So, I've not been a frequent poster here, but I've been in and out for about a year and a half now. I thought I had become really good at not relying on my wife for validation, and just doing things because they're the right thing to do and I wanted to do them.

Then my wife died. Not entirely unexpectedly. We thought she had 'til the end of the summer, but she collapsed in the kitchen two and a half weeks ago while I was giving our son a bath. I ran to help her, found her bloodied, tooth broken out, with vomit on the floor, saying "this is it! this is it!" and complaining she couldn't breathe... I ran to get her asthma puffer and told her I'd be right back as soon as I got our 3 y/o out of the tub. When I got back to her, just a couple of minutes later, she was dead. 911, chest compressions, no good...dead.

In the aftermath, I'm left befuddled. If I'd conquered my need for wifely validation, why is the thing that makes me cry the fastest that I don't have her around to tell about...well, how well I've handled shit since? That our boy peed on the potty? That I organized one helluva memorial service? For all that I thought I'd made my own way with that particular part of this whole RP cocktail, that's the piece that's nagging at me. She was never one to give me that attaboy anyway ... it pissed her off that I sought the validation, so all the better that I stopped looking for it -- but not even being able to angle for it in this time of crisis is hurting. Just simple grief, or some sign that I was deluding myself about how well I was doing?

And as much as I thought I was OI and IDGAF about her staying or going in my life -- ok, I can say, convincingly if cognitively, that my best days are ahead of me and she was in some ways a shitty wife. But in poring over the memories and documents and scrapbooks and all that post-death stuff, I can't help but think things could've been better if I'd just been a bit more .... smack me if you need to .... romantic. Again, crisis of faith in my MRP learning, or just a griefly puke?

The answer may be as simple as "Dude, your wife just died in front of you and you're suddenly a single parent. Cut yourself some slack." Or, conversely, "She was a shitty wife and your SMV is going to skyrocket once you get back on the rails." Or perhaps ... "MRP doesn't work on dead people or memories."

I dunno. Mods may end up deleting this for bringing nothing to the table, but this isn't a subject I've seen brought here before, so on the off chance that there's something worth exploring, I'm going to click Submit.