How soon should a widow or widower remove a wedding ring after their spouse has died? My latest Widower Wednesday video has the answer.
Transcript:
Hi, it's Wednesday, and that means it's time for another video edition of Widower Wednesday.
I'm Abel Keogh, author of the book Dating a Widower, and today I'm answering a question from a viewer who writes the it says, Abel, how soon should a widow or widower remove their wedding ring after their spouse dies?
That's a great question, and for the most part, the answer is a personal one. I know of widows and widowers who have removed their ring in the days or weeks after their spouse died, while others have kept it on for years or even kept it on until the day they died. So taking off when to take off the wedding ring after your spouse dies, it's a personal choice and one you shouldn't do until you're ready to take that step.
Now, however, there is one caveat to this, and there is one case when all widows and widowers should remove their wedding ring, no exception to this, and that is when they start dating again.
And for those who are wondering why, well, a wedding ring is a symbol of your love and devotion to your deceased spouse and has no place in a relationship with a different person with a living, or just a different person in general.
If you're looking to open your heart to someone else, if you're looking to go out there and put yourself out there, you got to take the wedding ring off, put it in a box, put it somewhere special where you can look at it once in a while if you want. But if you're out there dating, you shouldn't be wearing a wedding ring again. And just think you're putting people, by the way, in awkward situations when you're going out dating and you're wearing a wedding ring.
It comes up in coaching sessions a lot, and I haven't met anybody that said, oh, they wore a ring. I felt great about that. No, it bothers people. So again, if you're looking to open your heart to someone else, that's great. It's fine. But the wedding ring has to go off if you're not dating, if you're not doing anything like that, then keep it on as long as you want. Keep it on until you're ready to take it off.
People take it off for various reasons. Sometimes they're just ready to take that step. Sometimes it's a reminder, and they don't like the reminder. Again, not necessarily a right or wrong reason, so long as you're not dating. But if you are dating, there's no place for a wedding ring. You got to take it off and put it in a special spot.
Go ahead and leave your comments below, especially if you have different thoughts. I always welcome disagreeing opinions. Go ahead and like this video, subscribe to my channel. And if you want to talk to me personally, you can go ahead and schedule a coaching session. There is a link for that in the description below.
I'll see you next Wednesday.