Saturday, Jun. 18, 2011 4:32 p.m.

worst case scenario

For some odd reason, I have just spent an hour or so reading blog of widow/widowers. I'm not sure why exactly, but the thought of what its like to experience becoming a young widow/widower is so devastatingly intriguing, and I found myself drawn to the emotional release that came from my tears.

I think because something happening to K is truly my worst fear imaginable (I wrote about something similar in an another entry a couple back). It always has been. I remember when K and I were first married; it terrified me then too. I had a backup plan in mind though - perhaps I'm strange, but somehow being able to think though a rare, but horrible experience and coming up with a hypothetical solution has always soothed, rather than stressed, me. I decided that if K was to ever pass away, that I don't believe I could continue living...and would choose to no longer do so.

In early marriage, I'll admit that the thought of having kids freaked me out, almost solely because then my hypothetical suicide back-up plan if something ever happened to K would be no longer be a viable option. How could a mother kill herself when she had children to take care of??

But then years pass, and it's not that love fades (in fact, it actually grows much deeper, but in an not-so-emotional way), but the reality of oneself in a marriage relationship develops and I could begin to imagine, if heaven forbid something did happen to K, that perhaps I could continue on after what I can only image to be a very difficult grieving process.

But now things have changed once again. With this pregnancy has come a resurgence of feelings for K. I have ALWAYS loved K deeply, but the past several months I seem to once again be MADLY IN LOVE with him. I know that it is this pregnancy. I don't know how much of it is chemical, psychological, or merely relational. But after having gone through the sadness of not knowing if we'd have children, the realization that we actually made a child together is overwhelming to us. Not only is he my partner for life, he's also now going to be the father of my children. We now get to have the privilege of figuring this thing called parenthood together. And this thing is something we have both wanted for quite awhile.

So I am once again awash with devotion and love and passion for K. And so the fear of losing him keeps popping back up. How would I survive if something did? I have to rethink my old backup plan. How could I continue on without him; how could I raise our child without him? I don't have an answer.

And not having an answer or a back-up plan leaves me feeling vulnerable and scared; I want a plan, I want to know how to survive, if on the crazy off-chance I find myself in that position.

So I've been reading these blogs of young widows and widowers. How did they do it?

It seems that they just keep going. They mourn, they grieve. They talk about their spouse, they relive the good times. They cry, and cry, and cry.

And then they go on with their lives. After several years, many find new loves. They write about now the new loves will never replace their old, but how it's important that acknowledge that can experience happiness again. One guy said how when his wife died, he died...and that that person will always be dead. But that after his wife's death it was though h had been resurrected, as someone different. And though his still hold all the memories of his previous life, that it is with his new life that he is able to continue on, and love and live again.

I'm thankful for having read all these things, as, in a way, that do help me to feel better. It would be possible to recover from my worst fear.

But I still can't help thinking how much I wouldn't want to go on living without K. I don't know if I'm the kind of person that would have the strength to push through.

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