Can't Explain My Reaction To Friend's Husband

KDR · 08-22-2013, 04:26 PM

Hi, all,
I can't explain my reaction to my friend's husband.
She fought triple-negative breast cancer for a while. Wow, did she suffer, and did she worry. We were co-patients, friends. We spoke on the phone. Met at the center. Shared our families. She, with two sons so cute, ages 10 and 14, and a nice (nice and nice-looking) husband. Things went downhill. She died last November 2012. Her husband and I have stayed FB friends and since her passing, it's been all about her. I'd see what's going on with the boys and I'd get to see her before all the tragedy.
A few days ago, all of her photographs were taken down. Every last one. There is an announcement on the page: In a Relationship with XX. Love notes between the two.
I felt so sad for my friend. I can still feel her, pink baseball cap and all. I know life goes on. The children need to move on. The man desires a woman. Perhaps the profound sadness really is about me? My own worries?
Time is short and is not to be wasted. I understand. And I know that over our lifetimes, there may be many loves. I know that we are all connected by love. Just seems so unfair, I guess. Maybe her husband is the one with the forward thinking, and I'm just left behind.
I don't usually ramble, but this got to me.

Karen

Mtngrl · 08-22-2013, 05:02 PM

Dear Karen,

It seems perhaps that you are still mourning your friend, and maybe you think her widower's actions indicate that he has forgotten her, or that he's not still grieving. Is it anything like that? Do you know him well enough that you can talk to him about how you feel?

I know women who have dated widowers who had not managed to put their beloved deceased wife firmly into the past, and into private memory. The house is a shrine to her, which may not be altered. He only talks about how wonderful she was. The live woman feels sometimes as if she's competing with the dead one.

I think I'd feel much the same way you do. Something precious has been lost. Someone real, alive, important is no longer around. You also express quite appropriate sympathy for the husband. He's all alone with two boys to raise. That's hard. Not many men feel they can handle that alone.

If at all possible I think you should meet with him and talk about how you feel, and find out where he's coming from. Maybe he thinks of you only as "her" friend. Maybe he doesn't think you care about him as a person too.

I don't know. If you were rambling, so am I. Maybe something in my jabbering will be of use to you. If not, then leave it.

Good luck.

Lauriesh · 08-22-2013, 05:20 PM

I really disagree to talking with him. He is moving on.
I think it is more of a reaction to your own situation .
I really can't stand the thought of my husband being with someone else and my kids having a " new" mom.

I think if I was in your position, I would unfriend him, so I didn't have to read about his new girlfriend.

Laurie

KDR · 08-22-2013, 05:34 PM

P.S. I left out she looks like a teenager, very young, very sexy. So I think I'm comparing this new, fresh girl's approach to the platform when someone so ill and afraid and worried was standing on it. Also, how would she have felt that it was just eight months or so...and she was replaced. While I know there is no length of grief that is "correct," it's apparent that everyone will be right here.

Karen

jacqueline1102 · 08-22-2013, 06:33 PM

Hello Karen,

Indeed, your post resonated with me. I am 50 and have a husband five years younger than me. There has been numerous psychological studies conducted on grief and loss. What typically happens is that when a man has a wife die, he yearns for finding that attachment again. The grieving process becomes too overwhelming and he will typically run from those feelings. The man will put himself on dating sites and if he has even a slight appearance of a good decent man there will be plenty of women who will jump all over that if you know what I mean. This short term distraction may serve a means as a way to cope with the depression and loss. A sexy, young woman also serves the biolgoical need of a sexual release especially if he and his wife were unable to have relations for some time with her illness and months/a year of decline. If his wife/your friend suffered for a longer period of time, then his grieving process probably began some time ago. Yours may have just begun at her death. That being said, he will need to be particularly careful that he not get involved too quickly with women who do not have his or his children's best interests at heart. He may place himself at risk for another heartbreak. He may need to hear that his children are grieving and that a "replacement wife" will only serve to injure them in the process. I have too often seen the grieving spouses only react with their impulses when entering a new relationship not giving any thought to how the children are doing. This may catch up to him. Hopefully, friends are advising him to take it slow for the sake of the children. I feel for you, Karen. I have actually told my husband that when my time comes to give himself a year to gireve, then find someone who is smart first and then beautiful. No dumb chicks need apply. And I have spoken to his aunt to help guide him in his next mate selection so that he does not make a hasty decision. That sounds practical and it is. But, trust me, I feel the emotional pain daily.

