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Ask a Widow: How Do I Meet Other Young Widows?
About once a week, I get a message that goes something like this: My husband died six months ago, and now I’m a 35-year-old widow. I’ve gotten to the point where the grief is somewhat manageable, but my problem now is that I feel so isolated. My friends want to help, but they just can’t understand what it’s like to be me. I’ve tried going to spousal loss groups, but everyone is twice my age. How can I find a group of young widows in my area? For a long time, my replies to these emails were always the same: “I have no real answers for you. I found people…
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It’s Not Up To You
“Wow, that’s great!” she says to me, after I tell her that my boyfriend Chris has been staying with me and the kids for much of the past few months. She is just an acquaintance, really, but I can tell that there’s a “but” that’s coming soon. “It’s pretty quick though, isn’t it?” And there it is. Judgement. I mean, I’m sure she didn’t mean for it to sound judgmental. But I can see it in her eyes, and feel it in that question. Because it is quick. Our love affair didn’t develop over years and years – it was the lightning-fast type of falling in love that sometimes happens.…
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You’re Not Really a Widow Anymore
A few days ago, Austin woke up early and came downstairs. I had been writing, but I paused to talk to him for a few minutes as he ate his cereal. We discussed what we were going to do that day, and then he wanted to know what I was doing on my computer. “I’m trying to figure out what to write for my blog,” I told him. “Do you have any ideas?” “There’s not really anything for you to write about anymore,” he said, simply. “What do you mean?” I asked. “Well, you’re not really a widow anymore,” he replied. When I gently asked him why he thought this,…
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The Earring
I heard the clink of the earring on the tile before I even realized I had dropped it. I looked down at the blank floor. “Damn!” I said (under my breath because I’m trying to swear less frequently in front of my kids). I bent down and tried to look under the bathroom vanity. Clearly, the earring had fallen down into the crack under it. I couldn’t see much, so I went into the boys’ room to get a flashlight. Austin was reading a book. “What’s wrong?” he asked. “I dropped my diamond earring somewhere in the bathroom,” I said. “I need your flashlight to try and find it.” He…
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School and Single Parenting
Every single parent I know is obsessed with what’s going to happen in September. Will schools fully open? Will we have to continue to home school our children? Will we do some sort of hybrid model? There are so many questions and no good solutions. Consequently, everyone is freaking out. I was talking to an acquaintance the other day and we were lamenting what the fall might look like. She and her partner are able to work remotely, but noted that without school, she gets very little done. I commiserated with her, because I get it. But do you know what I was thinking? It may be bad for you,…
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What Does It Take to Date a Widow?
As I write this, my partner Chris is sitting across the kitchen island, typing something on his computer. He’s focused on what he is doing, so I can take a minute to look at him. He’s got a scruffy face, the kind of stubble that’s sexy on men like him, and he’s wearing a Ruth Bader Ginsburg t-shirt, which makes him even more attractive to me. He is not smiling right now, because he is working, but I can see the softness that’s always in his eyes. It’s a softness I know because he looks at me with those eyes all the time. Just behind him is a photo of…
There’s No Handbook for How to Do This
