I honestly have no idea what I'm doing

I have learned that widowing is just like being a first time mother:

You have no idea what you’re doing.

There is no instruction book to help you.

Lots of people give you advice and not a lot of it is useful.

And most of the time, you are making decisions just hoping like Christ you’re not fucking up your kids for the rest of their lives.

But honestly, I have no idea what I'm doing or how I'm doing it.

I am basically just bumbling my way through this whole thing, trying to do what has to be done and make our lives work in what is our 'new normal'.

I would love to be able to stop the world, hop off, get my head around it all for a bit, then get back on again ... or at the very least, maybe sit in bed with a really good bottle of wine or champagne, lots of hazelnut chocolate, a few packets of chips and cry all day.

But that’s not reality, is it?

The reality is: the world keeps spinning.

The sun keeps coming up.

The kids and pets still need feeding.

The dirty washing basket is still breeding with the odd socks and seemingly multiplying by the day.

The reality that Pete is dead will not change.

Ever.

And so I have to get up, show up and function.

I am still a mother to 4 kids who need me irrespective of how desperately sad and heartbroken I am - they need me to function.

I need to function for them.

Also - at a completely selfish level - I have invested a bloody lot of time and effort into making those kids functional little people.

I’m not about to let all that time I’ve invested go to waste by letting this fuck them up. I cannot let this be that defining thing that ruins their lives.

That thing that stops their world functioning.

I will fiercely and unapologetically do whatever I need to do to help and guide and love and care and support these little people Pete and I created and raised. Above all else. And above everyone else.

Because these kids and our family were his world and I know his greatest fear would be him doing something that fundamentally damaged the kids.

It’s what he worried most about with his auto-immune disease. That his inability to do things was wrecking our lives as we knew it. That the kids were being impacted by his inability to do things. That he was the cause of their frustration. He was so desperately worried about it that I need to do this for him.

Also, he didn’t marry me because I was an incapable woman. So... *takes a deep breath* let’s do this.

This is how we are functioning:

We have good days and bad.

We have stretches of days that work so well it’s like nothing has changed. Like he’s just out of town for work.

Then we have day upon day that feels like the weight of the world is upon our house and the whole concept of getting out of the house seems ludicrous.

And on the days the wheels totally fall off, we cry - usually all of us at some stage during the day - then go to bed before 8pm and try and sleep and reset and start it all again tomorrow.

If that doesn’t work - we find wine, food, friends/family & repeat.