Looking Back

I recently got a rather startling insight into how things have changed in the last year. See, a year ago, a friend who works for NAMI asked if I'd be willing to go speak to a class on Death & Dying about suicide. She'd done it before, and thought I'd be able to do pretty well. I'd been saying for quite awhile that, if there's any good that I can make come from me darlin' wife's death, I'd be all good with that. When that chance came along, it was suddenly time to put my money where my mouth hand been. It went pretty well last year, and it seemed like the teacher and class got a lot from it. Enough that he asked if I'd be willing to come back and do it again this year. As it'd gone well before, I said, “Sure.”

And then I realized that, a year ago, I'd still been reading a lot on suicide and grief. At the time, I was still trying to get a handle on what'd happened and what was going on with me. However, I haven't felt much need to be reading or looking into that anywhere near as much in the last 10 months or so. I didn't have the same information at my fingertips I did before. So I had to sit down and go through some of the stuff I'd read and get some notes together. The last thing I wanted to do was stand up in front of the class and be, “Uhh.....suicide happens a lot. And it's bad. Uhh......any questions?” So I got a lot of stuff together.

One thing I pulled up is something I'd brought along last year. It was a piece I'd written up about six months after her death, trying to describe what it was like for me. It seemed like a lot of people didn't get it, and so that'd be the best I could do to help with that. When I presented to the class last year, I ended with that, and figured I'd do the same this time, too. The whole thing is about two pages typed out, but here's some of it:

It's kind of like what happens when you get a bad cold or flu. It's hard to think straight. I know what's going on around me and where I am, but getting the thoughts into coherent order is hard, sometimes impossible. Things suddenly feel unreal, even if it's circumstances that have been familiar for years or more. Sometimes those simple, basic things just don't click or make sense. In an abstract sense, they do. The ideas are still there. Getting them to click together, though, to feel like they've become REAL, is sometimes just impossible. It's like trying to put together a 3D puzzle with pieces made of barely-tinted glass that's coated in oil. Along with that, the level of energy present for doing much of anything is drastically reduced. The thoughts come to mind more than once that it's like watching the Energizer Bunny trying to keep “going and going and going” with only one or two of it's four batteries. There's no lively little step or smart rap of the drum. Instead, it looks like it's trying to drag its way through a swamp of cold molasses, wondering how many more times it can hit the drum before its arms just go dead and drop. Sometimes it's better, sometimes not so much, but it's never what it used to be as far as energy for doing—or even enjoying—things goes.
Suddenly even normal, routine things are complicated and hard to understand and kind of scary. It's again like having the bad flu and having to go up or down stairs when I'm weak and shaky and my balance & equilibrium are just shot. Something like walking into the grocery store where I've been dozens of times before feels like walking through a field of tazer mines. They're not going to kill me, but I don't know when something will suddenly pop up and hit like a blast of electricity...and hurt. The same is even true about thinking about who's now gone, who's been lost. It's kind of scary, as there's no way to know what will suddenly pop up in association with those thoughts. And none of them will just take me out, remove consciousness, no matter how bad they hurt. If several go off in a row, they just keep adding to each other....and taking what there is of me at the time apart. When it gets bad, reality starts to bend, and what's most scary about that is that at those times I'm aware there's less of me to be afraid than there was before it happened.
Thinking gets just....strange. Odd and unexpected thoughts come up sometimes. Some of them make sense, like wondering why it happened or what I did to bring this to myself in this life. Sometimes it seems like life's not worth living, especially when it hurts that bad. It's not the thought of ending myself, but just wondering what the point is anymore. It's hard to see something good coming. It's hard to see much in the future at all. In that way, it's like coming back to consciousness in the middle of a thick forest in heavy fog. I can see about five feet in front of me but that's it, and I have to get out. There's no way to hurry, too many low-hanging branches and rocks and unstable footing. I just have to pick a direction and hope I'm going the right way, 'cause I just....don't.....know. And it seems to go on and on and on and on and on.....with no real way to tell whether I'm getting anywhere or not. I just know I can't stay where I've been. Sometimes my brain just seems to shut off and I find myself staring at whatever's there for....I don't know how long. Especially if there's not someone else there that snaps me out of it.
One of the things that also stands out is that humor and joy are pretty much just gone. For awhile, sure, there's nothing that's funny or in which I find joy. That's bad, but not the worst of it. The worst comes a bit later when I started regaining at least the wish for it, the impulse to sing a song or make a joke or do something silly and funny. In the beginning, the impulse would half-form and then die in a cloud of sickening futility and despair. Over time, it's changed to where it doesn't die that quick. Sometimes I'll get out a line or two of song, the start of a silly voice I'd used before....and then it collapses. In some ways, it hurt less when there was just no capacity for it as opposed to the conception and then abortion of some of the more enjoyable things I used to treasure....and take for granted.

