Before embarking on a new chapter in life, many face the profound and often isolating experience of widowhood. In this poignant episode, Joi Brooks shares her deeply personal journey through widowhood, reflecting on her life after the loss of her husband, Harry. With humor and heart, she navigates the complexities of adjusting to a new routine while cherishing the memory of Harry and the little things that remind her of him, like his t-shirts and quirks around the house. Joi talks about the challenges of balancing work, retirement, and the grief of losing a partner. This episode offers a moving look at resilience, loneliness, and the quiet joys of continuing to honor a lost love. I am sharing my experience of loving the same man for 32 years, a mother to two adult children, a retired military officer, a breast cancer survivor, and my connections with others. Anyone experiencing suicidal thoughts should reach out to a suicide hotline or local emergency number in their country: Psychology Today Suicide Hotlines and Prevention Resources Around the World — Watch the episode here   Listen to the podcast here   Evaluating The Realities Of Widowhood With Joi Brooks Joi, welcome back. How are you? It’s winter. Winter is starting to kick in here in Virginia, but what does it look like? It’s a heated blanket. It keeps me warm. I’m in my office and it tends to get a little chilly because I’m just sitting here. Are you in New York?     I’m in New York. What’s the temperature like now for you? The temperature is 36 degrees. We are doing this on a Thursday night and this is my actual last conversation for 2024. Whereby, it’s only going to get colder. Yes. It is a bit nippy in Virginia, but it was that cold and I was told the coming week is supposed to be in the 60. Good for you. We’ll get like 40s but it was very windy. It was 36 degrees and it was very windy. I was out with the dogs walking and I thought, “I can’t wait to get home.” I can hear the wind outside now. How many dogs do you have? Three. That’s what happens when you become a widow and you don’t have a social community around you. You build a social community and since you can’t create people, you buy dogs. Did you have the dog before or since your husband passed? I’ve always had dogs. They were always my sanity. They were always there for me when I needed to escape humanity. Sometimes, humanity is like, “Oh my goodness,” but humans need social community. We do. After high school, you just can’t find friends the way you used to. It’s not the same thing. High school is like a store for friends. From me, high school was not the best. I flourished after high school. It was not the cozy situation. High school was not it for me. It was after high school where life became more interesting but if that was interesting part going forward would be more challenging so I could see how that could change. For people that may have not caught our conversation before, would you mind sharing your late husband’s name with us? It was Harold Brooks. I only called him Harold when I was pissed off. It was Harry. All his family referred to him as Harold, so maybe they were always pissed off. I don’t know. When I would call him Harry, they’d do one of these head cock things like, “Oh, Harold.” He refers to himself as Harry. The three dogs you have now. Did you have those with Harry or did you get them since he died? I had two of the dogs and one of them was getting old when Harry was going through cancer. He would always complain, “She’s snoring.” “She’s this.” “She’s that.” She still alive three years later. It’s funny how things end up. She’s not snoring anymore, though. I thought about that the other day, when did that stop? The Experience As A Widow In 2024 Three years being a widow. What does 2024 look like for you? It was a year I retired and I sort of retired in 2023 three but I retired from full-time work and I kept all of my part-time gigs. In July of 2024, three of my part-time gigs ended. Back up a little bit. What was full-time work for you? All of my work is email marketing related. I had a full-time client. That was in 2023 when that contract ended. That was a long-term full-time contract. I kept my part-time gigs. As I said, 3 or 4 part-time gigs and then all of them slowly started to end. With part-time gigs where you’re working on particular projects, you expect at some point in time, you’re going to solve the project. You’re going to succeed and it’s going to be over. I always knew that, but they extended. I had one client that was like five years. As they ended, I thought to myself, “Let them end and see what happens. Stop. You don’t have to do this. You need to figure out what you want to do for the rest of your life. You need to slow down a little bit. You’re not proving anything to anybody. You do need to think about your next chapter.” I don’t know what the next chapter is. I’m forcing myself into that and if monetarily it’s a problem, then you know that. If it’s I don’t have enough to do problem, then you know that but figure out what the next few years of your life will look like. You are riding out an old routine that may have run its gamut and I wasn’t sure. As they ended, I was like, “Someone’s telling me to end these. Let them in. Don’t get hysterical.” I’m carrying one client and thinking