Sunday, March 22, 2020

Personal Blog #14 ... Continued Happiness ... 3/22/20

I have already posted several Personal Blog columns about my difficulties trying to move on with the rest of my life after losing my wife of nearly 50 years to AD.  This is the last time, however, that I will post a Personal Blog column about this topic.  However, I am planning to continue posting occasional columns on other issues related to AD and caregiving. 

There will be no more columns about my personal struggles to find new happiness because that long battle has been fought … and finally won … even if current or future realities, such as dealing with the effects of the coronavirus, may cause an occasional step backwards now and then.

After 10 years of an almost daily “new normal” while Clare struggled with AD and after grieving for years while Clare was still alive … only to be followed by 2+ years of serious depression and then another 18 months of overwhelming sadness after her death … I have finally arrived at another new normal, one that has brought great happiness back into my life.

Despite our entire world being turned upside down by the coronavirus pandemic … talk about a worldwide new normal … I am now very optimistic about my future.  Why?  Because shortly before the virus began making daily headlines, I had already “found” new happiness.  By sheer serendipity, a woman I had known for many years, also a caregiver, re-entered my life.  We started meeting occasionally at diners simply as friends enjoying breakfast, but our relationship quickly and unexpectedly morphed from friendship to deep affection to emotional and physical love.
 
The physical portion of our new relationship is now, sadly, “on hold” due to the virus constraints and sensible precautions that we must take.  However, we continue to express our happiness through daily texts and phone calls, along with an occasional walk at the beach while practicing social distancing.  Despite current virus restrictions keeping us apart, we both now know that we can look forward to a wonderful future together. 

That is a future I had almost given up on ever finding again.  In Personal Blog #10 (“Life After Moving On), posted on 9/2/19, I wrote about how I had finally moved on in many aspects of my life as a widower, even summoning the courage to try meeting new women through online dating sites.  But I had not yet found that “special woman” I was looking for … that special woman who would bring to my life “more happiness, less sadness, and less loneliness.”  I was still hoping to find my “second act.”

And now, quite unexpectedly, I have found that second act.  For the first time in many, many years I am smiling, laughing, and thoroughly enjoying my time with a special woman again.  For the first time in many, many years I am truly enjoying being alive again.  For the first time in many, many years I now see my future filled with happiness.

Readers may recall that I have written about how Clare had left a letter for me on her computer, a letter she had written when she recognized that she was losing her cognitive functioning.  However, she never told me about that letter.  It was only when going through her computer files after she died that I discovered that letter, as well as a letter for each of our children.  Clare’s letter to me was extraordinarily beautiful, expressing her hope that I would “find continued happiness” after she was gone.  It has taken me nearly 4 years, but I have now finally found that continued happiness.

I hope that readers who have also had problems “moving on” have found some comfort in my Personal Blog columns on this topic … mostly by discovering that they are or were not alone, but also by reading about how my path to finding happiness has been very bumpy with many setbacks along the way.  And yet … I am now enjoying that happier life I sought.

Some widows and widowers seem able to put their grief behind them in a matter of weeks or months and then move on with the rest of their lives.  I certainly was unable to do that.  However, I am now a witness to the reality that even after an extended period of grief, depression, and sadness it remains possible for a widow or widower to find that special someone … it remains possible to find that special someone and enjoy a wonderful “second act” of a life filled with happiness.

If steps you have taken to find more happiness, less sadness, and less loneliness as a widow or widower have not yet been successful, please don’t give up on yourself.  Please consider taking more new steps to try to find that happier future, while also remaining open to possibilities that may arise from chance encounters.  I never thought of my friend as that “special someone” for me … and yet, happily, it turned out that she was.
 
All widows and widowers deserve to find happiness again … we all deserve to find that second act.  Please do not let the death of your loved one end your quest to find continued happiness.  

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