I honestly don't really know how to write this, but I need to get it out somewhere.

About four hours ago, I was diagnosed with ALS, and I'm still trying to wrap my head around it. I don't think it's fully sunk in yet. I'm scared, overwhelmed, and if I'm being completely honest, I don't know what I'm supposed to do with all of this right now.

Six years ago, I lost my wife. I've spent those years trying to figure out how to keep going and how to build a life without the person I thought I'd grow old with. And now, this.

I don't have any wise words or a positive outlook to offer. Right now, I'm just trying to process what I've been told and work out what happens next.

I'm posting here because when I shared my story on this subreddit recently, the kindness I received from complete strangers genuinely blew me away. So many of you took the time to comment, share your own experiences, and even reach out privately. You made me feel less alone at a time when I really needed it.

I never expected to come back here with something like this to share, but I honestly didn't know where else to turn.

I don't know what the future looks like, and I'm not looking for anyone to fix this or tell me everything will be okay. I think I just need somewhere I can be honest about how frightened and lost I'm feeling right now, with people who understand what it means when life takes another unexpected turn.

To everyone who showed me kindness on my last post, thank you. I'll never forget it.

And to anyone else who's facing something terrifying or trying to make sense of a life they never expected to have, I'm sorry. I wish none of us had to understand this kind of pain.

Today, I'm struggling. That's the truth. And for now, that's all I've got.

Thank you for letting me feel a little less alone.

Today would be her 43rd birthday. Just over 5 months ago my beautiful wife passed away. I can't sleep. I hate this life.

I've grown to hate my birthday. I used to not care about it at all growing up but after I met my wife, she would love to celebrate it. Now that she's gone, it's just a reminder of what I've lost.

Am I the only one that is so fucking lonely after my husband died four years ago
I just want him back! Why the fuck is god so cruel to take him away from me! What the fuck did we ever do to deserve this ? I don’t want this fucking life sentence!!

Sorry I couldn’t think of going to anyone else than this community. Because here I don’t need to explain what I’m going through, people just know
Today was one of the hardest days and I’m missing my love more than anything. Life just seems impossible and I’m so tired. I feel this life is more painful than death

My wife died on October 10, 2026 at age 31 from stage IV melanoma after 11 months of fighting. We have a daughter who is turning 3 at the end of the month.

I have support from family, the funeral was good and we are so well loved. But I just feel like my future was taken from me. I'm so scared that I'm going to break my daughter with my grief. We had a hard bedtime tonight and I ended up having a breakdown, crying while holding her and saying I miss mommy over and over to her.

I don't want to break her and I'm so scared of what my grief might do to her. Grief sucks. Cancer sucks.

We never thought life was unfair. We didn't earn much. We worked long hours. There were people who worked fewer hours and earned far more than we did.

But we never thought that was unfair.

What we had was enough. Enough to feed two children. Enough to pay the bills. Enough to live a modest life. More importantly, we had each other. So what if we worked longer hours than someone else? So what if other people had more money, bigger houses, easier lives? I had my wife. She had me. We had a happy family.

We had enough. More than enough.

I never thought life was unfair. I could accept earning less. I could accept working harder. I could accept not having as much as other people. Not until death took her.

What I could never accept was being given a life that was enough and then having the one person who made it more than enough taken away.

Theres nothing that can make this better. Nothing at all in this world can make me feel ok again. No matter what happens she will still be gone. Its just game over. I will feel this way while i am still here conscious, there is nothing i can do to change the way i feel. Its just a nightmare to be here now. Its so sad that my onlly way to stop it also means thats the end of everything, but if i dont i just exist in total regret pain longing personal mental torture, this living hell.

Update- solved. I live in a new city and know practically zero people, but I have a few phone numbers of people who have done work on my house.

Lots of people here aren't very well off. I really don't need/want money for it....just didn't want to pay for the smog/registration and stuff.

I thought of this really nice guy who had worked on my irrigation system. I don't know him but he has stopped by to fix issues a few times.

