{"id":919,"date":"2017-02-07T02:35:45","date_gmt":"2017-02-07T07:35:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/activeseniorsdigest.ca\/wp_activeseniorsdigest\/?p=919"},"modified":"2017-02-07T02:35:45","modified_gmt":"2017-02-07T07:35:45","slug":"life-after-death-surviving-the-loss-of-a-loved-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/activeseniorsdigest.ca\/wp_activeseniorsdigest\/?p=919","title":{"rendered":"Life after death: Surviving the loss of a loved one"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"After<\/a>
After recovering from the loss of his wife, Freed takes lots of time to travel the world. Here he poses for a photo during a mountain adventure.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By Joel Wittnebel\/Active Senior’s Digest<\/p>\n

Hope was gone. For months, no matter what Dennis Freed did, it seemed like nothing made it better. The suicidal thoughts were strong and the group grieving sessions only pushed him further into despair. Instead of shining a light to some happier place, they turned him inwards
\nonly to focus on exactly that he was trying to get around.<\/p>\n

Freed\u2019s wife of 31 years, Hope, was dead, and Dennis was lost.<\/p>\n

\u201cI never cried until my wife got cancer,\u201d he says. \u201cI wasn\u2019t allowed to cry.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dennis needed to put a bright face on things as he watched his wife, diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2005, battle the disease for nearly 7 years. Hope, a former teacher, passed away in 2012 at the age of 53.<\/p>\n

The two had been married for 31 years, and had been married since Dennis was 22. For Dennis, it all happened so fast.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe fell in love quick,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

After three months of dating, the two were engaged, seven months later they were married.<\/p>\n

\"Freed's<\/a>
Freed’s past wife, Hope, smiles for the camera after shaving her head during cancer treatment. Freed says the picture is a perfect example of the type of person Hope was, still smiling after years of treatment.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It was the way they lived, Dennis says, that not only pushed them closer together, but grew their love as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe grew up the hard way. No money, saving, prospering together,\u201d he recalls. \u201cWe raised a family and went through all those hard times and the loving times, and then just as we\u2019re about to be ready to be done, my last son is graduating, she dies.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now, in his 50s and a widower, Dennis says he had no idea how to recover from not only being a caregiver to his wife, but also how to find happiness and love again.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnfortunately, dating at 18 and dating at 54 is a terrible situation.\u201d
\nFor that reason, at the recommendation of a life coach, he decided to write about it, starting with writing letters to his dead wife.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe pages just kept coming and\u00a0 coming and coming and the book developed,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe writing actually helped me heal.\u201d<\/p>\n

The end product, entitled, Love, Loss and Awakening: (Mis)adventures on the Way Back to Joy, is Dennis\u2019s part memoir, part self-help book on dating in your 50s and finding love after the death of a spouse.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s never too late. You just need to decide what you want,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

The book has also gained attention from a much younger crowd then Dennis may have expected: lovelorn young adults.<\/p>\n

\u201cI get a lot of kids in their 20s and 30s that want to talk to me about it,\u201d he says. \u201cThe reason being they can\u2019t find love the first time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Author<\/a>
Author Dennis Freed sits with his new wife Lisa. Freed met Lisa after the death of his former wife Hope, who after being diagnosed with cancer, passed away after a long battle. He details the experience of recovering from the loss of his previous wife Hope in his new book Love, Loss and Awakening: (Mis)adventures on the Way Back to Joy.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Now, Dennis is happily remarried, and says that the choice to move on is one that is different for each person.<\/p>\n

\u201cNobody can comment on the way a person recovers from being a caregiver or an illness because each experience is so different,\u201d he says.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s a very individual choice and there\u2019s no right or wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n

More information on Dennis\u2019s book can be found on his Facebook page and copies of the book are now for sale on Amazon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Joel Wittnebel\/Active Senior’s Digest Hope was gone. For months, no matter what Dennis Freed did, it seemed like nothing made it better. 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