A small part of my big story as a 45 year old widow

One of the biggest parts of therapy that I have found helpful was writing. So here it is, some of my thoughts, feelings and advice (if you can call it that) on a small part of what I have gone through and how I keep moving forward.

First, I will start by saying I see a psychiatrist and also a therapist that specializes in PTSD and trauma. Both are extremely helpful. You have to make sure you find the right people though. You need a vibe with each other.

For those that are new here, my husband passed away June 21, 2025. I was 44 years old and we have a daughter who was 15 at the time. He had a long long…long health battle. I was his primary caregiver.

There are so many instances of things that happened during this time period that it is almost unbelievable and I sometimes wonder how I kept going. I just never gave myself another option. I would just put my head down, figured it out and keep moving forward, one step at a time.

I am finally at a place where I am ready to share some of that journey and what it looked like, partly for therapy for me and partly because I believe there are others out there that can use a story like mine to help find strength.

My PTSD/Trauma therapist told me this week that I am an inspiration to her. That with everything I have gone through and that I just keep searching for joy, making big decisions and how I keep going is truly inspiring and I could help others. I hear her say that, but to be honest, I still feel pretty broken at times. I do have hope mending the pieces and don’t know if I am inspiring, but I feel like my words can at least resonate with others and helpful let them know that they are not alone.

Since the death of my husband I have been having the same recurring nightmare. With therapy it has got better, but my sleep is still greatly affected. To get an idea of the nightmare, I am going to share with you the end of my husband’s life, so this could be a trigger warning for some. This post won’t have the long story, but a short version of the end.

My husband had yet another fall in May 2025. He broke his hip and sacrum. He had to have two surgeries to put pins in. Because of his heart, kidneys and liver issues his blood pressure was chronically very low. We are talking 68/43, and that is with the max dose of medication to help keep his blood pressure higher. This just complicated everything, including surgeries. He was on dialysis 3 days a week for his kidneys. He had to have a paracentesis once a week to remove roughly 20 lbs of fluid from his abdomen because of the liver issues. He also had a leadless pacemaker put in to stop his heart from “pausing”.  So all of that, plus another hospital stay for the fall and in patient physical rehabilitation to get walking again was hard on him and his body.

One of the big problems with regular paracentesis and dialysis is the high risk of infection. He had been in septic shock before, so we were always on the lookout for this. When I got to his hospital room one day he seemed a smidge out of it and fevery. I told the nurse that this was how sepsis started the last time and she said she would look into it.

The next day I got a call he was being transferred back to the main hospital because there was in fact another blood infection and they were worried it was in his 2 replaced heart valves (infection likes to stick to foreign things in the body). They wanted to do another heart procedure to check and that is when my husband said, “No. I just can’t do all this anymore. I don’t want anymore heart procedures.” He was tired of dialysis 3 days a week. He was tired of the hospital one day a week for a paracentesis. He was tired of hurting, of not feeling good, of taking 16 pills a day. And as heartbreaking as it was to hear him say this, I also couldn’t blame him. The doctors and nurses also agreed with his decision.

They referred us to palliative care, which I didn’t event know was a thing and I am very thankful for their guidance. Dialysis is considered a live saving measure, so stopping this means death. They referred us to hospice to help make arrangements for him to come home.

Hospice had a long talk with me as the caregiver teaching me about the medications to help keep him comfortable, about signs to look for towards the end of life, the death rattle cough, the diapers, the calls I need to make to arrange a funeral home, the numbers to call for certain situations, etc.

I then sat in my car and realized all the people I needed to tell, including our daughter. This was gut wrenching and I wish it on no one. There was absolutely nothing I could do to make this situation better, and as a parent that is the worst kind of pain.

This was a Thursday evening. Hospice arranged for a hospital bed to be dropped off at our house and an ambulance to bring my husband home from the hospital. I had friends come help prepare the house and get the things I needed because I wouldn’t be able to go out. I was told that once a dialysis patient stopped dialysis it is typically 7-10 for them to pass, but that if the infection was in his heart it could go quicker.

He passed on Saturday evening. 2 days after he came home.

No one thought he would pass that quickly, so it took hospice a bit of time to be able to get to the house. It was just my daughter and I with him. He was comfortable and peaceful. But being the person “in charge” of making sure he had passed and sitting with his body for over an hour until help arrived was a lot.

My husband had been very sick for awhile, so I had “dress rehearsed” in my head what his death would be like, how to handle it, what I would need to do, but all the dress rehearsing in the world can not prepare you for when it actually happens.

This brings me to the recurring nightmare I had almost every night for a very long time after his passing. The dream always started with him showing up at home a couple weeks after he died. He was extremely angry and kept yelling at me that I “got it wrong”. That he didn’t die and it was my fault he was stuck at a funeral home for weeks until someone found him and now I had to call everyone and tell him he didn’t die and try to undo all the paperwork that had been done. He was screaming at me the whole time that “how could I do this to him.” I would wake up every night sweating and in tears.

I am thankful I started seeking more help. If you are having moments of PTSD, seek help. With therapy and talking through things I can acknowledge that I did everything I possibly could’ve in that situation. I know I went above and beyond for my husband for years. That doesn’t make experiencing trauma or PTSD any easier, but I can see the road to healing.

Thank you for reading my words. Whether it’s one of you or many of you. I know it is the right time for me to share. Writing is a form of therapy that I have found works best for me to release emotions, so there may be many similar posts or just a few…stay tuned to my roller coaster, dumpster fire, but looking at my glass half full life.

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