I'm alone since my boyfriend died yesterday and getting in bad shape. Please help me

I got up and buttered 2 pieces of bread. That's the best I could do by way of some supper. And poured some wine. My hands tremble when I go to do anything. I am just shaking a lot when I move. I will eat the bread and take the Seroquel to knock me out. I dread waking up in the morning.

I've experienced bouts of depression for years and years. This is something that's a new kind of awful in my experience.

I think the wine is helping me a little.

This can't go on and on. Maybe the grief eventually runs out of steam.

When you described how interacting in the psych unit helped you feel better and now how you described caring for your SO and then talked about the psych unit again it taught me something about you. You gain from giving Rose. For some dopamine comes from that kind of interacting.

Actually, my therapist and I were talking about that today in our phone session.

I can see you thriving in partaking in a group where your contribution is appreciated the way you described. I even thought of suggesting you seeing if you could donate your time a couple days a week in that psych unit tbh.

When you shared how you did have a dog and how hard it was for you to recover when your dog passed I saw a different side of you. I think you really loved taking care of that dog. I can totally relate to that. And most dogs do appreciate the care and love.

I am like that with animals. Taking care of them and connecting was important to me. I really valued them and when so many were injured in so many different ways from my neighbors dog I was totally devastated and I was treated like I was wrong to value them so much. Many people don’t realize how affectionate ponies and horses can be. They can really bond with an caring hands on owner.

I think as I mentioned that you may be greatly comforted if you adopted a dog. A smaller dog that is easy to manage. Are there any animal shelters near you? Maybe see if you can visit?

Thank you. I guess I pictured doing things like that, myself. It's the getting from here to there. I am very mentally unwell.

In 2004 I was in bad shape. I got into a "partial hospitalization program" at a university run psych hospital. I improved there fairly quickly. I stayed in it a few months. My peers in the program helped me a lot. The staff grew to dislike me and were glad when I left. My relationship with my s.o. was very troubled at that time. I got better for awhile. But a year later I was inpatient again. The relationship was very troubled again. As I remember all that strife between my s.o. and me, I have to recognize that, even when I had him, I had severe depressive episodes. Actually, those bad episodes happened partly because of that strife. So, in 2007, we got separate apartments. Then I was miserable living alone. So I'ld spend a lot of time visiting him. But, at times, I was content in my own apt. I fixed it up as nice as I could. He visited me now and then. Whenever we stopped being mad at each other, we would be very happy being together . . . for awhile. In 2012 I had a severe depressive episode. At around the same time, he started having signs of dementia and his mobility impairment began to worsen. I stopped working and found myself doing more and more to help him. By 2013, he would have probably been put in a nursing home without me. He couldn't fry himself an egg. By 2014, I was living as much at his apartment as at my own. From 2014 up until he died, I seemed to be more stable mentally. In 2016, he was in a nursing home for 3 months. I felt pretty well over those 3 months. I was content in my apartment alone. I went nearly every day to the nursing home and did a lot of his care. He came home, and I basically moved in with him at his place. So we then had almost 4 years together. I think that was the happiest I was with him. It was either stay and care for him, or send him back to the nursing home. I wanted him home. He needed me. He couldn't even shower himself. I loved caring for him. We just got closer and closer. He realized how loved he was. He'ld always loved me and knew I wouldn't leave him. We still got annoyed with each other at times and sparks would fly. But feuds just blew over, and we always came back to cherishing each other. In 2018 he got the cancer diagnosis. He was totally brave about it right till the end. He was also reasonably comfortable almost to the end. So it was nice being together. I could keep him clean and fed. And he'ld be happy. He lost the ability to walk. We watched TV together. That's all I needed to be happy. He got too frail to leave home. We just stayed together in the apartment. I made nice dinners and we watched TV together. Movies. News commentary. He couldn't remember the names of famous movie stars. I'ld remind him. Then he'ld remember. I'ld talk to him to get him to remember things. I'ld ask him about things that he had lived through. His mind would wake up like I helped turn the light on inside his head, so he could see better what was in there. He was good company for me a lot of the time. He was often very sweet. I just wanted him to not be in any pain, physically or mentally. The last few days I began to fail at that. He started to be in distress, physically and mentally. He was dying. I knew the hospital could do no more for him. I had all the hospice drugs. They didn't help very much the last night. In the morning he was gone.

I was glad his suffering was over. He'ld been through an awful lot. We both had been. Maybe that's why I was more okay right after losing him than I am now. It was a relief to have that dying process over. But now that little sense of relief is gone. All I feel is the loss.

