Encore: S04 Ep 03 - Richard’s Wife’s Death

This week, we’re in session with Richard, who has been trying to avoid feeling the pain of losing his wife of 40 years. We teach him how to sit with his sadness, even as he moves forward into a new relationship.

 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
I'm Laurie Gottlieb. I'm the author of Maybe You Should
Talk to Someone, and I write the Dear Therapists advice
column for the Atlantic.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
And I'm Guy Winch. I'm the author of Emotional First Aid,
and I write the Dear Guy advice column for Ted.
And this is Deo Therapists.

Speaker 1 (00:19):
Each week we invite you into a real session where
we help people confront the problems in their lives and
then give them actionable advice and have them report back
to let us know what happened when they did what
we suggested.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
So sit back and welcome to today's session.

Speaker 1 (00:34):
This week, a man whose wife of forty years has
passed away wonders how to grieve while also moving forward
in a new relationship.

Speaker 3 (00:42):
She would say, in an accusatory way, You simply haven't
had enough time. You haven't stopped grieving. But this was
an excuse to put some distance between us.

Speaker 2 (00:55):
First, A quick note therapist is for informational purposes only.
It does not constitute medical or psychological advice, and it
is not a substitute for professional health care advice, diagnosis,
or treatment. By submitting a letter, you are agreeing to
let iHeartMedia use it in part or in full, and
we may edit it for length and clarity. In the
sessions you'll hear, all names have been changed for the
privacy of our guests. Hi Laurie, Hi Guy.

Speaker 1 (01:20):
So what are we going to be talking about today?

Speaker 2 (01:23):
Today? We're going to be talking about grief. And here's
the letter, Dear therapists. I lost my wife almost three
years ago. We would have been married forty years on
our next anniversary. For the last one and a half years,
I've been involved with a wonderful woman whom I'm grown
to love, but who lives twelve hundred miles away. Although

(01:43):
we talk on the phone twice daily, we get to
spend time with one another just one week in every
five I am going stir crazy living by myself for
the first time in my life. My depression gets deeper
with every passing week, and I can't imagine living this
way in the years ahead. And I've been retired for
several years, but I do host meetup group walks and

(02:04):
pickleball events. I also volunteer some of my time to
a literacy organization. Every hour I spend at home seems
like days I'm in therapy, but the results have been limited.
I would be very receptive to any advice you can offer.
Thank you, Richard.

Speaker 1 (02:21):
So, first of all, I can understand how hard this
is on Richard. He's been married for forty years, he
lost his wife, and he's really trying to adjust to
a new normal. And I think that people imagine that
somehow grief goes away, and it doesn't. So it's been
three years. He's going to miss his wife for the
rest of his life. The question is how can he

(02:45):
hold on to some connection to his wife and also
not move on, but move forward in some way so
he can enjoy the rest of the time that he has.

Speaker 2 (02:56):
I completely agree. It seems like he's thinking in this
way that I just have to get used to being alone,
and I have to get used to being without someone.
And in part, he was in a long distance relationship
in which he was alone most of the time. But
I don't think he has to get used to being miserable,
and it sounds like the long distance relationship is making

(03:16):
him miserable. So I'm curious about the choice of the
long distance relationship and why he chose to get into
that and how that even came about.

Speaker 1 (03:24):
Yeah, so let's go talk to him and see how
we can help. You're listening to Dear Therapists for my
Heart Radio. We'll be back after a short break. I'm
Laurie Gottlieb.

Speaker 2 (03:42):
And I'm Guy Wench and this is Dear Therapists.

Speaker 1 (03:47):
So, Hi Richard, welcome to our show.

Speaker 3 (03:49):
Hi Guy and Laurie, thanks for inviting me.

Speaker 2 (03:51):
You're very welcome. And first are condolences for your loss.
Thank you, And we would like to hear about your wife.
Just tell us the about her, about the relationship.

Speaker 3 (04:03):
Yeah, we met. I was a grad student and was
on an internship and this was nineteen seventy eight, and
we got married in nineteen eighty one. Michelle died in
twenty twenty September, so in six months would have been
our fortieth anniversary. And we have one child who's thirty three.
And it was a wonderful marriage and tough at first.

(04:25):
I was very young, she's four years older. But it
grew to be a wonderful marriage and it just got
better and better, and we both retired. She retired and
then encouraged me to retire, which I did so I
thought that might be difficult, but it was wonderful. It
was really wonderful.

Speaker 1 (04:44):
How old were you both when you first met?

Speaker 3 (04:47):
When we first met, I was twenty two, Michelle was
twenty six.

Speaker 1 (04:51):
What was tough at the beginning.

Speaker 3 (04:54):
I was very young. I didn't have a lot of experience.
I had a college girlfriend, still didn't know how to
be in relationship. Michelle being a woman and being several
years older, I think she had to teach me how
to be a good spouse. And it took several years,

(05:14):
and our son wasn't orange till we were married eight years.
We did that intentionally, and by then we had very
loving marriage.

Speaker 1 (05:23):
You said you didn't have a lot of experience in
relationship and you were very young. What was it about
Michelle that made you want to commit to this person
for life?

Speaker 3 (05:32):
She left in my jokes, and she was very funny,
and she was also very worldly, more so than I was.
She knew about art, she knew about Actually the two
of us could run a Jeopardy board, you know, kind
of mutually exclusive. And I love that she was intelligent.
She read the New York Times, so I that was

(05:54):
a very big deal.

Speaker 2 (05:56):
So what you're describing is that you were really good friends.
You really could have fun together. You enjoyed the same things.
You were really sympatical in terms of your interests. The
fact that you said that we can both run a
jeopardy board, You're both interested in world knowledge. It sounds
like you really enjoyed each other on so many levels.

Speaker 3 (06:20):
You know, we did. And she was also out in
the working world, which no one I knew was. I
was working with two other students who I also went
to undergraduate, and they were involved with young women who
were also students or just getting established, and she seemed
so grown up and confident. So that's what attracted me

(06:41):
to her.

Speaker 2 (06:42):
Yeah, Richard, you said that Michelle retired and then you
retired as well. Yes, tell us a little bit about
how you spent time during your retirement and how that
was for both of you.

Speaker 3 (06:54):
Yeah. I mentioned that she died two and a half
years ago, and she had lemonary issues, cardiac issues. She
was on oxygen the last couple of years. I was
essentially her nurse, which is why I also retired. But
she was very mobile. We'd made sure that I got
Michelle a mobile scooter and a transport chair, so we

(07:17):
had a very active social life. First of all, Michelle
and I every morning we have two dogs, and in
Michelle's last couple of years, we would sit and have
breakfast with the dogs. And you would think a couple
that was married forty years wouldn't have a lot to
talk about, but it was at least an hour more

(07:38):
often too.

Speaker 2 (07:40):
Well.

Speaker 3 (07:40):
We were always friends getting very emotional.

Speaker 1 (07:45):
That sounds like such a beautiful relationship where even forty
years down the line, you have a couple of hours
in the morning where you just want to talk with
each other and you don't run out of things to say.

Speaker 3 (07:57):
Yeah, yeah, I mean again. We sometimes read the same books.
Michel and I were, even in this day and age,
were newspaper readers, but it wasn't just about the news,
but we were interested in things outside of our own
personal experience. That was another commonality. We were intellectually curious.

