Spastica, I am so, so sorry for your loss.
I haven't read through all the posts here, so I'm not sure what others have already said.
I recently lost my sister unexpectedly (in early February), and when I was ready, I wrote a letter to her. It was hard, but it felt so good. I think I might do it again someday.
One thing that has helped me too is to realize that everyone feels guilt for losing a loved one, no matter what happens. I felt a lot of guilt at first and while I'm not completely over it, I am better able to cope with it now, knowing that it's a natural response to a loss like that even though logically I know it's ridiculous to blame myself for what happened to someone else's body. My counselor explained to me that grief implies you did something wrong, which you didn't, Spastica. You did everything you could with the knowledge you had at the time. That's all any of us can do. If you can, try to transform your feelings of guilt into feelings of regret. And from there, you can begin to make peace with yourself. Regret means only that knowing what you know now, you wish circumstances had been different or that you might have done something different. We all wish that in these situations. But you did nothing wrong. Please keep telling yourself that.
It's great that you are talking to him in the mornings. I've been doing that with my sister as well.
Have you been able to keep active and social? I know I didn't feel like that at all at first especially, but once I started being social again, it really helped. I found that telling friends the story of my sister's death helped me process it in a way that sitting by myself and thinking about it couldn't.
If your friends are doing their own thing, can you find some new friends who will understand more what you're going thru and that you need support? Maybe there's a grief support group where you could meet some people on a regular basis. My area has several sorts of grief support groups, and I'll be going to one when it starts up again in April. It's scary to think about going, but I think it's important to be proactive about grieving.
Anyway, I hope I didn't repeat too much of what's already been said. But I saw your signature in the home and body care area, and I had to come over and share what I could with you, especially since you share so much in MDC with everyone else.
I guess I watch too many cartoons.
Thanks for the update.
