Bereaved relative not coping.

Let him be. He probably has given up, and why shouldn't he? The centre and purpose of his life has gone.

Do the family equivalent of palliative care. Make sure he is warm and gets up and goes to bed at normal times and is dressed during the day. make sure he always has easy to consume food and drink beside him. This is not a time to worry about balanced nutrition. If he likes chocolate always have it by, if he prefers cheese ditto.

Then let him be. Gradually he will recover a bit, or on the other hand he may just drift down hill until he joins his wife.

I've seen this happen a few times

I think sometimes, when our loved ones don't want to be here any more, the best thing to do is give them what quality time we have and understand, this is their choice

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

I have seen quite a few cases where one partner dies and the other follows fairly quickly.It is said they died of a broken heart.So sad.Barbarax

Sadly when one partner dies after a long marriage the surviving partner often doesn’t live long afterwards.

We are in our eighties and been married 63 years. I have often said I have no wish to be hanging around without dh.

Maybe he feels that he doesn’t want to be here without his wife.

It is grief, time may make a difference but speaking from experience outside help does not always make things any better.

It must be worrying to witness when you cannot make things better.

Poor man , I’ve been there with my fil , he absolutely adored my mil and was totally lost and lonely without her . It’s very early days for him and there isn’t a time scale on grief . My fil went to a grief counsellor about 6 months after my mil died . He found it helped .
Just keep checking in on him , take him hot dinners . Offer to take him out shopping, for a walk or help with the garden . My fil was a lifelong Chelsea fan and my dh would go over and watch the match with him.

It's very early days in his grieving, and he's lost his whole purpose in life.. I think you can probably only make sure that he is warm and fed at the moment and respect his need to grieve.. the antidepressants can only do so much. he needs a lot of time to grieve and all you can really do is to try to keep him safe, let him know you care and listen to him if he wishes to talk

Another help might be a local befriending charity?

It's still early days, I would say, to try and jolly someone along (for want of a better phrase, which i cant think of)

Is there a local bereavement group who may help?
They sometimes have short walks or coffee meet-ups?

I forgot to add that he is quite deaf and struggles to hear on the telephone so help lines are not helpful to him.