Tomorrow will mark the one year anniversary of the day Tony died - 365 days of widowhood - 12 months, 8760 hours. Will I ever stop missing him, his smile, being loved?
He was an inspiration to many, the way he handled his treatments, the chemo and radiation, the loss of his hair, the party he threw before his surgery, which was a great success and on many of the reports from his team at M.D. Anderson he was referred to as "a very pleasant gentleman". He made friends easily and because he was so good at it, I just coasted along - can I learn now to do it on my own?
Although he was a fighter, the cancer was very aggressive and I had no wish to see him struggle on any longer and so I accepted his passing and live with the loss of his loving presence in my world. There are days I feel Tony's presence holding my hand and encouraging me to move on. I try to do that for him but question if I will ever feel whole again.
I have been saying, get through this first year and I will be able to move on and be whole again and ready for the next chapter in my life. But the closer I get to this first anniversary, the more I realize how unrealistic those expectations are. What I didn't understand is that moving through grief is not the same thing as finding a door at the end of a dark tunnel and walking through it - no, it doesn't work that way. I acknowledge now that the second year of widowhood is not going to be a sunny stroll on the other side of a tunnel door that I had imagined. It is going to be a step by step climb as I rebuild my life and find "me" again. The woman who is sometimes wise, sometimes silly but always wanting to honor what Tony and I had together by striving towards being as upbeat and lacking in self-pity as he was.
And the first year I just came through? What was it all about? I would answer, it was all about survival.