SIX MONTHS A WIDOW

We all know time is a fickle thing - for me last month seemed to last forever, for you it might have passed in a blur. Six months ago just happened.  Six months ago seems like a lifetime past. Six months ago today was a Saturday.  It was Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day.  It was the day my husband died.

I had to look up what day of the week it was.  The 22 days living in the hospital were marked by the rhythm of shift changes.  The whiteboard laying out each day's status updates, planned meds, infusions and procedures. During the last few days spent in the ICU many of those personal connections were lost as treatment stopped and reacting to each new problem and symptom began.  In the ICU they didn't know him when he arrived 18 days earlier, weak but still himself.

Tom at the top of the "Rocky Steps" in Philly. September 2019

And now here I am.  Living alone in a little house in a new state with a fraction of my belongings collected over 37 years of living with my husband.  Each day I am reminded of things planned 

which will not happen. I open a cabinet and see his hat or the velveteen bag containing his ashes.  I usually say "Hi Tommy" and go ahead with what I was doing. I have moved from pain to wistfulness. 

I know for sure that I would be in a more positive mood today if not for the Covid 19 situation.  The classes I signed up for were cancelled, the social groups I had hoped to join have delayed events until late June or July, the gym closed.  The voids in my life I had hoped to start filling will have to wait a little longer.

I have the benefit of living in a small house with a large yard.  I don't particularly like gardening but I find myself pulling weeds, planting herb gardens, fussing over tomato plants, spreading  bark, watering, sweeping off the patio and porch.

There is a large park nearby with many walking paths and I have watched winter turn to spring as I traipse through it several times a week.  I've stopped having the TV on all the time for company.  I make lists of things to do and check them off as I complete them.  I am baking low carb cookies and cinnamon bread, grilling salmon, eating the first cherries and apricots.

My son and his wife have shared their murder mystery boxes with me following nice meals in their home.  I am in touch with all 3 children nearly every day and have Zoom gatherings with other family and former co-workers.

Alone together - isn't that the theme of the day?

GRIEF - ONE SIZE NEVER FITS ALL

Much has been studied and reported about grief.  We have all heard about the stages of grief and the requirement that one has to go through them to go forward emotionally.  The most frequent  statement is that we must express our grief or it can't be put to rest.

It is four months ago today that my husband died.  He was hospitalized for 22 days.  He went through a complete round of chemo during that time.  He struggled physically and emotionally.  He would say to the Palliative Care team that he looked at the disease as a "blessing - a new beginning".  He never talked that way.  The entire family engaged in eye rolling over that one.  But generally he was himself to the day he died.  Difficult, demanding, hard working, sentimental, loving.

I loved my husband of 35 years.  Our relationship was interdependent in many ways.  I am a nurturer by nature. As a lonely only child he sopped up all that I did for him with gratitude. He was my protector, provider and companion.  We have 3 amazing children.  We - all five of us - are independent people.  We agreed to let him go when it was clear he was not going to recover, we were at his bedside when he breathed his last breath.  We told stories and laughed and none of us thought he would go as quickly as he did because it was his way to put up a fight and drag things out.

I did not cry then - and have shed very few tears since.  We went home and started getting things organized the next day.  I did not take to my bed.  I did not feel that there was no reason to go on, or that my life was over. I recognized that my life had completely changed - but that I am still my whole self.

After the initial shock had worn off and many tasks had been taken care of and things around his death had slowed a bit - I started to wonder if there was something wrong with me.  I didn't feel I was denying any of my emotions but I wasn't distraught.  I felt pretty secure in the decisions I was making.  When I felt overwhelmed by things I took a step back.  I engaged in self care - went for walks, made sure I ate well. But still I wondered if I was "normal."

I went online and looked at information about grief.  I don't think I am repressing things - Brene Brown would say I was not being authentic, that I was denying my negative emotions and that suppression would bring more suffering.  I don't think so.  I am not denying who I truly am.  I am not fearful of being unlovable.

I had and still sometimes have a lot of anger toward my husband for the financial situation he left me in - but I also recognized immediately that he suffered knowing what was coming for me and I have, as best I can, forgiven him for it.  So I explored if that combination of being sad and mad was something others had experienced - and there is a bit out there about similar situations - but mostly it goes back to the "stages of grief" kind of anger.  So I was satisfied with the general sentiment that not everyone grieves the same way, on the same timeline - one size doesn't fit all understanding of grief.

