Life Didn’t Go As Planned

“Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime, and falling in at night. I miss you like hell.”

― Edna St. Vincent Millay

You know how it goes - life keeps you busy, and daily routines provide the structure we all follow without thinking about it. We can predict our tomorrow, next week, and next month, and life becomes a comfortable blur of activities.

And then, something happens that throws that routine, even your perception of what your life is all about, down the tubes. For me, it happened on October 22, 2022, at 1:30 am, and that was the day and exact time that my husband died.

We had been together for eight short years. We met on Match.com - seriously! - and after our first meeting at Panera in Chesapeake, VA, we both knew. I fought it at first: I never wanted to be in a committed relationship again (read Success Is The Best Revenge to understand). But he would not go away, and eventually, neither did I. We crammed many adventures into our short time together, and we had many more planned. Plans that we will not be able to fulfill.

He had been in a VA Home for two and a half years. The Home was fifty miles away, so I visited him once or twice a week, and we Facetimed the rest of the week. I will be forever grateful to have been with him when he passed. I just wanted him to know he was loved and not alone until his transition occurred.

The weeks after were a blur and filled with planning and notifying not only his colleagues and friends but all the agencies that needed to know he was gone. He had a beautiful and meaningful military service at Fort Sam Houston. His colleagues said so many wonderful things about his life and the impact he made on the Drug Testing world.

So now, all the ‘busyness’ of my husband’s death is over, and I’m alone. Well, Toby, The Cat, is here too. Grief is a weird emotion and can hit you hard one day; the next, you think your grief has played out. I think the hardest for me is knowing I do not have a partner to talk with, have dinner with, or plan my next adventure. I don’t feel connected and miss the hole he left in my life.

So, what now? Good question.

I have another book to write - a book my readers are asking me when it will be ready for them to read.

I have not explored much of Texas, which we planned to do together.

I have not volunteered as I had planned due to my time being taken up taking care of him.

I have not developed a social life since my life was wrapped up with his illness.

Writing, exploring, finding a social life, and volunteering will answer ‘what now.’

Bob would want me to live and take care of myself as I work through this grief.

But it’s hard without him.