The Aloneness of Isolation

When disease of any kind hits a family like a carelessly flung grenade, your initial response is, “this can't be happening,” then it's, “okay, this is happening but how do we get out of it?” My husband, Randy, and I fought with every tool we could find but nothing was working and days turned into weeks, weeks into months and when months have now turned into years a stark reality sets in regarding the situation. Long term illness is the draining of all resources, not just once, but everyday!

You never want to be on a losing team. You don’t want to be identified with failure. You don't want to be grouped with the 'have been married' because you are still married...married but alone.

There is an old Three Dog Night song from years ago, entitled with this impressive, unequivocal name, “One.” These are simple lyrics, that give a diminutive perspective on this aloneness dilemma.

One is the loneliest number that you'll ever do
Two can be as bad as one
It's the loneliest number since the number one.....

Trying to adjust to one when you have been part of two for many years, as in my case 46 years, is an exercise in futility. Your thinking has morphed through the years and you realize there is a unit of two that has developed with varying opinions, strategies, abilities etc....all intertwining to bring identity to your life as part of a 'couple.' Your life as 'a couple' is now only a memory as I rehearse yet another simple line from the above mentioned song; Now I spend my time just making rhymes of yesterday.

It's a couples world out there and no matter how many times friends and family want and attempt to include you in their own couples world, it is uncomfortable at the least and down right depressing at the worst....and it's no one’s fault! And that, my friends, is maddening, I so want to BLAME someone or something, hoping that by placing blame I might get a little relief from the constant nagging question that pounds in my head, “why?”

With no answer to that question in sight, I must lay it aside and continue to live and take care of my husband until the final chapter is written. I am not the author of that chapter. If I did not personally trust in God as the Divine Director of my life I would be without hope...but I am not!


Three thoughts:

1. You still have value as 'one.'
2. Accept that not everybody can handle the situation. Don't take it personally.
3. People that you counted on leave you. People that you may have forgotten about find you.