When I read it off last year, I could still very much relate and connect to that. It didn't feel like I was all that far from that place at all, even though a year had gone by. This time around, though, it was different. This time around, as I was reading it to the class, I found my stomach tightening and getting queasy, while the thought came up, “Man, I was messed up!!” It wasn't in a derogatory or critical sense, more just one of surprise. I could remember having written that. I could remember that it had fit rather well. I just didn't feel the same connection to it this time as I had before. And part of what was so striking about that was that it wasn't something that had come from me thinking about it and reasoning my way to a conclusion. It was the initial, gut-level reaction to reading what I'd written and where I'd been.

I know I'm not the same as I was before. I know I've still got more to go with regard to healing and working on actually LIVING my life. At the same time, though, it's good to see the proof of the progress that's happened. And, as intellectual as I can be at times, there are some things where it's just got to come from experience, from my gut, for it to really sink in.

Since that night, I've noticed the feeling of a core of stability in me that hadn't been there before. Maybe it had been, and I just hadn't seen it yet. Maybe it'd been getting built over the last weeks and months, and it wasn't until I was hit by something else that I got to find out that it's there. I know it doesn't mean that there won't be times that will hurt. But at the same time, it now means that, when those times come, I'll KNOW I can handle them. I may get knocked to my knees again, but it doesn't mean I won't get up again. It doesn't mean I won't heal.

It doesn't mean that I will ever be trapped in the Hell of loss and grief due to suicide.

Blurring of Feelings

One of the things that I realized recently is that sometimes it's just about impossible to keep feelings separated on things.  Specifically, right now I hate what I'm having to go through.  I still hate having to take care of the bills by myself.  Ariel was always really good at keeping track of them and making sure things were covered on time.  I've gotten a bit better, but I'm still not as good at it as she was.  I also hate having to do all of the housework by myself.  Even in the last couple years of her life, she still would occasionally do some to help with dishes or laundry.  It wasn't ALL up to me.

I also hate the things I'm having to work through to deal with the grief over her suicide.  I hate feeling afraid of opening up again, for fear of getting hurt just as badly again.  Intellectually, I know the odds of that are low, especially if I keep in mind some of the things I've learned in the last couple of years.  It doesn't seem to do much to change how it feels, though.  I hate getting ambushed by grief by stupid little things that either never affected me before or used to bring smiles to my face.  Drying fruit on the dehydrator.  Singing in the shower.  Sometimes rolling over too far onto “her” side of the bed.  Looking at the fall leaves that've turned colors.  Figuring out how to cook something new.  Even as much as I've enjoyed learning what I have about cooking, it's very often at least tinged with some sadness and resentment.

The big one right now is dealing with a heart condition that reared its head about six months ago.  See, I'd been there to help her through some nasty stuff of her own.  The viral arthritis she had left her essentially nonfunctional for a couple of weeks,and struggling for some time after that.  I was there for her through it.  I brought her food or drinks or things to read.  A few days, I had to help her in the bathroom because her hands and feet were so painful and swollen she couldn't take care of things for herself.  Just being there to reassure her she's not alone, that there's someone around to help her out and take care of her.  And now, when it's my turn to be sick and hurting and scared....she's not here.  I'm having to deal with that all on my own.  And it's hard to believe that this isn't at least in part from having a broken heart.

What's hard now is that it's sometimes really hard to keep the separation in place about hating my circumstances and the issues I have to deal with....from her.  I know that she was lost and in pain.  I know she was terrified of what other people would think if she told them the truth.  I know she was terrified that I'd try to have her committed to a psych hospital.  I know she wore herself down by abusing prescription and over-the-counter drugs to either be able to wake up or sleep.  I know she loved me.  But when my life now is hard, it's hard not to hate her for it.

The best I can think for now is to let it ride out.  I try to remember what a wise friend one said to me:  feelings aren't facts.  I hope that, if I don't dwell on or ruminate (too much) about them, they'll resolve themselves and pass.  I really don't want to hate her.  I don't think that's good for either of us, not in the long run.  And yet, for now, that's what I struggle with feeling.

