My heart goes out to everyone whos grieving, two of my older grandsons are grieving just now for their granda who passed away after having a bypass done.. he never woke..... I havent seen my grandsons since but feel for them as its the first major part of their lives to be taken away.... and to me losing my granny at age ten or eight was the worst Ive ever experienced....I still think of her often sixty years on .... Grief depending on how close the person was to you and how much you needed them makes it more difficult and longer to get over.... losing a child being the hardest Id expect... strength to you all who are in thos position.
I am a sad, angry new member here.
My love lost his battle after almost ten years on Thanksgiving morning. We were together for 25 years, not nearly long enough as it turns out.
most days I cant seem to get going, and I will go a week without crying and then I cant stop for a week.
It's not that I don't have support and a good future to look forward to, but I don't want all that--I want him back.
I am excited about my future, lots of great stuff ahead and all that, but my now is so sad and so mad at how he died. of course i second guess myself about all of the decisions we made in the last few months, and i wonder if he would still be here if we had gone to a different hospital.
I don't know if i can ever forgive myself for not insisting he go there instead.
suz, first off, I think a lot of us understand the 'what if's" and "should haves" . I know I've been there many times.
But nobody knows what would have happened if different paths were taken. Things may have been different but still ended the same. The best anyone can do is whatever they can do at the time. You can't beat yourself up when you know you did do your best at the time.
None of this is easy but if what you say about 10 meaning a long battle, you deserve more than being angry at yourself.
Would he blame you if he had a way to do so? I doubt it.
Be kind to yourself. This is a time that you need a little kindness. There's enough else to go through.
I almost felt like it was a cruel joke of God's to take him that way when infection control was the one thing that I thought I could control..
It is like I needed to process it all 1000 times until suddenly I didn't need to anymore..
time to work through that..
Agree - there is always the second guessing but you just can't do it - try to get into the mindset of "it was time" - just recently had the 1 yr. anniversary of my husbands' passing - doing better now (still have moments) - but... you can't beat yourself up.
I am sorry for your loss, suz.
I'm at the 5 1/2 year mark, and I still well up when I think of my husband. I've gone on, and changed a great deal, but I always question my decision to be in Tucson ahead of him for a few days. I could have stayed home with him, and we'd have come down together, but I didn't, and I wasn't there when he died. I have horrible remorse sometimes, still, for that decision. I have rationalized myself to eternity and back trying to convince myself that even if I'd have been there, chances are, I still couldn't have saved him. Logically, I know that, but because I didn't get the chance to find out, I still wonder if I could have made a difference...an eternal question I won't have an answer for until I see him again some day, hopefully.
There used to be something I beat myself up over for the first year or so. After reading your post, Marcy, I realize I can't even remember what it was! I must have come to terms with it. Not going to try and remember either.
I'm still sad and angry at times and it's been over four years. It's nearing five.
I wouldn't try to second guess the hospital unless they were blatantly negligent. My husband died of massive infection in a well regarded regional medical center. They did everything they could. In fact, after his death, one of the specialists called to apologize. He didn't think my husband was going to die.
The thing that really ticks me off once in a while is that not one of the many specialists whom he was seeing during the last couple of years of his life could tell us what disease or disorder was killing him. The best answer I got was that it was an extremely rare form of cancer or an extremely rare inherited disorder. That's not very satisfying.
Things change and you will have some happy moments, days, weeks. They will just be different that the ones you had before.