Loving a Widower
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My boyfriend and I have a great relationship and plan to marry. His wife of 10 years and mother of his 2 children, passed away a year and a half ago. For the last 6 years of their marriage, they were discussing divorce and had lived a part a lot of the time.
He has come a long way and a lot of her things have been given to the girls or stored away, and I have been hoping that one day he will change his mind about being buried next to her...but i am not counting on it. She was horrible to him and i would never do the things she did to him.
He keeps posting messages on his facebook saying he loves and misses her. He says its from the girls but he never says that in the msssages. It hurts me very much. Am i over reacting?
Wish I'd had your mother's
Wish I'd had your mother's forethought.
This is hard.....for you
This is hard.....for you both. But I would be somehow talking to him....reminding him of how reality for them both actually was...not how he wished it was....he propably feels great loss...and guilty for the kids, and I would say its the only immediate family member he has ever lost....he may even blame himself for the death....
I would search the internet for others in your predicament, and for some counsellor who can give you some good advice or options to try....
Its not you, its him that has the issue.....he needs to let go....move on and make his life something that his ex wife would be happy to see from above....she would have wanted him to do right for the skids, and with you he has that opportunity....you may be their last resort to a normal family life...
I lost my father when I was 10 and mom never got over it for 10 years....the hardest for her was the first 6. But I would have been so much happier if she had re married really quickly and I didnt have to live for years under a one parent family.....I look back now and Im sure she felt loss but I think she also felt it wasnt the right thing to do to remarry....she actually used to not let me know about the odd boyfriend....
Im sure it will pass and he will find sense of it all soon....
Telling someone how their
Telling someone how their marriage was the reality of it is not your job. We tend to idolize our loved ones after they are gone. It is for the spouse to eventually come to that realization on their own. My first DH was a PIA, but I loved him. If this DH says something to point it out to me, it causes me to shut down and no longer be open with him. That is not what the OP wants. You want him to feel comfortable talking about his first wife. That helps him process his grief. Not talking makes it take much longer. It is not for an outsider to point out the flaws in his marriage. He has to come to this realization himself.
This is a tough situation. I
This is a tough situation. I am 5 years a widow and I still want to shout to the world Iove and miss my late husband. Losing a spouse is so hard. I can tell you that I still plan to be buried with him. I'm sorry. I know this is tough for someone in love with a widow/widower.
A year and a half is not very long. If I'm honest with myself, I should never have started dating until 2.5 years out. I did though. Definitely look for books and websites on being the wife after death. I have seen these.
I know my SO is sensitive about this whole issue as well. he's never met my late husband's family and they were such a big part of my life. I carry a lot of guilt not being around them much like I should. Although its hard for me to be around them as well. I can tell he tenses up when my late husband's name is brought up too. I hate when people bring up BM so I get that. Its just that me and my husband never had a bad relationship.
I have been widowed 10 years
I have been widowed 10 years now. And I can tell you that he is not ready for you. He is still grieving. I didn't date until the three year mark and even then was not ready. Everyone grieves differently. I still miss my husband everyday. I love DH but he is not who I wanted to grow old with. Sorry to be blunt, but it is the truth. He is not ready for a serious relationship.
The guilt for me moving on has never gone away. I am sure he feels a lot of guilt for moving on. I ended back up in therapy when DH proposed to me. I felt like I was just walking away from my past and I had no right to.
If you are going to stay with this, I suggest he does some counseling to prepare for a new partner without forgetting the old one.
Also, I plan on being
Also, I plan on being cremated and spread over my first husband's grave...I don't even live where he is anymore but, I am willing to be cremated in order to be with him and our son who died previously. DH knows and is fine with it. I can't imagine being anywhere else...
"I love DH but he is not who
"I love DH but he is not who I wanted to grow old with. "
DITTO!!!!
I still wish I hadn't dated so early.
My bf's family doesn't live
My bf's family doesn't live here. He moved here for his wife and her family is now pretty much his family. I spend every other weekend with them, I spent Thanksgiving with his deceased wife's family and everything. I talk to her mother all of the time because the girls are with her while we work.
We are all in counseling. One of his daughters has cancer and is very attached to me, the other loves me, but is having problems living with us. I have reached out to all of them and I'm not sure what to do. In September, I told him that I was leaving because he wasn't ready for me because of this same thing. He told me that he had an awakening that day and decided he needed to move on, and by the time I had come home to get my things, he had already moved all of her clothes out of our closet and packed some away for the girls when they get older.
He told me he wants to have a child with me. I am converting to his religion, which required me to contact my own ex husband and dig up a past that had been buried for 10 years.
She had a boyfriend when she died...he and their kids know this. He told me that she admitted to being with 50 people during their marriage. He even attempted to have a girlfriend at some point, but felt guilty and broke things off.
I know that if she hadn't died, he'd still be there trying to make it work, even though he says he was not happy and hadn't been happy a long long time. He's just one of those people who take commitment very seriously, and she was his first love. The girls even say in counseling that they can tell how much happier he is now. But, when I see that he is posting he loves and misses her on Facebook on Thanksgiving, when even her family didn't post that... it hurts me. I guess because I know that we wouldn't be together if she hadn't died. And it just is a physical reminder that I am the 2nd choice. It's been hard for both her family and me to be around each other, and when he posts things like that, it makes me feel like all of that work and all the sacrifice I am making to reach out to them FOR him, is worthless. And I pray to God my family doesn't see it because I don't even want to try to explain that.
That's why it takes longer.
That's why it takes longer. She died with them having a lot of unresolved issues.
I think its extremely supportive of you to be ok with her family. At some point, he is going to have to learn to be sensitive to you about this whole thing. I certainly don't talk to SO about my "bad" days when I grieve for my husband. SO has said the same thing though that you have, "we wouldn't be together if he hadn't died". I can tell that bothers him. That something bad had to happen for him to be with me (and he says for him to be happy with me).
You can't explain it to your family. Grieving is hard. You just never get over the loss, even if it was bad. Especially if it was bad. Again, no closure. Counseling should help him get to some point of closure, or else its going to remain.
That is EXACTLY it. I carry a
That is EXACTLY it. I carry a lot of guilt too because I know they have all had to have their world ripped out from under them just for me to be the happiest that I have ever been. It's not fair.
It isn't fair, but s*it
It isn't fair, but s*it happens. You enjoy your new relationship as much as you can. He needs to work on his closure issues with his late wife. If you feel that its best that you give him space, then so be it.