How am I?

When Shelly was suddenly torn from me I did not conceive of the depths of my loss.  Of course, I lost the love of my life, my best friend, my other half.  I lost the person I loved spending time with more than any other, that I looked forward to seeing everytime she was not with me.   I liked seeing Shelly last at night and first in the morning, no day is as good without that.  

I felt the loss of the immediate, but that pain, blinding and in my face, blocked the deeper truth.  This trip, has left me facing the darkness of that truth.  It was not just the immeditede joy of her presence which was gone, but our complete future.  She planned this trip, with just the input she needed to make sure it would be pleasing for us both.  She ordered the room, worked out the times and planned for all of us.  She would plan, than excitedly tell me.  That won't happen again.  Ever.  Planning our vacations, our annaverseries, our retirement, our life, was always a joint venture.  There was so much of our life that was the shared anticipation of the things to come.  I have lost all of those talks, all of those moments.

It is not just those moments which have been lost.  When I consider the depth of this new reality, It is everything.  Not only is the joy of the planning gone, but the future we did plan doesn't matter anymore. The posability of moving to Florida in our retirement, the exhibits and plays we wanted to see which were coming to our area, our plans for doing a small ceremony where we renewed our vows on our twentieth annaversery,  they are all washed away.  If the dreams we have are who we are, I don't know who I am anymore.  When I dreamed, I dreamed for us.

I have tried dreaming for my kids, but it is not the same.  If I do my job right, I will train them to be thoughtful and good adults, who soar from the nest into successful lives of their own.  They will make dreams of their own or with their spouses, as they should.  My dreams for them have to be restricted to who they become, not what they will do and certainly not what they will do with me.  I hope that they will come to me for advise, but where they live, the jobs they get, what they choose to do with their free time will mostly exclude me.  We are together for a time! but in a few years they will be on their own.  

When we talked of those moments of becoming adults, Shelly eased the fears I have for my daughters.  She gave me the confidence we were doing right, she made me dream, excitedly dream, of those successful launches.  Without her, I struggle to find the ease.  I worry about how they are interacting with boys and what it is I don't know.  They feel like the one thing I have left and I am afraid for them, for me, if they are hurt.  I can't bring myself to be excited about my home without them in it.  It is another loss.

This trip I have spent many of those moments, which I would have spent with Shelly, chatting to the girls, but it is clear they are quick to dismiss me.  I don't mean that they are mean or rude, I only mean I am still just Dad.  They don't open up to me in the way they did to Shelly and I don't know how to advise them in the way she did.  I try, but I don't make a very good Mother and that feels like such a loss. Shelly filled a gap I don't know how to fill.  In a way we are closer than we have ever been before, but I can't speak with her voice and there are times it is the only thing they want to hear.  I suspect it will always be this way.

"How are you doing?" People still like to ask me, I suppose wanting a simple truth.  There is no simple truth.  My life has a giant hole left in it.  The initial pain of loss is more dull, but I want so badly to go back to planning a future with Shelly.  I want to be able to dream for more than just me and count on the future we had already planned.  I don't want to warp my kids with my fears, but without Shelly I don't know how to let them go.  I want to be excited for the future for both me and my daughters.  I don't want my kids to ever stop missing their mother, but I want to be able to fill the gap she left.  

 "How am I doing?" I honestly don't know.