The Personal Journey Through Grief
August 27, 2008 by Anna Farmery
Filed under Affirmations of Life
I came across a quote from Dag Hammarskjold, which I think explains the journey through grief and the pain that we feel during that grief cycle
“The longest journey is the journey inward.”
It is long, it is painful however when you reach your destination, when you understand your feelings and when you learn to cope with being who you are – a widow or a widower – then you can start to move forward.
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How do you know when the person you are seeing is ready to date again? I am seeing someone who lost his wife around 8 months ago, he is still grieving for her. He wants to be with me and I with him but doesn’t he need time to grieve appropriatly? Do I leave him alone and let him deal with his emotions? I know being around each other helps him but once he gets home its very difficult. NOT sure if he is ready to date.
Marcy…Oooh that is a difficult one as it is not about time, it is so different for each person. I suppose I may be careful to protect myself, he may be loving the friendship, the closeness….I would say there is no real way of knowing, but as you seem to realise he seems to be still grieving. Be there, be there with friendship and if love blossoms in the medium term wonderful…I think if it was me I would be offering friendship at this stage, explaining that you want to be there, you will support him through with no pressure and that if something grows in the future well…but for now lets be there as friends….
I think for me it would be important to know he wants me…not just someone? Could you offer a strong friendship at this stage?
Marcy, what a good question! I’m not sure if your friend could give you a definitive answer. Everyone has different ways of grieving and the limit of one’s grief is as varied as the individual. When I met my late husband, he was dating several other women. We lost touch for a few months, he lived with a woman, and she died unexpectedly from a head injury. About 3 months after she died, he contacted me. I knew that he needed to confide in someone, and I knew that he wasn’t ready to date. I was happy to be his friend, and I didn’t want to be a fill-in girlfriend. We gradually got to know one another through long phone conversations. We discovered that we had found our soulmates in those long conversations. Then it turned into a devoted (but too short – 6.5 years) marriage. He died suddenly of a heart attack in 2007. Now I’m the widow who hasn’t dated in almost 3 years! I’m getting ready to find the star of the next chapter of my life. Eight months–he’s still reeling. It sounds like you care for each other, but you deserve to be number one in a man’s life. Like Anna said, given the circumstances and the grieving he needs to experience, you might want to opt for friendship and forego dating.