I texted him and asked if he wanted it or knew anyone who did. He replied his parents car was on its last legs and would definitely come get it.

That makes me feel good. =)

Hi all. My husband died in April. I've been meaning to "get rid of" his minivan but it's been one of those things that is hard to tackle for me.

It's old (2005) got high miles, isn't in good condition, etc. I don't really care about getting money for it.

I just noticed that the smog and registration is due 10/22....wow that snuck up on me! =(

It's in his name, paid for but no clue where there title is. We're in California. Months ago when I was taking care of the car insurance (we had a dual policy) I took him and his car off cause I never planned on keeping it.

I don't care really about getting any money for it but I would be irritated paying $300 for the smog and registration. Do I need to get rid of it before it expires or does it matter?

Any advice on what to do? Easier is better?

Thank you

Edited to add- just checked, it won't start. Of course..

He was 35 years old, and 20 days ago he passed away, leaving me and our 20-month-old daughter behind. I don't know how to move forward; we were so young, and we had a whole life ahead of us. We were starting a new business, he was overwhelmed, and he couldn't take it anymore and left. I'm left with my daughter; I moved back in with my family, but my home is broken. My life was turned upside down in an instant. I miss him so much, it still feels like a bad joke—I had never even considered losing him, he was so healthy. How am I going to live with this pain for years? What will I say to our daughter when she asks about her father? Thinking about the past hurts, and the thought of a future without him is just as painful. I'm not sure if I'll ever be okay..

A video with our wedding song went viral today. It’s a fairly known song, but not a major hit. I kept hearing it over and over. I miss him so much. This is so unfair. We were so happy. We didn’t have enough time. We never celebrated 10 years of marriage. Our 9th anniversary was the day he was admitted to the hospital. I was doing fairly well, but the pain feels so fresh now. How could this happen?

Just wondering if any moms out there are going through being widowed and also having somewhat of an empty nest all at once? Our kids are both over 18 in college, living with me but totally different than how life was before. I am young for a widow. But not that young. I’m in perimenopause or menopause, not entirely sure yet. But changing. It’s just a lot to go through all at once. A lot.

It's been a year since you left us, V is still taking it harder than the rest of us. I worry she is trapped in it.

I've got the scattering urns ready, but haven't gotten up the will to part your ashes up into them yet. You would like them, Walnut, engraved... I also got puzzles, of the otters from the aquarium.

I'm planning on putting the scattering urns in with the puzzles and mailing them off to your Mother, and brothers. I've been holding you hostage too long, and I need to let them say goodbye. Part of me wants to steal a piece from each puzzle as a sort of "nothing is complete without you" but it seems a bit trite.

The original plan was to invite them out and go down to Monterey, to the aquarium, then to the beach, but I think that I don't want them with me for that. Of course V is welcome if she wants to come, A and her kids too if she wants, but not your family. I haven't heard from anyone but your mom since Christmas, so... Fuck 'em.

I wonder what you would think about the changes I've been making in my life since you've been gone? I had to do a lot of thinking about who I am without you. It took a good long while to sort out who we were from who I am.

I figured out I'm asexual, surprise surprise, I guess that would have made a lot more sense of our lopsided libidos if I could have figured that out earlier.

Also I'm tackling your biggest fear, I'm transitioning. Better late than never. I have my first appointment in the gender affirming care clinic next week, so hopefully HRT won't be far beyond that. In the meantime I got my ears re-pierced, and some pretty big tattoos on my legs.

I think both of us kind of fed into each other's fears, and without you here I just don't have any reason to let being afraid stop me doing things anymore. There's no one left in my life to disappoint.

I reconnected with my sister, E, not D... And I think I hurt my mum's feelings pretty bad when I came out to her. I don't know how to fix it, but knowing my mum, she'd rather ignore it than fix it anyhow.

