One of the most striking aspects of grieving in the early months after your spouse has died is that words truly seem inadequate. Even the word “grieving” does not begin to capture the range and intensity of emotions that can erupt in an instant, and it takes days, weeks, months to begin to understand the complexity of the process.

Catherine Tidd, in an article on the website, Open To Hope, focuses on a single aspect of grieving, loneliness, and her realization that definitions she once took for granted cannot capture the kaleidoscope of thoughts, feelings, experiences, even physical responses, that constitute the grieving process.