A Second Chance At Beautiful Love: Navigating Grief And Dating With Marketta Davis
Grief and dating do not exist in opposite poles. There is no hard and fast rule on how long someone should wait to date after being widowed. Grief for a spouse never goes away, and if we treat grief and dating as mutually exclusive, we’re never going to have another chance at creating a wonderful romantic relationship with another human being. But we all deserve a second chance at beautiful love. As she continues sharing her story, Marketta Davis shows us how this is possible without ever once denying that her love and grief for her lost loved one is still with her. — Watch the episode here Listen to the podcast here A Second Chance At Beautiful Love: Navigating Grief And Dating With Marketta Davis My friend Marketta is here, continuing to share her journey with us. As she ended that last episode, that was the beginning of her being in the widowhood. We are going to pick up and continue sharing where her journey went and where it is now. You stepped into widowhood, and where do we go from there, Marketta? Pregnant and lonely. From the time he passed through homegoing celebrations, the funeral, and all the beginning or the ending things, I should say there are tons of people around all the time. People bringing food, consoling, saying helpful things, saying ignorant things. Everyone is around. My neighborhood even started a food train for me. They signed up for different days. I wasn’t mean, but I wasn’t the friendly neighbor. Danny would come home and say, “Mr. Davis, how are you doing?” I’d come home and bolt in the house. I’m off work, and I’m done peopling for the day. Don’t talk to me. Once this happened, none of that mattered. My community is very diverse, so I got to try so many different things. At this point, I still was so far gone. The base, his unit, had a babysitting train, which is what I could call it. I was never left alone, at least for the first 2 or 3 weeks. One person would come in, stay a designated amount of hours, then another person. I remember there was a gap one time and no one was there. I flipped all the way out. I wasn’t scared of being in the house where he died. I was scared of being there without him. I called my mom, “No one’s here. They said they’d be here. What do I do?” I’m screaming. She gets a hold of someone in the unit. They were running behind, but that’s all. She finally made it. She brought her daughter. Everyone was so sweet and treaded very lightly for the most part. After all of that dies down, we’re stuck in this alternate reality while everybody else gets to go back to their life. May I ask, how did this trigger or impact your depression and bipolar and everything else? Though, as it turns out, the type of wonderful medication that I’m on is not very baby-friendly. I had been off my medication since we started trying to get pregnant in 2014, the whole time. Danny was left to fend for himself when it came to taking care of my ass. It was hard. It was a very hard journey. They offered to put me on baby-safe medications, but I was like, no, there’s already enough risk. I know I’m going to push through this non-medicated. Danny’s like, “Danny is in the back talking to the doctor, so forgive what she said.” “We slip a little something into something like.” “Put it in the peanut butter as you get to the door.” “Have this biscuit. They’re so yummy.” I’m on nothing but prenatal at this point. It was hard, but here’s the but. I had what my friends dubbed a unicorn pregnancy. No morning sickness. My feet swelled once at eight months. No mood swings. I was barely hungry. I could barely eat. My healthy weight is about 175. I got down to 160 before the baby started growing. All I could eat was salads and potatoes. I had none of the typical symptoms of pregnancy. I wasn’t uncomfortable unless her stingy ass was hungry and she made sure I knew. The stomach cramps were ridiculous like, “I’m getting food. Can you pipe down?” Other than that and mild heartburn, it was like an outside of the obvious. It was an easy pregnancy physically. I think me not being on medication but having those other happy hormones from the baby floating around. I managed. I had the grief, obviously, but I didn’t have any diagnostic bipolar episodes. It was all the grief. I managed and it was hard for me to get back on the medication because they wanted to put me back on it when I was breastfeeding and I was worried, but I did it. They’re like, “Now that she’s not in vitro, or in uterine, whatever they call it, it’s safe. You’re fine.” I did it for her because it went downhill fast, postpartum-wise. During the pregnancy, I was okay as far as my diagnosis. That’s the medical part. Who was there when your daughter was born, and what is her name, if you’re willing to share? Her legal name or what I call her under my breath? It’s your episode. Say what you want to say. You called her your stingy ass, so maybe that’s what you’ve been calling her. I don’t know, maybe that’s her name forever. My husband was very close to his grandmother, and so was I. His grandmother’s name was Lilli and my grandmother’s name was Resa. They had both passed on by this point. We were going to call her Lillian Resa Davis. That’s what we were going to call her. I was going to nickname her Lily Pad. I saw that coming. My little Lily Pad. Danny said that was gay. No offense
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