There are opportunities you never welcome – the letter offering you the chance to go on a speed-awareness course, an illustrated guide to lovemaking from one’s partner or, as I now have, the chance to join a club exclusively for people who’ve experienced close bereavement.
Widowed & Young (Way) is a support group with more than 1,800 members. It embraces everyone whether married or not with or without kids and whatever sexual orientation – as long as you’re 50 or under when bereaved. They know full well you’d rather be anywhere else: “We’re sorry you’re eligible to join us, but we’re glad you found us.” Surprisingly, so am I as it turns out.
I’d heard about Way but resisted my cousin Holly’s advocacy with some vehemence: “No chance. I’m not a clubby sort of bloke and I’m not going to start now. In the 30 years I’ve been a member of the Triumph car club, I’ve yet to go to a meeting. Anyway, where am I supposed to find the time and inclination to hang around people where the only things we’ve in common are tears and trauma?”
This last point is a biggie for me – I need to be lifted out of my slough of despond, not to join others wallowing in it. It’s why I wonder how online dating sites just for widows and widowers work – over dinner do you talk about funerals, memorials and bereavement benefits?
Holly doesn’t let me off the hook – her best friend’s husband died and his widow is a Way cheerleader. She also, as family feel entitled to, goes for the jugular. “For Christ’s sake what have you got to lose, Adam? You might just discover there are people who are going just as crackers as you feel you are and are not mad at all but simply grieving. Anyway, you old fooker …” Holly is younger than me and has a north-east accent, “… in how many clubs do you still qualify as young?”
I smile; she has a point – not so much about the age thing, although it is true, but I’ve been looking for an explanation for my strange behaviour. In the weeks since Helen’s death, I have developed an hour-long nightly bedroom ritual. I find myself picking up objects that were Helen’s – her diary, her hairbrush with blond hairs still attached, her makeup and even her dressing gown – and then spend ages being extra careful to place them exactly as she had last touched them. I know it has something to do with maintaining a close connection but it also smacks of bereavement-induced OCD.
It always happens at 1am adding further to my exhaustion and sense of the macabre, but as long as I jump into my empty bed by 2am I’m asleep in minutes. But if I miss the 2am slot I can lie awake for hours.
So I have bowed to Holly’s will and joined Way. It’s a revelation. It makes me realise that I am not alone. There are people there who have so many of the same sort of issues and it’s the one group who when they say that they understand, really do. I tinker at the edges for now but enough to take comfort in their stories and knowledge.
I’m humbled by the trauma of some of those whose loved ones have gone more brutally than I experienced with Helen, albeit we all ended up at a graveside. And I remind myself that I need sleep to be in the best shape for our children, Millie and Matt – they are the true reminders of Helen, not a hairbrush or comb.
So I go on a spree of clearing out our bedroom to bin/loft/charity. There’s a very bad moment finding Helen’s reading glasses. These were so much a feature of her appearance that knowing there’s no longer a face to place them on is an unexpected and painful emotional ambush. Team Way will be nodding at this. But this scorched earth clearance strategy works and I’m stronger – another small notch on this dreadful journey. Check out Way if you have been bereaved and qualify. It has a sister organisation for people in their 50s and 60s, Way Up.
“I don’t want to belong to any club that will accept people like me as a member” – Groucho Marks was wrong. Way to go, Way.
