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Ask a Widow: When Sex Can Be Good…and When Sex Can Be Tricky
I know a lot of widows who think a lot about sex. I’m not talking about any specific group of widows. I hear from people of all ages and backgrounds and life experiences on this blog, and one of the most common things people write to me about is sex. Is it okay to want to have sex after (fill-in-the-blank-amount-of-time) has passed since your partner died? Is it strange to desire people who you would have never desired before widowhood? Is it totally off-base to date a friend or a neighbor? Some questions are easy to answer. Anything about feelings (i.e. “is it okay to feel this way”) is easy.…
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Ask a Widow: Am I Moving Forward if I’m Still Angry?
Answer: Yes. That’s my answer to the question “am I moving forward if I’m still angry?” It’s a question I get frequently from readers in one form or another. So many widows I know – both my friends and people I’ve met online – want desperately to move forward with their lives. (On the whole, most widows say they want to “move forward” rather than “move on,” since the latter seems to imply leaving behind all memory of the person who was lost.) Regardless of how a widow wants to define it, there often comes a point in a widow’s life when you begin to move beyond the initial loss.…
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Widowhood and Breakups
I’ve been thinking a lot about breakups lately, which I guess is super strange since I’m also wedding planning. Let me be clear – I’m not thinking about my own relationship breaking up! But I think being in love (and knowing that I have a future with someone new) has made me reflect on all the times when it didn’t work out. And there were a lot of times when it didn’t work out. I wrote very little about it at the time. I told some of my friends that I was dating, but I was shy about it with most people. I felt judged by everyone, even though the…
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Deserving It
Over the past few months, I’ve been telling my friends, family and online community about my new relationship. “I’m so happy,” I say, honestly, and for those people who can see my face, they know that it’s true. Do you know what people almost always say back to me? “You deserve it!” When I hear this, I always say “thank you” and smile. I know that others are trying to say that they are so glad that I’ve been able to meet someone who makes me so happy. I get it. My dad and many of my friends have used this phrase when talking to me. In fact, I’ve said…
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Being Alone is Scary
One night in early February, as the wind whipped the trees so hard that they seemed to bend sideways, I laid in bed and tried to warm up my freezing toes. Life finally had a rhythm to it, and I was getting used to year three of widowhood. I thought about Valentine’s Day, and how it was around the corner, and I was still without a partner. This year, however, I was feeling a sense of peace about my singledom. I was still dating, but the urgency of finding someone new had abated. As I sat there writing and thinking, Tommy came to my door and then climbed into my…
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Out of the Corner of My Eye
Back when I was happily married, I used to have these moments that made me long for another life. I’d be doing something like picking out eggs at the grocery store while I fed my baby Cheerios, and I’d see something out of the corner of my eye. Maybe it was a magazine with a cover story on European train trips or a newly-in-love couple trying the free samples together. Whatever it was, I’d wish for a little bit of excitement, a little bit of something new. I’d think, I like my life. I am happy. But I just wanted a little bit more. Now I want to go back…
There’s No Handbook for How to Do This
