18 years ago today the love of my life, the other half of my very being died from bladder cancer. We had spent years trying to be healthy, exercising, trying to eat right, and we both had quit smoking, him for over 20 years and me for 7 and a half years.
I thought about suicide because I didn't want to continue on without him, I had the necessary drugs to do the job, left over highly powerful pain killers that he had been on to try to ease his agony. Strangely there were only two things that stopped me, my little rat terrier and the knowledge that few suicide attempts are successful, most are a cry for help and I didn't want help. I wanted to stop living, I wanted to stop feeling the pain.
I had friends who tried to help, most smoked, since my life was over anyway I began smoking again, hoping it would kill me, I started drinking again because it was the only way I could sleep. I also started doing another thing that I cannot mention here because of the censors. My income instantly stopped the minute he died because he was a service connected disabled veteran, a paraplegic injured in a parachute jump while on duty. It was a very windy day at Ft Benning GA and the very first ever company of ParaMedics was going to deploy to Viet Nam the next morning, 101st Airborne.
To celebrate this on this very very windy day they held a parade jump for the Military big brass, it was too windy to jump safely but they did it anyway. The wind caught the parachutes of nearly 100 boys and caused their chutes to streamer and wrap around their bodies in such a way that the reserve chutes couldn't open and they fell to the ground. Many of those boys died and many others were paralyzed, my Jerry was one of the lucky ones who survived. Those who weren't injured left for Nam the next day as scheduled and most of them were shot down and killed the first time they tried to jump into a battle to give medical care to wounded soldiers.
That day I began my quest for anything that would give me any kind of pleasure or relief from the pain, but the best I could do was to drink until I could no longer feel my face and I would lay down on the bed and hope that I would not wake up again, but I always did, I am a survivor even when I did not wish to survive. Friends and family called and visited for a while but they had other things to do so after a few months it was decided that mom was fine now. They couldn't see the pain that was now my life, eventually my widow's benefits started coming from the VA, all $890 a month, I had taken care of him for 25 years instead of completing my education and having a career. The only job skill I had was dog grooming, but 25 years of lifting him and a wheelchair had taken it's toll on my body and I could no longer groom dogs for a living. I volunteered at my ISP for 4 months and finally convinced them to hire me, but not before I had to declare bankruptcy. I never had time to properly grieve because I was too busy fighting off bill collectors who acted like I had intentionally killed him just to get out of paying them.
I met Cliff online and after two years came here to meet him in person and see if things might work, my ISP was closing the office I worked at and I was pretty desperate at the time. I had to do something and moving in with my daughter and her family wasn't going to happen.
Anyway that is the story, we stayed drunk and high for several years until after his work injury when we quit drinking.
After a few years I finally began to want to live again and breathe and tried to quit smoking, and simply couldn't do it until I discovered vaping.
I haven't had even one puff of a cigarette for almost 8 months and there is no way I would let anyone else push me to smoke again, this journey has been too hard fought to give up now.
This is MY life and I AM a non smoker, I make the choice NOT to smoke.
I thought about suicide because I didn't want to continue on without him, I had the necessary drugs to do the job, left over highly powerful pain killers that he had been on to try to ease his agony. Strangely there were only two things that stopped me, my little rat terrier and the knowledge that few suicide attempts are successful, most are a cry for help and I didn't want help. I wanted to stop living, I wanted to stop feeling the pain.
I had friends who tried to help, most smoked, since my life was over anyway I began smoking again, hoping it would kill me, I started drinking again because it was the only way I could sleep. I also started doing another thing that I cannot mention here because of the censors. My income instantly stopped the minute he died because he was a service connected disabled veteran, a paraplegic injured in a parachute jump while on duty. It was a very windy day at Ft Benning GA and the very first ever company of ParaMedics was going to deploy to Viet Nam the next morning, 101st Airborne.
To celebrate this on this very very windy day they held a parade jump for the Military big brass, it was too windy to jump safely but they did it anyway. The wind caught the parachutes of nearly 100 boys and caused their chutes to streamer and wrap around their bodies in such a way that the reserve chutes couldn't open and they fell to the ground. Many of those boys died and many others were paralyzed, my Jerry was one of the lucky ones who survived. Those who weren't injured left for Nam the next day as scheduled and most of them were shot down and killed the first time they tried to jump into a battle to give medical care to wounded soldiers.
That day I began my quest for anything that would give me any kind of pleasure or relief from the pain, but the best I could do was to drink until I could no longer feel my face and I would lay down on the bed and hope that I would not wake up again, but I always did, I am a survivor even when I did not wish to survive. Friends and family called and visited for a while but they had other things to do so after a few months it was decided that mom was fine now. They couldn't see the pain that was now my life, eventually my widow's benefits started coming from the VA, all $890 a month, I had taken care of him for 25 years instead of completing my education and having a career. The only job skill I had was dog grooming, but 25 years of lifting him and a wheelchair had taken it's toll on my body and I could no longer groom dogs for a living. I volunteered at my ISP for 4 months and finally convinced them to hire me, but not before I had to declare bankruptcy. I never had time to properly grieve because I was too busy fighting off bill collectors who acted like I had intentionally killed him just to get out of paying them.
I met Cliff online and after two years came here to meet him in person and see if things might work, my ISP was closing the office I worked at and I was pretty desperate at the time. I had to do something and moving in with my daughter and her family wasn't going to happen.
Anyway that is the story, we stayed drunk and high for several years until after his work injury when we quit drinking.
After a few years I finally began to want to live again and breathe and tried to quit smoking, and simply couldn't do it until I discovered vaping.
I haven't had even one puff of a cigarette for almost 8 months and there is no way I would let anyone else push me to smoke again, this journey has been too hard fought to give up now.
This is MY life and I AM a non smoker, I make the choice NOT to smoke.
I hope it pushes you over the hump 
you're obviously in cahoots with the Chinese trying to undermine capitalism by getting free stuff 
