u/GrayTheFroggy

I hold back tears. I don’t want to feel this anymore, because I don’t want to be so stuck in it again that I wind up back in the psych ward. My family thinks that now that I’m home from the hospital and back to work after 2 months since the day he passed, that this is a “fresh start,” and honestly, I’m treating it like it is…I cut my hair very short, I’m thinking about dating again and I’m on dating apps even though I just lost him 2 months ago. I’m doing all of this because I’m just too scared to grieve. Everyone around me is so tired of hearing about Daniel. I feel people are treating him as some ex-boyfriend or that he means nothing and that he’s someone I need to move on from like an ex. But they never lost a partner they were infatuated with at such a young age! So now I’m pushing it away and not grieving anymore by behaving in ways to avoid it, like looking for a new partner, and i even started to talk shit about him as if he wasn’t the one for me in the long run. I want to feel what I felt from him again with someone else, but now it’s hitting me hard that nobody can replace him. No one can replace his beard, his heartbeat on my ear, and most of all, HIM!! Because of how people treat me now by telling me since I’m functioning again that I should “forget about Daniel and move on” Ive been avoiding my feelings about him and now I’m missing him so much and now I’m back to square one of being in shock about his death again, just like on the day I found out about it!! My family judges, and they have their boundaries about crying and trauma dumping, and so I play happy go lucky with not only friends and family, but also myself, BY MYSELF!! With dating apps and drastically changing how I look, as if this was a normal breakup!! But the dating apps and haircut and manicures and pedicures are not helping anymore, especially the dating apps, and I realized I can’t be a “robot” the way my family wants me to be!! It hit me hard tonight that Daniel is gone and he’s not coming back! I don’t know how to approach my family and tell them that I need to cry and grieve and that they’re making me afraid to do it, even in my own house alone and away from him. I can’t even cry anymore! I’m too afraid someone will hear and yell at me about it or commit me to the psych ward for the 9th stay!! My family never mourned a partner, let alone at 22 following a honeymoon phase…

Me and Danny weren’t married, but I still consider myself a widow. I was so happy when I was with Danny! It was honestly the happiest time of my life! I told him that when he was alive! I remember manifesting under the stars last December for us to be together forever! And then this happened!!

People keep saying, “you have to live life, you can’t wallow in it.” Nothing I do that used to make me happy seems as exciting anymore now that he’s gone! “Work will keep your mind off it.” But I just want to cry but I can’t with customers I have to be professional. I’m told, “oh you’ll find love again.” I’m bisexual but I’m more attracted to women and even though I like women better, I just don’t see myself loving anyone even a woman as much as I loved Daniel. “You have to cry, you can’t hold it in.” But then I’m told, “stop crying so much! You look psychotic.” What the fuck am I supposed to do then?! Be a robot?! “Don’t isolate.” But then again I’m told not to “trauma dump.” “Distract yourself.” “But don’t numb it.” “He’s in a better place now, he’s not suffering anymore.” But now I’m left here without him, suffering because I lost my one and only! This is what fucking urks me, “you have your entire life ahead of you.”

Look, nobody, especially a 22 year old, should lose their partner suddenly like this. It is not normal. Your 20s are supposed to be your prime; the best times in your life. I’m not a typical woman in her 20s to begin with. I didn’t go to college, instead I chose to work retail and blew my entire savings on a toxic man I was with in 2022-2023, because I thought I loved him and that he would pay me back. He didn’t, and I had to leave because he was unsafe. I spent most of my young adulthood in psychiatric hospitals and residential treatment centers. I lost jobs due to my mental health issues and being in those hospitals so much, And I went in them again after Danny passed away, but luckily got to keep my job this time and I’m actually going back in 2 weeks. It’s not some rewarding career though that most people my age get after getting a bachelors degree, it’s cashiering and stocking at an outlet store!

I never had a lot of friends besides toxic partners until I got with Daniel actually, and we shared our friends. They are all 30+ years old, and Daniel was 15 years older than me. I don’t even have friends my own age besides out of state. It’s because I live in a retirement town and I hate partying. Plus, my abusive ex never even let me have friends. So yeah, my late teens early 20s fucking sucked, until Danny came along, but now he’s gone!

I am grateful I had the time I had with Danny. I know I deserve better but something this amazing had to end and I’m scared of something like this happening again. This is something I wouldn’t wish on anyone!