Widowhood Perks

The title of this post is a bit misleading. Widowhood is a club that NO ONE wants to join. We are literally thrust here against our own free will. It is completely without benefit, but the longer I'm here, the more I realize it SHOULD have perks. Big ones. These are a few of the things I think should be bestowed upon all of us, as soon as we become members.

Chauffeur service - No widow or widower should be expected, or even allowed, to drive themselves anywhere for at least the first three months. We are so consumed and preoccupied with our grief that there is no way we can possibly devote our full attention to operating a vehicle safely. In many cases, such as my own, we are responsible for young children, which makes this even less safe. These wonderful creatures, when placed in the restraints of a carseat or seatbelt, often become more loud and obnoxious than usual, which does nothing for our already lacking ability to focus on the road. For those of us who are caring for young children, the car can often be seen as a place of retreat, to be alone with our thoughts and let out any emotions we may have been holding in for hours or days while we have been busy parenting. We should be allowed to sit in the back, privacy screen up, and cry our eyes out, kick and scream, or just sit in silence uninterrupted if we so please.

Personal assistant - The amount of paperwork one is required to fill out when one's spouse dies is ridiculous. Add into that any funeral arrangements, refinancing, life insurance benefits, getting any and all accounts switched over to make the remaining spouse the primary account holder, and you can begin to see how completely maddening this can be. This is compounded even further if you happen to be in the throes of a legal battle. The widow or widower should be given a personal assistant to access and provide any of the aforementioned information and get it to the appropriate parties. The widow or widower should be allowed this time to grieve, and should NOT be rushing off to meetings with lawyers, financial analysts, or sitting on the phone with incompetent morons reading us scripts off of computers with no emotion in their voice when they tell us how sorry they are for our loss.


Widow Card - You know those bidder cards people hold up at auctions to let the auctioneer they want to bid on whatever item has been presented? When someone becomes a widow or widower, they should be given one of those that says "WIDOW" or "WIDOWER" to use at their disposal, and people will just automatically forgive you for whatever offense or inconvenience you may be placing upon them.

Examples:

Accidentally cut someone off while driving? Or maybe it wasn't an accident. Flash your sign out the window.

Met with a less then friendly cashier at the store? Flash your sign.

Meeting friends for dinner or drinks and having to wait too long for a table, or told there are no tables at all? Flash your sign.

Someone grab the last box of cookies before you could get your hands on them? Flash the sign.

Tired of explaining your current situation for the thousandth time to random personnel at the bank, credit card company, benefit's office of your spouse's work, etc?? Flash the sign.

Trying to return your spouses new clothing they bought a month before they suddenly died, without the tags but have never been worn? Flash the sign.

Walking down the street with tears streaming down your face and getting odd looks from passersby? Flash the sign.

Child or children having a tantrum in public and getting stares and judgement from bystanders? Flash the hell out of that sign.

You get the picture.

Food Delivery Service - We should also not be expected to cook any food, for the first few months after such an event. This is especially true if our homes are filled with children who are picky eaters, or hoards of other family members and friends staying in our home to help us out, or both.

Maid Service - We should not be expected to clean our houses, for much the same reasons talked about in the "food delivery service" section. It's hard enough to keep a home with children living in it clean on a good day. Throw in the horrific life event of losing your spouse and all the grieving and lack of sleep that comes with that and one is lucky if they can make their own bed, let a lone sanitize the entire house and do 2 loads of laundry every day. When friends and family come to stay, it is nearly impossible to keep the house clean with all that traffic, even if the visitors are trying to keep things neat and tidy.

Nanny Service - Those with children at home, or maybe elderly parents they are caring for, could greatly benefit from this. We are exhausted from the grief and can barely take care of ourselves, and to be quite honest, most of us aren't. We aren't because as a mother, generally the care of our children comes before us, and when we lose our spouse, we continue with this practice only without any respite or reprieve. We have no one to turn them over to at the end of the day, or share them with on the weekends. If we don't have reliable family living close by, we feel guilty sharing this burden with our friends, because many times they have their own families and children to tend to. Even if they offer, it can still be hard for some of us to accept their offer.

All I'm saying, is this has got to be one of worst clubs in the world, and it would be nice to have a some help to ease our burden a little.