Sex After Loss: A Widow’s Guide, Year 1

Almost immediately following my life partner’s demise from a harrowing journey with cancer — during which we were also able to revel in five months of remission by checking items off of our family “bucket list” before the cancer returned in his liver — I felt hungry for a vibrant sexual encounter.

More than anything, I needed to be held in strong arms — this was my grandest fantasy, especially after 18 months of an intense cancer journey that included six chemotherapy sessions and 48 upper head and neck radiation treatments that rendered my partner unable to…