Speaker 1 (08:16):
Did she have some time in retirement when she was healthy? No,
not really tell us about when she got sick and
what happened and how you found out.

Speaker 3 (08:26):
Yeah, she always has some cardiac issues and she was diabetic,
and it was just very difficult more and more and
more for her to breathe, to the point where it
was very hard for using the equipment to maintain a
healthy level of oxygen, but she persevered. Michelle had a

(08:47):
mobile oxygen device that we took with us. But that's
one of the reasons she retired, and that's one of
the reasons I retired.

Speaker 1 (08:56):
She said she always had cardiac issues and pulmonary issues.
How early in the marriage did these become a parent
Did you know this from the very beginning, or did
these become a parent later on?

Speaker 3 (09:09):
Michelle had gestational diabetes and she was told that it
would return, and it did, and she was on insulin,
lots of insulin. The pulmonary issues every six months or so,
there was a hospital stay for a few.

Speaker 1 (09:24):
Days, even when you were in your twenties.

Speaker 3 (09:26):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and it was undiagnosed, I mean really undiagnosed.
But they just sent her home. And this happened time
and time again. It was not debilitating, but maybe it started.
Every couple of years she said, I need to go
to the hospital, and she would. Between the hospital visits

(09:48):
she was more or less fine. She appeared healthy.

Speaker 1 (09:51):
Did the two of you find that alarming that she
would end up in the hospital and you had no
idea what was causing this.

Speaker 3 (10:01):
The doctors gave us some false comfort. There's nothing wrong
with her. She did not have a heart attack that
we could detect. They would send her home and we
would think that was okay. But it did get more
and more frequent, and then her symptoms started presenting themselves,

(10:22):
but that was into her fifties.

Speaker 2 (10:24):
Probably nothing when there's something chronic like that with as
an emergency and then things are okay. Then there's another
emergency of visit and things are okay. Over the years,
you kind of sometimes get used to it. What was
the point in which you, at least for the first time,
started to think, oh, this might be the beginning of

(10:45):
the end.

Speaker 3 (10:46):
Now, I think Michelle and I both assume that I
would outlive her, but neither of us expected or die
when she did. The hospital is it's got more and
more frequent. They diagnosed her with pulmonary hypertension. It was

(11:06):
prevax's COVID. The last time she went to the hospital
and I couldn't see her, and she was there for
a few days in my town, and then she went
down to Miami because they had equipment that they thought
she would need. They allowed me to see her for
a couple of hours, and then she went down to Miami.
Doctor Cole the day before she died, saying, prepare for

(11:29):
hospice care. And I'd been through this with my dad.
I was a project manager in real life, so I
thought I just went into that mode. I didn't feel
sorry for myself, and I was ready to receive her
and to give her the same kind of care with
the help of hospice staff that my father. I'd been

(11:52):
through that before.

Speaker 1 (11:53):
When they said hospice and you went into project manager mode?
Did you think it all so there's no tree meant
for her and she's going to die?

Speaker 2 (12:02):
Oh?

Speaker 3 (12:02):
Yeah, because that's what hospice is.

Speaker 1 (12:06):
Yes, What was that like for you?

Speaker 3 (12:08):
I didn't have time because I think it was maybe
twelve hours before I got a call at two in
the morning and the doctor said, I'm sorry, she doesn't
have long to live. I think they tried me and
I actually was exhausted and I fell asleep. They tried
me about eleven PM and I slept through it, and

(12:31):
then they tried me at two saying we tried to
get in touch with you, and now Michelle has only minutes.
And I stayed on the phone and they told me
she had passed.

Speaker 2 (12:40):
So you didn't have a chance to speak to her
or to say goodbye to her.

Speaker 3 (12:46):
No, when Michelle was in the local hospital before she
was transferred, they gave me a couple of hours with her,
and then the transport came, and I didn't expect that
that would be the last time I saw Michelle.

Speaker 2 (13:01):
Richard, I'm glad you said you were a project manager,
because part of what I'm hearing is that in some
of these most difficult moments you went into project manager mode.
There were things to be done, like, oh, hospice, been
through that with my dad, know what to do, Let's
get on it. And it sounds like you were in
that mode, which was useful to you because it was

(13:22):
kind of protective. I don't think you feel as much
in project manager mode as you might if you were
just present with what was going on. And my question is,
at what point did you stop being in project manager
mode and start to feel the loss of what was

(13:43):
happening around you.

Speaker 3 (13:45):
So two fifteen in the morning, I called my brother
and I'm in shock, and then he called people. I
didn't get any sleep, and the next day I was
in the kitchen and you could see from the kitchen
into the living room where we used to be every
morning for a couple of hours, and I absolutely broke down.

(14:07):
We were all in lockdown, and I don't know where
I would have gone, but I felt trapped. But because
we were in lockdown, Michelle and I had friends and
I had relatives who are actually working from home, and
they wrote in a rotation. They would talk to me
after I walked the dogs at seven am. And that's

(14:30):
how I survived for two or three weeks. Of course,
you know, even close friends and family will do that
for only so long, but it really really helped. I
knew I would need an abreathment group, and what am
I going to do? I can't leave the house a
breathmen with a widower's group, and I found an organization.
It became an online community of called Stitch, and members

(14:52):
would host events, including bereavement groups with a widowisch groups.
That's how I handled it, and that last did for
quite some time, and I got so involved with Stitch
and met so many people. I think it was five
or six hours a day. I would be involved in
various events.

Speaker 2 (15:11):
You mentioned that you called your brother first. I'm curious
about your son.

Speaker 3 (15:16):
My son was living with us at the time. He
had his own medical issues. He was recovering and he
was living with us. I forgot that.

Speaker 1 (15:26):
How old was he He was thirty one.

Speaker 2 (15:29):
How long was he with you after Michelle died?

Speaker 3 (15:33):
Michelle died September twenty twenty, and he was with me
till April. Yeah, we had a fraught relationship. There was
a history of that, but I have to say we
did not provide the support for each other that we
should have.

Speaker 1 (15:52):
So while you were spending about five hours a day
with Stitch at the bereavement.

Speaker 3 (15:58):
Group, I stopped attending the readment groups after a few weeks.
It was very social, there were games and chats and anyway,
meeting people from all over Canada, Britain, Australia and all
over the US.

Speaker 1 (16:12):
And what was happening with your son? What was he
doing with his grief since you were living together.

Speaker 3 (16:18):
My son was uncommunicative before and after Michelle's passing. He
might have felt the same thing, but I almost felt
more alone, if it makes sense, with him in the house,
and that had been for a.

Speaker 2 (16:35):
While because of the disconnect emotionally between the two.

Speaker 3 (16:39):
Right. I had a discussion with my wife. I said,
you know that our son and I will be estranged,
and Michelle said she wasn't surprised. It seemed like she
accepted that that had been the case for a while.
My son was forced to come home because of his ailments,

(17:01):
and now that's not the case. We actually have a
good relationship that we haven't had since he was maybe
in his early teens. And we talked to each other
at least once every couple of weeks. And he came
here for a family reunion, and I'm going down to
visit in July. Probably that's certainly helping.

Speaker 1 (17:24):
What changed, do you think maybe in.