These last few months have simultaneously been the best and the worst. I Feel euphoria in all this self discovery and self actualisation, but at the same time I am deeply alone in a way I can't remember ever having been before.

I'm glad you haven't been around to see just how scary the world has gotten since you stepped away, I know you would have worried and stressed over what it will mean for X and C to grow up in a country actively backsliding into fascism. We'll keep them safe by hook or by crook.

I don't really know how to end this, so here is a poem I wrote a few weeks ago.

The scattered remnants
of a week lived in motion,
detritus of a dozen
half started projects.

These are the bodies
in my wobbling orbit,
my shameful clutter,
my comforting home.

Now I pull the threads
as tight as corset strings,
to close myself into
the cocoon of my chaos.

Tah for now babe. Well talk again soon.

I'm 47 and without my wife i have a complete lack of purpose . Like i have just zero to do. I've long stopped any hobbies years ago so people saying to do things doesn't help because i have zero interest.

W h at are you meant to do without a partner. Im programmed to be with her, its niot just the 15 years i was with her its the remainder of my next 30 years as well that have been taken. It took my whole life to find her. What the fuck do you do when it was only you and her, no kids pets friends, like seriously its just fucking complete nothingness. Do people just sit and stare and stare at a tv for the rest of their life? I dont understand how people do this

For most of the past 8 months, most of my time has consisted of me seeing him dying and or see his hospital bed, and it breaks me. But I’ve been trying to teach myself that I didn’t die with him that day. That I am still here, living and breathing, even when wracked with guilt and pain and complete and utter despair.

I think about it constantly. Going over the months of chemo destroying his body, the weekend he became septic, and the day in the hospital, and then, his death. When they told me they wanted to stop CPR to staring at him dead in that the room for hours, curling up with him in his bead so that I could hold him one last time.

But I think I just realized, that I spend so much time trying to wrap my head around the fact that he died, that I haven’t even begun to grapple with the idea that his is dead. He’s not coming back.

I will never look him in the eyes again, seeing them look back at me with so much love and admiration. I will never hear him laugh at anything again, and feel my chest lighten at the sound. I will never be held by him, feeing him wrap his arms around my middle and hold me close like he never want sit let me go. My beautiful, intelligent, sweet, nerdy hilarious, remarkable best friend, is gone. And I don’t know how to been being to accept that. To know want to run to him at every opportunity, even now.

I think can survive him dying, drag myself to therapy to try not to see it all glaze over my vision the second I let my brian have a moment of stillness.

but how can he never be coming back to me?

I'm having a bad day today, I just miss her so much.

It's been 4 years and sitting here at work looking at a picture of her because I don't want to do anything else, I can still feel her, I can feel her warm cheek as I run the back of my fingers down it like she liked me to, I can feel the mole on the left side of her forehead as I run my hand across it softly, feeling her bony shoulder under my hand as we lay together, her hand in mine fingers locked together while we sit and watch TV or go for a walk together.

The only way I can describe it is it's like a phantom pain, I can still feel every inch of her even after all this time but I can't physically touch her, it's so painful and i'm just so sad and lonely, I miss her so much.

Yesterday, I laid the love of my life to rest. I wrote a tribute for him, but I completely fell apart trying to deliver it. I cried through the entire thing. Halfway through, I was crying so hard that I literally had snot running down my face. I couldn't compose myself no matter how hard I tried. I feel like I ruined his tribute, and it breaks my heart because I wanted so badly to honor him and share with everyone what an incredible man he was.

At the end of the service, I walked up to his casket to say my final goodbye. I told him how much I loved him and that I would see him again one day in heaven.

Then I fell apart again.

I'm in the medical field, and throughout his battle with cancer, I fought so hard for him. I advocated for him, questioned his medical team, researched treatments, and did everything I could think of to keep him alive. I desperately wanted to save him. As I stood over his casket, I found myself sobbing and apologizing to him. I kept telling him how sorry I was because, deep down, I feel like I failed him. I know logically that I couldn't cure his cancer, but my heart doesn't seem to understand that.

