Author Topic: Lost my partner  (Read 1519 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline TonLapin

  • New Members
  • *
  • Posts: 3
  • Karma: +0/-0
Lost my partner
« on: January 14, 2021, 01:44:09 AM »
Hello,
I joined today on the recommendation of a friend. I have just lost my partner unexpectedly in November. He was 45. We were together for 20 years.
He suddenly fell ill in September. I spent 8 weeks with him in the ICU and thought he was getting better but then the hospital told me we could go no further. The ending was rather traumatic, at night I relive it in my head. It wasn’t how I expected it to be.
I still feel it can't be real, and keep thinking he’s going to come home, 2-months later. I find myself bouncing all over the place between feelings of loss, pain, regret, remorse, guilt, and sometimes anger. Anger towards myself, the hospital, and even him for not having gone to the Doctor. We were together for 20 years, our whole adult lives, but recently had to spend long times apart due to work. I thought we had so much time ahead of us. We were working hard to achieve our dreams. Those dreams were supposed to start this year. The timing feels like a terrible joke someone is playing on us. We were so close to the finish-line and had been counting down the months, and then this happened out of nowhere. I was working abroad when he fell ill. I had asked him to go to a Doctor but he said he was fine. On September 14th I was speaking to him on the phone and noticed he was behaving strangely. I called a neighbour to check on him, she called an ambulance and I flew straight home. The paramedics told me if I had called him an hour earlier he would have seemed fine, and if I’d called an hour later it would have been too late, he would have been unconscious, I would have just assumed he was working. I flew home immediately. I thought I’d been given a chance to save him. I thought this was a wake up call, I convinced myself we had been given a new chance.
I’m overcome with remorse that we were too focused on the future and guilt that we didn’t live for the moment. Years ago, before he died, my Grandfather had told me not to make the same mistake as my Grandparents did, working all their lives to enjoy a retirement which my Grandmother never saw. I thought our plan was an answer to that, leaving our jobs at 43/45 to launch our dream, but somehow I repeated exactly the same mistake. It’s so hard to live with myself for having sacrificed time together, some days I just wish I had an off switch. When the palliative care nurse sped up the end I wished she could have done it for both of us together and still do.
Grief feels so surprisingly lonely. I didn’t expect that. We always said we were a great team against the world. We relied so much on each other. Even when we were apart we were always on the phone. We made every decision together. Outwardly I was the successful one but it was really joint success together because I had him, my biggest cheerleader, behind me, always encouraging me and picking me up when I felt out of my depth at work. I feel that I've not only lost my partner, but also my identity, and my future. Everyday feels so pointless without him.
I feel very alone, and lockdown doesn't help. I knew he wasn't close to his family but I didn't realize until he fell ill that they didn't know who I was (we are a same-sex couple). I didn't know he had hidden so much from them. Now I worry about the stress he was under, and why I didn't know. Should I not have noticed, When he was ill I had to build a relationship with his family by phone to keep them informed of the situation. After it ended I took him back to his home country. Now I'm back here in the UK on my own with so much to sort out. I've never operated alone as an adult, he was always there to support.
I’ve had to go back to work but my loss doesn’t seem to be acknowledged by my employer or colleagues which makes the pain feel so much worse regarding the time sacrifices we made. The nature of our relationship might be part of why some people can’t quite understand my grief, I’m not sure.
I’m hoping here I can meet people who understand better than my family and friends do. Nice to meet you all.
« Last Edit: January 14, 2021, 11:50:54 AM by TonLapin »