Ladies on the other hand will give themselves time to grieve and may not even remarry once their spouse dies. Men have more challenges being alone especially if the relationship with the wife was good. They want that connection again.

Take care of yourself. And perhaps it may be best to distance yourself from him if you were not close to him. You are grieving, too. Peace to you.

Jackie

Jackie07 · 08-22-2013, 08:49 PM

Father-in-law had taken good care of my late Mother-in-law for a good while (driving her everywhere for several years; 2 years home health care; 3 years in the nursing home where he visited twice a day to help feed her lunch/supper). Not long after her funeral, when he finally got over his depressive mood, one day he suddenly announced that he's going to locate a woman (in her late 40's?) he had met while helping Mother-in-law deliver Avon several years prior.

He did not find the lady at her old address. But he snapped out of the depression soon after. That happened 4 1/2 years ago. Now FIL is 90 1/2, and I've not heard him mentioning anything about it ever since.

I truly believe the focus needs to be on the well being of the surviving spouse instead of the deceased or the feelings of other people (family members/relatives/friends/...) except young children/teens.

Do need to admit that I've been told that I don't think like most people. When I was in a semi-comatose state in ICU after a long brain surgery in summer, 1990, I'd tell hubby to go date the nurses who were helping me. (Of course I did not have any memory of it.

I had told him before the surgery that it's OK for him to find a new love/wife in case I didn't make it even though I'd also told him a bunch of Chinese ghost stories about how a deceased wife would haunt her unfaithful husband. The stories had been told a couple of years prior (just after our wedding?) and didn't scare him as he didn't think Chinese ghosts would have any power over a Gringo ...

Rolepaul · 08-23-2013, 08:11 AM

It is likely that the man's mourning started with the knowledge that his wife was not going to survive her illness. My mother-in-law lost her husband due to a heart attack and it was three years before she started to think about herself again. Her new husband was married to a woman with a health care diagnosis that took three years to cause her death. She actually meet my mother in law and told her husband, Anatoli, that this is the woman she should marry when she was gone. Marianna and Anatoli were a couple six months after Anatoli's wife's death. They have been together 14 years at this point.
The thought might be that you are not ready to lose the fight and you want to be remembered. You have made important contributions to your family. You might think of this as being disrespectful of your friend. The husband might be thinking of a healthier woman to help raise his children and not put them at risk of the lost of another Alpha female.
I think working out your feelings will be difficult. If the man was not part of the friendship, although the children might have been, then that might be part of the issue. It is hard to be the spouse of a HER+ patient and you never know how each person will respond.
I plan on keeping Nina around for at least another 18 years of marriage, which would put us bth at 72.

Paul

jaykay · 08-23-2013, 10:43 AM

First of all, no offense to any of the great men on this board.

My husband died suddenly 7 years ago and I went to a grief counselor. She basically said that men and women handle the death of a spouse very differently based on the roles in the marriage. Typically (she said), women do all the social networking and men really aren't prepared to take up that slack nor do they want to. That's why it seems as if men, after the death of a wife, get back into dating/relationships much sooner than women.

Women, on the other hand (again typically), are in no hurry to begin dating, etc. and can handle the It took me 3 years to decide I missed having male companionship and to start dating (ugh!) again. I went out with several men who were widowers for less than a year - didn't sit right with me.

Conversely, I went out with a man who's wife had been sick on and off with breast cancer for 3 years. He was very honest and I totally understood. At that time, I was a 10 year survivor and had to let him know - wouldn't have been fair to hold that back. First and last date!

Okay, I'm rambling, too. I would have also been upset with my friend's husband.

Best,

Janis

conomyself · 08-23-2013, 11:07 AM

If you don't want to see the his posts you go to his page and hover the mouse over the "friends" box and uncheck "show in news feed". I did this with a few "fair weather" friends.

I can totally understand your pain, but I'm glad he was so good to her when she was alive.

Love,

Rachael

KDR · 08-24-2013, 11:04 AM

Certainly learning more about relationships, as we continue to do throughout our lifetimes.

