Hi everyone, I'm a bit of a stranger to the website these days. I've been trying very hard to do what I can to get out from under the weight of my bereavement, with a small measure of success.
I think I need to write some stuff down so that I can read it back to discover how far I've come. Does that make sense? I first joined this wonderful site the week my wife died in June 2008, already a lifetime away.
The support, advice, empathy and understanding I received from contributors to 'webhealing', was, after the natural and powerful bond with my children, the most robust raft that kept me from drowning, psychologically speaking. Within two weeks I was contacted via email by a fellow-contributor who seemed to have a deep understanding of my pain. She helped me enormously, and in many ways I must admit, she kept me alive.
As with all of us, there has been much drama, soul-searching, navel-gazing, home-truths, revelations, upsets, frictions, and expressions of love and care along the way. In a nutshell, I've had a half-dozen really viciously bad times; inconsolable grief after a month or so, the same at about three months, an illness at Christmas which I thought might finish me off, and an unfortunate accident in that it almost took me back to Day One! I seem to have survived all these, and I forced myself to be honest (as I am doing now), and to admit that it has got a little easier. After thirteen months I am accepting that my life has changed forever and I must either stay in the past and die inside or attempt to move on in this insufferable semi-misery, taking little bites at happiness when I can. It would be a terrible slap to the memory of my dearest friend and greatest love if I gave up. Back in November, as I've described before, I travelled to Scotland with my son and daughter to commit a portion of my wife's ashes to the beautiful grounds of 'Sweetheart Abbey' in Dumphrieshire, Scotland being the last love in life that my wife, Heather, discovered, and as a homage to her insistence whilst dying in the hospice, that we would all return to Scotland as soon as she left her sick-bed.
The venture was a romantic wish to ease our pain and re-bond, and it was successful.
On the anniversary of her death, the three of us threw a further handful each of her remains to the wind blowing out to sea from Southsea in Hampshire on the south coast of England. This was an amazing revelation: my pain lessened and we all found a strange and unexpected joy in our actions, perhaps this was the 'closure' we sought? Part Three, the final committment came when by chance, we all happened to be at the Glastonbury Festival a couple of weeks ago, when we released a Chinese Fire Lantern containing the last remnants of ashes to the skies in the early hours of the morning from the hill above the festival, after the Bruce Springsteen gig (our favourite performer). I'd love to share the moment with you, and if you care to enter 'Fire Lantern For Het' on Youtube, you can see the little video made by my son's partner.
I thought I was doing well, but underlying everything is the fact that most of my life is acted-out, but that's better than appearing as distressed as I am in actuality.
This posting is purely to outline my current hopeless unhappiness that I now seem to have lost the support of my constant email friend, whom I met on Webhealing. I do in fact feel a similar amount of bereavement in losing her as I've been experiencing every day since 6th June 2008.. She has her own problems and I respect that she may not need me as much as I need her, still. I do hope she might read this one day and contact me. I've tried everything to get in touch with her and I feel lost once again, one of my strongest supports apparently faded into the endless procession of time and trials.
I know I will survive this, I am a relatively normal human, and I expect to carry on albeit with the major part of my heart and sensitivities absent.
I apologise for this dreary, down-beat message, I know I need to learn to make it on my own somehow, but it is so very hard.
Nothing more to say, except that I feel like I'm moving through a desert of lost warmth, just hoping I can one day find a way to come alive again. I will make it, I'm not a quitter, but I know many times I'll think about giving-up, (if I just knew how).
Thanks for your patience if you've read this, and thanks for always being there webhealing, I wouldn't be here writing this if it wasn't for you all,
Regards to all who might remember me,
Love and regards,
Pete (UK)
PS: Please, Sheila, do get in touch with me again!