Offline Sandra61

  • Administrator
  • VIP Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 579
  • Karma: +62/-0
Re: Lost my partner
« Reply #1 on: January 15, 2021, 02:25:55 PM »
I am so sorry to hear of the loss of your partner. Sending you a hug.  :hug: It is always a huge shock to lose someone and especially at such a young age. I can relate to all the feelings you describe. I think we all go through a variety of feelings right across the range of emotions after a loss and I promise you, we all find something to feel guilty about and blame ourselves for, but the truth is we are all doing the best we can in the present that we find ourselves in. Everyone makes plans for the future and so often, after an unexpected and devastating event of this kind, find we were planning and dreaming in vain, but it doesn't seem like that prior to the event. Why would it? I suppose what I am trying to explain is that all we can ever do, is make the best decisions we can in the moment. The plans you were working on sound very sensible to me. Who would have expected what happened to happen? None of us can see into the future or we would all make different choices and we all blame ourselves for something once we have the benefit of hindsight, but we don't have that at the time, so you are blaming yourself for something that was impossible to predict.

I think it is far better to remember your partner for who he was; to accept that he made those choices with you and thought them a good idea - and they were! It's simply that life has a way of taking an unexpected turn sometimes that wrecks all our plans with no warning and forces us in a different direction. It is no one's fault. That's just how things are sometimes. I can guarantee that there is no one who can look back after any loss and say they were entirely happy about the train of events they experienced or that they did everything right. Life isn't like that. We do our best with the information we have at the time and however hard we work to do everything for the best, we will always find something to criticize ourselves for. You are not alone in this, I promise!

In terms of trying to move forward from it, I would suggest you try to look beyond the self-blame. You can't change the past and it sounds as if you were very happy together, so all you can do is be grateful for the time you did have together and celebrate that. There is nothing wrong with dreaming and planning for a better future and you both did that for all the right reasons. Life just threw you a devastating curve-ball, as it does from time to time. Think of ways you can celebrate your partner and ease your way forward. Put together an album of your favorite photos of him and the times you spent together. They will help resurrect the good memories. Once we are allowed to travel again, revisit places you went to together to remind you of the times you did have. It may bring a tear to the eye, but I promise it will also bring a smile to your face. Did you share any interests? Can you carry those on on behalf of both of you? Did he have any ambitions that you could fulfill in his memory, so that you can tell him about them when you do eventually meet again? Can you remember him in some other way? Could you have a bench placed at a favorite spot you both liked or that he did, so that you can go there to sit and remember him? Would he like a tree planted in his memory? If you have a garden, could you plant some of his favorite plants somewhere in it and put a seat there to go to remember him? Could you make a cushion from some of his favorite clothes to hug when you are missing him? Or put a memory box of items of sentimental value together to keep to look at when you need to? How about a memory book or jar? Some people like to write down anecdotes, traits of the person they have lost or memories of times they spent together either in a book or on scraps of paper they can pull out of a jar at random to relive the memory it evokes.

Grief is a difficult and long road to walk and there will always be better days and not so good days along the way. You don't get over it so much as learn to live with it, but what you have to hold on to is that your partner loved you too and will always be with you in your heart and in your memories and helped shape the person you are now. He gave you  a gift of all the time you had together. Perhaps you feel that was wasted in plans and dreams that never made it to fruition now, but that is not so. Those plans and dreams gave you a shared focus about which you were both enthusiastic and enjoyed working towards together. They are part of the legacy of time you did have together and you need to focus on what you did have, not what you don't. The past cannot be re-written but contains all sorts of gems and bright spots that you have lost sight of in the face of the pain and sadness you feel now, but they have not gone away and are just waiting to be rediscovered. Your future is up to you now to make as good as it can be in memory of your partner and in honour of him. He isn't here to help you do that now, but that doesn't mean he would not still want the best for you, so now it's up to you to do that for him. He will always be there with you in your heart, so use that to help you move forward in a positive way and make the best of your future, for him.

