Year 2: What Now?

I can't go back.

The life I had with G is gone. Gone. Nearly everything has changed. I'm still at the same house, but it's different now. In practical ways, like things being moved. In other ways, like the quiet, the emptiness - no sound of him walking down the steps, no signs of him organizing the freezer, his favorite foods missing from the fridge. His socks not strewn about the carpet. His perpetual "pillow stack" has been missing for 13 months.

The things that look the same, aren't.

I don't know how to go forward. What am I going forward to? I have no direction. I have no life partner. It's me and my child. He is growing up and changing. He is moving into a life that is a head of him. And me? I'm stuck. Stuck in the in-between. Stuck in the what-if-this-is-it?

It feels like loneliness and drudgery. Not fitting in anywhere. We are a family but we're not whole. We have friends and family but they aren't here. My coworkers are single and 14 years older than me or married and engaged and dating and 10-14 years younger than me. And then there's a family. Complete with mom, dad and two kids.

Weekends used to be family time for us. They are for everyone else. But it is so damn lonely now.

I was lonely before - but not this lonely. G couldn't meet a lot of my needs, but he did meet some. My built in best friend. Someone to talk to. To go to bed with. To dream with. Heck, to fight with. I hated fighting with him. I don't enjoy the thought of going back to that. But I do miss having someone who was here and invested enough to fight. Someone who cared. Someone to come home to. To hug. To share life with.

I am so awfully lonely. And HW hasn't been returning my texts really. And I'm finally listening to God and forcing myself not to text him first. Which has revealed to me that I've been using him as a bandaid for my loneliness. Companionship, interest, a man around. Gosh do I miss having a man around!

And the fear is that if it's not HW, will I be alone? What if he is interested in someone else? What if he's not interested in me and it is God's "provision and protection". But what if I am supposed to do this life alone from here on out?

Being a widow is desperately lonely. Oh so lonely. I bet remarriage would be too. But parts of it wouldn't be. Someone to hug and kiss. Someone to talk to. Someone to share with and listen to. Someone to drive places with, make decisions with. Someone to even do chores with.

A child is not a companion. I miss having a companion. And I am forcing myself to wait. But it hurts. Because it reveals the loneliness. If HW would just text me. I'd get that adrenaline boost that says I'm noticed, that I'm not alone.