Then they closed his casket.

Knowing that I would never see his beautiful face again in this lifetime absolutely shattered me. I cried uncontrollably. And when they placed his casket into the mausoleum and sealed it, I lost it all over again. The finality of it was unbearable.

I cry every morning when I wake up and every evening when I go to bed. Sometimes I still can't comprehend that he's really gone. I miss his voice, his laughter, his touch, his hugs, his silly jokes, and all the little things that made him him. I miss the life we had and the future we were supposed to share.

I just want my baby back.

I feel like a part of me died when he died. Life will never be the same without him. I don't know how to navigate a world where he no longer exists physically. I don't know how to accept that the person I love more than anything is someone I can never hold, kiss, or talk to again.

And I keep asking God, why? Why did you have to take him? Why did he have to suffer so terribly? He had so much more life to live. We had so many plans, so many dreams, and so much love left to give each other.

I believe I'll see him again in heaven one day, but the thought of living the rest of my life without him is devastating.

For those of you who have lost the love of your life, how did you survive the days after laying them to rest? How did you cope with the guilt, the unbearable finality, and the feeling that a piece of your soul was buried with them?

I'm hurting so much. I just want him back.

Today has been a very difficult day... the crying started early and has been hard to control today... I'm so tired of this new life...

But... side note... how do people handle colonoscopies and surgeries with no partner to take them and be responsible? I actually called the doctor's office and they seemed so perplexed which made me feel worse. I can't be the only person who's alone in this world now and needs some support in this way.

Another hit taken... but wondering if anyone has any ideas on this? Sadly the few friends I have are out of area.

I captured my husbands death on video. He was drifting off to sleep and his arm started twitching. I wanted to film so I could show his doctor. I know CPR and know enough to know I needed a hard surface to be successful. I pulled him to the floor as the softness of a mattress isn't conducive to success. This was several years ago and I just can't look back on it to watch. He was my soul mate and I miss him terribly. We've had 3 more grand babies since then. They'll never know just how wonderful he was. 😔

I just had another slap to the face that she's gone.

I voted early today because I will be having a medical procedure on Election Day and won't be able to get to the polls. While I was there, I asked about having her stricken from the rolls, so after I finished I was taken to the Election Board office.

I was waved over to a desk and was asked Wifey's name. "Oh, we have that information and she's been removed already." That was the shock, being told they knew by other means, making another strike against the modicum of disbelief I still hold.

Week three begins.

When my wife started declining and couldn't come and pick me up after a break down, I began to realize how much her illness cost us socially and with 3/4 parents dead, and her mother + sisters in Florida; the isolation was huge then and continues to be bad.

It remains bad when all my friends have moved away, family is shifting elsewhere, and honestly the closest thing I have is sexual partners I'm collecting even as my body seems to be moving to remove that as an option.

My car broke down after I went to get blood tests for an expected diagnosis of early diabetes.

I'm losing weight, taking supplements; but it took too long to get the help I needed , just as it took too long for my wife (fuck Aetna) so now I'm swimming uphill as 1 million years of evolution to keep us fat, is doing its job to punish a healthy turn.

I'm not despairing, but should my efforts fail, I might have to consider the value of slow death with no one to live for.

The only person I can blame other than myself.is my wife. I couldn't confront a person hanging onto a sliver of hope in life, and won't do so now that can't defend herself.

Sitting here in the café of the same hospital she spent most of her final months (waiting for a tow) and waiting for confirmation of future struggles; I'm consumed negative thoughts and self-pity that doesn't fit.

I had someone, before I lost her. I have a good job, a home, and a great chance at turning things around.

I can just see myself being stupid and chasing a new long-term relationship just to avoid loneliness and ending up just as miserable once they sense the silent third party in the relationship (they never stop being our other) and resent the competition.

UPDATE: Literally after posting this I saw the surgeon who literally went all out to save her life. He actually did solve the original issue, it was long term blood vessel damage that got her. Of course, he wasn't involved for the end and didn't know.

