better or for worse (spot the irony here!), but that I can be happy despite the fact that a part of me will always be missing. Some days I still have to remind myself ‘to do it anyway’, to carry on putting one foot in front of the other (there’s still the temptation not to do so, to not want to let go), but I can feel a slow transformation within myself as my life expands around my grief. So, the Jester (my grief) is still with me, but most of the time he is a friend not a foe. He is helping me to live in the reality of now. He is a part of me, just as B was / is a part of me, and I imagine both will remain a part of me however my life turns out from here-on-in. But, most of the time, I am feeling sanguine, and I have hope that I will be able to hold and celebrate what B and I had together whilst moving forward and living a different but, hopefully, fulfilling life.

References: 

Attig T. (1996) How we grieve: Relearning the world. New York: Oxford University Press. 

Caldwell G. (2010) Let's Take the Long Way Home: A Memoir of Friendship”. Random House