Wishing you well.  :hug: :hearts:

Offline TonLapin

  • New Members
  • *
  • Posts: 3
  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Lost my partner
« Reply #2 on: January 15, 2021, 11:25:14 PM »
Thankyou so much Sandra for taking the time to give such thoughtful advice. I really appreciate it.
You've made me think about all of the fun we had researching our plans; in person, and by phone when we were apart. Maybe it wasn't wasted time but instead brought us together with a common purpose. We certainly both enjoyed doing the research and planning out how it would work, down to each of our roles. That's a really helpful way to think about it, thank you so much. we were both looking forward to it so much, at least that would have brought him pleasure. Even in the hospital we were talking about it when we thought he was going to be ok.
Your other suggestions make a lot of sense and I've tried some of them, but traveling to places we enjoyed is something I hadn't thought about. I had thought I would need to avoid those places but you're making me think again.
Thanks again for taking the time, I really appreciate it and it's been a great comfort tonight.







Offline Sandra61

  • Administrator
  • VIP Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 579
  • Karma: +62/-0
Re: Lost my partner
« Reply #3 on: January 20, 2021, 11:51:20 AM »
I think that's something that struck a chord with me, when you talked about making plans and working for a better future. My mum and I were doing that in our own way gradually. In our case it was more because we would have liked to be able to move to the coast and so that I could work less or not at all, as my mother did not have good health and had lots of hospital appointments I needed to take her to, which was difficult to juggle with work as well. I suppose we were three quarters of the way there when she died. I had managed to switch from full-time to part-time working, which helped, but was still not ideal. We also enjoyed the work and plans that went into all of that and it kept life interesting. We had also found a house to move to and were enjoying holidays there for the time-being, so she had a taste of the life we hoped to build at least.

She was 96 when she passed away, but was always someone who looked forward rather than backwards, even at that age and never stopped making plans right up to the end. She worried about what I would do after she was gone; so did I, once she was. All the official processes that follow wreaked havoc with my life and increased my stress levels ten-fold until, about six months after I lost her, I just hit rock bottom and had to take a week off work, as couldn't bear it anymore and felt close to a breakdown. I think I teetered on the edge of the abyss at that point. I couldn't stop crying. I didn't know what to do or what might happen at that point, so despite my state of distress and panic, I realised that I had to do something to stop myself sliding into a pit of despair and one of the things that helped was the plan we had made and been working towards. I had  a think about it and although she was gone, the plan itself still made sense, even for me on my own, so I gave it a bit of a rethink and decided which bits were still realistic to do and made a list of what things would need to be done and in what order to make it feasible to go forward with it, as it would still improve my life and my future and so still made sense.

That helped me focus on something other than my loss and my grief and gave me a goal to work towards that in itself, helped me keep my head above water and not slide into the pit that grief can become and which, if you let it, like quicksand, can keep sucking you down until you are lost. A little over three years on, it still stands me in good stead and helps me move forward and to have confidence in the future and in myself. I think she would have approved of all I have continued to achieve up to now and can envisage her looking on with interest! My dad too, come to that. She was always pleased once we managed to move another step forward with our plan and never lost faith in it. So, even plans made for two can still help you, even once you are no longer two and give you purpose and resolve moving forward alone. In a way, it helps that these were plans we made together, as I know she believed in them and wanted them to succeed, so carrying on is something I feel I am doing partly for her still, as she wanted the best for us both and hoped this would work to achieve that and it had started to, so it is still a link with her and something I know she believed in and wanted because it would make life better for us and would still want, as it will make life better for me, even without her. Perhaps once you are a little further along this road, you might find the same.

In regard to your work colleagues, I had a similar experience when I went back to work and more than once, found it so distressing that I dissolved into tears at my desk. Fortunately, I have my own office, so no one really knew, but your colleagues don't have any real understanding of how you are feeling, especially if they have not been through anything similar themselves. I don't think anyone who has never lost someone close can understand how that feels. Loss changes everything. It rips the foundations of your world as you knew it from under you and changes your day to day life, your perceptions of what matters, your personality and your future. You quite literally seem to become someone else over night and you can never go back to being who you were, because loss of a close loved one changes you forever, changes how you see the world and those around you and reshapes your future, whether you like it or not and nothing is ever the same again. That's a lot of change to have to come to terms with on top of the loss and grief you are already trying to learn to cope with. It's not that work colleagues don't care, but more that they cannot understand unless they have been there themselves. It made me more impatient with all their trivial concerns and want to bang their heads together to see that things they thought important were not, in light of the magnitude of the impact of the loss of a loved one, but they will never understand until they have experienced that for themselves, so now I find myself feeling set apart a little from some of them and sharing a link and an empathy with those who have.

