When Fear Became Reality!

I remember as a young girl overhearing a conversation my mother was having with some female friends from church. We were never allowed to be in the same room while adults were having adult conversations. This particular day, I left the room as told, but listened outside the door. It would be a conversation that would haunt me until adulthood. I never disobeyed my mother, but for some reason that I still can’t explain today, I took it upon myself to listen in on the conversation she was having with women of the church.

The conversation they were having was of a woman who had lost her husband. I was about 10 or maybe even 11 or 12, but what struck me was when one of the women used the word “WIDOW.” I didn’t understand the word then but I can tell you it terrified me to the core. I do remember what was stated and it went like this: Sister …..just lost her husband and my heart goes out to her, because now she is a Widow and her life will never be the same. I should never have been listening in on grownups conversations. The word WIDOW was new to me, I had never heard of someone being called this before and for some reason I was too young to understand, it terrified me.

I remember asking my mother what the word meant and she telling me and even though she always had a way with comforting me and my siblings, this word still frightened me. Unknowing to me, one day, I would become the word, title and name that terrified me so much. The word nightmares are made of. That word only one could think that only happens to other people, but could never happen to them. My sweet little bubble that I was living in suddenly burst!

June 4th, 2012, Grief and Widow rang my door bell and when I answered, it became the greatest, challenging, horrific time of my life. The word I was most frightened of and it’s best friend showed up at my door, moved in and began a reign of terror on my life.

There is nothing more menacing and painful than Grief, and to be accompanied by it’s best friend Widow, is almost too much for any person to comprehend. My husband was my best friend, someone I could always talk to, share my dreams, ambitions, goals, as well as the things that frightened me and went bump in the night with.

Never would I ever imagined that the one word that terrified me so much would show up at my door! I have learned to accept the fact that I am a “Widow,” but I will never allow it or it’s friend Grief to hold me down and neither should anyone else, whether you are a Widow or Widower!

This is a lonely journey, but one we all can conquer.

JASMINE D. PARKER ©