Then I ran across some newer studies about resilience.   I am nothing if not resilient.  The Mrs. Brightside moniker is all about that. For me it isn't about glossing over or denying the negative - it is about finding your way through by focusing on what is possible, the positive, the light.

George Bonanno's studies and book The Other Side of Sadness: What the New Science of Bereavement Tells About Life After Loss  is about "studies which followed bereaved people over long periods of time we always found tremendous variability in how people react to loss. We found a pattern we call "resilience" in between one third and two thirds of bereaved people. It looks like the term suggests. People who show a resilient outcome struggle initially with the pain of loss, as almost everyone does, but they manage to deal with the sadness and distress with equanimity. Their pain is acute, usually lasting most pointedly for a few days to a few weeks but then begins to subside. It is not that they don't grieve, or that they didn't care; far from it. Rather, they are able to put the pain aside when they need to and they continue to meet the demands of their life. They even laugh and experience moments of joy. They accept the loss, readjust their sense of what is, and move on."

I don't report this as in "I am of superior mental health" than people who are traumatized and grieve for years and years.  I am well aware that sudden, violent loss or the loss of a child is much different and creates more of a PTSD response.  I am just comforted by the approach that lets me know I am not a cold, unfeeling or suppressed person for experiencing my grief in my way.

TRIGGERS

I have not experienced grief in a go to bed for days, weepy, can't cope way.  I moved into the what needs to be done zone and stayed there for weeks - to the point that I wondered what was wrong with me.  Am I normal?  I loved my husband, he died.  Shouldn't I fall apart at least a little bit? 

Then a cascade of problems started to set in - and I found I was fine putting out fires but unable to cope with simple things.  A notice from the bank that required me to change my log-in just threw me - I couldn't think of something new.  The woman on the phone nicely came up with something until I could think straight. A CPA I called for advice told me what killed him probably was the financial stress he was under and I hung up on her but was so shaken up I didn't make phone calls for days.  Paperwork for the new bank account I opened had to be corrected because I put in that I was married.

Driving through the city where we used to live brought on tears.  Seeing people out on their bikes brought waves of memories. Passing by things I used to buy for him at the store made me sadder than planning meals for one.

After moving to a new state, I have not had many of those moments, until today.  I went to donate

blood - which is the thing I told people to do when they asked how they could help following his diagnosis and death.  I  didn't really give it much thought until I saw all the people there doing this generous life giving thing.  I had gone prompted by the Covid crisis, but realized once there that the hospitals are still full of leukemia patients in need of this precious resource only we can provide.

I had strong mixed emotions all day.  The loss. The life sustaining gift we can  give. 

FRIDAY FAST ONES

1.) I enjoy wearing cotton dresses in the summer especially on hot days like we are having now.  The only issue is the undies.  My usual one cling in the area of my large bottom.  I have a couple of nylon ones which I wear when I wear dresses. (Remember wearing slips?)  Today I put on my dress but I realized the necessary undergarment was in the dryer.  I finished hair, make-up, shoes, jewelry and came downstairs for my yogurt and blueberries.

When I sat down to eat I realized I had never gone into the dryer for my undies. A moment of "should I just go to work without?" 

Not today.

2.) There was an article about whether anxiety causes women to age faster - which confirmed it is true.  I know when we were in the initial throes of our life changing struggles that I had all kinds of physical issues associated with stress.  Now I can legitimately blame my wrinkly face on all that, too.

Interesting that they only studied women.  Is pre-mature aging only an issue for women?




Marion Cuningham in her kitchen at home in Walnut Creek.

 3.) This is getting posted late because I read that the mother of one of my high school friends died this week so I was searching to see if I could find him to write him a note. My friend's mother was Marion Cunningham.  In the years after we graduated she became "Fannie Farmer" and an icon in the national food scene.

I knew my friend was different than any of the other kids in our rather large circle.  He was smart, sophisticated, sarcastic and guarded.

 I was only in his house one time and I remember my friend Chris and I going into the kitchen and loving it - funny how a feeling about a person can be felt in their special space.

It wasn't until many, many years later that I read in one of Ruth Reichl's memoirs some of the details of Marion's life - that she had been an alcoholic and agoraphobic during the years my friend was growing up.  Learning that explained a lot.  Marion, the year we graduated, broke free of her fears with the help of my friend,  and began a whole new life - I hope that my friend was able to take pleasure in that.  I wish him all the best at this sorrowful time.