No one ever knows how to grieve.

I think I've grieved every loss in a different way.  My dad passed away 26 years ago.  That was the first, the hardest, the longest.  Mom died 6 years ago.  I lost my best friend, my counsel, my support.  And I grieved harder than when dad went.

Last fall my son died.  I honestly thought I would die.  But then my other son got so upset that I had to snap out of it and "be here" for him.

And now hubby.  How do I grieve his passing?  There have been many wonderful moments in our life.  I posted the bad ones here.  I posted the reality of diabetes.  I truly want to just forget all of that and focus on the good.  I want to remember him as the man I loved, the man I fell in love with - the stable, sane, good sugar level guy.  Yet it is diabetes that killed him.

The death certificate showed the reason for death as "respiratory failure".   And chronic heart failure as the secondary cause.  Which is correct.  He had a heart attack.  And then he quit breathing.  The very last thing was that he just stopped breathing.  Respiratory failure.  You and I know that it was the high sugar content that ate away at his body, clogged his arteries, caused the heart attach which caused him to stop breathing.  But to the world - nowhere does it say diabetes.  How sad.

And I have absolutely no say in what goes on the death certificate.  That is left up to the hospice doctor.  And they admitted him as a chronic heart failure patient.  Because that's what he was discharged from the hospital as.  Because he entered the hospital due to a heart attack.

It makes sense.  But is it fair?

I am grateful for his sake that it is over.  Do I miss him?  Unquestionably.  Do I miss his diabetes and all of it's complications?  Of course not!

I have moments when I want to crawl in a hole and become a recluse.  I want the world to go away.  Yet I know I can't allow that to happen.  I have forced myself to allow friends and family to visit.  To answer emails.  To appear "ok".  Life has become a long twisted nightmare of notifying the world of his death.  Utilities.  Banks.  Insurance.  Vehicles.  Phones. Death comes easily but deleting the life that existed is nearly impossible at times.  I want to give up.  But I keep plodding along.  I want to just quit.  But I know I can't.

Is this the hardest thing I've ever done in my life?  At the moment it seems like it is.  But I know in the overall scheme of things it isn't.

His daughter calls and wants comfort from me.  Yet I think I'm the one who needs to be consoled.  How do you comfort someone else in the midst of your own grief?  I don't have the answer to that.

I've hit the anger phase.  For a million reasons.  I know the steps in the grief process and I know that I will eventually go through them all.  I just hope the anger phase is very short.  I'm trying hard to focus on the good thoughts.

Being deeply religious - I know my Lord will sustain me.  I know that it will be OK in the end.  I know HE will take care of me.  It's just the nearly impossible task of getting there.

As a funny aside, hubby was a computer programmer, a genius in 3D printing arena, and a wizard at designing with led lighting.  I now have the task of putting parts together.  Where's the power cord to the Kindle?  What does this computer chip belong to?  I know these are led light strips....but what goes with them?  Google has become my best friend, ebay might be an even better one because I can give it a non-descript definition and usually find a picture of what's in my hand!

What will I do with everything?  Sell what I can on ebay.  Then a garage sale.  I have to clean out and downsize and then decide if I am going to sell the house or keep it.  Decisions.  Something that seems to take place 24/7 at a rapid-fire pace right now.  I'm most likely going to sell the travel trailer and truck.  I can't see me trying to hook it up myself.  I was a miserable failure at backing the thing up.  And I'm not sure I want to go travel alone right now.

He was cremated.  His wish.  His ashes will be spread in the mountains where he grew up.  His brother is coming Monday to pick up the remains and handle that for me.  Not sure I could do that.  So many things to think about, decide upon, take action.  Right now, closing cell phone accounts has been the worst....and it's still not done.  But I'm getting there.

I hope you have a support system in place.  My sisters have been here daily.  My friends visit, call, text.  The cards have been pouring in -from people I haven't heard from in 20 or 30 years.  That was surprising!  I have an amazing support system and am very grateful for that.

Many more decisions to come in the future.  I know I will make mistakes.  I will take my time on the major ones.  The minor ones will fall in place along the way.  It really just takes time.  Not much you can do in the first 10 days.  Not much you can do without a death certificate.  Plan your days.  I get up and walk with one of my sisters.  Then I garden for an hour or so.  Then I come inside and do a couple of hours worth of paperwork.  Then I run errands.  Next up is something enjoyable or relaxing.  Lunch with friends, an art class - something that brings me joy.  Then I start my evening with a movie on and a box of things to sort beside me, my laptop in front of me and a yellow sticky pad next to me.  It seems to be a good method of balancing life, getting things done and getting through the grief process.

Life goes on.  But it's not the same.  I am still learning every single day.  We should have done a better job of preparing for this.  We should have had $5K in a safe at home.  I should have paid more attention to simple things like setting up Plex, what to do if the door bell quits working due to a storm.

Yes, we had the worst storm Monday evening that they've had in 30 years.  Flooding all around me, but I was lucky that there was no damage here.  Yes, life goes on.  I will be just fine.  But I hope those who have been reading my blog will take this week to prepare themselves as though this was the last week you had on earth.  Get the paperwork in order.  Make it easy for your spouse.  Don't delay.  I thought we had another year.  We didn't.  Take advantage of my life and make yours simple.  Because even when you are gone, your loved ones are here and perhaps not in the best mental state to make all  the decisions and choices that they will be forced to make.

But no matter what - it will be ok.

DW

PS.  I just checked my yahoo email and I hope I have responded to those who wrote me.  If I missed you, I'm sorry.  Thanks to each of you for your kind words and prayers.  I pray that your life will be blessed.