WTF... Widow, Miss, Single?

I have wanted to write for some time now, however I can barely speak. My words or thoughts get all jumbled and nothing I say sometimes makes sense. I feel like this is a natural part of grief but it is hitting me harder than before.

Grief changes you, period. Whether you are accepting of it or want it to happen, you come out on the other side different. It doesn't go away, it becomes a part of you. With Kinsley, I kept saying I didn't even recognize myself and I needed to figure out who I was without her here and what that looked like. I needed to find myself again.

I can say with Kinsley, I was a bereaved mother, "MOTHER". I will always be a mother, that title would never be stripped from me, regardless if she was my only child or not. I will forever be her mother, a mother.

No one tells you or fills you in that when losing a spouse, you could be standing in a crowd at a Taylor Swift concert and still feel the loneliness in your bones. I have the greatest people in my life but at the end of the day or end of the night, I find myself sitting here alone in this house thinking "this is it for me", "where is my husband?"

Before my husband left this world, I was a wife, a MRS. We were Jordan and Shannon, a couple, The Sandvik's. So many identities you take for granted. I see people pass and they are holding hands. I mean I wasn't the best hand holder especially since his hands were clammy but I get lost in thought. There is no more US, no more trips, no more anniversaries, no more marriage. I have to check a box now titled "widow" not "Bereaved Mother". I have people saying "Miss" like I am single. I am NOT. When I stood before my husband, I chose an identity I planned on keeping for life. I understand people choose to walk away, call it quits but that choice wasn't mine, it was a choice that was made for me and I don't agree. He was my forever. I will forever be married to him, I said "to death" and I meant it. Not just his death but mine as well. I don't think it is fair, I am being stripped of an identity I chose for life.

I spent the last 10 years with him creating a life and figuring out who we were together. I have no idea who I am without him. Honestly, my life before him seems like a different lifetime ago. That girl was damaged but not in this way, not a bereaved mother and now a widow. I keep being invited into these special clubs, I don't ask to be apart of.

I have a community of people checking in on me and I appreciate it. But no one and I mean NO ONE will fulfill his spot. I get angry that these are the cards I was dealt in life and sometimes I feel sorry for myself, I ask "why?". Then I realize well "why not" if not me, it would be someone else, right?" and I wouldn't wish this on anyone.

Life is full of unexpected tragedies, without the bad, we can't appreciate the good. I get that. Garth Brooks wrote a song about "The Dance". How ironic right?. I can't say if I knew this is what I was signing up for, I wouldn't do it all over again. I most definitely would. Given the heartache, the pain, I would have rather known Kinsley for 8 years, than not at all. She made me a better person. She made everyone's lives better. The same is said for Jordan. "I'm glad I didn't know, the way it all would end, the way it all would go. Our lives are better left to chance, I could have missed the pain, but I'd have had to miss THE DANCE."

I would choose him over and over again. I would always choose to dance with him. I will always be grateful for the time I had with him. Forever "I'm Yours".

Love always,

Your Wife