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I think my dad is ok overall, but he absolutely was not prepared for this. He travels some for work, so she would have been used to being in the house without him, but he never was home when she wasn't there. It is and will be a HUGE adjustment for him, as they were together 50 years since he was 17 years old.
The best part of this situation is that we are closer than ever, and being in the hospital just waiting for those 2 weeks helped us to be very open and honest with each other. So I am grateful for the chance to talk with him every day and support him however I can.
I was just surprised by this feeling. The only time I really cry is when I get mad or frustrated about something. The other day I couldn't get something in the kitchen to work right, and I just burst out crying. So weird.
I also think about calling her about once a day. Then I remember ...
Anyway I know you've all heard it before. It just is so surreal. Not something I ever understood before. I think being in the hospital with her, seeing her SO sick and then having to decide to stop treatment just puts things in perspective for me, but it makes me impatient with everyone around me (friends/coworkers) who mean well but have gone on with their lives.
I will be glad to move out of this dazed/irritable/impatient stage. At least I hope I do.
I will say things here. They will sound clinical, but they're not, even while they are.
Before that, let me say that while I don't know you, I'm sorry for your loss. I'm sorry because I've lost people from my own life, and I know how it affected me -- and I don't really have but a couple of folks I'm close to. The idea of losing someone near and dear is so frightening to me that even while I'm the type to consider such things, I find myself mentally swerving, veering off course, refusing to do so.
So in a very human way, I am sorry for your loss.
And the clinical-sounding part:
The loss of a parent or child or close sibling is one of those things our minds have difficulty grasping. They are part of our worldview, a constant. And when they are gone, without preparation, the mind rebels. Even with preparation it's a difficult hurdle, one which brings crashing home a sense of mortality as nothing else does. While it may not be that we suddenly fear death, Death, that grim reaper, just got real.
You are in shock. It's emotional shock, which has physical ramifications.
You turn to do something and mid-turn absolutely forget what you were about to do, have no idea at all, and it's so frightening you burst into tears from the scare, and the sheer frustration of it all.
You're moving along for a moment with your day and suddenly it all comes crashing in, the loss, the fear, the overwhelming sense of the entire world being out of whack, and an empty/weird/dizzying pain hits you in the gut so that the world reels and you collapse into a human-shaped pile of loss and confusion.
You can stare at a spot for a moment and realize half an hour has raced by while you were lost in one molasses-like thought that never really coalesced at all, just kind of drifted away into a paradoxically painful numbness right on the edge of hurt.
The only thing I can tell you is that time heals all wounds. You know this academically, and you've even experienced it before.
One day you'll forget for a while, and then it will come back. The next day may be all pain and confusion, but the day after that will be one of forgetting again for a little while.
And again, and again, each time returning, each time a bit more used to the pain and loss, until it's finally accepted in a gut-level kind of way.
The only sad reality there is that unlike romantic relationships, which we really do get over, this one never really stops, only dulls.
Best of luck, really. Again, not just polite words: sorry for what you're going through. That it will happen in one way or another to all of us does nothing to alleviate the pain.
I am sorry for your loss, you and your family are in my thoughts and prays. I lost my wife of 11yrs on September 9th 2017 so almost 2 months ago so I understand exactly what you're going through. I was completely numb for the first 3/4 weeks. I was so physically numb that I could poke myself with a straight pin and not feel it at all. Like everyone before me has mentioned it is shock and completely normal.
I think my dad is ok overall, but he absolutely was not prepared for this. He travels some for work, so she would have been used to being in the house without him, but he never was home when she wasn't there. It is and will be a HUGE adjustment for him, as they were together 50 years since he was 17 years old.
The best part of this situation is that we are closer than ever, and being in the hospital just waiting for those 2 weeks helped us to be very open and honest with each other. So I am grateful for the chance to talk with him every day and support him however I can.
I was just surprised by this feeling. The only time I really cry is when I get mad or frustrated about something. The other day I couldn't get something in the kitchen to work right, and I just burst out crying. So weird.
I also think about calling her about once a day. Then I remember ...
Anyway I know you've all heard it before. It just is so surreal. Not something I ever understood before. I think being in the hospital with her, seeing her SO sick and then having to decide to stop treatment just puts things in perspective for me, but it makes me impatient with everyone around me (friends/coworkers) who mean well but have gone on with their lives.
I will be glad to move out of this dazed/irritable/impatient stage. At least I hope I do.
Thanks again
I was looking for you. I'm not going to one post here. It's too close. My father, husband, mother. They were all on oxygen at the end.
I was looking for you. I'm not going to one post here. It's too close. My father, husband, mother. They were all on oxygen at the end.
Thanks for sharing, Gerania. I understand
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