There is more wrong with me than grief. There has been for a long time. I see in what I wrote above that I've got a severe mental health problem that I've had for a long time. But, in between bad depressive episodes, I clung to his warmth and affection. I had frequent intervals of feeling okay, even happy. I had periods of time when I wasn't lonely. A lot of the time we were in a good place together. I can't go back to that place ever again. I'm locked out in the wilderness of how awful life is when you are really alone. I don't think this is just another episode. I'm in this wilderness that's awful and barren. I've begun to really hate this apartment of mine that I've returned to. I wish I had died with him.

It's amazing I've survived this long.

I don't know what to do.

Before I met him I had been through such severe depression. It was all due to being alone.

I said a prayer for you. As long as we are alive, there is hope that we can overcome our depression and grief. I prayed that you will have a breakthrough.

Thank you. God bless you for your kindness

It's good that you spent time writing out your last post Rose. It allows you to see how you often responded to times when your SO did not appreciate you where you distanced and felt depressed. Throughout your relationship there were times where he emotionally neglected you. I think that was part of how he was though and not so much anything you did wrong. Yet, when he did fault and emotionally neglect you, you ended up experiencing an episode. I remember how it would take you time to work your way out of a triggered episode.

I believe you did love him Rose, yet, he did have power to hurt you at times. There are times a person feels it more than they want to, and they don't quite identify it where it's actually connected to withdrawing into a depressed state. And this often was something experienced in childhood too.

This was a period where you felt he appreciated you more too. So you were stable because this was a period that you felt your dedication and effort was being appreciated and respected and you were experiencing less emotional neglect.

In your grieving Rose, there are times where you will remember the caring things you got from him that kept you engaged with him. It's very normal to weep when recalling these moments. However, when writing out the periods you struggled with a depressive episode, if you pay attention it was triggered when you were not appreciated but instead emotionally neglected in some way.

Is it though? The last years of his life he really needed you Rose, and there is a sense of purpose in that where a person can endure despite how challenging it might be. Also, while he experienced dementia, he never forgot who you were, there was always a part of him that reached out to you or responded to you despite his deterioration.

This is known as survivors guilt. And it's part of the grieving process.

It's not really the apartment as much as it's how it has some of him in it and it's so disorganized and overwhelming. You mentioned his chair is there? That is just a reminder of his absense and it's taking up space too. Yet, part of you may not be ready to let go, and that's actually "normal". Rose it's only been a couple of months.

YES !! This is the stage of grief you are in and this is a very difficult stage. This is part of what you don't want to feel too.

When you shared how you were there for him to the end, I was a bit jealous in a way because I did not get to experience that with my parents. And maybe jealous is the wrong word to use for how I felt, except that I was deprived of being able to be with my parents the way I wanted to be with them. So, it's not about you but what you got to experience that I was deprived of experiencing. I did experience a sense of relief in that the pain of dealing with not being able to safely be with my parents was over. I think the depression I experience is from both emotional neglect as well as being intentionally emotionally abused. Also, it was so bad/toxic that it was incredibly embarrassing at the same time. I am very familiar to waking up depressed and even just wanting to take something that helped me to not feel all these awful feelings. I am very familiar with having little to no appetite as well. I also am very familiar with having NO motivation to even prepare something for myself to eat. If it was not for my husband preparing the meals, I would not be eating well at all. I also have boxes and pieces of furniture that I finally got from my parents. I have not had any interest in going through it or finding places to put it. It's hard to have motivation when dealing with grief and depression. I am familiar of having the desire of wishing I was not here to feel all that I am feeling too.

I actually do respect the things you do manage to do Rose as I know it's not easy. What I have learned is the only way to go foreward is by taking it one day at a time. I also know that there are days that are hard and just getting through the day itself is a feat all in itself. One day I noticed that the TCM channel was doing a tribute to Olivia Dehavland and I got to sit and watch her movies and I enjoyed that day until my husband came home and then I felt guilty for not doing anything else. She was not only a good actress that proved so versatile, but a very strong woman as well, truely one of the shining jewels of her time. So I enjoyed my day of being able to sit and appreciate her work. I just wish I had not felt guilty for that when I did not tend to other things that day. It would have been nice if my husband came home, noticed I was enjoying my day with Olivia and said, "Oh, that's so nice honey that you enjoyed your day like that as I know she is one of your favorites". That's something my mother would do though as she loved the old movies as well and there were times we would sit together enjoying one of these old movies, and it was NICE. It's always nice when another person notices things you happen to enjoy doing, even if it's not something they themselves care for.

A lot above rings true. One thing doesn't. I don't have survivor's guilt. If I had been dying when he was dying, he wouldn't have gotten the care I gave him. He was lucky that I was younger and healthier than he was. He was very fortunate that I was well enough and strong enough to be capable of the physical work of moving a mobility impaired man around. I don't feel that my still being alive somehow cheats him out of anything. There is nothing about being alive that makes me feel guilty. You can't just take a "catch phrase" and plug it into my story and assume it fits. I realize, O.E., that you are trying to make sense of my narrative. So you relate it to ideas you have picked up over the years. These popular theories are used by people as "short-cuts" to grasping another's experience. They can be misleading and involve assumptions that just aren't true. My wishing I weren't alive has to do with wishing I could escape the pain and despair I feel.

