Widowed by Sunrise: My Transition from Stay-at-Home Mom to Working Widowed Mom
The author and her kids: Smiles of hope seven years later
Little did I know that my husband had just eaten his last family dinner with us.
That a few short hours later I would wake to him having a heart attack in our bed.
That I would be frantically pounding on his chest, administering CPR, until the paramedics arrived, while our three children – ages 15, 5, and 17 months – slept peacefully in their own beds.
I thought my husband, Josh, was in good health. We lived a great life. It wasn’t overly lavish, but we traveled often and had just purchased our dream home ten months earlier.
From the moment I met him I knew he was a hardworking man – so much so that I was able to stay home with our kids, and he was the full-time breadwinner. I eventually started a cake business from our home to fulfill my need to have a creative outlet and to pay for activities the kids would participate in.
Josh’s death came as a total surprise. He was 36 and I was 37, and we’d been married seven years. Unfortunately, we had not prepared ourselves, financially or otherwise, for such an event. Though we’d had some brief conversations, we hadn't put any legal plans in place. Like many other semi-young couples, we felt it was something we had plenty of time to handle down the road.
After hearing the devastating news from the doctor, I felt angry, sad, lost, and confused. I didn’t know how I was going to tell our children and I didn’t know how I was going to manage everything without my husband and their dad. Though I had the cake business, it wasn’t enough to support us, and my first priority was taking care of our children and home. I hadn't worked a nine-to-five job outside the home for six years. It was in that moment that I felt I was carrying the weight of the universe on my shoulders.
I am grateful because even though every day may not be great, I’ve survived something that should have destroyed me.
I had never felt that leaving my job and choosing to be a stay-at-home mom diminished my value as a woman in the workplace. I knew that when the time came time for me to return, I would be able to polish my skill set and get back in the game. But what I didn’t know was that when I returned, I would be carrying the responsibility and weight of three grieving children and myself.
I soon found work within my children's school district as a cafeteria aide and later transitioned to a health liaison in the school clinics. Neither of those were my dream jobs but at that time I was in survival mode, and it just didn’t matter as long as my check was right on pay day. I learned hard and fast that when I arrived at work, I had to leave my grieving brain and emotions in the car to be able to function at work.
I wanted to be the best I could be for my children and help them navigate the loss of their dad, so I signed myself up for therapy. Soon after that, we all started family therapy. Though I missed my husband deeply and knew that I always would, I found myself growing in some areas – and stagnant in others. The areas I felt stuck in were because I was holding on to every earthly possession of his as if it would bring him back. As if it would lessen the reality of him being gone.
My children and I loved our home, but because of how my husband passed I dreaded going to sleep in our bedroom. And, despite my best efforts, it was becoming harder to make ends meet. It took nearly three years for me to be at peace with packing up and selling our home. By far the hardest part was telling our kids that we needed to move, and why. I assured them I would do my best to keep them in the same schools as their friends. I was hopeful we would land on our feet, but there were times that fear of the unknown made me doubt my decision.
I also wanted to teach my children that when bad, unexpected, unfortunate, and scary things happen, we are responsible for taking back the power it tries to steal by finding the courage and strength to move forward.
I believe that every widow and widower must make the decisions that are right for them. For me, moving was instrumental in being able to go from struggling to survive emotionally on a daily basis to being grateful.
I am grateful because even though every day may not be great, I’ve survived something that should have destroyed me.
