Journeying With Wisdom

I recently came across a video by John Schneider, recorded after he lost his wife of 30 years to cancer. His words struck a chord deep in my soul. Nearly seven months since I lost my own soulmate, this video captures exactly where I am—emotionally, spiritually, and in the quiet in-between moments.

You’ll find the video at the end of this post. Whether you choose to read along or simply listen, I believe it offers a powerful window into what grief really feels like. It’s raw. It’s real. And it gently reminds us that we’re not alone.

By sharing it today, I’m sending out a warm, heartfelt hug to anyone walking this same road.

John said…

Widowhood is more than missing your spouse’s presence. It’s adjusting to an alternate life It’s a growing around a permanent amputation.

Now for some it’s a longtime friend saying I will always be there for you and then, they also disappear. They disappear from your life.

Widowhood is going to bed for the first time, of the thousandth time, and still the loneliness never feels normal. The empty bed is a constant reminder. The night no longer brings intimacy and comfort but the loudness of silence and the void of connection. That’s what it brings.

Widowhood is walking around the same house you’ve lived in for years and it just no longer feels like home. Because home incorporated a person. And they’re not there. Homesickness fills your heart and the knowledge that it will never return, never return, haunts you.

Widowhood is seeing all your dreams and your plans that you shared as a couple crumble and vanish around you. It’s the painful process of searching for new dreams that include only you. And you see them – it’s like amounting to climbing Mount Everest and every small victory of creating new dreams for yourself includes a very new awful shade of grief that their death propelled you into this path.

Widowhood is second guessing everything that you thought you knew. Everything, everything that you thought you knew about yourself. Your life had molded together with another’s and without them you have to relearn all your likes, all your hobbies, all your fears, all your goals. The Renaissance of a new person makes you proud and heartbroken simultaneously.

Widowhood is being a stranger in your own life. It’s the unnerving feeling of watching yourself from outside your body. It’s going through the motions. It’s going through the motions of what was your life, but being somehow detached from all of it. You don’t recognize yourself. Your previous life feels but a vapor. Like a mist of a dream. And you begin to wonder if it ever happened at all.

Widowhood is the irony of knowing that if one person was here to be your support, you would have the strength to grief that one person. The thought twists and confuses you. If only they were here to hold you and to talk to you, you’d have the tenacity to tackle this unwanted life. You could do it together, to tackle the arduous task of moving on without them.

Widowhood is missing the one person who could truly understand what is in your heart. To share that that funny joke, the embarrassing incident, the fear compelling you, or the frustration tempting you. Now to anyone else you would have to explain and that’s just too much effort. So, you keep it to yourself. And the loneliness just kind of grows inside you.

Widowhood is struggling with identity. Who are you? If not their spouse, what do you want to do? If not the things you planned together? What brand do you want to buy if not the one that you two shared for all those years? What is your purpose if the job of investing into your marriage is taken away? Who is my closest companion, when my other half isn’t here?

Widowhood is feeling restless because you’ve lost your identity, your partner, your lover, your friend, your travel companion, your co-parent, your security, and your life, and you’re drifting to an unknown destination.

Widowhood is living in a constant state of missing the single most intimate relationship you’ve ever had. There’s no hand to hold, there’s nobody next to you, no partner to share your burden.

Widowhood is being alone in a crowd of people. It’s feeling sad even when you’re happy. It’s confusion. It’s feeling guilty while you live. It’s looking back while moving forward. It’s being hungry but nothing sounding remotely good or appetizing. It’s every special event turning bittersweet.

Oh yes, my God, my beloved is much more than simply missing their presence. It’s becoming a new person, whether you want to or not. You can’t help it. It’s fighting every emotion mankind can feel at the very same moment and trying to function in life at that very same time.

Widowhood is frailty. Widowhood is strength. Widowhood is darkness. Widowhood is rebirth. Widowhood, sadly, is life changing. And widowhood makes awful seemed not quite so bad.

If you’re going down this road, it’s well-traveled, but you have to walk it alone.

God bless and guide each and every step until you see them again – they reach their hand out and say, “My beloved did you miss me?”

“You bet I did!”

God bless you.