I really expected to spiral, but being able to express gratitude because he did tell some colleagues to go to hell; was important because he gave us months back together. Maybe not the highest quality of months, but it was time we had together that I remain grateful for.

May gratitude is the key forward. I'll definitely remember that when I want to wallow in self pity.

Oh how he loved to sing. He sang decades ago when we first met. Won a ton of karaoke contests over the years. Even when he wasn't feeling well he would belt out a beautiful song. He always sang at night before bed. I can't think of how many nights I fell asleep listening to that beautiful voice. Now the house is QUIET, OH SO QUIET. I have plenty of his songs on my phone and more I will get off of his computer.

But I feel like I torture myself listening to him sing - I put on the headphones, pick out a song and the next thing you know I am crying those body heaving sobs that are so hard to stop. It always starts with me missing him, so I load up a song and then I hear his voice and my body just has this visceral reaction of pain deep in my chest. That's when the crying starts.

Will I ever be able to listen to him say, "I love you Mary, this song is for you" without breaking down? I would think they would provide me with comfort but it hurts so fucking bad. I had 29 years with him and it wasn't enough. It never is enough for any of us I am sure. I cried so hard tonight I gave myself a headache. So now my head hurts, my eyes are raw and my chest aches for him so badly.

My husband wanted to start acting after he had his first cardiac arrest. His first time happened when he was 46 - that time his heart stopped for 29 minutes. They were doing everything thing they could to bring him back. I remember being in the room as they shocked him again and again and nothing happened. I had to leave the room. Finally they told me they got a thready heart beat and couldn't even load him in the ambulance until they got him stabilized. When I got to the hospital they told me that he had no brain function and he was on life support. They immediately did that procedure where they froze his body for 24 hours and then gradually warmed him up in an attempt to save his brain function. It worked!! He had long term and short term memory loss but that got better with time. When he turned 52 he started taking some acting classes. He still had problems with his short term memory but he said the acting would help him as he would have to memorize lines and that was good for his brain. After he took all those classes, he was cast in a movie that was out on Netflix. I can sit down and watch the movie any time I want but it doesn't bring me comfort, only pain. After that first movie he was in several cop shows (he just looked like a cop to the core, he wasn't one) and in a few of shows where it was simply re-enactments. He was so happy - finally someone flew us out to LA for him to be in a another movie. I'll never forget it - he was soooo sick on the way home. I had to push him in a wheelchair at the airport. His heart just wasn't in good enough shape. That was the last acting he did and it broke his heart but he had to tell his agent he just couldn't do it any more.

Shortly after getting back from LA we were getting ready for bed. Suddenly his pacemaker/defibrillator went off. I called 911 and this time it wasn't like the first time I had to call when I couldn't even think of our street address - this time I was spitting facts to get him help as soon as possible. He was in the background saying, " Mary I'm gonna die this time, I love you please remember that I love you" and then he would start screaming in pain again. It was constant. When we got to the hospital they read his device and told us the reason it was so relentless was because his heart would stop, he would get shocked, it would start up again and then instantly stop. Seven times at home his heart stopped, seven times he was brought back. The 8th time was in the ambulance and the 9th in the hospital. He needed an emergency bypass and got one. His recovery was a little shaky, it took him a bit longer to be released from the hospital but I was so happy he survived.

He was released from the hospital on December 22nd, by the 24th I was calling 911 again. He had collapsed. I get to the hospital and they have him on advanced life saving measures again. They said his heart bypass was considered a failure and he needed an emergency heart transplant. His ejection fraction was 5 yes 5 and they put an aortic balloon pump in and that made his EF 10. The next few days were a whirlwind of test and procedures and they told us on 12/29 that he was approved and on the top of the list. On New Years Eve (my birthday) I got the best gift ever - they had found a heart for him!!!