Speaker 3 (17:27):
The wake of Michelle's death, Maybe because we knew we
just had one another in our nuclear family, it was
just better. I mean, it was just close. It was
in a relationship for a while through stitch. By the way,
he met my girlfriend when he came back for the

(17:47):
last family reunion. That could have gone either way, but
they really clicked. They baked together, they prepared for a
brunch that I always host every year. I can't tell
you how wonderful it is to almost be united. And
I don't know what to attribute it to, but maybe
after a delay Michelle's passing.

Speaker 2 (18:08):
You said you've been highly involved with stitch literally hours
and hours a day, and then you'll online socializing and
getting support in that way. And you said you even
met this girlfriend.

Speaker 3 (18:20):
Right, Well, we broke up three months ago after nearly
two year relationship.

Speaker 2 (18:26):
Who broke up with whom?

Speaker 3 (18:28):
Ostensibly I did, but my opinion had been a toxic
relationship that I was grasping onto because I was used
to being in a relationship, and she would want to
break off several times, and I would beg my way back.
My younger self would not believe that I did. That.

(18:50):
I wanted to move up to where she lived, and
she nicksed that that's what I wanted, and that's what
I wanted because that is what I was.

Speaker 1 (19:00):
You wanted to be in the same city with her, yes,
and she did not want that.

Speaker 3 (19:05):
I wanted to be in the same house as Yes.

Speaker 1 (19:10):
And you said she kept trying to break up with you.
Why is that?

Speaker 3 (19:14):
I would be a bad boyfriend. For example, I try
to censor myself, but I would talk too much about
Michelle sometimes and I would be very nostalgic. We saw

(19:34):
each other one week and five. That was a huge
issue for me. This was all to the un end
for me, which was cohabitation. She would yell at something
I did. One time, I had a meltdown when we
were preparing for one of these reunion brunches, and she
threatened to leave. She threatened to buy plane tickets. I
apologize immediately, but there was no flexibility, there was no

(20:00):
tolerance there.

Speaker 2 (20:03):
So you're essentially grieving the loss of Michelle when you
meet this woman of a stitch and you're within the
first year of grief when you get into a relationship
with her, which is why you're still processing these things
and still talking about it, because you're still working through

(20:24):
the initial stages at least of grief. And she doesn't
sound like she was supportive of that or sufficiently understanding
of that. That's where you were.

Speaker 3 (20:35):
On that point, she would say, but in an accusatory way,
in my opinion, she would say, you simply haven't had
enough time. You haven't stopped grieving. You need to grieve more.
But this was an excuse to put some distance between us.

Speaker 2 (20:54):
Yes, but she's also correct in that you were still grieving,
and I'm not saying that you needed to have more
time to grieve outside the relationship. You can do both,
you know, if she were more supportive. You could have
done the grieving while you were with her.

Speaker 3 (21:10):
I broke it off because she said I could not
live with her. As abusive as the relationship was, in
my opinion, I would have done anything to move to
where she was in her house right, And that's why
I broke it off.

Speaker 2 (21:26):
So when Michelle dies, the first entity that's there for
you is Stitch because you spend hours on it, you
socialize on it, you play games on it. You're distracted
from things in a good way when you're on it.
And that was a real bridge for you because your
son's in the home, but you're not supporting one another,
at least not at that point. And then you meet

(21:46):
your ex girlfriend and your hopes are like, wow, if
this works out, I can maybe move and we can
live together and I can not be alone. I can
have that companionship again, I can have that friendship again.
And then when she says, actually, no, that's not going
to happen because we're not going to live together, that's
when you realize, well, okay, I've been putting up with

(22:07):
a lot with the hopes of that happening. But if
that's not happening, then really, I don't want to be
here because I feel lonely a lot, and I want
to be with someone full time. And then in your
letter you indicate that part of you thinks maybe you
need to come to terms with being alone or learning

(22:28):
not to be dependent on a relationship. And that seems
so at odds with what all your experience has been,
which has been like I really need this and much
happier when I have it. Tell us about that? Why
that thought about maybe I don't need another relationship, I
just need to get used to the loneliness. Where did
that come from?

Speaker 3 (22:48):
I think I got in retrospect, involved myself with my girlfriend,
perhaps for the wrong reasons. It became evident four months
in that it could turn toxic, and I kept convincing
myself if only I did this, if only I said this,
if only I didn't say this, if only I could
be this way, and it went on and on and on.

(23:10):
I pinned all my hopes on that relationship. But to
answer your question, I thought that was a problem. That
was a problem that I needed someone who was probably
not a good match for me.

Speaker 2 (23:27):
You said you felt you needed someone, and I stayed
in a very toxic relationship because I needed someone so much.
Maybe that's a problem that I need someone in that way.
And I'm saying to you, it's a problem that you
stay in a toxic relationship because you're afraid to leave
it and be alone. It's not a problem that you
fundamentally feel like you need to be with someone.

Speaker 3 (23:49):
Yeah, to illustrate the problem. Within days of the breakup,
I was on four paid dating sites and already dating
and it got me out of the house five seven
dates dates a week, sometimes to a day.

Speaker 2 (24:07):
That's you in project manager mode, you know, starting to
hit all the bases and do this and get onto it.
You're a good project manager, so you don't just going
to do one app and wait for things to happen,
because that can take a long time. It's competency to
get yourself a all for I'm still not sure I
see where the problem is. You're saying, well, I did
it with a bit too much desperation, perhaps a bit

(24:28):
too much intensity.

Speaker 3 (24:30):
Perhaps all right, the problem is that I wasn't comfortable
being by myself at home. I'm not comfortable being with myself.
That is the problem. I always have to be doing
something outside the home always.

Speaker 1 (24:47):
It's interesting you went into project management mode during Michelle
being transported and then she had to go into hospice,
and then you break up with this girlfriend because she
doesn't want you to cohabitate with her and move there,
and immediately you're on these other dating sites. So you're
doing all the project management stuff. But when you do that,

(25:08):
what happens is it takes you away from your feelings.
It takes up all of the real estate in your mind,
so there's no room for you to feel the feelings.
And so you then say, Okay, the problem is I
can't be alone. But I think the problem is you

(25:31):
can't seem to grieve. And because when you're alone, that
is when the grief will come up. When you're not
in busy mode, that's when the loss is present. So
you'll do anything to avoid feeling those feelings. So I

(25:51):
think we have two separate things that you're conflating. You're saying,
I think it's a problem that I want to be
with someone. That's not a problem. That's natural that you
would want to be with someone. The problem is that
you won't allow yourself to grieve.

Speaker 3 (26:08):
I don't know how to do that. I don't think
I properly because I didn't know how grieve the loss
of Michelle or the loss of this relationship. Friends of
mine would say, don't date right away, grieve the loss.
I said, what does that look like? Well, I'm in
another relationship. After twenty eight first dates and three second dates.

(26:32):
I found someone. It's a good thing, yes, but I'm
kind of second guessing myself. She's wonderful. But if it
was too fast and too much, I mean, I'm there
half the week, she lives an hour away.

