Thank you Diane for your post. I am recently divorced after 27 years of marriage. Thank you so much for saying what you did about the grieving process - very helpful. We always have choices and although I'm not always thrilled about starting again at 50+, it is an often exciting journey, sometimes lonely but I spent years feeling lonely in my marriage. My life now is a better one and I am happier overall.

Thank you so much… I needed to hear that!

i understand where you are coming from. i am in a similar boat. you have to make yourself get out and do thing for yourself. don't loose the person that you are. i feel like you are a great person and you deserve better. do something different. i know the first step is hard. you have to think of yourself. i know you are a very caring mother, but sometimes we just need a girls night out. join a class that interest you. maybe going to church and joining a bible study or woman club. something different to get out of your comfort zone. do some research on things you enjoy maybe a book club if you are interested in books. think what are your hobbies reading to children going to a play or musical or concert. the list can be endless. one day your kids will be gone and you are left alone. dream your dreams and get out and make them happen we only have one life to live and we need to live it. i hope this helps to encourage you to go out and enjoy life. i personally love to read and explore new things. but i am better at giving out advice than receiving it. i am going through some personal issue of my own. but i know it is good to talk to someone it help to clear our minds. Take care and God Bless.

Hi Marlie. You’re experiencing part of the grieving cycle. It’s hard enough losing a spouse, but then, like you say, we also lose the companionship, the future plans we’d made, the belief that we’d grow old with them etc. We feel cheated of the safety, security and certainty that we thought we had (and even perhaps didn’t give a second thought to, as it was perceived as being ‘a given.’)

But....Just because we’ve lost one partner (mine left after being married to me for 32 years), doesn’t mean that all of our future hopes have been blown apart for ever. There are some plans that you will still be able to fulfil. There will be others that never would have come into sight, had you still been with him.

The future will look different to how you’d planned/envisaged it, but it doesn’t mean that it will be sad, lonely etc. It will just be different. None of us can predict the future. There’s no point in worrying or being upset about future plans that might not of even happened in the end. What if he’d got a terminal illness and the ‘holiday of a lifetime’/cruise (or whatever) never actually got to happen anyway? As for grandchildren? There’s no reason you still can’t enjoy grandparenthood! You get to enjoy them without sharing!

Imagining you both having the house to yourselves, is hard now it’s not happening together. We had our children young and I always looked forward to the fact that we would both still be relatively young by the time they left home. I envisaged holidays together, leisurely cafe breakfasts, hand-holding walks into the sunset. Instead, I got a midlife crisis husband who went off on week (sometimes month) at-a-time, motorbiking holidays alone, overseas work trips without me and ultimately, he moved himself into the spare bedroom, then moved out after a year of shouting at me daily and physically hurting me once. My dreams, like yours, were shattered. I longed for the normality of life as it had been before: The routine, the reliability, the sense of security, togetherness, making plans for the future and having ‘hope.’

The future doesn’t have to be bleak however you know? It’s scary as we don’t necessarily have any (or many) plans now our ‘other half’ has gone. There’s a void. An unknown. A silence. But slowly, perhaps very very slowly at first, it’s like a sliding door begins to pull open ever so slightly; letting a glimmer of light in. Over time, the door slides open further and further, until sunlight begins to stream in. Our eyes blink and shed tears with the brightness of it all, but they’re happy tears because we realise that rather than sit alone in a dark room, we now have a new pathway to step out onto. Yes, it’s not with him. No, it’s not what we’d initially hoped for or planned, but it’s actually got a name: ‘POTENTIAL!’

Give yourself permission to smile, to laugh, to not be upset about the past and not to grieve the future ‘that could have been.’ All we have is the ‘present moment’ and the ‘future’ that none of us-not one single one of us-can control. So: Go with it! Maybe you’ll find a new partner and can still persue your dreams? You are not alone..there are millions of us across the globe who have been left, unexpectedly and unfairly (often without warning) and for no good reason. Me? I’m bloody determined to have a great future to spite the SOB! He’ll miss out on all the wonderful things I’ll be doing when I retire! I’ve slammed the history book firmly closed on that relationship and I’ve opened a new book, with empty chapters yet to be written. Scary? Yes. Sad? Yes, I’m sad about what could have been. No hope? No way...I’ll create new plans. New dreams. I’ll imagine a happier version of me -aged in my 60s-then I’ll work out what needs to happen/change fir my new ‘happy plan’ to come to fruition so I can work towards this and take back some measure of control over my future. A future that’s not alone. Not lonely, but different (that’s all)...

Oh my goodness that was good. I need to print out and put on the fridge. I felt like I was the only person in the world that this was happening to. I am very sad, but when I remember what it actually was… that man was horrible. I needed to read this today!

I’m devastated and can’t even function. I feel you.

I am sad and lonely too!! 50 years old, 30 years of marriage, kids grown, me trying to heal...him on his 2nd "friend" since we split in March.

yes i think anyone who goes through separation or divorce is sad, angry, hurt, lonely and feel unworthy. we all go through so much pain and heartbreak after so many years with a person who was suppose to stay with you forever. do some soul searching and find yourself. get out and try to enjoy yourself. change something about your self. something that you have never done but have always wanted to do. i know it is hard. i am trying to get myself out more. all i want to do is stay inside and hide. you deserve better and maybe the future is telling you that it is time to move on and become a better person for yourself. i am trying to retrain my mind to have good thought not negative one. take care and God Bless you. i know you have it in you to be the best person you can be.