Dating after death of wife

“That will scare you into never dating again,” she told me.Of course, plenty of widows meet a great “chapter two” (widow parlance for a love after loss) and are able to move on to a new relationship.I’d been with my husband Shawn since right after college, so I had no real idea how to meet single men that I didn’t just run into all the time on campus.My friends assured me that the way to meet people was via the internet.But when I look at my digital options, I feel overwhelmed by even the seemingly small issues that arise all the time.Most of the formerly married people I see online are divorced.“Please tell me it’s okay to find someone,” I said to no one in particular. I was widowed at 38 and had plenty of dating years ahead of me.

I didn’t want to date a 70-year-old man, but apparently if I was looking to date other people who suffered a similar loss to mine, my options were limited. Yes, I could list that I was a widow on my profile. Worse, might it draw creepy men, like the ones who pretended to be widowers and stalked my Facebook page?But what did I know about the world of online dating, from writing a catchy bio to appearing attractive in digital form?My research into the best online dating sites for widows and widowers was not encouraging.I bet he’d smile and have a good joke ready to help me feel better about it all. The death of a spouse presents challenges that the death of a relationship does not, although both have the same result -- you are left alone.