On March 24, 2010, my husband died. It will have been 5 years in a short time and I have desperately tried to come to grips with what being a widow means in terms of how to go on with my life alone. It is like trying to put back together the pieces of a shattered mirror, one that reflects what used to be. Those pieces will cut you and make you bleed if you aren't very careful, but you have to try to make the pieces fit, so that you can see yourself again.

My life has changed. I live in new city, one where there were no nightmare memories. I have a good job, doing something that I love. I have old friends, new friends, good friends. And of course, I have my family, that I love more that I can say.

My life has changed, but I have changed, too. I am not, nor will I ever be, the person I was before March 24th, 2010. I wish that those people I hold so dear could understand what this life is like but unless you have lived it, that is impossible. Others can think that they understand but no one can, really, because it is so very different for all of us. What I write about what I feel hoping that someday even I will understand.

I miss...

I am sick tonight and it is making me wish Dave was here because I miss how he always took care of me when I didn't feel so good. But, then, I miss a whole lot of other things, too. 


I miss having someone to sit on the sofa and rub my feet and bring me tea just the way I like it. I miss having someone to just put both arms around me and hold onto me and tell me everything will be fine, no matter what's wrong.  I miss having someone warm to put my cold feet on with under the covers and hearing that familiar "Stop that!" and then the both of us laughing til our sides hurt. 


I miss hearing someone tell me that he loves me before I go to sleep every night and having that be the last thing I hear before I drop off to sleep, wrapped in the security of that love. I miss kissing that scruffy cheek and then teasing him about "When are you gonna shave so I can see that handsome face?" even though I loved how he looked and he knew it so very well. I miss waking up in the morning (because I always woke up first) and I how much I loved to just lie there and watch him sleep. 


I miss those impossibly blue eyes, the color of the ocean he loved so much and all the times I thought I might fall into them and drown (oh! but what sweet death that would have been).   I miss the physically beauty of him and how just looking at him could make my heart beat faster. I miss the way his hair curled around his collar and how his earlobes were covered with just the tiniest peach fuzzy hair and how I used to tease him about that.  I miss his flat, smooth belly and his strong, broad shoulders.

I miss reaching out for him in the night and always finding him there. Now when I reach out in the dark and there is no one there and I feel my loss so deeply.  It makes me cry and then I am awake for the rest of the night, aching with longing for him and for all that we had, all that we were together.


I miss listening to his strong heart beat whenever I put my arms around him and held him close.  I miss the innocence of him, his totally guileless way of thinking and his kind, gentle soul.  I miss his intelligence and his curiosity, his talents and his gifts. I miss the way he made me feel, about him and about myself.


I miss everything about him and I don't reckon that I will ever recover from losing him.  I know that it has been almost a year now and the pain of my loss is just as keen as that first day I spent without him, that first morning when I woke and realized he was no longer in this world with me. I will never be the same again and now I not only miss him, I miss myself.  I am no longer the person I was when I was with him and I don't think she will ever return.  I think I may miss her most of all.