How do I deal with all of this?

Hello Flapper 81 …

Thank you for your message. It sounds like you have experienced a lot. I am so sorry that you lost your wife. That had to be terribly difficult. Do you have any kind of a support system to lean on?

I see where you mentioned that your friends turned out not to be your friends. Does this mean that they all sort of disappeared when you lost your wife? A lot of people do not know how to handle other people’s grief, and they just disappear when something like this happens. I don’t know if that is what you meant, but regardless, that had to be upsetting to find out that the people you thought were your friends were not.

And you also mentioned that your family is not in the same state where you are located. But are there any family members that you can turn to for emotional support even if not in person? Losing a loved one is such a very personal event and each one of us experiences these losses in our way. No one can tell another person how they “should” or “should not” handle the loss. No one else knows your experience. We do know, however, that it helps to have someone to lean on. If you do not have anyone you feel like you can lean on, you might be able to find some online support groups that you could connect with. Everyone is different so that might not appeal to you. There are a lot of people who will turn to their spiritual life for support or, if they are not particularly spiritual, they might engage in some kind of volunteer work in an effort to actively do something to honor their loved one. We could certainly talk more about this if we were working together.

Losing your stepson had to be almost as painful if not equally as painful as losing your wife. I can only imagine how gut-wrenching this would have been after raising the child as your own. Is there any possibility of having him returned to you? Do you know what you would have to do?

If I am reading your message correctly, you are asking “How do I navigate all of this and still maintain some kind of a reasonable lifestyle?” You mentioned how hard it is to go to work. All of this is very understandable as you have been overwhelmed by life events.

When we are overwhelmed, it is important to look for any way possible to take care of ourselves both physically and emotionally. There is something called the emotional bank account which is essentially the equivalent of a regular bank account. Money in, money out. If there are no deposits to the bank account, then we either cannot pay the bills or if we write a check on an empty bank account, we go into overdraft. Same with your emotional bank account. If there are no deposits but lots of withdrawals, then we go into overdraft mode. In the case of the emotional bank account, overdraft looks like depression, anxiety, anger, fear, and so on. Many of the everyday challenges that we would normally do without a thought feel nearly impossible to handle. So, it is important to give yourself some grace – self-compassion – and do for yourself the same thing you would do for a good friend going through the same experience. Give yourself permission to take care of yourself. Do you need to take some time off from work? Is that a possibility? Do you need to travel back to where your family lives to connect with them and gain some strength from them? The question to ask yourself is “What would help me feel better? What do I need?” And, then, to think about how you might be able to meet your needs so you can start to heal.

Some people like to write or journal about the things that are going on with them. Journaling allows you to express everything that is on your mind – the good, the bad, and the ugly. It gives you a way to get all of the energy that is churning inside of you out of you and on to paper. It can be very therapeutic to write.

Another thing that some people find useful is to immerse themselves in nature. So, this would be something like walking in a park where there are lots of trees and plants, or sitting by a lake, or just laying outside on the grass at night and looking at the stars.

Some people gain comfort from animals. If you have a dog or a cat, you might have noticed your pet being more attentive to you. The animals seem to know when their parent needs some attention.

Mindfulness is another technique that many people practice to help calm their nervous system. Mindfulness just means paying attention to what is right in front of you. Some people do yoga or meditation. It can be as simple as taking five minutes to do mindful breathing – just paying attention to your breathing. Or a body scan where you notice from head to toe what you are experiencing within your body. Or take five minutes and make note of everything in the room around you. There is a mindfulness technique called the “5,4,3,2,1” technique. This one means you note five things you can see, four things you can feel, three things you can hear, two things you can smell and one thing you can taste. The idea is to focus all of your attention on what is in your surroundings. Even if you just do this for a few minutes, it will help to calm your nervous system.

There are so many more things we could talk about if we were working together. These are just a few ideas. The real key is to give yourself some time to start healing and not to judge yourself for needing that time. Be as kind to yourself as you would be to a friend.

I hope this has helped a little bit. Remember that healing is a process and is going to take some time.

I hope things start to get better for you.

Judi