Speaker 2 (26:43):
I want to go back to what he said just
a minute earlier. Yeah, he said, what does it look
like to grieve? I don't know what that looks like.
I don't write because you do keep yourself busy in
order to not feel it. I think you feel it
when you're home, because, as Laurie said, when you're not
busy is when your mind has time to actually start
dealing with the loss of Michelle. And I'm sure that

(27:05):
that makes you feel incredibly sad when you're home. How
much do you think about Michelle? When you think about her?
Do you try and get busy or distract yourself? Do
you sit with those feelings? Do you cry? Do you
talk to her? Do you memorialize her in some way.
Do you sit where you used to sit in the
morning and think of her in the mornings? How and

(27:27):
when is she occupying your thoughts?

Speaker 3 (27:30):
I'd see something in the house, of course, it was
our house that would remind me about Michelle. It's only
pleasant feelings.

Speaker 2 (27:37):
So you don't feel sad in that moment when you're
thinking of her. You're not thinking of missing her. You're
not feeling the loss of her. You're just having a
nostalgic moment and it feels pleasant. There's no sadness, less
and less.

Speaker 3 (27:53):
And tell the truth, I think it's more not wanting
to be here alone, not in a relationship, more than
grieving for my wife. At this point two and a
half years later.

Speaker 1 (28:09):
I wonder if it's hard to tell how much is
not wanting to be alone and how much is missing Michelle,
because it sounds like you really never did the grieving.
You never let yourself have the time to just feel
whatever you feel missing this person that was integrated in

(28:35):
every way into your life for the last forty years.
So there's no one way, there's no right way, there's
no kind of formula, there's no way you have to
feel or should feel. It's just that I don't think
you've felt in whatever way that would be for you,

(28:55):
and I think that that's why you keep second guessing.
That's why you start to say, I'm not sure what
I'm doing or about this current relationship. But I think
that you're going to need to feel some of those
feelings that you've been blocking so that you can feel

(29:16):
a little bit more free. And that doesn't mean that
you moved on. We say with grief, you move forward,
but that person that you've lost is always there with
you in some way, it's integrated into this new normal
for you. And I just don't think you can integrate
that until you've felt the feelings. When you say I

(29:39):
have these pleasant memories, I imagine that it feels good because
they were pleasant, but also sad because she's not there
to have those two hour breakfasts with. Then she's not
there to share your life with and to read the
paper with and to have those conversations with that you
loved having with her. Even right now, as we're talking

(30:00):
and you're choking up a little bit, that tells us
that the feelings are there. What's it like to just
sit here with us right now and to feel a
little bit of that choking up that sadness.

Speaker 3 (30:16):
Yeah, I'm feeling sad now. And of course I kind
of thought that my grieving was over after some period
of time and I got more involved with other things.
And of course, as I described to you, at first,
it was horrible, and I relied on other people and
we had breakfast together every morning. We spend a retirement
that I would think would be difficult was the best thing.

Speaker 1 (30:39):
What you just said was so important that you imagine
retirement with each other. Yeah, And it turned out that
retirement you said was the best thing, but you didn't
get to have that because she died so soon. Yes,
and so what's it like to sit with that that loss?
So I see it all over your face, But I

(31:01):
don't know if you're connecting with the sadness.

Speaker 3 (31:05):
What I could say about that is I'm looking for
that again and someone else. That's how it feels.

Speaker 2 (31:12):
I think that's what you do with the sadness you
think of Michelle, A nostalgic feeling comes up. It's the
morning you think of something. There's an automatic sadness that
goes with that because she's not here. And I think
when you start to feel it, you have this reflexive, quick,
instinctive response to okay, project, manage, do something, and then

(31:34):
you immediately go to I need to find that, so
let me do twenty eight dates in twenty eight days.
You do not let the sadness that's inside similar even
a little bit. You distract yourself away from it. And
what Laurie and I are saying is that if you
weren't in a rush to convert the nostalgic feeling or

(31:54):
the lonely feeling or the missing her feeling into let
me find a replication, we find a distraction, then you
would just have to sit with a loss, and that's
where the grieving happens. And that's what you're trying to
run away from. Essentially all the time.

Speaker 3 (32:12):
I am running away from that, which in my mind,
I don't know how to do with it. I don't
know what to do, how to use my time alone
for that purpose.

Speaker 2 (32:23):
When you have the nostalgic memory of Michelle, you can
literally pause and take a deep breath and try and
locate where that feeling is in your body. If any
sadness comes up, where you're feeling it in your stomach
and your throat and your chest and your shoulders, and
you can first identify where that's coming from physically, and

(32:44):
then you can say something to Michelle about it. You
can say, wow, I really miss you, I really miss
some morning conversations. I really wish you were here. You
can talk to her, You can get in touch with
that feeling and to be able to hold on to
it a little longer, because I think automatically it kind
of get snatched away from you. But you can intentionally

(33:05):
try and hold onto it and try and talk to
her and try and address it.

Speaker 4 (33:10):
Makes sense. It would take some practice. I would think, well,
what if you tried that now for a moment. I
don't know if you're close to that breakfast area, but
if you just look around, and if you just try
and evoke a memory of her nostalgic or otherwise, and
maybe if she were here, if she were able to
listen in some way, what would you say to her

(33:33):
right now?

Speaker 3 (33:36):
I would probably talk the way we talked at breakfast.

Speaker 2 (33:41):
Do it now? Say it to her.

Speaker 3 (33:43):
I'm looking at a picture that was handed down from
her folks. So you know, Michelle, it reminds me so
much of your parents. And at first it wasn't my style.
It's very kind of Greek classic, but I've grown to
love it because your parents and now because of you.
I remember how much you loved it, and eventually I

(34:05):
did too. I've see so many things in the house
that were so important to you. You decorated the house,
and they've become mine. It's a little sad because because
they've become mine alone and not yours, but they also

(34:26):
you evoke happy, happy memories, So I'm glad about that.

Speaker 2 (34:32):
You know, you started saying that, and then you start
choking up when you started saying they were yours, and
then you love them, so I love them, but they
were yours, and now they've become mine because you're starting
to deal with the fact that she's not here, and
then you choke up, and then you quickly say, but
happy memories too, to kind of get away from that, right,

(34:53):
But if you see, just put the break in and
just it's okay to stay with choked up. It's okay
to stay with you now their mind because you're not
here and I wish you were here. It's okay to
keep going there because that's how the grieving works. Grieving
means that you are getting your mind and your body
and your brain adapted to this loss, adapted to the

(35:17):
fact that it's not there. You keep running away from it.
So you do have to stay there and say these
kinds of things and continue that dialogue with her.

Speaker 3 (35:26):
And I can do that. I've never thought about doing that,
but talking out loud. I would want to do it
out loud, like.

Speaker 2 (35:33):
I'm doing with you, right, But you wanted to run
away from it pretty quickly.

Speaker 3 (35:36):
That's true. I need to focus and stay with it.

Speaker 1 (35:42):
I'm thinking too, Richard, that you didn't have the chance
to say goodbye to Michelle. Yeah, And I wonder if
when you're sitting at breakfast you ever think about what
you would have said to her, or what if she
were sitting there with you you'd like to say to her.

Speaker 3 (36:01):
Oh, I've thought about that.

Speaker 1 (36:02):
Oh, can you talk to her about that right now?

Speaker 3 (36:08):
Yeah. I'm sorry that we had a couple of years
of retirement together and it was so wonderful and we
were really rediscovering what was so great about our marriage.
And I'm you know, I'm sorry I didn't I didn't

(36:29):
really talk about that. That's one thing I'd like to
talk to you about. And how it was cut short unfairly,
but life is unfair.

