Grief experts tell us that a widow is highly functional in the months following her husband’s death. If that entails receiving the ashes (from dust we come, unto dust we return), writing the obituary, doing what you can for the memorial a friend is organizing for you, giving a remembrance speech, and smiling bravely, seemingly strong, under the hugs and condolences of hundreds of friends and acquaintances who come to weep along with you, then yes.
If functional is gathering the death certificate copies, having EVERYTHING put in your name–the house, the car and truck, the bank accounts, the pension fund, the health insurance, the social security widow’s survivor benefits, then yes to that kind of functionality too. If it means a first for your ever having had to take a car in for maintenance problems, having a sump pump installed and your basement reconstructed from flooding disasters, selling your home for the first time in your life and hiring someone to stage an estate sale, then yes, a widow is gifted with a high functionality.
I even had the “presence of mind” to have a lawyer friend guide me through the process of drawing up my OWN will, power of attorney, and living will–”little” things that I had had to do for Phillip at the last minute while he lay dying in the hospital because he had thought he’d live forever….
You are so caught up in the paperwork and phone calls and meetings that you have no time for yourself. Which can be a good thing: left to dwell too much on who and what you are and where you are heading, you would self- destruct. The deconstructing DOES come, but during the weeks, months of shock, you find yourself “protected”–I now liken it to a heavy covering of angels’ wings beating back the dark forces that rush in to lay claim….
Along the way, I stopped eating, sleeping, exercising. Thank God for the garden. My one haven where I went to work out the pain, the gut-wrenching anxiety that took up residence in my belly. Fear of the present, fear of the future.
When my neighbor, Araceli, phoned and asked, “Shaaron, are you eating?” I had to reply honestly,”No, not really.”
“I am bringing food to you as soon as it is ready!” she said.
My younger daughter was with me
at the time. When the plate arrived, heaped with sausage, skirt steak, chicken, beans and rice, I could only look at it and feel sick. My daughter encouraged me to try SOMETHING. I said it was too much. She said she would help.
My first bite, I knew I was in trouble: I started to shake…and shake…and shake… But before the evening was gone, we had finished the plate. It took a very long time.
Later Araceli told me when she’d realized I needed help. Her husband Ishmael who had been home for months caring for their young son while Araceli worked, had become used to my dwindling frame. So when Araceli noticed someone dressed in black with a baseball cap working in my yard, she asked her husband, “Who is that in Shaaron’s yard?” When she found out it was me, she couldn’t believe it. Because she worked full-time and wasn’t home much, she hadn’t seen me for a while. I had lost over thirty pounds in six weeks.
I believe I owe my life to that young couple. When Phillip’s and most of my friends and acquaintances returned to their lives before death, I was still left to face life after death. Hardly anyone phoned; no one came. With Araceli, there was a phone call and dinner at my door daily for three months. I ate posole, tamales, ceviche, tortillas, tortas, grilled meats, beans, rice, fried pork fats, soups, more grilled meats, strawberry dessert….my daily bread.
This couple was there for me when the police came to take me away with two choices: handcuffed or not.
I had just returned from a week-long stay in Oregon with my two daughters (end of June; Phillip had passed away the fourth of May), and when I walked through the door of the house, it hit me that I was totally, undeniably ALONE. I felt like disintegrating and out of desperation called the grief pastor at a church I attended. Put into voice mail, I used the “S” word: suicidal. Later he told me that when he tried phoning back, my line was busy. What to do? By law, he had to call the police as he himself made haste to get to my house. By then, I had been taken away to the mental health facility in Tacoma for evaluation.
Prior to pulling away, my little Hispanic family was gathered on their lawn waiting, watching. I had the policeman tell them what was happening, and they were told to come pick me up within a couple of hours.
Within an hour, after having my shoes and purse confiscated, after sitting and listening to a mental health care worker who had been at her job far too many years and appeared to need more counsel than I, after conversing with a drug-addicted street preacher and choking down some of the most god-awful institutionalized “food” ever, after being asked if I would like to spend a night of evaluation in a cell-like room devoid of everything except a cold metal cot, I was told I was free to go because my friends were already downstairs waiting for me. I had to fill out a form and sign it about what positive steps I was going to take in “recovering.” I literally fell into Araceli’s embrace.
I just phoned Araceli whom I haven’t contacted in a year. Such excitement! I am going to see her and her family tomorrow!
There are reasons I am moving to Mexico in two weeks to lease an apartment for at least a year.
They may well have begun with that first plate of food.