I think coming home to an empty house was one of the hardest things to start with. I had been used to coming home to a house with lights on and calling out hello when I came in and then chatting about the day and walking in to see mum sitting in her favourite chair of having a lie down. Suddenly I was coming home to a dark and silent house with no one to talk to and one that, worst of all, felt like there was a void where she was supposed to be. The hole left by someone who you are used to having there is impossible to fill and I still feel it now, though I have grown more used to it - just another element of the new normal that I have had to grow accustomed to. It helped to have flowers around. They lifted my spirits a little and I still talk to my mum and my dad's pictures. I can hear what they would probably reply in my head. It is not the same, but I don't feel they are completely gone, just no longer here in the way that they were. Indeed, at times of trouble, I have found feathers or had a visit from a robin that makes me think they are around at least some of the time and wanting me to know that!

It helps to leave a light on in winter, so there is some light in the house as I approach it and I put the radio on or TV or some music, so that there is some background noise and that helps too. You just have to ease your way into the new situation you find yourself in and do whatever helps to make that more acceptable and easier to cope with. I joined a class in a shared interest I held with my mum. As others who know me here will already know, I decided to learn how to dance! Mum always loved dancing, so I felt in a way, I was doing that for us both and that helped more than anything else. I met some lovely new friends that that I have kept in touch with even in these non-dancing lockdown days! That helps too as we support one another through this horrid time. Perhaps you could think about doing something similar when we come out of this, or even on-line if that is possible. It helps because it makes you think about something else for a few hours a week and takes the focus off grief for an hour or two, because grieving is exhausting and all consuming without a break and having something different to focus on forces you to re-engage with life and gives you something to look forward to and get you out of the house, which is very important. Talking to you and mentioning this reminds me of a Boxing Day dance I went to just over a year after I lost mum. It served as a way of not having to sit indoors missing Christmases gone by. There was a male same sex couple there who were amazing dancers and I was very jealous as was still a beginner then! I'm a little better now, but will have to start again once we are out of lockdown, but that's something to look forward to too.

I suppose what I am trying to explain in my roundabout way, is that you find things that help you as you move forward and rebuild your life anew in a way that helps you recover and that's what you need to do. You reshape your plans and you decide what aspects still work and would have been what the person you have lost would have wanted for you. You maintain those links with them and that helps too. You are physically without them, but their influence and interests continue to remain a part of your life and of who you are, so they are never completely gone from you. Life goes on in a modified form, but still with its links to those you have lost and plans made when they were here to be part of them, are not necessarily things you should or need to abandon once they are gone. Those plans are in themselves a link and accomplishing them would be something they would want for you still and can be something you can do for them to remember them, as well as to improve the remainder of your own life.

It is still early days for you, but you will find a way forward that works for you and I am pretty sure that elements of the life you shared with your loved one will still be a part of that and that is a good thing and something to maintain the link and bolster you up. The negative view you have now of those times you have already remembered did indeed provide fun and pleasure in trying to bring about and still could, even in a modified version and will still be a link to him and to the times you shared.

Find the things that help you and turn to them as and when you need to, and you will slowly realise, you will never need to leave the life you shared behind and indeed cannot. They have shaped the life you have now and will always go on influencing your future and who you are in some way. Those we have loved never stop being part of our lives. Not a day passes without me thinking of them or remembering something and often smiling about that. One day at a time. Stop being hard on yourself and be kind to yourself. Grief is pain enough on its own for anyone. Wishing you well.  :hug: :hearts:
« Last Edit: January 21, 2021, 10:52:55 AM by Sandra61 »