Hello again Gail. I feel for you, going away for a few days is not something I could bear just now. I have a full time job and that keeps me going, although I regret that it kept me away from Colin in the last couple of months, but no one told us he wouldn't have much longer. I guess they didn't know. Even when they stopped treatment they were saying he might have a few months but more likely a few weeks. As it turned out he only lasted a week after leaving the hospital.
He was my life for 10 years, even though our relationship was long distance for 8 of those. I still can't believe that after all our struggles to be together he was taken away from me so soon after we moved in together.
I don't know what to do at weekends, and evenings are not good either although I can usually fill those with chores and tv. I don't sleep well some nights, although I seem to have managed 9hrs on and off last night. My family and friends are all 400 miles away, and I would like to move back to be close to them, but I am scared of doing anything. I know you are told to wait a year or two before moving but I can't wait that long. I did have a kind of break down there a couple of weeks back, but I was still working during the day. It was good to be with them in the evenings and weekends, although I know it won't be like that if I go back to live there and I will still be alone most of the time.
Maybe it helps a bit that I was living alone for several years before Colin moved in anyway. I am fairly self sufficient and I spent most weekends alone, but he was always there to ask advice and we chatted every day. I never went on holiday alone though, and I don't want to face that. I'm not looking forward to my birthday or christmas at all.
I suppose my work gives me a focus, and I am almost the person I was before when I'm there, so I do still smile and laugh with colleagues, but it's so different at home. I'm writing this with tears streaming down my face. Our normal Sunday would be to sit in bed reading or on the laptop, then going out for lunch at a local cafe and going for a walk somewhere or visiting a castle or garden. He would have loved it this weekend too, its been so sunny and he loved to take photos of everywhere we went. I visit his grave every other weekend as its about 30 miles away, but it makes me cry.
I have been invited for counselling by the hospice where he died. I think I may do that. I have had days when I feel numb, days when I don't care if I love or die, sometimes I am angry for all the wasted time, or guilty because I wasn't with him every minute when he was in hospital for the last month, and there are things I wish we had talked about. In fact everything the websites about bereavement say you will experience, I have. The only thing I don't feel is any sense of relief. I suppose this is what we have to go through to heal.
I miss the man he was, and his kisses and cuddles. The disease took away all possibility of sex, and it hurt him sometimes even to cuddle. I couldnt even kiss him in he last few weeks because he had some kind of viral thing in his mouth that caused blisters. They never told us exactly what it was. I miss the closeness and, even though his mum says no one will blame me if I find someone else (how insensitive is that, she was already saying it just before he died), no one else will ever compare with my wonderful man.
Happy to chat on here Gail, say whatever you like. I get email notification anyway. It just helps to have somewhere to say these things, but I wish it wa live chat.
Sue x