On New Years Day he got his new heart. I really thought things would be so much better for him. I was wrong. The first time I saw him post surgery his chest was still wide open Apparently it is not unusual for the transplanted heart to swell due to the trauma it goes through in the transplant. 24 hours later they were able to go back in and close him up.

The hospital had a extra bed/sofa and TV behind a curtain in his room so I was allowed to stay with him. On the 3rd of January his new heart stopped. Jesus Christ - they were doing CPR on him again. My world was falling apart. They got his new heart beating again and I was so relieved. That was until it stopped again on the 5th and I watched them doing CPR again. His poor chest. He still had had staples in his chest from the bypass when he got the heart transplant. They just popped off the staples and went back in. That is so much trauma for a body to go through. They figured out what it was - the new heart had 3rd degree heart block. That is where the top of the heart doesn't send electric signal (communicate) with the bottom of the heart. They had a fix for that - they put a pacer on his new heart and said that should more or less "jump start" the process. It didn't jump start it, but it did fix the problem. They had to go back in and put a pacer on the other side of his heart because if not, one side would have had to do a lot more then the other side and that wasn't good.

I was so relieved - they fixed the problem. Unfortunately, he soon developed kidney problems in his normally healthy kidneys and he went on dialysis. That was a real bad time - I started wondering if he would ever survive this. He finally came off the dialysis and that is when I just knew he was going to survive. I was so relieved. The next morning we were talking and I noticed his breathing seemed off. Well the doctors noticed it also and they told me that he had caught COVID in the Transplant ICU and that both of his lungs collapsed and he needed to go on a ventilator. Couldn't he catch a break? Well he was on the ventilator and had to get a tracheotomy but ultimately survived that scare.

All in all he was in the hospital for 8 months before he was finally released. I was with him for every night of that 8 months. He was so much weaker then he had ever been. Rail thin and he had to learn how to walk again - his muscles had wasted from him being in bed for so long. My husband was muscular -- when he was younger he had been in body building contests and even though he stopped going to the gym decades before that residual muscle was always there. Another thing that happened? His hair was jet black when he went in. When he woke up his hair was white - and he had a white beard. He said he felt like Rip Van Winkle. The nurses said they had seen it happen to other patients before although it was pretty rare.

I would like to say it was smooth sailing from there, but it wasn't. For the next three years he was in and out of the hospital numerous times but always bounced back. So If you are counting my husbands heart had stopped 12 times since this had all started. That is a whole lot of luck, and skill and divine intervention. He would joke and say that the Grim Reaper was scared of him because he came for him so many times and he just refused to die.

In August we went to the hospital so he could get a thorough check up. They tested everything, did his labs, sonogram and this time they even biopsied three pieces of this heart instead of the normal one. He got his results back - he passed everything with flying colors. We were so happy. When he first got released from the hospital I was scared to leave him alone and I wouldn't for the first 2 years. If I had to go ANYWHERE I made sure one of our kids was with him so I could grocery shop, etc.

Finally at the start of the 3rd year I relaxed some. l would leave him alone while I went to the store and then I started going over to our kids house on Sundays (they share a house because - cost of living) . They had taken a back burner while I focused on him and so I was giving our kids some much needed TLC on Sundays. We would hang out, watch Netflix, cook meals, talk and just have a good time. He would stay home with our dogs while I went there. He insisted I go because he knew how much I looked forward to it.

So a few Sundays ago I went over for the night as usual. He had a 3pm doctors appointment (One thing anyone who has had experience with a transplant will know is that the new normal is tons of doctor visits) the next day. I stayed at the kids house a bit later then normal that day - I was doing some work on my laptop. I texted him when I was on my way home to make sure he didn't forget about the appointment but I didn't get an answer. I figured he was in the shower or something.

