Poor Widow's Brain

Well, FFS there is that word again. Widow. Widow, widow, widow. I said it, I typed it, I look at it, and I am it. And I am still pretty pissed off about it. It is not something I chose it was a title thrust, unfairly, upon me. While I don't love my new title of Widow, I refuse to shrink from it. It's the new me. It's my new life. I wear the pain of Widowhood and I will do so with dignity. As much dignity as I can muster when I am crying for no real reason other than I am having a day or when I have Widow Brain and can't remember what the hell I am doing.


Widow brain you ask? Yeah, Widow Brain. It's a very real thing. It occurs after a traumatic loss to protect the mind. It's like helpful amnesia. A protection of sorts.


 I thought right after Tony died that I finally had lost what was left of my mind. I knew I was doing weird shit and I couldn't help it. I couldn't string together a complete sentence and I sure the shit didn't know what I was doing. I would just walk away while people were talking to me. I couldn't concentrate and  I was dangerous to be around. I could only accomplish things that were automatic or routine and it was a hardship to accomplish those things. I am amazed at this time that I made it through those first weeks without a huge disaster but I did. Thankfully, I have wonderful family and friends that helped me through and continue to help me though.


It's seven months out and I still suffer from Widow's Brain. It's almost amusing at this point. I never really was someone who had their shit together on a good day. Now, oh hell, I am just a mess. I laugh at myself a lot because I do stupid shit. I still will just up and walk away when people are talking especially when I start getting upset or bored or look there's a squirrel. My memory is horrible. HORRIBLE. It wasn't good to begin with but it is bad now. I actually forget that I forgot something. At least before I knew I was forgetting. Now when I am in the laundry room looking around I am just like "fuck it" and sit back down. I figure I will eventually either remember what I was doing or smell smoke. Either way it will work out. I am still alive, mostly and other than a plant that died no one has been harmed.


I guess I really have no point to this blog today other than if you see me and you know I am lost please return me to someone who knows me. Don't ask me though if I know them because all you are going to get is a blank stare. And whatever you do, don't turn your back on me for a minute because I will wander off.

Days and weeks

Today as I sorta sorted through this massive pile of mail I have collected, I came across the last two bills you filled out to pay. The dates on these, oddly enough, medical bills is 10/13/13. You died 10/28/13. And you were sick in the hospital 2 weeks prior. So basically these fucking bills were the last thing you felt good enough to do prior to your death. And it makes me so fucking mad. And in case that doesn't cause enough grief and pain, I came across my insurance bill which now I am so clearly labeled widowed. Widowed at 40. How did this happen? Why did this happen?


I will have a few days or at one point it was even a week that I feel OK. Not great because I never feel great because I am a fucking Eeyore. But I will feel OK maybe like I will live through this and walk out the other side of this journey better and whole and healed. I don't really think that is how grief works. I think I will limp along waiting for someone to save me from drowning in this pain and when that doesn't happen I will still continue to limp along. I am good at limping along I have had a lifetime of practice.


I am not going to wax poetically about how great our marriage is/was or whatever because that is just bullshit and the world is full of enough bullshit without me adding to it. What I am going to say is we did tragedy and suffering well together. It was our "thing". The world knocked us down and by God, one of us pulled the other one up and we dusted ourselves off and we survived. We made it through my family's multiple screw-ups, the loss of friends and the year we lost Grandpa, Gran and Gertrud. But we always had each other. Now, I am alone and it sucks.


It's been 26 weeks and 3 days since you left me. I replay your illness and death over and over and over in my mind. I have a lot of anger. A whole hell of a lot of anger. I failed you. Medicine failed you. Ego's failed you and ignorance failed you. And I am sorry.