Four months today, Susan has been without the husband.

Susan has reverted to thinking of herself as a normal person but she's really not. How can she be normal when there's a big hole in her universe where the husband used to be? She doesn't even know where he is other than in a cardboard container in her bedroom closet. She sat his talking George Bush doll up there to keep him company, she likes to see them together.

Susan watched the husband get sick and die in two months, shouldn't she be mad or something? Or be flinging herself around screaming and tearing her hair out? Wait, she already does that when she can't find the nail clippers.

She's recently gotten a handle on the crying. She still does it of course, but can go longer periods in between.

That first day back to work after burying Cousin Lisa Susan took crying breaks in the toilet. At the end of the day she barely cleared the front door before she broke down, then sat in her car sobbing. Every morning she cried all the way to work then sat in the parking lot, sucked up her tears & went inside.

The car is crying central, it's her little privacy bubble which inspires thought and emotion. Same thing with the shower.
Alone + thinking = Bam! She's crying.
Thinking about sex definitely makes her sad, all that trust and intimacy is just gone. Plus the husband was funny. He'd strut around the room all full of himself like a wrestler in the ring, grandstanding for his audience. Who else is going to act like that for Susan?

No one.

Susan is going to get up, go to work, pay the bills, count her blessings and keep moving toward the future.

She misses her cousin Lisa every day.

She misses the husband every minute.