Five Months

It's been five months today since Jeff died.  I feel like this has been the toughest month so far. 

I came across an article I read online that really resonated with me by Thomas Fiffer titled "When a 'Good' Man Loves a Woman."  Here it is if you want to read it yourself.  It melted my heart.  I had a good man.  I didn't need this article to tell me that Jeff was a good man.  It just reminded me how good he really was and how lucky I really was.

Below are some of my favorite quotes from the article that Jeff epitomized:

• When a good man loves a woman...he is present...he never ignores her...he shows up in her life again, and again, and again.
• When a good man loves a woman...he is patient...he answers the same question over and over again.
• When a good man loves a woman...he is committed...he holds a space in his heart for her that no one else can enter...if she gave him a ring, he wears it.
• When a good man loves a woman...he is grateful...he is appreciative of her gifts...he wears the clothes she buys him.
• When a good man loves a woman...he is smitten...he saves her cards and letters...forever (I am still finding cards I gave Jeff throughout our ten years hidden around the house.  You have no idea how wonderful this makes me feel)...he sneaks a sniff of her underwear (you have no idea how embarrassing this is to admit and how sick I thought he was for doing it...but it's true and it blows my mind that it showed up in a published article).
  he sneaks a sniff of her underwear in the laundry.
• When a good man loves a woman...he is respectful...he treats her friends as his own.
• When a good man loves a woman...he values her independence...he never tries to control her...he doesn't always need to know where she is.
• When a good man loves a woman...he is generous...he gives unrelentingly and unresentfully...he doesn't keep a running tab.
• When a good man loves a woman...he is fearless...he's not afraid to show his love for her...he is not afraid to cry in her arms.

On this fifth month anniversary, man do I miss my good man.

When a good man loves a woman … he is present.

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… he doesn’t just listen, he hears.

… he never ignores her.

… he stays up with her when she can’t sleep.

… he shows up in her life, again, and again, and again.

- See more at: http://goodmenproject.com/ethics-values/good-man-loves-woman-fiff/?utm_source=Friday+May+2%2C+2014&utm_campaign=Constant+Contact+May+2+2014&utm_medium=email#sthash.PHDppyow.dpuf

Truly Alone

I have finally realized I've been in denial.  I didn't think I was in denial but looking back I definitely was.  Maybe I shouldn't call it denial, maybe I should call it shock or delusion.  I guess it doesn't really matter what I label it.  All that matters is, I now understand that whatever it's label is, it allowed me to keep my sanity.  I also know I'm so grateful that I have had the opportunity to go to bereavement groups and have a few sessions of one on one therapy in order to be able to cope now that I'm no longer protected by it, whatever it's label is.

I didn't quite recognize how truly alone I was until something slapped me in the face and I finally saw clearly.  I am alone.  I do not have Jeff to stand by my side, which means I no longer have someone to protect me.  I have to stand by myself.  I have to protect myself.  That is the most painful realization I have had to recognize so far.  I am no longer denying it.  It's as plain as day and I now see it clearly.

I see now how I deluded myself into thinking if I took Jeff's mother, father, and brother and glean from them all of the different aspects of Jeff I saw in them, I could potentially have a semi-whole Jeff.  With all three of them combined, I saw who Jeff was and where he got his personality, his quirks, his sense of humor, his temper, essentially his soul.  I wanted to keep them all in my house, under my roof so I could continue living my life relatively the same way before Jeff died.  I recognized certain aspects of Jeff from his mom, lots more from his dad, and his brother is almost a mirror image in body type and mannerisms.  In my delusion, I was able to have pieces and parts of Jeff "present" these first few months after he died.  I have since finally seen them as individuals and stopped only seeing them as an extension of Jeff.  They are not Jeff and cannot take the place of Jeff in my life and that was a painful realization.

I was so selfish to think that they would always remain by my side and protect me and stand by me the way Jeff did.  It's been long enough for them, they are moving on with their life as best they can after losing a son and brother.  I am not and will never be their number one priority the way I was for Jeff.  Jeff is gone.  They and I remain and no matter what, I am not a true member of their family.  I am no longer delusional about that fact.

I think I truly grieved once this was made so clear to me.  I feel like the grieving I did the first few months was a drop in the bucket compared to the grieving of this realization, the true realization that my life before Jeff died is over.

It is so true that we don't only grieve the person, we grieve our own lives that we shared with the person.  I am in a sense grieving myself, because who I was before Jeff died is also dead.  Someone else is standing in my shoes.  Jeff's wife died with him, the woman who took care of him and was taken care of by him.  I don't know who this person is standing in her shoes and the grief of that is terrible.

I Hate Cancer

One of my best friends' cousin was diagnosed with stage IV Hodgkin's lymphoma a few months after Jeff was diagnosed.  Her original scans showed lumps in her breast as well as the multitude of other tumors that had spread throughout her body, but her doctor's assumed the lumps in her breasts were either cysts or metastasis from lymphoma.  She went through many rounds of chemotherapy and was told that her latest scans showed that she was cancer free.  We celebrated.