Speaker 1 (36:38):
Do you see where you went with that again? To
the It's almost like the happy place of well, it's unfair,
but hey, you know life is unfair. So what can
you do?

Speaker 3 (36:47):
Not allowing myself to grieve, to get emotional, to move
away from it? Yeah, I understand.

Speaker 1 (36:55):
Can you tell Michelle what it was like not to
be with her when she died? Is there a picture
of her that you can look at as you're saying.

Speaker 3 (37:03):
This, Yeah, actually, I.

Speaker 1 (37:06):
See you looking there, So go ahead and talk to
her and tell her.

Speaker 3 (37:10):
Well, the last time I saw you, you were worried
about the MRI, and that was my last conversation with you.
Was trying to calm you and give you some comfort,
which is good, but it wasn't enough. I didn't want
that to be our last conversation. I still thought i'd

(37:32):
have time. I didn't know you would die. Even after
I was told that I had to arrange for hospice care,
I thought we'll continue to have our time together and
maybe together we could prepare for the end. And there
was no preparation.

Speaker 1 (37:52):
You're talking more about sort of what happened and what
transpired than what it feels like. Is there a part
of you it wishes you could have been there with
her and held her hand as she was dying. Is
there a part of you that wishes that you could
have given her more support than the comfort you gave

(38:13):
her around the MRI. Not that you could have, but
can you tell Michelle what the experience was like for
you of not being able to be there for her
and then not being able to be there when she
actually died, And to have this unfinished conversation that if
you'd known that you only had twelve hours with her,

(38:38):
what would you have wanted to have said to connect
with her, to say goodbye to her? Can you talk
to her about that.

Speaker 3 (38:47):
Michelle, even if you couldn't hear me, and hopefully you could,
I wanted to hold your hand and talk about are
forty years together and anniversary that was coming up. We
had planned to have a big adniversary and even though
it was difficult for you to get away to travel

(39:10):
the world anymore, we were planning something more modest that
you could be comfortable doing. And I wish I got
to do that. And if I was in the hospital
with you, I would have talked about those plans, giving
you something and me something to look forward to. That's
what I wanted to do, even if we both expected

(39:32):
the worst. I want to hold your hand and be
nostalgic and talk about each other, our relationship with each other,
and how it progressed and how good it became, and
about the people we loved in common.

Speaker 1 (39:49):
You were saying that you would want to give her
something to look forward to, But if you both knew
that she was not going to make it, what do
you think you would have wanted to say to her
about how important she was to you? Can you tell
her that right now?

Speaker 3 (40:09):
Yes, I mean you changed my life. You made my
life wonderful. You were my best friend in additions being married,
and I appreciated you every day. And I appreciated that
you retained your sense of humor even when it was

(40:30):
difficult to move or difficult to breathe, and that you
were brave. You were frustrated about restrictions, but underneath it
you maintained your sense of humor and the sense that
living was fun and you had a great life lived.

Speaker 1 (40:49):
Can you tell her, if she could hear you now,
what this loss has been like for you, And can
you really stick to your feelings as opposed to the
logistics of it.

Speaker 3 (41:05):
Not your fault, of course, but I feel a sense
of abandonment and a real sense of loss. I feel
aimless and purposelessness because so much of my purpose and
yours is to be there with one another. And I

(41:26):
couldn't continue to enhance your life and to feel your
love and for you to feel my love. That's what
I miss.

Speaker 2 (41:34):
I think that this is an example, Richard, of the
kind of thinking and the kind of feeling that you
need to do. Degree we both had to bring you
back to stay with a feeling, don't go to logistics,
don't go to your head, stay with your heart, stay

(41:55):
with the feeling. I think it's very difficult for you
to get in touch with how you're feeling, let alone articulated.
And you can see every time you start choking up,
you take a breath, and then instead of staying with
the feeling, you say something more casual that kind of
bumps it out into your head, or like, well, you
know you can't have everything, or you say something that
kind of takes you out of the feeling zone. And

(42:18):
that's the practice that you need.

Speaker 3 (42:22):
And that will make me less avoidant less anxious to
leave the house at every moment.

Speaker 2 (42:29):
You're anxious to leave the house because you don't want
to feel this. You're anxious to leave the house because
it feels to you like if I stay here, I'm
just going to be so sad. But you mentioned depression
in your letter, and there's a difference between depression and grief.
And you're grieving because it's really specific. You are able

(42:51):
to enjoy certain activities and you're even seeking them out
for the distraction of them. A depressed person wouldn't enjoy
those activities, but a grieving person would because those activities
are a distraction from the grief. And I think you
need to reclassify in your head that when I'm feeling sad,
it's grief, it's not depression. Depression sounds like something you

(43:14):
should do something about. Grief is not something you do
something about. You learn to tolerate the loss, you learn
to sit with it. You're afraid to cry. The minute
you start choking up, your breathing changes, your mouth clinches,
as if like let those tears through kind of thing,
and again it prevents you from actually going to that place.

Speaker 3 (43:37):
That's true. I mean I never thought it in those terms.
I thought I was depressed about being alone for the
first time in my life. By the way, I always
lived with somebody, college, roommates, whatever. And I thought the
depression I called it depression, was simply from being alone

(43:57):
and not with someone, which I was trying to to remedy.
I didn't think of it as grief.

Speaker 2 (44:04):
You were trying to remedy that by looking for a substitute,
looking for that person that you can live with, because
you don't want to be alone, because you've always been
with someone all your life, and in the first six
months after she died, your son was with you, ambivalent
as that might have been, and then soon after that
you had a relationships. At least once every five weeks,

(44:25):
you were with someone. But it's this need to not
be alone, and you're out there looking intensely for a
girlfriend that can become a serious relationship super quick so
that you don't have to be alone. And I want
to suggest that you're not going to find a substitute
for Michelle who will make you feel the way Michelle did,
who you can spend the mornings with in that way.

(44:47):
Who are youre going to have the sympatico about everything,
an alliance that was built over forty years, even if
the chemistry was there from the beginning.

Speaker 3 (44:55):
Well, I don't have forty years left if.

Speaker 2 (44:57):
You don't, but I'm suggesting that you need to find
something that's different. We said, it's not bad to want
to be with someone, but you do have to learn
how to be alone a little bit. You do have
to learn to tolerate that and to deal with the
grieving when you're alone, because if you don't, you'll really

(45:18):
indulge this impulse to just find someone else who will
be with you full time, even if the relationship's abusive.
You'll tolerate it for that prospect because part of you
feel can just be with someone, I'll feel whole again,
and you won't. In much the same way that it
almost felt worse to have your son with you after
Michelle died because of the emotional disconnect. You felt It's like,

(45:41):
I'm with someone, but I'm not feeling that closeness, so
it feels bad. It might feel similar if you're with
the wrong person full time. So part of you needing
to learn how to be alone is to not rush
into something to quickly put a patch over the grief
that you don't have to fully sit with it because

(46:03):
that won't look.

Speaker 3 (46:05):
Yeah, I did rush, but again, twenty eight first dates,
So I didn't jump at the first.

Speaker 2 (46:11):
Twenty eight first dates in a short amount of time
is not the definition of not rushing.

