1. No matter how much you think you know about grief and loss, when you watch the person you love most take their last breath, you have nothing to hold on to but sheer survival. No amount of knowledge or preparation can soften the agony of being left alone, alive, without them.
2. The first days and weeks and months of being bereaved of your soul mate are horrendous. I truly don’t know how I survived. I couldn’t eat, I didn’t sleep, I didn’t know how to be or who I was. Life was reduced to very basic functional instructions to myself; get up, shower, make tea, try and focus long enough to do essential tasks, walk, force some food down, haplessly tidy and clean the space I live in. Get through it. Just get through another day.
3. The world shrinks down to the very few people who you feel safe with. And they are not necessarily who you’d expect. While you try to comprehend the enormity of living on without the one person who you are embedded in, invested in, beholden to, there will be a few dogged, loyal souls who are unafraid of your rage and strangeness and brokenness. These are your anchors in the churning, boiling sea of terror and anxiety. Turn and grip tight to them. You might find yourself sharing your deepest thoughts and fears with someone you only know slightly, but who is there when you need them, undemanding, steadfast and reliable. That’s perfectly ok. If they are there for you, then reach out to them and lean on them. People show up when they’re most needed, in whatever way they can. And some people just can’t face your pain. Death has a way of sorting the wheat from the chaff.
4. There’s something about building muscle memory that is relevant to surviving the worst bereavement. You just have to get through the days, day after dreadful day. You have to teach yourself how to be in this new, hateful loneliness. You have to learn new ways of being. Facing up to having to be without the person you love. You have to be brave. Brutally. Force yourself to do things alone. Do it once. Then do it again. And again. And again. And then do it again. That goes for every damn thing, from grocery shopping to dealing with difficult phone calls, from getting back to work to achieving something fantastic and having nobody to share it with. Just force yourself to function. A little bit at a time. Keep doing it, whatever it is. You have to learn that this is your new normal, being alone, and you can only really know it by doing it. You are your own teacher. Nobody else can do this for you.
5. Trust yourself. Really, really trust yourself, no matter how scared you are that you can’t be relied on in your new, strange, unpredictable incarnation as you struggle to work out who you are and how you are. Losing your other half, your beloved person, sends you almost completely mad, everything suddenly is incomprehensible and unbearable, and it’s natural to think that you are broken beyond repair, unreliable and inconsistent. But the greatest despair and loss and grief forces open a door to your soul that you never knew existed, and if you simply allow yourself to face your loneliness and grief and emptiness full on, you will find that somehow you have the strength and the skills that will help you survive. We are all born into this world alone. And we all die alone. Tap into this individuality, this strength. Ultimately, this is all we have.
About Fran Hall
Fran has worked in the funeral sector for over 20 years, as a funeral director and a natural burial ground manager, and most recently as CEO of the Good Funeral Guide. She and Steve were partners for many years and finally married in September 2020. Steve died three weeks later.
Fran writes about living with grief for the Good Funeral Guide. You can also find Fran on Twitter and on Instagram.
