tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7973994758641403598.post3501465136142533041..comments2023-09-19T04:35:47.067-04:00Comments on Loving A Widower....a blog by author Julie Donner Andersen: Feeling "Left Out" As a GOWJulie Donner Andersen. authorhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03762949807031902269noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7973994758641403598.post-26560507076790556892010-06-24T12:25:22.794-04:002010-06-24T12:25:22.794-04:00I have been dating a widower over a year now. I ha...I have been dating a widower over a year now. I had a lot of the insecruties that many GOW have. have come to a place where in dealing with the LW family/friends and widowers grief that I truly do understand their loss. I do understand them feeling bittersweet about our relationship and feel their sorrow and mixed emotions- I get that the W will always have a place for his LW and love for her. <br /><br />But I am not a martyr. I also feel entitled to have my own happiness and life with him. Because I understand, sympathize, and have empathy but doesn't mean i want to live there. I also am not wrong to expect that his family, the LW family, and friends be cordial and polite to me and not rub my face his previous marriage anymore than I would expect those in my life to do that to him with my previous marriage. <br /><br />I also had a marriage before his - ended in divorce. I know this apples to oranges in comparsion. They are 2 separate entities, but I don't let my former marraige and relationship dictate my present. My W has to understand and accept aspects of me being divorced. An ex-husband on the scene... continuing interaction with him for the sake of childrenetc. But I dont' expect my W to take a back seat to my ex-husband and our issues. I have my own memories, but I am committed to living in the present not the past. My divorce made me who I am today. I am not the same person as before my divorce. I am refined. I am more independent. Just the same as I know his loss of his LW has changed my W. He is different than when he was married to her. the same man but refined also. He has been as single parent for many years and I am sure he is more compassionate and understanding due to not having a partner and caring for 2 daughters alone. <br /><br /> I know it can be more difficult with a widower because the loss was not a choice per se - but I also believe there comes a time to keep your memories but also not live in them... to honor the past, be respectful the LW and her memory and her family but not to LIVE FOR THEM soley or at the expense of your GOW/WOW. A man must decide to move on enough to let love come into his heart and start a new life. He can still simtulaneously maintain relationships with people from his past. <br /><br />He doesn't forget the old life or love but he has to hold his past loosely enough so he can enjoy the present and the future and allow love to grow again. <br /><br />I am happy My W posts OUR picture on his FB and I am by his side at all family events (his own famliy and his LW's). He makes it plain and clear he is with me now. He is not dishonoring her memory or hiding our relationship. It's simply life is for the living (the circle of life shall we say)- people eventually heal and learn to love again. In fact, I believe it celebrates the life of those who have gone before to live the remainder of our life fully rather than in constant sorrow. <br /><br />I try to be understanding of those who were close to LW but not the expense our our relationship or my own happinesss, its a balance. I try to conquer insecurities by realizing she was no better or worse than I. He met someone he loved and sadly she was taken away. Of course they remember her but it has no reflection on my own worth. Those who compare us are doing so out of their own inability to handle their grief inability to deal w/the fact that he has found someone new. Essentially it's their problem - not mine. <br /><br />I don't want my life or our relatioship to be be necessarily defined by his widower status it is but one facet of "us" not all of us just as me being a divorcee is not all of who I am or who we are...Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com