Christine Sutton

Female

Hillsborough, NJ

United States

Profile Information:

About Me:

I am a 45 year old woman. I have three older children, I am disabled with lupus but in the process of returning to school for my PhD.I have worked in the field of psychiatric advocacy for most of my life until becoming ill. I use the arts of photography and writing to express myself and my feelings-lately I feel as emptier than ever imagined possible.

About my Loss:

Three weeks ago yesterday from the time of joining this group my husband died unexpectedly in his sleep.It was four days before his 50th birthday.I was in the hospital at the time for a complication related to my illness My sister found him after he had been dead for at least 12 hours, most likely more. He was the love of my life. We had been living as married five years. I had finally found the person who made me the best me. He was humble, gentle, kind and someone I could have only imagined existed. Before Steve I had started to believe there was no such person on earth. The love and compassion we had was unique. The thought that I will never see him again eats at my stomach, takes something of my being away from the inside out. He was also disabled; we spent all the time together, similar to a retired couple. His disability was by no means life threatening, not in the physical manner. He had a serious mental illness. There are still questions in my head of suicide. I will not know the cause of death for at least another ten weeks. I have known pain and trauma, but I never imagined the intensity of this particular emotional pain. Some people say it never goes away, and I feel like a zombie in my own body.I can't imagine this never altering to a different type of grief, because if it stays like this forever, my life will be empty. I do have a modicum of hope, but that is all. Am I am going through a process which will someday take Steve from my everyday senses to the sense of soul and heart? This is hard to imagine and harder to find.

Are You a Service Provider? If Yes, please tell us about your service.

not now, but ironically I used to service as the coordinator of traumatic loss for the county where I was working. This type of loss is impossible to imagine. I am not sure what type of empathy I was really able to provide now that I have experienced it.

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