I lost DH 4 years ago and came here with a lot of my struggles, some of which were definitely caused by overthinking and a lack of anyone to confide in, so I came here looking for support and advice. Some people were quite unkind so I've been away for a while and this is a new account.
The upshot is I lost a lot of "couple" friends when DH died but some other people were really very good to me and I found a nice group of people who made it their mission to keep me busy! It helped tremendously.
At the time I questioned things a lot. Especially the men who seemed to be going above and beyond to help me, and the response by some female friends who either distanced themselves and their DHs from me or were very judgemental about me keeping male company. I desperately wanted to belive everyone was just being kind, but wondered about ulterior motives.
In my mind it was all friendly and I needed all the help I could get.
Now, I've found an equilibrium, I think I've coped pretty well and in this, the week of his 4th anniversary, I'm still desperately worried about young adult DC, one of whom is a shadow of what he was "before" on the whole life is OK.
But, every single one of those men, the married and single ones, including the one who was a really good friend to DH and I during his illness has tried it on at least once and some have been quite persistent.
Men! It's been an eye opener. I'd have said DH would never behave like that, and maybe he wouldn't but I would have said that about these men too. There's nothing special about me. I'm a very ordinary middle aged woman, who wasn't considered attractive even when young. If I've found this, I dread to think what attractive women have to cope with!