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Bereavement

Find bereavement help and support from other Mumsnetters. See also your choices after baby loss.

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Original poster

it is my 8th wedding anniversary today but DH died 4 years ago so he has now been dead for longer than we were married

11 replies

anniversaryblues · 15/03/2011 19:29

and no-one other than our best man has thought to acknowledge our wedding anniversary .

I really don't expect friends to remember the date, I wouldn't have expected cards from them when DH was alive.

but my parents? my in-laws? our siblings? I don't expect flowers and cards, but a text message would have been nice. Other than the first year, my in-laws and SIL have never acknowledged what a hard day this might be for me. This year nothing, from any of them including my parents.

If I say something then I am telling them to remember and that's a bit crap, I want people to do it because they want to not because they've been told to. It just feels so shitty and lonely that they don't think about it at all.

All I can think about today is the life DH and I (and ds) should have been having, whether we would have had more children, be going out for dinner, what we would be talking about, planning, celebrating. This is so fucking unfair.

Perhaps my fmaily don't realise how much I still miss him and want him back. But I don't know how anyone could think that this is ever something that gets better, properly 100% better.

OP posts:

FourFortyFour · 15/03/2011 19:32

I am so sorry .

I think people don't mention things like this because they don't want to upset you or remind you, as if you wouldn't already be upset or would forget.

I would be tempted to tell them how you feel tbh.

QOD · 15/03/2011 19:34

I am sorry - it's my friends DH's birthday tomorrow, he died 2.5yrs ago, and she is waiting with gritted teeth to see if anyone acknowledges it. Hurts if they do, hurts if they don#t :(

The problem with anniversaries is that some people (like my family) don't celebrate or mention them anyway - would they have acknowledged it if he were alive?

I am sorry though - he is so important to you and DS and yet it makes you feel like he's gone and forgotten.

Hope you did have a lovely wedding day to look back on - take care

izzybiz · 15/03/2011 19:35

So sorry

I can only imagine how you must be feeling today, I'm sure they are only trying not to upset you, still rubbish though.

piratecat · 15/03/2011 19:39

I am so sorry op, for your loss and for having such a sad day today.

Do you have a best friend to talk to this evening?

Its really hard when others don't remember something and you feel if the situation was reversed that you would remember and be there for them.

hugs xxx

Original poster

anniversaryblues · 15/03/2011 19:40

thanks everyone. to be fair, siblings wouldn't have sent cards had DH been here, but parents and pils definitely, they had done for the first 3 anniversaries anyway. it is my parents lack that hurts the most as I'm used to the fact that the ILs don't (and I'm afraid I am petty but as they stopped acknowledging mine, I stopped acknowledging theirs, so perhaps that's just where things are now.)

OP posts:

Carrotsandcelery · 15/03/2011 19:44

I am so sorry. It must be a very difficult day.
I am sure many of your family and friends have remembered and are thinking of you but either don't really know what to say or don't want to upset you if you seem to be doing ok.
I hope you are going to raise a glass/brew to you both tonight.

exexpat · 18/03/2011 10:22

Bit late, but sorry you are dealing with this too. After the first year, I don't think anyone acknowledged my wedding anniversary either. I get messages from family and friends on the anniversary of DH's death, and some on his birthday, but not the wedding anniversary. I think perhaps people aren't meaning to be thoughtless, just that they don't want to rub it in that I don't have anyone to celebrate with.

I find myself doing the maths sometimes too - DD has spent more time alive without her dad than with him now; we would have been married 20 years this year, but only made it to 15; I'm older now than he ever got to be...

I don't think it ever gets 100 per cent better either, but I wouldn't really want it to if that meant I didn't miss him any more - he deserves to be missed.

takemeasiam · 04/04/2011 23:15

A widow myself. I also found this was mentioned the 1st year. But not after the 1st year, In fact I think in year 1 even the in-laws didnt mention it, Just got that look off them lol.

Although I have a best friend who does call me to see how I am, and to show he remembers. My son's godfather.

Yep my husband has now been gone longer than we were married. 6 years in november, We'd just been married 2 n a half years.

Yep I do the maths too, my boy was nearly 6, he is 11 now nearly half his life he hasnt had his dad. But heyho such is life x

BluddyMoFo · 04/04/2011 23:18

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

takemeasiam · 04/04/2011 23:18

And yes I still miss him very very much, dont think I will ever stop. What annoys me is people seem to think you should. They think you should be over it, they dont realise you never will.

Its just another part of life you learn to live with.

Northernlurker · 04/04/2011 23:22

I'm doing these sums all the time at the moment thinking about my sister. Together for nearly a decade she and bil married at the end of last year after he received a terminal diagnosis. Her married life was just over 3 months. I don't know how we face her wedding anniversary but I will mark it somehow. Long before then though he will have been dead longer than they were married. That's pretty unbearable isn't it really?

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