The hospice movement is something I am very distrustful of for a number of reasons that are related to concrete experience I've had over the years as a nurse and in personal life. They are very into preaching these pat theories about what a terminally ill person goes through and what a grieving survivor goes through. They brand themselves as experts on dying, and they pass themselves off as having unlocked the secrets behind some of life's mysteries. They lack the humility they should have in approaching families facing death.

We had the services of a hospice agency for a few months. They kicked us out because we opted to go to the hospital ED (or ER) and get admitted for treatment twice, after signing up with them.

That whole hospice dog and pony show turns my stomach. Part of their act is to presume to enlighten families about the mysteries of death and dying. When the hospice "team" shows up at your home initially, there's even a clergy-person among them who seems to represent some watered down, generic version of "feel-good" religion. I read the pamphlets and little book they pass out. That stuff is big into laying out the "stages" of dying that the patient goes through and the "stages" of grief that family goes through. They've got it all figured out in their pat little schema, which I think is garbage. They even dare to explain what lies beyond in the after-life. I guess the world's major religions can step aside and take a break on delving into these matters cause the hospice folk got it covered. It's cheap, fake, new age spirituality that they bring to your door, telling you whatever is supposed to sound good and reassuring. It's part of a brain-washing campaign to lull you into letting them call the shots on what medical care the dying person does or doesn't get. They have a deal with the federal government: save Medicare money by keeping people out of the hospital emergency department, and Medicare will cut them a slice of the savings. That's their revenue.

So I get a little prickly when someone wants to clue me in on "the stages" of death or grieving. I have to wonder what qualifies this person to "know" these things. I've been around enough dying, as a geriatric nurse, to have gained a sense of humility about what we don't know. Not them! They got it all figured out.

It's a natural human tendency to just make up stuff to fill in the gaps of human knowledge. That's how the Greeks and Romans decided what to place in their temples. Much of what they took seriously is now the inspiration for a lot of cartoons on Saturday morning. The market for "stuff" to fill in those peskie gaps in what is really known remains a thriving one. And the hospice folk are no slouches on peddling to the insatiable human appetite for the obliteration of doubt that feels uncomfortable.

Therapists fall into the same kind of error. They stand ready to provide you with all kinds of enlightenment on what has happened to you in life and how you got to be the way you are. It mostly revolves around the notion that "it's not your fault." People line up to drink that stuff in. I used to look at the ads therapists ran in the yellow pages. Any given therapist would have a long list of human difficulties on which that therapist could lead a client to enlightenment about: marital strife, phobias, history of abuse, addictions, gambling habits, child-rearing problems, depression, anxiety, trauma, substance abuse, social ineptness, self-esteem deficiency and on and on. Apparently that graduate program leading to an MSW turns people into sages. I've shared employment venues with social workers. Half of them are so screwed up in their own lives that no one should be relying on them for wise counsel. But every hospice team has one . . . ready to help you sort through whatever.

In the 2 hospitals we used, we got approached by members of the palliative care team. (That's the "pre-hospice" people who soften you up to accept the hospice people.) Their mantra is: "I have no agenda." What crap! They are the most agenda-driven people you're going to meet in that hospital. Like most hard-driven agendas, it's about money. As a nation, we're growing broke on how we finance and deliver healthcare. A huge portion of that expense is for care of people in the last few years of their life. So the name of the game now is: "Let's keep dying people out of the hospital." For 3 years I was told to stop bringing my s.o. to the hospital ED. The role of "hospice" in America today is to keep you away from the hospital. They're like bounty hunters, only their role is to NOT bring you in.

I guess that's enough out of me for awhile.

I was not defining survivors guilt the same way you defined it. Instead it’s the stage of grieving the person who is left behind experiences even if the person did everything humanly possible for the one who passes.

I had been confused about that when it was mentioned to me.. I was commenting on your statement of wishing your life ended when his life ended. The guilt is that you did not die too and not that he was fortunate that you were young enough to care for him til when his life expired.

That being said it’s not surprising you feel the way you do given how experienced you are seeing things from the other side. I have had conversations with individuals sharing some realities with me that many don’t know unless they work within the field.

Same with individuals that provide therapy who are a mess themselves but think they are somehow qualified to offer quality care for others. I have talked about some of my experiences when it was clear to me the individual across from me was really incapable of providing me with the help I needed.

So what you have shared doesn’t surprise me. I was never counseled by hospice. That was something my sister insisted on controlling. I did not agree with the way my sister handled my parents care. And she also tended to make decisions against what the doctors instructed as well. Yet I also noticed why when I saw the accounting where it was clear she was taking so much of their money instead of tending to their health care needs.