But those pesky lumps were still there in her breast.  So being the proactive lady she is, she asked her doctor to have a biopsy, better to be safe than sorry.  It turns out she has breast cancer.  That means she had Hodgkin's lymphoma and breast cancer at the same time.  The only good news is that she caught it early and it's stage 0, meaning that she has been told it is fully contained in the tumor that was removed during the biopsy and the surrounding tissue found no signs of metastasis.  She is told she is still Hodgkin's lymphoma free.

She is now going to be tested for the BRCA gene, since breast cancer runs in her family.  Once those test results come back she will then make a decision to have radiation, chemotherapy, and/or a full mastectomy.

She just finished her chemotherapy for lymphoma and finally started to feel like herself again, her hair is growing and she is getting her energy back and now she's back at the starting line of a new marathon.

She is a strong woman, but she has young children.  I cannot imagine what her strapping fire fighter of a husband is going through.  On the outside he is the epitome of strength and optimism, but I was told I was also the epitome of strength and optimism as well while Jeff was running his marathon.  On the inside, I was an anxious mess pretending to be strong. 

I would love to be able to help them in any way I can, but they are holding strong on their own, just as we were holding "strong" on our own.  I remember people wanting to help us during our ordeal.  I did not call on them as much as they would have liked because I just didn't know how they could help me, just like I don't know how to tell people how to help me now.  I've been on both sides.  Both sides make one feel helpless.  I hate cancer.

The Only Way Out is Through

The only way out is through.  Such a true statement.  Such a damning statement.  It essentially means that I have to go through this maze of pain and suffering in order to get out.  But no one knows how long this maze is and how many times I will get lost and backtrack through the same pain and suffering that I've already experienced.  No one knows how many obstacles I will face.  And my biggest fear is will I never really "get out."  I wish I had Ariadne's thread.

Right when I published my last post about how well I thought I was coping, the maze threw me one gnarly obstacle and I definitely backtracked.  Actually, I think I might have been kicked into a completely different maze!

It scared me because it felt like I was literally dying, that I was broken, that I was irreparably damaged.  I felt my heart breaking and I experienced for the first time the lack of wanting to live.  I just wanted to lay wherever I had fallen.  I kept trying to get up but the strength never lasted long because I would eventually sink down again.  I didn't care about the things that needed to be done, I didn't care about where I was or what I needed or what anyone needed at that moment.  And I couldn't stop crying.  I tried all of the little tricks and distractions that had previously helped pull me back up but nothing worked.  I barely got through work, I went to the cemetery to be with Jeff and cried and cried, but I knew this was different than anything I had experienced before.  I just kept sinking back down.  I have had really hard bouts of crying but they usually never lasted more than an hour.  I could always pull myself back up.  I finally realized I was having a panic attack.  I was lost and I needed something to guide me through it, I couldn't do it on my own.

It took me a whole day of pretty much non-stop crying before I realized that this was different than before.  I called a trusted friend as I was crying on the floor and she talked me back up.  She made me see the obstacle in front of me clearly and not be afraid of it anymore; she helped me navigate through it.

Maybe I need more than just one Ariadne's thread.  Maybe the way through the maze will be multiple threads, which I've realized will come in many different forms, that will help me through all of the different obstacles.  And as I use these threads to overcome more and more obstacles, maybe the obstacles in the maze will start to be less challenging and less painful.  Maybe I will learn to not make the same mistakes so I won't have to backtrack as often, especially through the really tough painful obstacles.  I'm afraid to encounter another obstacle similar to this last one, but I need to remember, that I did survive and made it through this particular obstacle, I didn't give up and that survival instinct is one of the threads I need to always remember to follow.  The only way out is through and I am determined to make it through.

Coping and Guilt

Sometimes I read other widow's blogs and am surprised at where I am in my grieving process and where they were or currently are in their grieving process.  I know it's early for me still but I feel like I am moving through my grieving stages/process quickly.  Maybe too quickly.  Sometimes I read about a widow who cannot get out of bed and continues to be a terrible mess and her husband died months or even years before mine.  I know each person grieves differently but I still feel guilt that I have my good moments and bad moments but I seem to bounce back relatively well and quickly.  I don't seem to have weeks of deep sadness. 

I think this might have to do with the fact that I started grieving when Jeff was diagnosed and not just when he died.  The day of diagnosis (his 37th birthday) I grieved like he was going to die the next day.  The diagnosis was so horrific and hit me like a ton of bricks that I immediately started having panic attacks.  I couldn't be alone.  I couldn't breathe or eat.  I wanted to cling to him and even while physically clinging to him I still wasn't calmed.  This lasted weeks until we started treatment.

Throughout his treatment I feel like I was in hopeful denial that he was going to beat all the statistics and live for a long time, but deep down I knew that our time was severely limited.  I couldn't believe he even had cancer because he was not symptomatic.  He said it in the beginning too.  He said he didn't feel sick.  The only thing making him sick was the chemo.

