Please log onto the home page - www.thealzheimerspouse.com - and read the letter I have written to all of you. It is self explanatory. I am unable to do anymore at this time. Thank you.
Dear Joan, Please take your time. We truly understand what you are going through. And I also appreciate the info on grief you are sharing. It is helping to fill in some of the things I have felt.
It does get better, in a different way. But the pain does ease.
If any people on God's green earth "get it", it is us. And you have a very wise counselor. Do what you need to do to take care of yourself, dear Joan. You and Sid continue in my thoughts and prayers, as always.
I also have been extremely off balance and dizzy at times. Perhaps this is why. Thanks. One day at a time. I wrote on my chalkboard "Do one thing today". Sometimes it is just having a coffee before going back on the couch, sleeping, sleeping, sleeping. It is getting better though. Hang in. I'm fortunate to have friends that won't let me spend too many days on the couch and make me do something fun.
Party at my house then. No elephants, portugese gauchos, Richard Nixon blow up dolls, pogo sticks, or all dressing up as Elvis Presley this year again please. That was fun but we all need to look perfectly normal in case someone needs to drive into town for supplies. What the heck. Let's all go there together. I have a bus I stole in Bolivia. Wait. Maybe that was a movie.
Hey! We need to move that trapeze outside where it belongs! No, please don't throw the salmon canapés yet. That's for later. Oh, why not? Food fight started!
What? We weren't doing anything.
....
This link is both a bit hard to watch and very inspiring. It's giving and sharing and a good story and you will be crying and feeling the love if you watch. Crying isn't always bad and none of us are truly alone in life.
As I read the stories you and all your friends contribute here, I am always comforted by the fact that my journey through this was so much shorter and easier. But then I read some of my own stories from the bad times and realize that they were really not easy,
I think that time, (two and a half years) has taken away the bad times and made them seem like only a bad dream.
Joan, it is good to hear from you. Your grief counselor has provided sound advice. I am able to function but still feel very numb along with a deep sadness. Some days are better than others and yes this grieving business is hard work and not for the faint hearted for sure. Just rest. We are here for you when you are ready. God bless
So lovely to hear from you Joan. We all get it for sure. Take all the time you need. Thank you sincerely for sharing everything you have about your grief counsellor said. The part of being unsteady really struck me as that is my reality of late. I used to easily get up and down off a little stool to change hummingbird food. Now I find even that task a bit of a challenge and have to really concentrate and put my hand on the window frame. I am not going to be concerned about that now. Take good care.
Joan, I so feel for you and what you are going through now. My dear husband has been gone for 3 1/2 months. I am still not sleeping, eating properly, or thinking straight. No one understands this except the people here and other widows. I, too, have been extraordinarily clumsy. There are things I need to do in the house that require going up a ladder and I just won't do them. Even though my husband wasn't at home for the last 7 months of his life, and was frequently hospitalized during the months before, I suddenly find myself terrified of falling. I'm 57 and in good health, but the terror is there. This grieving has been a nightmare in so many ways - but I do know the only way out is through. There's no getting around that.