No-one ever promised the route through Hell would be smooth or clear.  Only that, if followed, one can eventually find their way to the bottom....and eventually out.

I Remember

There are a lot of things I remember. Some are easier to recall than others. Sometimes the memories are overwhelming, like a tidal wave. At other times, they're wisps of cobweb that I have to move very gently to get ahold of. Sometimes they bring the comfort of the sun coming out on a cold, winter's day. Sometimes they leave me weary and drained, like realizing at the end of a busy, stressful weekend that the sink is still full of dishes that need to be washed and there are no clean socks to wear to work the next day.

• I remember going for walks in the park or in the neighborhoods where we lived, holding hands.
• I remember talking about books and movies we both loved, comparing favorite characters or elements, and wondering how we'd cast the movie version of them.
• I remember how surprised and grateful she was the first night she got sick after we were together and I went to the store to get things like juice and crackers before coming back to her apartment to make sure she'd be OK for the night.
• I remember trips to the mountains in the fall to see the leaves changing color.
• I remember holding hands across restaurant tables on Saturday mornings when we went out for “us-time.” And the waiter who was surprised when he asked to hear we'd been together for a couple of years; from how we acted, he figured we were still in the infatuation of the first few months.
• I remember how my guts were tied in knots when we were exchanging vows in front of friends and family.
• I remember the deep, abiding sense of comfort and peace holding her as we drifted off to sleep.
• I remember how grateful she was that I showed up for her graduation, as no-one had done that for any of her previous accomplishments.
• I remember nursing a screaming ball of fuzz that turned out to be a still-blind kitten we found in our back yard, and marveling at getting to watch her grow and develop.
• I remember sitting on the couch together, my arm around her shoulders, her head leaning against me, watching favorite movies and shows. And times she'd let me lay my lap in her head when I was so tired I wasn't sure I could stay sitting upright.
• I remember working together on the staves/walking sticks we made for our wedding, and holding those same staves when we renewed our vows on our 10-year anniversary.
• I remember the nights spent at coffee shops playing cribbage or backgammon, and both of us getting more excited about good play or unexpected events than caring who won or not.
• I remember the Sunday mornings we'd spend at the laundromat, talking about nothing and anything while we waited and making a good team when it was time to work.
• I remember blushing beet red and not being able to stop laughing the time we were looking at tools in Sears, when she picked up a stud finder, pointed it at me, and went “Beep! Beep! Beep! Beep!”
• I remember loving coming up with puns to make her laugh, and even better when I could slip them into conversation without her realizing what I was doing. It got harder and harder over the years, but was always worth the effort.
• I remember times of touching and caressing and nuzzling and skin, learning how to please and satisfy each other.
• I remember waking up before her and just looking at her, and loving her smile when she'd wake up and see me there.
• I remember how lonely it felt on the mornings when I'd wake up and she wasn't there, because her anxiety wouldn't let her fall or stay asleep next to me.
• I remember the hollow loneliness of knowing she was only down the hall in another room, but wanted nothing to do with me. I remember the night after night of hoping she might come to spend some time with me, and the painful disappointment when I'd realize it'd gotten late, and she'd gone to sleep...and she wasn't coming.
• I remember the frustration when I'd try to talk to her about things that concerned me about us, only to be met with a sullen “Sorry” followed by silence.
• I remember the guilt when her episodes of screaming and pounding on things would get to me so much that I'd speak to her in anger. I never yelled. I never cursed. I never called her names. I never laid a hand on her, But I felt so guilty for being mad at her all the same.
• I remember the numb shock that dropped on me when the police told me they'd found her body in a nearby hotel.

I remember...

Regression...And Yet Not

One thing I've run into in the last couple of years is that life happens. Things go haywire. Unexpected stuff comes up. Things break. Medical issues crop up (which seems to be one annoying side-effect of getting older). And so on and so on and so on. Much though we'd like it to be the case, the word keeps spinning despite having to deal with the death of a spouse. Any mercy we get is grace or comes from the caring and support of people around us. We don't get a free pass from the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, no matter how bad it was or how hurt we feel.

