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Finding Your Way Back Home

By Deborah Feldman

My first grandchild, Sarah, was the light of my life when she was born. Everything she did was viewed as absolutely amazing (at least from my perspective). I was certain that she was destined for greatness when she was toilet trained before age 2; I had visions of her attending MIT or Stanford when she could add and subtract (doing it in her head) at age 3; she was a musical prodigy at age 4 when she learned how to play the theme song from Iron Man on my piano (OK, this was with some coaching from me); and when she began to read that same year, I was telling anyone who would listen about my genius granddaughter!

I was fortunate to have had a very close relationship with Sarah from the very beginning of her life. On the weekends we took many “day trips” and it was during these rides that we created a “game” where she would give us directions on how to get back to our home. She loved the challenge and by the time she was 5, she was able to direct us back home from her favorite places: Justice, Portillos, great grandma’s house, Woodfield shopping mall, Uncle Ron and Aunt Gail’s house, etc.

Like many families, home is so much more than a location – it is a feeling of acceptance, safety, calm, peace, security and love. The most important component of “home” is not the physical building, rather it is the people living in the house that makes a house a home – and when one of these people is suddenly gone, “home” can take on a completely different feeling.

There isn’t a “one size fits all” fix for grief. Every widow experiences it in her own unique way and must adjust and figure out how she will best live life going forward. My friend, Claudia, was widowed after 2 anxious, stressful years of dealing with her husband’s cancer diagnosis. While John’s doctors were very clear that he was not going to survive the rapidly metastasizing cancer, she never truly believed that he was going to die. After John passed, she seemed to be fine but, in the weeks that followed, she began to make some major life changes at warp speed. The home they shared for twenty years was put up for sale, she gave away all of John’s belongings, she distanced herself from most of her friends, she bought an expensive new car, and – most concerning of all – she refused to explain her actions to her children or to her friends.

One October day I dropped by her house with a pumpkin and a Starbucks gift card. I knocked on the door and was surprised when she opened it up to greet me and invited me in. I could tell that she had been crying and I, caught up in the moment, began to get teary-eyed. She said to me, “I know you know how I feel” and I responded with, “How do you feel?  Tell me how you’re really doing.” We spent the rest of the afternoon talking about John, how she had to get rid of everything that reminded her of John because it made her really sad, and that none of her family really understood her. Her whole life changed when he died and she believed that she no longer fit in with her friends because she wasn’t part of a couple anymore. She was afraid of the future.

I could have said to her that her friends wanted more than anything to be there for her. I could have said that her family is trying to understand her. I could have said that everyday reminders of John will get better, but I didn’t because I also once had the same feelings when my husband died and listening to her brought them all back to me in an overwhelming flood of emotion. So, we sat silent for a while, each taking in the realization that we both experienced these feelings, and this gave us a common bond.  She actually did fit in with someone…me.

The next few months were difficult for Claudia and her family because it was their first Thanksgiving and Christmas without John. Claudia’s friends all came through with meals, dinner and lunch invitations, and gifts. I encouraged her to join a widow support group and went with her for a while. I also recommended a grief counselor that I had used and liked. We continued to have meaningful conversations whenever the mood suited us – sometimes early in the morning, sometimes late at night. After a few months I could tell that she was beginning to see some light at the end of the dark tunnel. 

As luck would have it, or some would call it fate, or some would call it divine intervention, her house did not sell during the holiday season and by the time spring came around, she removed the listing. She was thankful that the housing market was slow – it gave her enough time to adjust and realize that what she was trying to run away from was extreme hurt and sadness and that leaving her home would not make those feelings go away. In the end, she found great comfort being surrounded by all the loving memories the house held.

For more insight from Deb, you can read the previous issue of Rebuilding Home here, or stay up-to-date on new issues by following Deborah Feldman’s blog on LinkedIn.