Speaker 3 (46:16):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (46:17):
I also don't know if you noticed this, but it
sounds like the only time that you were really talking
about Michelle was when you were with the other girlfriend.
So you wouldn't think about her when you were alone
because it was too painful, but you would talk about
her because you had the company of another person. Now,
the girlfriend didn't like it, and she wasn't very compassionate

(46:40):
about it, understandably, Yeah, well, but not so understandably. I mean,
you just lost your wife of forty years. I would
think that she would have some understanding that you were grieving.
But it's interesting that it was hard for you to
tolerate the feelings around Michelle when you're alone, but you

(47:00):
can tolerate them when you're talking to someone else. So
you would talk about Michelle with the ex girlfriend who
was at the time, and.

Speaker 3 (47:10):
By the way, with other friends, right, yeah, right, it
would also Yeah, I mean, my guy friends were always
part of couples. Now, maybe through the meetups and the
pickle ball, I have some very close guy friends, just
guy friends, which I haven't had in years and years.
When I talked to my girlfriend about Michelle and these

(47:32):
friends about Michelle, it wouldn't be mounting my feelings, certainly,
it would be nostalgia. It would be stories. I often
told my ex girlfriend when she complained about this, I said,
this was my life for forty years, and I am
my stories. Yes, And I started to just say I
did this, I experienced this, I like this, and excised

(47:55):
the word we. I found I had to do that,
but not with my friends.

Speaker 1 (48:00):
But even knowing that she could not tolerate that you
have a history which everyone comes with, and that this
history shaped you and as part of you and you're
sharing your experience with her, you still wanted to live
with her, even though she couldn't tolerate that. And I
think that that's a very important thing to consider, that

(48:23):
being in your grief was so intolerable that you would
put yourself in a different kind of intolerable situation.

Speaker 3 (48:30):
I just recall what you said before about the difference
you said not moving on moving forward. I was focusing
on moving on, and I thought, yes, I shouldn't talk
about my wife in front of my girlfriend as often
as I do in my head. I was moving on,
not forward by including my marriage my past experience.

Speaker 2 (48:54):
I'm curious in the first few months of UF that
she passed when he's I said, friends were doing this
rotational thing. Were you talking about your feelings or were
you just talking about stories?

Speaker 3 (49:07):
I was talking about my feelings. I cried, and not
just at the stories in my nostalgia. I would talk
about my feelings. It was a matter of weeks, and
then I moved on to STITCH and I talked about
my feelings and everyone did.

Speaker 2 (49:24):
Because that's a bereavement group. But you were on it
just for a few weeks. Why just for a few weeks.

Speaker 3 (49:31):
I don't know if I was uncomfortable or I think
it was because I knew everyone's what everyone was saying,
and there was a lot of repetition, and I felt
I was doing the same thing. So again, moving on.

Speaker 1 (49:45):
So you worried that you were maybe boring.

Speaker 3 (49:48):
And I felt they were boring me. I thought, it's
run its course, and these groups didn't start with me.
I joined a group. So after a few weeks. I'm thinking,
not only have I heard the same thing, which of
course was very helpful to share for a couple of weeks,
but that they've been doing this for I don't know

(50:11):
how long.

Speaker 1 (50:12):
You sound a little bit like your ex girlfriend that
you had this expectation. Why are they still talking about this?
Shouldn't they have moved on by now? They're funny, And
I think that's because you were hoping that would happen
for you, that you just didn't want to feel this
and you just wanted to move on as quickly as

(50:33):
possible without thinking that this is how they're moving again,
the difference between moving on and moving forward. This is
how they're moving forward. This is serving a purpose so
that they can do the work of grief and move
forward in their lives. But for you, it was I
have to cut all this off, and that will show

(50:53):
that I am done and I'm ready and I'm going
to find my next relationship and that's what it's going
to look like.

Speaker 3 (50:59):
Yeah, And I would check in on occasion and it
was the same people, and I thought, Okay, been there,
done that, I've gotten everything I could get out of it,
and I'm moving on to the chats in the games.

Speaker 2 (51:12):
Richard, Let's be clear that repetition is essential when you're grieving.
Any emotional processing is really done by repetition. Our minds,
our brain gets things really quickly. Our emotions take a
long time to catch up to the understanding that our
mind has. We can wrap our mind around the fact

(51:34):
that someone's gone much more quickly than we can our feelings.
And repetition is necessary. It's part of the grieving process
because you're feeling it again, but maybe slightly differently this time.
It's challenging, it's difficult because it's sad and it's painful.
But by going over it again and again, you're getting

(51:55):
your body and your mind and your heart especially adapted
to a new reality. That switch doesn't happen on a time.
You really have to massage it in and repeat it.
If you've ever had the massage, but strokes are repeated
numerous times. You don't just do it once, because even
the muscle needs the repetition to loosen up and to

(52:15):
be able to unclinch.

Speaker 3 (52:17):
Yeah, and perhaps these other members of the group they
understood that, and I didn't. I thought they were rehashing
in my mind, and I understand what you're saying.

Speaker 1 (52:27):
That's what your girlfriend didn't understand. She could not understand
why you were still talking about Michelle even though you
had just lost her.

Speaker 3 (52:37):
Yeah, I don't know. Someone told me you don't want
your deceased spouse to be the third person in a relationship,
which resonated with me.

Speaker 1 (52:46):
There's a difference between being the third person in a
relationship and telling your girlfriend something about you, And you
were telling her something about you and your experiences and
your history and your past. That's all about the getting
to know you. It's not like you just showed up
as this person who didn't have the last forty years.

Speaker 2 (53:08):
It's very possible that five years down the road, ten
years down the road, you'll have her thought about Michelle,
and when you've grieved properly, when you think about that thought,
and you'll turn to your girlfriend at that time, even
if it's in ten years time to tell her how
you're feeling. You will get choked up, you will get sad,
because that ache doesn't disappear, it doesn't go away. It's

(53:30):
appropriate when it comes to feel teary, to feel sad.
There's nothing wrong with it. That's what moving forward means
you move forward with the pain rather than moving on
from the pain. And so in your understanding of grief,
if you're talking about your feelings, it should be legit
to bring it up if you feel it, because you'll

(53:52):
probably feel it even for years to come. You kind
of touch that live wire and suddenly, oh, that thing
comes up, and there's someone there to here and to
support and to give you a hug like I hope
you would do with you with somebody who's a widow.

Speaker 3 (54:06):
Yeah, this new girlfriend, it's only been a couple of months.
Like I said, we moved very fast, probably too fast,
but she seems more receptive. It's early days, and I
can't say that I shared my feelings about Michelle's death,
but I've certainly referred to her.

Speaker 2 (54:22):
Do you refer to your sadness?

Speaker 3 (54:24):
No?

Speaker 2 (54:24):
Why not?

Speaker 3 (54:25):
Well, she's a wonderful woman, married forty years and divorced,
and I don't want to burden her two months.

Speaker 2 (54:34):
In with a feeling.

Speaker 3 (54:35):
Wouldn't be a burden with feelings? Yeah, with your feelings,
with those feelings.

Speaker 2 (54:40):
Maybe with any feelings that are challenging.

Speaker 3 (54:43):
That's interesting that you say that, because you know we're
just spending half the week already with each other. But
I was thinking this afternoon when I go down there,
I want to say, one thing I love about you
is your sunny disposition. But I want you to know
the only thing you've talked about that where you've shared
your feelings is about your ex and the acrimony and

(55:09):
the difficult divorce. But if you want to share other
difficult things or talk about our relationship in me maybe
most importantly. And it's so funny because that's what I
plan to tell her this weekend.

