Shrink

I saw the psychologist today.  It took me 45 minutes to fill out the paper-work.  She's probably in her late 60s, and speaks rather softly, which is unfortunate considering my hearing issues.

It went pretty much as I thought it would.  I told her the entire story, cried pretty much the entire time, and she said the same things most everyone else has told me.  I did get a couple of homework assignments though.  She wants me to write a letter to John, explaining how I could have fixed all of the issues he/we were going through.. and she wants to see the poem that I referenced the other day.

I had told her that I thought I could have done much more to help John, and prevented what happened.  That's probably why she wants to see how I think I could have fixed it.  From what she and everyone else tells me, the guilt over my inaction that lead to his passing is something that could be very emotionally damaging to me.. for a long time.  I expect that considerable time and effort will be spent trying to convince me I'm wrong.. but I don't think I'm wrong.

I'm also supposed to take the dogs for walks.. do work if I can, get out of the house more, and generally just not think about John 24/7.  She, and everyone else, insists that John wouldn't want me to become a lost soul.  I don't think he would, but I'm not sure what that is supposed to mean to me.  I'm very angry at John for not doing the things he should have done for his health in order to keep our family together.  I can both be angry at him for not doing things the right way, and angry at myself for not getting him to change course.

I still, and always will, believe that this nightmare was completely avoidable if John and I had just pulled together and managed it.  Maybe we both share half the blame.  That doesn't change the fact that he's gone and I'm devastated by it.

When my mother passed, my father did not react anything like I have.  He didn't have anti-depressants and therapists.  He didn't lay in bed and cry.  He was re-married about 6 months later.  I can't just randomly pick somebody and use them as a substitute for John.  He was everything to me, and I genuinely wanted to get old with him.  I can't just find a replacement as a coping mechanism.

So I guess 'bitter' is another word that describes me.  At the end of this black tunnel, I don't see the word 'happy' applying to me.  Sometimes people never recover.  I've seen that before.