Losing Weight

I suddenly find I have lost over 15Kg. I hadn’t really noticed. The last time I weighed myself was 2 years ago probably. Now I am 15Kg lighter. I am not sure how? Certainly my appetite is less. I did a lot more physical work while my wife was ill. I don’t cook for myself much. But I have lost weight without realising. I started to feel good about it; being slimmer makes me look better and feel better. It was fat I could well afford to lose and I had done it with no noticeable effort. Surely the best way?

Until today when a friend remarked that my wife would be very pleased. She had been trying to get me to lose weight for years. And it dawned on me that she had to be ill and die before I was able to do it? Now I feel awful about it. It’s a diet regime I can’t recommend to anyone.

Crying is Good for You?

Why is crying good for you? What pleasure can I find in it. What improvement to one’s body or soul results? Red sore eyes and a pile of soggy tissues? But when I tell friends (or even strangers for now I talk to everyone) how much I cry they tell me it is necessary and I must cry more (how much more can I cry). I am told it will make me feel better? How?

And why do I feel I must cry alone. That crying in front of others is somehow unmanly, unseemly. And what little things start it off. This afternoon the radio played Louis Armstrong’s “We have all the Time in the World” a beautiful song that starts tears coursing down my face as I drive. Because we didn’t have all the time”. Time was oh so short. And all those plans for our “grey” years vanished. The Great Wall, the Pyramids, Manchu Picchu, Angkor Wat. All these things she will never see.

So I resolve not to waste the time I have left for she would not want me to sit and cry for she loved me. But my new found sense of urgency seems lost on the world about me. People dance to their same old tunes and no one else seems ready to risk grabbing a little happiness in the dark. Are we frightened to dare? Probably until the fear of eternity looms bigger by which time it may well be too late.

Loneliness

I am so so lonely. The silence in the house cuts through me and shakes my foundations. I have no one to talk to, no one to smile at, no one to touch. I have called friends as much as I can without being "the nuisance". Some text replies suggest I have over-burdened friends with my neediness; they will call me at the end of the week. Enough already?

So now I have to endure the hours till the morning broken by irregular sleep and strange dreams. How do other people get through this. How? I am not the first, or the last. What is their secret and how did they survive? Who can I ask? There is no one. The phone is silent and the door bell still.

For 40 years someone has been with me and I have not needed anyone else. Now there is no one else and I have no one. The sudden change is terrifying. Three months have passed now and I thought grief would start to get easier but it feels worse night after night. No promise of a summit I might climb eventually, no light at the edge of my jungle.

I was given C S Lewis “A Grief Observed” and started to read but have not yet managed to get past page 1. His mention of “the empty house” is enough to start the tears sliding form my sore eyes and I cannot read even the next line. Maybe tomorrow it will be easier. Probably not.

The clichés

Like most people in mourning I heard all the clichés. Time will heal. It will get better. Life goes on. People don’t know what to say and I know I have shamelessly trotted these all out to my friends in the past. Never again. And the worst of these is the help cliché “if there is anything I can do to help ...... “. A few very close friends say it, mean it and do something. But for everyone else it the emptiest cliché; there is nothing they can do!

Yes I have said it to people in the past. And I am ashamed of it. I must never say it to anyone again. Of course we all want to help to sooth people in distress. But what can one really do. I have promised myself only ever to offer real help. I’ll say “come to supper next week” and fix a date. Or “ I’ll book cinema tickets for us – lets go to see ...”. Or “I’ll introduce you to my friend who’s had a similar problem”. But I’ll fix a date and do something or say nothing.

Perhaps people really mean the help cliché when they say it. Or just feel it’s the right thing to say. But what help can you really give someone who is alone? We all lead such busy lives and the only thing you can do is give time. Be there. Nothing else matters. To me now and to everyone else who feels as sad as I do now. But cut the clichés – please.

Missing Her

I am alone. I have never felt so alone so isolated from the world. She left and with her parting my whole life evaporated like so much dry ice, a life together that can never be repeated. So I cry.

How pathetic have I become. This empty house where the silence reverberates around me. Who am I crying for. For her or for my loneliness. I can’t tell. Or perhaps I can’t face my truth.

I am desperate for company. I sit and wait for the door bell to chime, the phone to ring or even the ping of an email. But no one comes. My friends ring but fewer now and less regularly now three months has past. Yes I am fine, everything is OK. It would be lovely to see them and we will talk of her and all the great times we spent together. And we will look at her photos and smile as we remember how lovely she was, how beautiful, how kind, how loving. And they will go back to their wives and tell them how strong I am. And leave me in my empty house.

I can cope. I watch a comedy on television and laugh. The Iranian woman is hilarious I read the paper and do the crossword but get stuck on 23 down. I play some 60s music but it makes me sad. But I am in control. I am OK. I am managing. And then it is time for bed.

I climb the stairs to the bedroom we shared and try to hide from the silence. But it surrounds me, smothers me. I can’t control it anymore and weep uncontrollably. How do I stop feeling like this. She will never come back and I am alone. I climb beneath the cold sheets and no arm comes across to warm me. No one whispers good night in my ear pr gently kisses me. How can I sleep. Will I ever sleep again?