As time goes on, we get better at handling the little stuff. The day-to-day stuff. Realizing the car's low on gas. Or that the milk in the fridge is all but empty. Or that the lawn needs to get mowed again. Those get easier. And as they do, we gradually get to handle things that are a little bigger with a bit more grace and ease. It sneaks up on us. I know I didn't see it happening at the time. It was just realizing one day that I'd achieved the goal I'd set of wanting to get to where I felt like I could handle a whole day at a time. Sure, not all days were easy, but I was at a point where I wasn't starting the day having to just think about the stuff for the first few hours because trying to think of more was overwhelming. It surprised me when I could look at an approaching weekend from the vantage point of Friday afternoon and not feel anxious or depressed by the prospect. I didn't know exactly how it happened. I still don't. But it did.

And yet, there are still big things that happen occasionally. Those are the kinds of things that are just part of life that everyone gets to deal with. They're the kinds of things that throw most people for a loop, at least for a while. In the last few months, I've been having to deal with having been diagnosed with cardiac arrhythmia. I'm lucky enough that it's not the worst type that it could be, and that it's not something requiring immediate surgery or hospitalization. Still, it's a big deal. The idea that my heart isn't quite working right is a sobering and scary one. It helps to remind myself that this is the kind of thing that would mess with just about anyone's head.

What I'm finding still gets tricky is this. When those big things happen, when they do a number on my head, when they leave me either hideously anxious & raw or just emotionally flat, when they leave me having a hard time enjoying stuff that had been fun before...see, those are the times that remind me of what it was like after me darlin' wife killed herself. And, in that raw state, it's easy sometimes to get to be afraid that I've fallen back into that fresh, painful stage of grieving all over again. One of the things that's rough in those times is to remind myself that sometimes feeling like that is just a reaction to normal life. It's sometimes painful and unpleasant, but it doesn't mean that the progress I've made has suddenly been undone, leaving me back where I was. It passes a lot faster. I've been better able to sit with it for awhile overall. Admittedly, sometimes I do better at sitting with it and not reacting than others. But, while it's similar, it's not the same.

Trudging down through the landscape of Hell, sometimes some areas look the same. That's where it helps to be able to look back up to see where I was and how far I have come, even if it feels for a moment like I'm back where I was. It's OK to feel the fear of that. As long as I don't stop on the journey down to get out.

The Rules of the Story

A little over a week ago, the younger brother of one of my best friends was killed in a hit-and-run accident. From what I know so far, my friend's brother was out on his motorcycle when someone plowed into him at high speed, and then drove off. No rhyme. No reason. It just...happened. On the one hand, it's not been easy being there for my friend. Death is always hard to deal with. A sudden death like this pokes at some of the stuff about my wife's death, which had seemed to come from out of nowhere as well. And yet, I'm glad I've been able to be someone he can talk to, can safely vent to. I remember having the thoughts come up I wasn't sure I could share with anyone else, worrying about how they might react. I also remember how much of a relief it was to be able to say those things out loud to someone who wouldn't get critical or judgmental or try to tell me what I should do or think. Far too often, it's underestimated just how much having someone willing to accept you can mean, especially at times like that.

One of the things he mentioned that has been hard for him is the idea that some of the rules got violated. I'd written about that before, but there was a different spin that came to me about it. See, most of who we think we are is the story we create for ourselves. We don't recall the past exactly. We turn it into a story so it can be understood and encoded and so other events can be put into context and assimilated into it. The same's true with the future. We make up a story about how we think it's supposed to go...or sometimes how we're afraid it's going to go. Either way, we understand the past and the future as our story.

It's a story in which we're the hero. Oh, sure, we have plenty of people around us that we look up to and respect and want to be like. We talk about them being heroes to us. But, in our own stories, we are the hero...period. As we grow up, we learn certain expectations of how the story is supposed to go. Sometimes we're clear on them, and sometimes they're lurking in the shadows of our minds, hidden yet still holding tremendous sway on how we understand events and expect them to unfold. For example, I don't know anyone who has the rule/expectation that when we get married, it's supposed to be good for a couple years, then go downhill, and then one of us bails out so we can go find someone else. That's not the rule...at least not for marriage. Same with having kids. Nobody figures when they have a child that the rule is they'll be happy and healthy and then struck down by an accident or illness after 15 or 25 or 45 years. That's not the rule we learned.

When something huge like this happens and violates the rules, it shakes the very foundation of how we understand ourselves, our lives, and reality. All of a sudden, the things that we were so confident of, often to the point of never before having considered they might not be true, lose that immortal credibility. It's like seeing one who we thought of as a god suddenly dropped to his knees, whining and drooling from a sharp kick to the ol' family jewels. Sure, he might get back up and prevail, but the belief in the invulnerability of that god's been shaken. Or like seeing the sun suddenly pop up in the west and zip across the sky to set in the north. Even if it only happens once, it takes an idea that'd been so solid as to make the hardest rock look like heated marshmallow and puts a crack into it. And it brings up a hideous question:  HOW MANY OTHER RULES AREN'T QUITE SO?

