Check

Add to the list of things no one tells a new widow, you will drown in paperwork.

Every single thing you and your spouse ever signed for in your life will have to be rearranged, reassessed, resubmitted.. it’s exhausting.

Instead of just doing it all at once, I have chosen to drag it out as long as I can because apparently I’m a glutton for punishment. In reality, it’s much easier to do one or two and then walk away from it for a while.

Yesterday I just ripped the bandaid off a few times because I was stuck here with sick Q anyway. Sometimes I have to force myself to be productive.

Every time I have to click “widowed” on anything, it’s soul sucking and I die a little bit inside.

I wish there was a new widow service that you could pay that would just swoop in and do all of this for you. You trust them with your passwords and they handle everything and all the appropriate boxes get checked and all of the accounts are changed over and everything is ok.

Survival, with help.

When I’m checking boxes on a daily basis, it usually has nothing to do with financial stuff. The questions I ask myself every day now just to make sure I can move through the world without absolutely falling out are pretty ground floor level.

Did I eat today? (Probably not 3 meals. Not even 2. Sometimes one solid is all I can force)

Have I had water today? (I bribe myself. Drink water all day, have tea and wine all night)

Did I take my medicine today? (Because real talk- nobody is making it through this hell without anxiety meds, panic attack meds, and a beta blocker)

Did I get enough sleep? (The answer to this question is always no, but I have learned to live on much less sleep than I ever thought possible)

And probably the most important question I ask myself on a daily basis is this-

Did I make it through the day ok?

Everyone spends all day checking boxes.

People are going through more than you could ever imagine. I don’t have the market cornered on grief and suffering with a cancer death. There are people all around you dealing with addiction, crumbling marriages, estranged family, miscarriage, loss of jobs, loss of loved ones, trauma from childhood… the list is endless. The weight of the pain that people carry around is so unbelievably sad.

If this holiday season you can check boxes for someone, do that. It means the world to the person overwhelmed with all the boxes left to check.