The downside of spending twenty four hours a day, seven days a week with someone is the yawning chasm they leave when they’re gone. It’s very difficult, if not impossible, to fill it. When your social system has gone, for one reason or another, what do you do? Can you get one from Amazon? Does it qualify for Prime?
I’ve been able to do things since losing Trisha that I wouldn’t have been able to do whilst she was still here. Things others take for granted, going to watch sports, just having an afternoon out for lunch (sorry to be a pain, Fenwicks, but your chicken salads meet my dietary preferences).
The freedom is all well and good but I’m still doing it all on my own, and it’s hard going. I can open up here but I find it really difficult to just strike up a conversation. Even more so because I have this huge thing that colours everything I do, everything I feel. So, if you see a middle aged bloke looking like he’s trying to fit in but doesn’t quite manage it. He’s not weird, he’s just lost his wife – his life – and is trying to find some way back into the world the rest of you are living in. Go easy on him.
A Husband For A Carer 