Speaker 2 (55:21):
That wasn't about your feelings, it was about hers. And
what I'm saying is that that's what you run away from.

Speaker 3 (55:28):
Yeah, I believe that. I wanted to tell her that
to see how receptive she would be, to see if,
in turn, she said, and you could tell me anything.

Speaker 1 (55:39):
I wonder what would happen if you were just direct
with her and said, I'm really loving getting to know you.
And I also haven't really done the grieving that I
need to do for Michelle. I'm excited about getting into
a new relationship, and I want to be able to

(56:05):
talk about all of my feelings, including the feelings that
I have about Michelle that still come up that I'm
still dealing with. I had a wonderful marriage, and I'm
feeling that loss at times, and I want to be
able not to edit myself so that if we're in
an elevator and they're playing a song and it reminds

(56:27):
me of Michelle and I get sad, that I can
say something about that or a memory comes up, or
I'm just having a hard day, because that will happen
in addition to the fun that we're having, because I
want both that I don't have to hide that part
of myself with you, and I'm enjoying this so much

(56:48):
with you, and I just wanted to get that out
there and let you know that this is something I'd
like to be able to be open with you about.
How does that feel for you?

Speaker 3 (57:01):
It does, And I think I said it. I was
going to talk about that I would welcome this girlfriend
to share her feelings so that she in turn.

Speaker 1 (57:17):
But it was a test. It was kind of a
it was it was like a trial balloon that you.

Speaker 3 (57:22):
Were It's a test because we've done nothing like that.
We've done nothing like that.

Speaker 1 (57:26):
It's right, it's fun, It's.

Speaker 3 (57:28):
Not necessarily a problem. You know, at this point in
a relationship.

Speaker 2 (57:32):
It is a problem. It is, actually, Richard, because we're
saying you have to move forward with grief. That means
the grief will be with you. It's a part of you,
forty years of your life. You can't put an X
on it. These feelings are given the example, in ten years,
they might come up. In twenty years, they'll still come up.

Speaker 3 (57:51):
Right, Well, I said it wasn't a problem. It's not
a problem because it's so early.

Speaker 2 (57:56):
Relationships, Richard, are such that you said, up a dynamic
early on in the relationship. You set up the pattern,
You set up an unspoken contract of what this relationship
is going to be about and what it's not going
to be about. And your contract right now is misleading.
You are sitting with all these feelings. There is grieving
to be done yet here. So that will absolutely be

(58:19):
a significant part of your experience going forward. And she
doesn't know anything about it and your inclination of I'll
test her and I'll tell her that I'm okay with
her feelings, and therefore if she can do that, then
I'll feel okay sharing mine. And a much better way
to do that is to just share yours, because it's
essential that the other person that you're with can hear

(58:42):
the grief, whether it comes up now or at any.

Speaker 1 (58:45):
Time, and having this conversation and bringing your whole self
into the relationship will help you not make her another
drug that numbs you from the pain of the grief,
because that's what happens. You're going into these relationships and
all of these dates because you're putting the needle in.

(59:08):
I don't have to feel. But if you really want
this relationship to be sustainable, you're going to have to
bring your whole self to it. And this way, she's
not the drug that distracts you from Michelle. You're getting
to know her, she's getting to know you. You're enjoying
each other. That's great, but you're also being real with
each other, and that's going to be more sustaining because

(59:30):
what you and Michelle had was being real with each other,
and that's something you're going to want in a relationship
going forward.

Speaker 3 (59:39):
Yeah, and what guys said about a dynamic being established
as we speak, I had never thought about it that way.
I'd been thinking, well, wait, it's too early weight, but
the pattern may have been established before.

Speaker 2 (59:53):
But relationship dynamics, I like cement much easier to mold
when it's sweat, much harder when it's dry, and like cement,
it dries quick. So two months in is a lot
if you're bereaved widower who's not talking about his grief at.

Speaker 3 (01:00:10):
All, And I have to move from stories which i've
shared to feelings to feelings.

Speaker 1 (01:00:18):
Yes, yes, so, Richard, we have some advice for you
to try out this week. And the first thing is
we would like you to join a bereavement group. We
know that you felt it was a little repetitive the
last time you were there, but as we talked about,

(01:00:40):
this is the nature of grieving, and we'd like you
to go in person to a group. And since you're
really good at project management, we're pretty sure you could
find one this week. And even if the other people
are closer to the loss than you are in terms
of time, you're still kind of a nubie at this
because you haven't really done much by way of grieving.

(01:01:04):
You've been pretty blocked for the last couple of years.
So we'd like you to say to the group when
you go there, my wife died several years ago, but
I'm kind of new to this because I haven't really
done the work, and I'm here to really process this loss,
and we want you to see what that's like with

(01:01:25):
this new perspective and understanding of grieving that we've talked
about today.

Speaker 2 (01:01:30):
Okay, here's the second thing. Michelle is all over the
home that you're in. She's all over the place, but
you don't really talk to her enough. And so the
other thing we'd like you to do is at times
when you're alone at home, would like you to have
breakfast with Michelle ten fifteen minutes short, but in that time,

(01:01:56):
would like you to sit where you usually sit and
have what you usually had, and would like you to
talk to her and say something like, you know, I
haven't done a great job of processing this and I
really miss you, but I haven't really told you what
it's been like to be without you, and I want

(01:02:16):
to tell you, and I'm going to start right at
the beginning what it was like that night that you died.
And you have to do it all at once, you know,
every day for a little bit, but share just one thing,
not a story, a feeling about what it was like.
Try and really stay with a feeling. And if you

(01:02:37):
feel yourself getting choked up, remember those are your feelings,
embrace them. It's okay, it's painful, but you'll stop crying. Crying,
by the way, has numerous positive psychological functions like release
and catharsis. It's a very useful physiological mechanism. So don't

(01:02:57):
be reluctant to experience tears if that's what happens. But
every morning that you're home by yourself, some breakfast with
Michelle where you try and bring her up to speed.
You have three years, so there's got to be stuffed
there just telling her what this was like for you,
in the moments that you miss her, in the moments
that you think of her, in the moments that you

(01:03:17):
wish she was there, that you wish you had more
time in retirement with her, all those things. One meaningful
feeling a day, and you'll know it's meaningful because when
we help keep you on it, you got choked up
each time. If you're not getting choked up, you're going
to stories try and bring yourself back to the emotion
and just express it and the feeling will come.

Speaker 1 (01:03:42):
And it's short because we know that it's hard to
go into those places. So these aren't the two hour
breakfasts that you used to have with her. These are
ten minutes.

Speaker 2 (01:03:54):
Yes, I can do that.

Speaker 1 (01:03:56):
And the last thing is we would like you to
talk to the woman that you're sing now say to her.
I just want to reassure you that whatever grieving I'm
doing for Michelle doesn't stop me from developing feelings for you,
because I am and I'm really enjoying this. But we've
spent the past two months where, unbeknownst to you, I've

(01:04:19):
been holding back. I want to be able for both
of us to bring our whole selves to this relationship.
And because I'm still grieving and I haven't really done
the work of grief, so it's a little bit fresher
for me. I want to be able to talk about
how I'm feeling when the grief comes up, because I

(01:04:40):
think that that will bring us even closer. We want
you to ask her, how does that feel to you?