Deep down I knew that he would leave me before either one of us was ready.  I started thinking about how I would cope once he was gone and started preparing my family and friends to help me.  I always talked about it in the distant future that I would need their support but I think talking about what I would need after he was gone has truly helped me.  I talked about going into therapy.  I talked about needing to not be alone and who would/could move in with me once Jeff was gone.  I ordered grief literature on Amazon.  I looked into attending bereavement groups.  I feel guilty.

I felt so guilty planning and thinking about what I was going to do once Jeff died because he wasn't dead yet.  But I thought about how I would react and feel sleeping alone, I thought about what I would do with his clothes, what was going to happen to his truck and other belongings.  The guilt of "planning" how my life would be once he was gone was terrible but I try to think that it was a defense mechanism, that it was a coping mechanism, that it seems to fit my personality of a planner and analyzer and a control freak.  I think this aspect of my personality is one of the reasons I seem to be holding it together relatively well right now.  

But who really knows.  I feel terribly guilty admitting these actions and thoughts.  I haven't even been able to admit it to my therapist yet.  I did admit it to a very close friend right after Jeff was diagnosed.  When I told her it was terminal she told me that I would survive and be able to overcome once he died.  I cried so hard because I knew in my heart that I would survive, that I would one day be able to feel joy again, and the guilt was terrible.  I NEVER wanted my husband to die, but I knew that I would survive and I knew that I was the determining factor of how my survival would be.  I made decisions based off of trying to survive in a way that was still truly living and not just going through the motions of life.  I didn't want to just breathe, eat, sleep.  I wanted to feel.  As I'm going through these months without Jeff, I'm definitely feeling and it's mainly painful, but I'm hoping for less pain in the coming months.  And that makes me feel guilty.

A Grateful Caretaker?

I'm not quite sure if if this is appropriate or not but I feel like I have to thank my husband.  See, going to bereavement groups and reading widow's blogs and other grief literature, a lot of the stories revolve around caretaking.

I don't see myself as a caretaker of someone who had terminal cancer.  Although he was diagnosed on October 24, 2012, Jeff was completely independent up until December 12, 2013.  That night a tumor on his adrenal gland that we didn't even know existed burst and started bleeding in his abdomen.  This caused him enormous amounts of pain.  He ended up in the hospital for ten days highly sedated and weakened by cancer and sepsis.  I lived at the hospital, leaving only to go to work and go home to change.  The nurses did such a great job caring for him so I feel I only truly took care of him when he was released home to me with help from hospice nurses and his parents on December 22nd.  He died at 5:15 am December 29th.  I feel like I was a caretaker for only six days, whereas others have been caretakers for months and even years.  I don't feel I earned the title of a caretaker. 

I know that technically I "took care of him" while he was getting chemo and radiation but he was so independent that I didn't really feel I did anything too different from before he was diagnosed, he just didn't feel all that great and wasn't working anymore.  I constantly thought about him during the day when we were apart, but I did that before he was diagnosed.  As I said before, he was completely independent.  He didn't need round the clock care, he didn't need me to drive him around, he didn't need me to make all of his meals, I wasn't worried about him being alone while I was working, he was truly independent.

We were told that he had one to six months left when he was released into hospice so I was prepared to take a leave of absence from work and be with him, taking care of him for as long as needed.  He didn't allow that.  He saved me from the horror of watching him change into a different person.  But he also left me too soon.  I know I said all I needed to say to him and I felt I heard all of the important things I needed to hear from him, but sometimes I look back and wish I just had more time with him, wish he did stay longer just so I could be in his presence.  But then I remember how selfish that is of me, that being bedridden and helpless would be pure torture and misery emotionally and mentally for him, on top of all the physical misery he was enduring.

He was such a gregarious and larger than life person.  He never wanted to talk about the end, he would always change the subject and try and make a joke so I knew not to push him.  The only thing he ever said was that he was worried about being in pain and I assured him that I would do whatever was in my power to make sure he was not in pain.  I am quite sure he did not want to be bedridden for any length of time.  He was sedated heavily because of the pain the majority of the time in the hospital and once he got home, he wasn't as heavily sedated on pain medication but he was still on high doses of morphine so he slept most of the time.

He went so quickly.  Ten days in the hospital and six days at home wasn't enough time for him to lose significant amounts of weight, to gradually lose mobility and bodily functions, or to become irritable and change his personality.  I didn't experience any of those horrors that other caretakers discuss that go with the slow change and loss of their spouse or loved one.

I don't feel like I truly was his caretaker.  I can't believe I'm saying this but, I might have been the luckiest widow out there because I got the opportunity to say goodbye and tell him how much I loved him without having to experience the horror of watching him change or the fatigue and crankiness that some caretakers experience.  I escaped the physical and emotional toll that caretakers endure, even though they all adamantly say that they would do it all over again, and I still say I would have done it for him until the end of time. But he didn't let me, and I feel the need to thank him for that.