I am not "mad" at him. I have often thought that my husband (being 16 years younger than me!) should go on NOW and definitely told him that upon diagnosis, but for the last 11 years we have had a great marriage and friendship, parenting side by side and could not have asked for a better life partner. My husband has never let me down. I do wish at times that I could disappear from both him and my daughter (10) as I don't want to be a drain on them. That is a patient's burden. Before the catastrophic event in the OR, I seemed to be more "sure," and definitely more able to handle anything that comes my way. Now, I am so weakened and they say it might be a year before I feel myself again. How can my body accept chemo at 50%?

Anyway, funny how in the past I've spoken to my own husband about picking out a new wife for him, counseled him on how to pick a good woman and mother to my child, when I don't know if I'm going anywhere--or if HE just might. Life is just a mystery. He could go as easily as me: tomorrow.

So, I think I was upset by the fact that not even one photograph was left up. That should not mean he didn't suffer terribly. I know he did.

It's none of my business, really, and I needed to get over it. I will now enjoy his new life, too. Best of luck to the new couple!

Karen

Andrea Barnett Budin · 08-24-2013, 07:07 PM

2 women who were very very close to me have passed. Myrna sat beside me in the chemo room for 5 yrs. we'd chat, of course. Her husband would always accompany her and would mine (Paul). It was great. The men talked, both experiencing such similar feelings. Myrna's husband adored her. The 4 of us would go for dinners. We were perfect together.

Sue was like a sister to me. Our bond, our love for one another was extraordinary. When my nails turned black and were lifting off the nailbeds (on Taxotere) after all I'd been through, I told Sue and she was so upset. I told her, it's okay. It's slightly painful but not really. I'm putting dark red nail polish on (to cover), and not wearing my rings (so as not to draw attention). Sue still felt it was the final straw. Unacceptable. She wished she could take her nails off (she had no use for them as she had been basically bedridden for yrs). She wished she could put them in a envelope and mail them to me. Her love never failed to make me feel better, no matter what. She would always say she was ready to die, but that I was different. I was going to be fine!!! She was emphatic about that.

Sue's husband was so in love with her, so devoted to her, it was a beautiful thing to observe. They laughed together, spent every day with one another, no matter what, where she went (doc's appts, tx, so on -- he was right by her side).

Each of these men shortly after their wives passed on, began seeing someone. Neither would tell me for over a yr. They didn't want to upset me, or offend me.

I was secure in the knowledge that they were each the very best husband any woman could wish for! Without question! I asked Paul why he thought they were so hesitant to admit this reality to me. I honestly was delighted that they were able to move on, had found someone who made them feel young and alive and they were living their lives as any one of us would wish our beloveds -- happily.

Don't take this man's actions personally. Hard as it is not to...

You, Karen, having a young child, worry so much more than I did. My dghtrs were grown. Still, our children remain our babies till they are old and gray and we are bit bent... Your husband, Karen, has been a prince in your life, and will stand by you always. You know that. He honors you and loves you. And, you're right, tomorrow... It is promised to no one. So don't focus on what might be...

I've often heard stories of women grooming their husbands for "the next one". How to pick the right one. What not to be misled by. I have found myself telling Paul, If you were on a date and did that, I would never go out with you again. Sending a subtle )) message, just in case. I must admit the thought does graze my mind for a few seconds here and there. I tell Paul, when I'm gone, whatever... And he insists he will be gone first. And then we laugh.

Live your life for today, I say. Tomorrow will take care of itself. Don't look too far down the road because you'll become overwhelmed with emotions. It's just too much to handle. Baby steps.

And yet, I use guided imagery, and vividly see myself far, far into the future, to send a message to my body, and to the Universe, that it is my clear Intention to be here!

I love you, Karen. You know that...

I know Sue and Myrna are at peace and must be elated to see how truly happy their husbands are now. In time, they will be together again, as I have no doubt it is meant to be. These were 2 strong women with husbands that could not have been more loving.

Andi

CoolBreeze · 08-25-2013, 06:30 PM

I have already told my husband that I want him to find a woman and remarry. And, I have heard the sooner men do that, the happier they are in their marriage.

I am not sure I understand why the photos needed to have been taken down - she was a part of his life. But it may be a part of the recovery process for him and I won't judge, as long as his new woman didn't make him do it. New women need to understand that they don't need to compete with a dead women.

But that's a big jump.

I'm glad he's happy and moving on and I hope the same for my husband when it's my time.