Speaker 2 (01:04:47):
You might even say something like because there are moments
in which I feel so sad and I don't want
to have to hide those from you. When it would
feel actually really good, and then you've put your arms
around me, you take my hand, that would feel really good.
I would like to be able to do that, and
I'll obviously be happy if you needed that as well.

Speaker 3 (01:05:07):
And I understand now why there's also some urgency.

Speaker 1 (01:05:10):
To this, yes, because of the cement.

Speaker 3 (01:05:12):
Drying right, good metaphor, So, how.

Speaker 1 (01:05:15):
Does all that sound for you to try this week?

Speaker 3 (01:05:18):
Good? Thank you so much, oh our.

Speaker 1 (01:05:20):
Pleasure, and we look forward to hearing how it all goes.

Speaker 3 (01:05:22):
I will do that me too, great, looking forward to
performing these exercises. Wonderful, thank you.

Speaker 2 (01:05:34):
It's really interesting to me because so many people don't
know how to grieve. They literally ask, okay, but how
do I do that? Even if I want to do that,
I'm not sure how. They think the best thing to
do is just numb. So if I'm not sad, I'm processing. No,
processing is sad. It is painful. You can't run away
or escape that. And I really hope that he got

(01:05:58):
that message that yes, it's an active, intentional process.

Speaker 1 (01:06:03):
I think he was aware that he was using distraction,
but I think his solution for that was how do
I learn how to be alone versus how do I
learn how to grieve when the pain comes up? And
so I'll be interested to see what he does this
week with the exercises that we gave him to help
him get more on track with that.

Speaker 3 (01:06:23):
Me too.

Speaker 1 (01:06:28):
You're listening to Dear Therapists. We'll be back after a
short break.

Speaker 2 (01:06:44):
So, Laurie, we heard back from Richard, and I'm very
curious to see how he did this week with all
those challenging emotional assignments we gave him.

Speaker 3 (01:06:53):
Hi, Guy and Laurie, this is Richard. I just wanted
to get back to you to let you know about
my experiences completing the exercises you assigned. One of them
was to have breakfast with Michelle, as I did for years,
and you wanted me to talk to her about what

(01:07:16):
it's been like to be without her and to express
my feelings to her, and you wanted to know how
I felt doing that. Well. The first couple of days,
I felt very self conscious and uncomfortable. Eventually I broke
through that and I felt mostly despair is how I
would describe it, and I got very emotional once I cried.

(01:07:42):
The next phase I would call it was I felt
an intimacy again with Michelle and the comfort that would
alternate with despair, but I felt I was making progress.
The next assignment was to talk to my girlfriend and
to explain that I may have cut short the process

(01:08:04):
of grieving for Michelle, and to reassure my girlfriend that
continuing my grieving would not affect our relationship. I told
her that I want to be able to talk to
her about my grieving, which I believe would bring us closer,

(01:08:28):
and my girlfriend readily agreed, but I left it there
for now. I will talk to my girlfriend in specific
terms about my grieving and the feelings it conjured after
I've had more breakfast conversations with Michelle. My third assignment

(01:08:50):
was to join a grief support group. I found one.
They follow a workbook called grief Share. This was the
only group available on short notice, so I really didn't
look into. Grief Share turned out to be a faith
based program, but I'm not religious and the references I

(01:09:11):
found distracting, so I may look for another group that
might be more helpful. Thanks so much, Guy and Laurie
for your help.

Speaker 1 (01:09:24):
So Richard is really starting the process of grieving. When
he talked about the evolution of the breakfast with Michelle
getting to a point just in this first week of
toggling between despair and intimacy and feeling closer to her,

(01:09:44):
I think that is what had been missing he wasn't
able to feel the despair, and he wasn't able to
feel the closeness. He would compartmentalize those and I'm glad
he's doing what he needs to do, which is to
let himself feel whatever he feels, to really stay focused
on talking to Michelle about what has been like since

(01:10:07):
she's been gone, because he needs to hear it as
much as he needs to have the conversation with Michelle.

Speaker 2 (01:10:14):
I agree, and I think that those first couple of days,
with that first assignment where he felt really uncomfortable, that's
where he would have stopped previously. And I'm impressed that
he really got the message of no, you have to
stay with these things. You don't run away from it
at the minute that oh, I'm uncomfortable, let me run away.
So he stayed with it, and he started to feel

(01:10:35):
and he started to feel different things. And when he says,
I'm not going to talk to my girlfriend yet, I
want to have more breakfast, I think he's beginning to
understand that he has a lot more to explore, and
if he puts himself in the situation and stays with
these feelings, he'll be able to move forward. And then
when he has a conversation with his girlfriend, he'll actually

(01:10:56):
have something to say. So he's really being persistent way
that he wasn't before.

Speaker 1 (01:11:01):
And I'm so glad to hear it, and i think
it was a great sign for that relationship, whatever happens
with it, that she was so receptive to his saying
I'm going to need to talk about this, and whether
it's this relationship or another relationship, he knows now that
this is a part of him that you can have
both Michelle there with you and you can move forward

(01:11:23):
with somebody else.

Speaker 2 (01:11:25):
Absolutely. I'm also really impressed that within a week he
found a support group an attendedy. So that shows a
lot of motivation on his part and a lot of
readiness to really embrace this grieving process in a much
more useful way for him ultimately. And I'm also glad
that this long term thinking then is this is not

(01:11:46):
the group for me because some of the faith based
things don't sit well with me, So let me find
one that I relate to more. And I really heard
the intentionality there in him saying that. I get the
sense that he's under stood that he needs to engage
in a grieving process in a very different way, and
that he's really starting to do that.

Speaker 1 (01:12:07):
And I think an important message here is that sometimes
when people look for a support group around grief or
whatever the support group might be, if they go to
one and it's not quite a match, they do need
to find one where they feel comfortable. So I hope
that he doesn't get turned off by this experience and
think that's what it's going to be like, that he
can find one where he finds his people, his philosophy,

(01:12:30):
and where he feels comfortable. So Richard, if you're listening
to this, I hope that you'll do a little more research.
I know it was rushed and you didn't have a
lot of time, but now you can take a little
bit of time and research some of these groups and
find one that feels right to you so that you
have some support around you from people who really understand

(01:12:52):
what you're going through.

Speaker 2 (01:12:54):
And I hope you can continue, Richard, to lean into
the discomfort and to really your emotions as you've started
to do, because I think that ultimately you'll be able
to come out of it in a much better place.
Next week, a woman who wants to have a better
relationship with her angry older sister wonders if that's possible.

Speaker 5 (01:13:17):
I feel so attacked by her and her emails that
she's made it clear my vision and my view of
the past is the right one and the correct one,
and your course is not.

Speaker 1 (01:13:29):
If you're enjoying our podcast, don't forget to subscribe for
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Speaker 2 (01:13:44):
If you have a dilemma you'd like to discuss with us,
email us at Lauridguy at iHeartMedia dot com. Our executive
producer is Noel Brown. We're produced and edited by Josh Fisher,
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(01:14:05):
fairy Godmother Katie Couric. We can't wait to see you
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