For me, it's shaken a lot of those things up. The one that comes immediately to mind relates to getting married again. How do I know she won't leave me again, whether it's for someone else or by ending her life? How do I know that, even if I put everything I can into making the relationship work well, that she will do the same? The simple answer, which still sometimes makes me feel sick, is this: I. DON'T. KNOW.

The only rules I can look to that seem that solid anymore are the ones I choose for myself. What kind of man do I want to be? How do I want to treat others? How do I handle my mistakes? What do I choose to believe? What do I hold to be important? That's about it. The rest have fallen prey to Heisenberg, to a greater or lesser extent they hold uncertainty to them.

In the book Escape From Hell, the story is an extension of a re-telling of Dante's inferno. This time, the main character Alan isn't the one being guided out. He's the one who's gone back to try to guide others out. On the way, he's confronted by doubts about who he was, how he'd judged others, whether or not he was making a difference. The only rule he was able to hold to was needing to find out if it was true that anyone could get out of Hell. Not that everyone should get out or deserved to get out. Just that they could, if they were willing to do and change what they had to. Along the way, there were heartbreaking losses of those who were willing to struggle free of their torments, only to fall prey to other situations that dragged them in and held them bound just as firmly, if not moreso. In the end, it came down to his own rule for himself, that he would stay to find out if it was true that any soul could be redeemed...if willing.

I still find myself, my thinking, swayed by the old rules. They push on how I SHOULD look at things, how I SHOULD expect them to go. It's scary to have to remind myself that those old rules aren't the bedrock principles I'd believed them to be. And yet I can't shake the feeling that, if I don't release my tendency to clutch at and cling to them, they'll keep me bound in my own Hell. Whether made of velvet or steel, chains are still chains.

And I want to be free.

Signs of Healing

In the last week, I've had two things happen that pointed out to me that I've made more progress than I might have thought. One had to do with a co-worker talking about how her marriage isn't going so well. Some of what she talked about, specifically feeling distanced and alienated and estranged from her husband, reminded me a lot of how things were with me darlin' wife, especially in the last few years. It was hard to hear her talk about that. And it wasn't easy to let her know that I understood and tell her about some of what I'd gone through that was similar.

The other has to do with the sudden death of the younger brother of one of my best friends. It was a hit-and-run accident, one of those things no-one saw coming or ever expected. Not surprising, my friend is hurting right now. It doesn't help having to plan out the memorial and figure out how to get to where his brother lived and having to figure out what to do with his stuff....and be there for other folks around him, too. I feel kind of helpless to do much for him, given that he's several hundred miles from here, and the city where his brother lived is just as far in the other direction. I'm glad I was able to at least provide a reality check and let him know that the stuff he's thinking and the reactions he's having are pretty normal for an insane situation like this. Again, it reminded me all too well of the time after Ariel died when all that stuff had to get figured out. And it also makes me grateful for all the people that were around me to help me through it, too. I still can't imagine that I would've made it through that without their help and support.

See, what these two things have shown me is that I am doing at least somewhat better. Even though it hurt to hear what they're going through, I was able to stay in the conversation with them. I was able to share some of what I've been through and thought and felt and done...the good and not-so-good. And though it stirred some things up for me, it hasn't left me a raw, shredded wreck afterward. Sure, I don't feel great. I'm not kicking my heels or cheerfully running to the next tasks on my list. But I'm not lost in my own maelstrom of anger and fear and confusion and sadness and resentment and grief, either. I'm bouncing back from that stuff faster...a lot faster. I take that to mean I've done some healing, that I've built up some strength and resilience over the last two-and-a-half years. And I'm good with that.

I'm not done on my journey. But I can see where I've made progress. And if I can help others along their way, too, then it gives some meaning to all this beyond just doing it for my own survival.

And maybe it's helping bring me darlin' wife's spirit some peace, seeing that I am healing up, that she didn't utterly destroy me when she ended herself. I'd really hope so.

