​Tomorrow is the sixth anniversary of Tim’s sudden and unexpected death. For each milestone date I’ve found the run up to be much harder than the day itself, and I expect this year to be the same. What has changed is the length of the run-up.
 
In the first few years it began on my birthday, which was also our wedding anniversary, in September. It continued through his birthday in December, Christmas, New Year and then to his death in February. Now, I can raise a glass and remember him on those dates, and the run up period doesn’t begin for me until February. In the early days of grief, it surrounds us, and its rawness is part of our every waking moment. Over time, in my experience, grief softens and becomes less raw, and while it remains the same size and stays with us always, our lives grow around it. 

Valentine’s Day is coming up. As a day focused on romantic love, it’s a tough one for many widows, and like all milestones, the first may be the hardest. Also, like other milestones, the run up to it may be more difficult than the day itself. 
 
What to do on the day
It's getting harder to avoid St Valentine's Day - the ads and trailers on TV, articles in magazines and newspapers, chat on social media sites, the shelves of food and drink in the supermarkets. Some online marketing companies offer the opportunity to opt out from Valentine’s Day messaging (this can also be an opportunity to go through your inbox and junk mail and unsubscribe from all the marketing messages that are cluttering your email and your brain).

While you may not be able to completely get away from it, there are things you can do make it easier. 

• Accept that it might be a day of grief attacks
• Take time out to celebrate your partner and the love you shared
• Buy yourself chocolates and flowers, and get some for friends and family
• Take it as a day to be kind to yourself and focus on some self-care
• Go to the cinema or theatre and watch something totally unromantic
• Host a bring and share meal – there will be other people trying to avoid Valentine's Day just as much as you
• Treat yourself to something you wouldn't normally do – make yourself your favourite meal, get a takeaway, go somewhere nice for the day (ideally away from all of the shops), book a massage

Alternatives to Valentine’s Day

• Black Day – a South Korean holiday where you eat jjajangmyeon (짜장면, noodles with black bean sauce)
• Ystävänpäivä or Friendship Day – a Finnish day to celebrate friendships
• International Quirkyalone Day – a day to celebrate platonic, familial and self-love
• Galentine’s Day (13 February) – a day to celebrate female friends (thanks to the sitcom Parks and Recreation)
• Palentine’s Day (13 February) – a day to celebrate platonic love, that includes male and non-binary friends, and is inclusive to those who are asexual or aromantic
• St Valentine was the patron saint of beekeepers – so have a day focused on planting insect-friendly flowers or learning about bees and beekeeping (ex-beekeeper here)
• Celebrate or Random Acts of Kindness Day (17 February) or Love Your Pet Day (20 February) a few days early

If it helps – Valentine’s Day has a pretty dark origin story (trigger warnings for this one). It also has a major impact on the planet, generating 9 million kilograms of CO2 and all kinds of plastic pollution. And chocolate and roses are often reduced the day after...

As Father's Day approaches, sending love to all who are:

• mourning their partners who were fathers, or who tried and weren't able to be fathers
• caring for children who are mourning their fathers
• mourning their own fathers
• missing ever having had a father figure.

Please take care of yourself this weekend.

"The pain of grief never really goes away. You just learn to wear it. But it's so raw for so long. And the awful year of firsts. And not being able to move things because they were the last person to touch it. And the more things that you move, the fewer things you have that they've touched last, and you feel like you're inadvertently erasing them. Hoping their clothes will retain their smell but they don't. Grief is so so complicated."

The time after they die is so full of firsts. That first time you go to bed and there's an empty space next to you. The first time you wake up in a world where they are no longer. The first time you do a load of washing that only contains your own clothes. The first meal for one. The first time that you change the bedding, and the bed no longer smells of them. The first shop that doesn't contain that little extra something that you always picked up.

Moving past the milestones
The milestone dates – your birthday, their birthday, Christmas – are tough. These are things that should be full of joy, but instead they trigger memories of what we have lost, and they remind us that our people aren't here. There are also the anniversaries of their diagnosis, admission to hospital and death.

When I came up to the day before the first anniversary of his death, I honestly didn't know how I was going to get through the next 24 hours. A friend from Widowed and Young told me that I had survived the day of his death, and that no anniversary could ever be worse than that. That helped me a lot.

For me, the first New Year was tough. This was partly because we had been going to the same New Year's Eve party, dating back to years before we were married. But most of all, it was because it heralded a year that Tim would never see.

The firsts don't necessarily end after a year. There will be others – the first wedding, the first time a friend or relative has a baby, the first death of someone close.

In my experience, the run up to the milestones are worse than the days themselves. For me, the length of day, the temperature, the weather, the emerging of the snowdrops, all remind me of the time of year and the anniversary of his death. People reminisce about the Beast from the East, and that was around the time he died. The milestone day dawns with a small sense of relief.
​
Coping with the firsts

• be aware that these days can be tough
  
• Plan things to do on milestone days, either alone or with people. Treat yourself. But allow yourself to cancel at the last minute if that feels the right thing to do.
• Create a ritual – light a candle, put flowers somewhere significant, visit the grave, eat their favourite food, make a donation to a special charity. Remember that this ritual is for you, though – if it becomes a burden, don't do it.
• Talk about them to the people who loved them.
• Do something creative – write your thoughts down. Draw or paint something. It doesn't have to be good, it doesn't have to be shown to anyone, it's just for you.
• Plant something, perhaps something that flowers or fruits at the time of year you are remembering.
• Use grounding techniques, to root yourself in the now, rather than 'then'
• Sit in the sadness – sometimes we need to accept that we are sad, that we miss them, that there is a hole in our lives without them.
• Celebrate if you want to. Or have a really good cry. Sob. Wail. Howl. Or do both. It's all okay.

This time last year I…
This time last year you…
This time last year we…

Tim Dudley
1 December 1967 to 24 February 2018