Are you there for your friend when she  is drowning?  Where are you when a new widow needs you most?  How many look at the person who is scammed and loses their life savings with pity or anger?  How many belatedly try to rescue them from themselves?  The real question should be where were you before it happened? 

New widows and divorcees find themselves alone when they need someone the most.  When they want family and friends calling and visiting, allowing them to talk out the hurt and loneliness, they have no one.   

Loneliness in a New Widow

 

Once half of a couple, they find themselves dropped from the guest list of their married friends.  Family turns a deaf ear to hear them talk of their past life with their partner.  The new widow especially, often becomes almost hermit-like as people step out of her life.  Often terrified to go places alone, whether for physical safety or being unsure of how to act without a partner, she remains home.  Even going grocery shopping becomes a challenge.  How does she buy for one?  With so much time to think, depression takes over.

An online friend, Carol, came to me with a request.  Would I write for her blog about the experience of being a new widow?  She had no idea that she saved me that day.  After Bru passed I sank into deep depression but attempted to hide it for my daughter’s sake.  Born with Down’s Syndrome, she knew her beloved Daddy died.  Did she know how to process it?  Did I?  The house became lonelier, and the task of handling her problems as well as my depression grew to be more than I felt capable of handling. 

I needed to talk more than anything, but did not want to interfere with the lives of others.  My children helped care for Bru three years.  My son worked nights, and my daughter-in-law traveled in her job, sometimes working sixty hours a week or more.  I felt we already interfered in their lives long enough.  Writing became my salvation as a new widow.

Cutting the Strings

 

I looked at homes in Pennsylvania to own instead of rent.  Seeing a for sale sign on the house next door to the children, I laughingly told them I might buy it.  Stunned at the harsh reaction to even joking about moving closer, I understood not wanting Mama under their feet.  However, having lost my husband, feeling shoved aside by my children hurt.  During their marriage, they cared for two very ill parents and did not need a third, even a fairly healthy one.   It was I, not they, who found myself cutting the strings – moving reluctantly into the realm of widowhood.

Moving Back Home

 

Suddenly moving back to Florida, the first place that ever felt like home, became a priority.  Among other things, many widows live there and happily make new friends.  The sun shines warmly all year and, as severe back injuries from car accidents and lifting my husband for three years began to hurt at the thought of cold weather, living there seemed right.  My children needed their own lives back, which they very much deserved. 

Barely had the contract been signed on a home, before we met our first neighbor, Joanne, and her trusty companion, Romeo, a smart little pup.  Within days after settling there, Carol, my Facebook friend, came to the door with a welcome package.  We got along in person as well as online.  Our friendship remains strong today.  We talked for a long time and not once did her eyes glaze over while listening.  She knew it was much-needed therapy.  Other friends, single and married, new and some from previously living in Florida,made up the circle of companions for my daughter and me.   

Loss of Home; Renewal of Family

 

Within less than two years, I left my beloved friends and state, answering the call to help my brother fight kidney disease.  Leaving the home, that we worked for months to make ours, broke my heart.  Leaving the quickly made friends, hurt even worse. After years of taking care of Bru, and still holding the guilt of ‘what else might have been done to save him,’ we moved to Alabama to go through it all over again.  Except there I had no one other than Jim and our sister, Vickie.  Fortunately in a small town, it is easy to meet people, although not so easy to be invited to their homes.  Meanwhile, my son’s job transferred him to Italy for two years.  While he lived there, we talked more during that time than before.  I enjoyed it very much.  Today, with him back in the states, we talk only if I call or there is some special day.

Learning to Live Alone Again

 

Jim lived with kidney disease slowing wreaking havoc on his mind for five years.  He, Sis and I got to know each other again after a fifty year separation and for that I will always be grateful.  When he died, the floor dropped out from under me once more.  After being a caretaker for several years, what does a person do when it ends?  They smile like their lives are spectacular and listen to people tell them how they brighten their day.  And they fall apart in the privacy of their bedroom every night. They yearn for loving arms to hold them.  They wish for good, strong conversation, instead of another evening of mindless computers and television.

That is when the scammers move in.  It is as though they smell the desperation and know this is the moment to attack.   Where are you when a new widow needs you most?  As the scammers are sniffing at her door, pretending to give her the friendship she so desperately needs?  Have you been attentive enough that she comes to you with information about this new ‘love?’

When no one comes to visit or calls, when she must make all the moves to be friends, make the calls to family, it seems only too possible that her usefulness is gone. 

New Widow – Scammer’s Mark

 

Then the note comes at the top of the computer screen.  Someone wants to friend you.  Sure, why not?  It’s not as though the door is being beaten down by local friends. 

The Scam Begins With Love

Oh, my, he’s entranced with my picture!  He was so delighted with it, he felt compelled to contact me!  It’s been so long since anyone made me feel pretty, wanted, needed, that I am enthralled. 

The Money Move

Every message from him flatters, assures me he cannot wait to meet me, and, yes, hold me in his arms.  How good that would feel, to be loved, held, comforted!  Oh, it doesn’t matter that he’s asked for a few dollars.  Everyone is afflicted with financial problems these days, so the request is not unusual.   

His demands for money grow, but he assures me all will be settled when we finally meet.  And with people in love, what difference does a loan or two make?  Except it has turned into a regular flow and all my credit cards are maxed out, even two new ones I opened.  What?  He’s in the hospital and they won’t release him until he pays the enormous bill he owes?  Could I possibly help just one more time?  I take out a loan on my fully paid-for home and send it to him.  All I have now is my husband’s retirement money and a small Social Security check and a growing stack of demands for payment.  BUT he is coming to me and all will be well. 

The Final Blow

What?  He must grease a few palms to get out of the horrible country where he lives?  They took his passport?  If I love him, please, my darling, he pleads, send money just one more time.  I have to tell him there is no more.  I’ve sent all I have and am in debt up to my ears.  But when he gets here, he will help fix that, right? 

He curses me, screaming vile things, calling me names and hanging up the phone.  Tossed aside, I sink once more into Depression’s waiting arms. 

And then the magic begins once more as a handsome man asks me to please be his friend…

The Key She Should Have Noticed

Not once does it occur to this person that hospitals do not hold a person who cannot pay.  She is so thrilled to be in the illusion of love, of anyone giving a hang whether she lives or dies, that clear thought no longer exists.   When the screen is down between her and her ‘lover,’ she falls further than ever before.  Like a deflated balloon, rising to Life’s challenges is impossible.  And the next scammer comes to her, throwing a faulty life ring to a drowning person.

Where Were You?

 

If she is lucky, the family will finally show up again and discover what has happened.  Where were they while the scammer wreaked havoc on his victim’s life?  Where were the phone calls at least once or twice a week and the visits?  And, no, sending gifts on holidays does nothing to relieve them of their guilt in letting her face this challenge alone. 

Sometimes a lonely person needs to be given to instead of taken from.  The death of a partner is capable of destroying the strongest person. When family and friends back away, depression pulls the person onto a path leading directly to disaster.  When this happened to your friend, to a new widow, where were you when she or he needed you? 

How to Show You Care

 

So, my friends, when you hear of someone who has been snookered by a scammer, check your relationship with that person.  How good a friend, how close a family member were you in that person’s time of need?  Could you be counted on to listen when they most needed to talk and know they counted in someone’s life?  Did you offer them a strong shoulder or hold up your hand in the ultimate sign to stop them?