Standing by the bar, nursing a glass of wine, my new friend Sarah leaned in and whispered something heartwrenching.
‘I was married for 42 years. And now I don’t know who I am without him,’ she said.
I understood that feeling all too well.
Like me, Sarah had lost her husband and over our holiday we’d bonded over that shared grief.
She told me about the silence in her house, how she still slept on her side of the bed, and how people assumed she should be ‘over it’ by now. My experience was almost identical.
I’d had a lot of conversations like this, but I suppose that was inevitable given that I was on a cruise specifically for widows.
Andy and I were together for 18 years. We had a full life, filled with plans, laughter, and the kind of love that makes you feel safe.
Then, in 2017, aged 57, he suffered a brain injury after a heart attack, which left him completely incapacitated.
He couldn’t walk or talk, and didn’t know who he was or where he was. It was devastating to see him so profoundly disabled, and he required specialist 24/7 care.
But it was actually Covid that took him from me in April 2020.
It was a total upending of my reality. The days blurred into one another. Sometimes I’d wake up in the morning and for a split second forget he was gone – and then it would hit me all over again.
I went to counselling, which helped in small ways, giving me space to talk, to cry, to understand that grief doesn’t have a timeline, but I also clung to the support of Widowed and Young (WAY), a charity that became my lifeline.
Without all that and my son, Finn (who was 12 when Andy died) to care for, I’m not sure I would have found the strength to keep going.
In time, I downloaded a dating app, more out of curiosity than anything else, and quickly realised that being a widow was a conversation stopper. Some men even ghosted me after I mentioned it. It was exhausting.
That’s when I had the idea to create a dating app specifically for widows so that I, we, had a place where we didn’t have to explain ourselves, where everyone just got it.
From there Chapter 2 Dating – the UK’s first dating app exclusively for widows and widowers – and then WidowsFire – a supportive space for those in need of human connection – were born and suddenly, I wasn’t alone.
But it was only after I ended up on my first widows’ cruise that things really changed.
I first heard about these cruises through an online widows and widowers support group. One day I saw a post asking if anyone would be interested in joining. I instinctively replied and said yes.
At first, the idea seemed absurd – I was a little concerned that it may be full of grief workshops or lots of discussion of death and loss. But then, the more I thought about it, the more it made sense.
A widows’ cruise would give me the chance to be around people who truly understood and who, hopefully, were all after the same thing: A chance to reconnect with the world. So, I booked a ticket.
From the outside, it looked like any other cruise: Sun loungers, cocktails, and live music. But there was one key difference.
Conversations that would normally make people uncomfortable were normal here. We talked about our late husbands and wives, openly discussed loneliness, and we even held a memorial service.
In short: We laughed, we cried, and, for the first time in a long time, I felt understood.
We had group excursions, watched spectacular shows, joined in the trivia and games, and danced until 2AM.
There’s a term in our community, widow’s fire, meaning the sudden, burning desire for intimacy after loss, and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t also succumb to it on the trip.
One night, I was sitting next to a rather delicious guy and we hit it off.
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The next night, we shared a drink at the bar and ended up snogging like teenagers, leading a waiter to joke that we should ‘get a room’.
‘We have two!’ I quipped back and swiftly invited him for ‘coffee.’
I woke the next morning happy that, in the midst of grief, I’d managed to find my tribe. I found moments of pure joy on the cruise, made lifelong friends, and I’m meeting up with that guy in a few weeks.
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The cruise helped me rediscover who I was again in a way. It was about fun in the sun but also about connection, hope and joy.
Moving on in all its guises after loss is complicated, but it’s not impossible.
The important thing to remember is that we don’t have to ‘move on’, we just have to keep moving. And sometimes, that journey takes you somewhere unexpected.
For me that was a cruise in the middle of the Caribbean Ocean and not only did I find myself laughing and crying, but also, somehow, healing.
Do you have a story you’d like to share? Get in touch by emailing James.Besanvalle@metro.co.uk.
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