Dark Stormy Nights ... and Days

There is a podcast I discovered recently called Widow Cast, hosted by one JoAnn Filomena, a life coach. She does an episode where she talks about "Widow Moments"... those times where it REALLY hits you that your spouse is truly gone.  For me, there have been a couple times where it hit me like a ton of BRICKS - one time being where I was asked to populate an emergency contact field on a form I was filling out.  I wrote the first letter of my husbands name, and then had to cross it out.  

There are moments right up until now that I feel like our house knows Andre is gone - every time something breaks I think - "oh you're leaving me too?"  Shortly after he died - thankfully while I had family in town, there were these violent windstorms in my area. It was windy enough that the furniture on our upstairs deck was able to slide around and make a grinding sound against the ground as if someone was actually up stairs rearranging things.   The wind whipped - and the draft actually blew small traces of dust through our closed windows  (put that on the checklist to get checked out).  The wind was so strong that 4 of the 5 blades on our outdoor ceiling fan actually broke COMPLETELY off.  The first night of the wind storm I actually went up stairs to push the furniture against the walls of the patio so it would not be blown around.  I looked up to the sky and I could see stars clearly, and I could also see clouds moving rapidly with the wind.  It all seemed surreal.  The wind storm seemed to represent the actual storm going on inside my mind and in my life.  The broken fan also seemed very symbolic.   During weather like that, I was so used to remarking about it to my husband, and then cuddling with him during those cold nights.  Now that reality was no more.   I think that's the epitome of a "widow moment".

I've experienced the downside of having a husband who was handy around the house, and an electronics geek.  I talked about the dark stormy nights, but I spend many DAYS dreading the days when the computers need updating, and my son asks for the newer game console for Christmas.  Don't get me wrong - I am not the COMPLETE damsel in distress... I have my ways of figuring things out or getting the professional help I need.  However, these are moments when I just MISS having my husband around.  It's heartbreaking. I am realizing that I may have been a tad spoiled.  Spoiled in the ways of being able to defer certain things to him.  He was also my best friend, and protector.  I was spoiled in that I always had an advocate in my corner, looking out for me.  The upside is that I was able to observe him, and he taught me a lot.  Right now I am learning that in certain moments I undercut myself, and I am stronger and more clever than I realize.  I am having to tap into reserves I didn't know I had in order to sustain and survive. 

Feel free to comment.  Have you had widow moments that hit you really suddenly, and really hard?