Ending A Life

When me darlin' wife left this world, we had two cats. The younger one was one she'd bought at a local pet store that we really liked. He was special, as she'd previously sworn she'd never get another kitten at a pet store. She'd rather go to a shelter where there were plenty of perfectly good cats who were in much more dire straits and more desperately needed good homes. And yet, on this one day, somehow this little guy charmed her right away. As soon as I saw her point out to the clerk the one that'd caught her attention, when he brought him out and handed him to her, when the kitten just draped the upper half of him onto her shoulder contentedly....I knew we'd just gotten another cat. She named him Zen, and he's still with me now.

The older one was one we'd found as a tiny, timy kitten in the back yard about a year after we moved into the house. There used to be feral cats in the neighborhood, and our best guess was that a mother cat had moved her litter and somehow forgot this last little one. She was young enough when we found her that the vet wasn't sure she'd survive. Her eyes weren't open yet. At the time, she weighed about four ounces and was about half the size of my hand. We named her Moses because she was a foundling (and we didn't realize at the time that she was really a She). When we learned her gender, we just nicknamed her “Mo.”

Mo was my cat. Oh, she liked both of us well enough, and Ariel loved her, too. But she was my cat. At night, she'd sleep next to me. When it got to the point that Ariel & I weren't sleeping in the same room much anymore, Mo would almost always come and curl up next to me. She'd let me brush her out or clip her nails much more easily. And she got to be a big cat, too. At her heaviest, she weighed in at about 18.5 pounds, and it didn't feel like it was flab, either. It just seemed that she was a solid lump of CAT. When she'd come to greet me when I came home from work, it would always warm my heart.

Mo ended up developing diabetes. I've had to wonder if it had some to do with how we'd fed her from the get-go. The vet said it also could've been a genetic predisposition; there was no way to tell. But it was there. For awhile, it was controllable with insulin shots, which she accepted without any crying or complaints or resistance. For a time after Ariel's death, it even seemed to go into remission. She did OK without the shots, and I was just careful to feed her good food and control how much she got. But then the symptoms came back. And they kept getting worse, despite going back on the insulin and going up to some kind of scary doses. Toward the end, the vet said that there was more testing we could do to see if it was being aggravated by something else, but that it'd be expensive and honestly kind of a long shot. Not to mention there wouldn't be any guarantee that, if there were something else found, that it'd be something that could be corrected or at least controlled. And all the while, Mo was having a harder time getting up or walking around. The functioning in her back legs was failing. She was also loosing control of her bladder, which was making for some pretty spectacular messes. It was horrifying to realize that there were times her urine had gotten through the cracks in the wood floor and showered down on parts of the basement.

So about 10 months ago I had the vet put her to sleep.

I was very torn about it. On the one hand, I desperately did not want to lose someone else I loved. I'd just lost my wife; wasn't that enough? I didn't want to imagine what it would be like to come home from work and not have Mo there to greet me. Or to feel her flop down next to my calves as I was trying to sleep. I didn't want to have to deal with another major change that would require an additional painful period of adjustment. Hell, I didn't want to go back to having crying jags again. I know it's OK to cry and that sometimes it helps to get the feelings out—and yes, it's OK for MEN to cry, too—but I have never liked the experience of it.

And at the same time, I could see that Mo was suffering. It was hard for her to get up. It was hard for her to walk around. She couldn't jump up onto the couch anymore. She had to be lifted up, and it was hard for her to jump back down. Hell, she was having a hard time getting up onto the futon I sleep on, which was only about at her head in height. When she'd end up peeing on the floor somewhere, she looked so horribly embarrassed, at least at the time. She was as affectionate as ever, but her energy level was just not the same. I know she still loved me and was glad to be around me, but it was getting harder and harder to see the things that were making her unhappy, too.

It finally came down to it that I couldn't justify avoiding my own fear of more pain and loss by making her suffer to keep her around. I had to let her go. And one of the hardest things to accept about it was that it was as much for ME as it was for her.

Doing that changed some of how I looked at my wife's suicide. Oh, I still felt angry about it. And I still thought (and currently think) that she hadn't done all she reasonably could have to get help for what was going on for her. At the same time, it also gave me a glimpse of what it's like to see suffering going on that doesn't seem to have any good end to it...where there's no hope seen to be grasped. The details and circumstances are different, and in some very important ways. I can't help thinking, though, that the feelings are much the same. And when those get strong enough, they end up running roughshod over reason.

I still miss Mo, in some ways more than the person me darlin' wife had become at the end (and, boy, is THAT a bitch to have to admit!!). But I am grateful for the laughter and love she brought into my life...and the final lesson 'n' shift of perspective she provided when I let her go.

Thank you, Mo.