Nothing surprises you, O.E. Everything fits into your pat, preconceived ideas about how things are. I have not experienced "survivor's guilt" in any way, shape or form . . . or by any definition anyone cares to give the term. I don't have any "guilt that I did not die too." Someone "mentioned" that concept to you, and now you can't wait to run with it and slap it on someone else's story to show how deeply you understand everything. There's more than a thing or two that you don't understand. Your "understanding" will stay at a surface, superficial level, until you simmer down and stop saying: "I know, I know." all the time. Please respect my right to make a judgement on whether or not I have experienced "guilt." And let's leave your evil sister out of this. She is quite irrelevant to this thread.

I see that you want to relate my experiences to yours, as a way of . . . I don't know what. It's not serving to convey empathy. It's you going off-topic because your mind wanders over to an extraneous issue. That issue - of your sister embezzling your parents' money - is fine fodder for a thread of its own, where it should be left. I'm sorry for what your sister has put you through. You deserve sympathy for the awfulness of that experience, and you hunger for that sympathy and understanding, so you - sooner or later - squeeze "evil sister" into every conversation, as though there is some relevance when there isn't any.

Thanks for pointing out that should not have mentioned my sister. Ironically while I was writing my post to you my lawyer called. It was good that I spent time writing to you in that I was inside to get the call. Not good that my feelings drifted into what I was writing to you. Sorry for that yet thanks for drawing my attention to that.

Rose how are you? How are you holding up? @Rose76

Thinking about you

I got very despondent over the past 4 days. Yesterday was about the worst day yet, since he died. I hate being alone in my apartment without him. I didn't used to, when I knew I could hop in my car and he was just 5 miles down the road. Now I can never go to him again. I was pretty much semi-hysterical yesterday. I talked to a counselor on a crisis line. I was just bawling in anguish. She was exceptionally attentive and caring. She convinced me to come back to the hospital. The police, who were very nice, took me. I'm here now. It's not like last time when I liked the place. I'm in the unit for young adults. It's a much bigger unit. It's noisy. Staff doesn't talk to patients like on the other unit.

I'm despairing of getting better like I did before.

I am sorry this unit is so busy that staff doesn’t have time to talk to patients, they might be short staffed like many psych hospitals, and young adults sure could be nosy. I hope it gets a little better and you’ll find it helpful in some capacity. We are with you in spirit. Maybe there is something you can find pleasure in like food or reading or tv or maybe there is a courtyard you can enjoy etc etc

Hugs

Can you ask to transfer to the other unit that was smaller and quieter where the staff was nicer?

I'm over here because the other unit (for patients over 5p) is full. It may stay that way. Other patients over 50 may show up and be considered higher priority.

No courtyard. Can't even open the blinds in the windows in my room. No shelf of books here. I've found no one to talk with. No group today. Basic warehousing of humans. I hear the young guys talking to each other about their court dates and the rehab facilities they've applied to.

The TV room is pretty much like TV facilities in jail. Fiberboard seats are bolted to floor. Usually 6 to 9 guys sitting in there staring at the screen.

It's very cold here. In my room just a bed but no chair. Very dismal. The young guys are company for each other.

I'm scared they are keeling me here. I'm here voluntary. A counselor said, if I try to leave AMA, they will put me on "a hold." that's 72 hours.

It feels like punishment. I've been through enough. Then, looking fof help, I vet this.

I'll be scared of ever going inpatient again. I feel like I will leave here worse depressed than I came in.

I’m so sorry Rose! It was a little over four weeks ago I myself called a help line and that turned into a nightmare for me.

Keep asking for that transfer and let them know this facility is making you worse. That way perhaps they will keep asking if there is an opening there for you. After all someone may be discharged at any time.

Can one of your friends bring you a book to read? At least if you had a good book you could lay in your bed and read. They should consider letting volunteers at least bring in book carts for patients so they can sit and read in their rooms when there is no group and a patient doesn’t care to sit and watch TV with others.

Maybe explore on your phone to see if you can find some youtube talks on healing from grief and loss of a spouse. Even try to look up help for other things you are feeling. At least that way you can lay in your bed quietly and listen/watch a YouTube talk.

Also try to see if you can find TED talks to listen to as often there are really goods talks given by them. Just google TED talks on grief as there are some good talks there and I just listened to one myself.

((( here to listen and give Hugs when you need it))))

Sorry Rose, it sounds tough. Covid doesn’t make it easier either, psych hospitals are full and understaffed, tough times.

Thinking about you, I hope it either gets better on the unit or on a different unit or you’ll go home and it might feel better than being in the hospital

Thinking about how you are doing as you have been quiet today Rose.