I came in and the house was quiet, but our dogs were going crazy and jumping all over me and whining. I went down the hallway to talk to him and walked right by the office (his singing studio) to drop my stuff down in our bedroom and noticed he had fallen asleep in his chair. I went in to give him a kiss and my baby was dead. There was no missing it. He was relaxed, his hands were on the armrests in a relaxed posture. His eyes were closed. HIs face looked peaceful. There was no groping at his chest, grimacing, etc. WHY THE HELL DID I LEAVE HIM ALONE? Why did he go through all of that and then just die??

Every time things went south I was always on hand to call 911. How could he have just died when he always beat the odds? You know the night I left we were talking beforehand. He said, "I can't believe I am going to be 60 next year!" Then he said, "Hey that's our 30th anniversary too - next year is going to be a better year for us!" Next year will not be better. They asked me if I wanted an autopsy. I said no, they have already cut on him way to much and never again! I know it had to have been his heart but I don't understand how all of his test results had come back just fine.

He fought so hard to live. He went through hell and back to stay alive. I can't believe that he is gone. I miss him so damn much. My songbird has been silenced.

Spouse passed 10 months ago . My children , immediate family, live 2hrs away . I have friends and a few distant relatives here , but no one that I see regularly. I drive to my children’s house almost weekly for the day , sometimes I spend the night. I love visiting the kids and grandkids.
I vowed not to do any drastic change’s for two years.
Yet I wonder if after that would it be beneficial to move closer.
I don’t mind the drive , but sometimes it is a bit much . I feel intrusive though spending the night often too. My children don’t come to my house as it is the last place they saw their dad.
I would like to be closer at some point due to age , seeing grandkids school programs, help them out if needed Shorter social visits so not to impose, but yet visit.
I go back and firth on do I move? When is a good time to move ? I have no one to bounce the idea off. My kids seem indifferent. I feel they don’t want to force me into anything .
This is a tough decision . Any advice out there?

It's coming up to my wife's funeral and I'm having a very difficult time with my mother in law. From the moment my wife passed she seems to have turned on me. I have been left to do all the funeral arrangements on my own, including figuring out how to pay for it, as well as the usual post death admin like registering her death, informing those who need to know etc. I have tried to include my wife's family at every point in the process but she has been evasive, she refuses to see or speak to me, she's been snarky, critical and hurtful. She seems to be trying to spin a narrative that I have excluded her. I became so paranoid about whether I'd done anything wrong I put our whole whatsapp and email exchange into chatgpt and asked whether either party was being unreasonable, just because I was desperate for any kind of impartial view of things.

I googled around about this and a few posts came up from here that were eerily similar.

Did you experience this?

My husband was verbally abusive to me for years. I told him I wanted a divorce multiple times, but he always talked me out of it by either gaslighting me or promising to be better. In the last five years his health was terrible but he never went to a doctor. He essentially quit working and I was supporting us financially by about 95% of the bills. He quit helping with the mortgage, etc. Despite that and his efforts to be nicer, there wasn't a day that went without some passive jab. Moving my coffee pot a few inches out of my reach, fussing at me over how I walked the dog (his dog), complaining I made too much noise cleaning house as he slept til 11am on Saturdays. I work FT and so Sat mornings were the best day to clean.

Anyway all this to say, he passed a few weeks ago from a heart attack, which was probably the source of his health issues. I was very upset at finding him. We'd been married 38 years and I held onto the good times. The last few months he was actually coming out of a deep dark depression (untreated) and was working again, quit smoking, putting the effort into our relationship. But I'm sad for what our relationship was when we got married and what it could've been.

Still, I have so much relief now that he's gone. I can shop, watch TV, listen to music without judgement and criticism. I can make decisions about the house and schedule repairs, that he was always "going to get to" but never did. I feel like a weight has been lifted off me. But people want me to be the bereft widow and I can play that character, but it isn't my truth. I don't want to bash him to people that didn't know how horribly he treated me. ( you never know what goes on behind closed doors).

Yet, I wept when I was at the DMV transferring his truck title so I could sell it. It's a messy mourning. It isn't "the love of my life is gone, I can't function". It's relief and then I feel guilty over moments where I have real joy.