Becky Aikman had a problem that widows don’t usually face: She was too happy. After her husband died of cancer in 2004, she joined a widows’ support group. But she found them too depressing. And the group didn’t like her upbeat attitude too much either, so they kicked her out.
Aikman took her recovery into her own hands in 2010, rounding up five other widows from the tri-state area, who also clung to optimism, and started a group they dubbed the Lotus Blossoms — after flowers that bloom even in mud. They met monthly for a year at Aikman’s Park Slope apartment. The adventures of its members are chronicled in her new book “Saturday Night Widows,” released last week by Crown.
She explains the group’s philosophy. “I knew I needed to leave behind the nightmares, the heartache. The goal of our group was that we wouldn’t focus on being sad. We would focus on things that were fun and exciting,” she says.
Here’s their guide to starting life over.
TEENS, TAKE 2
The biggest obstacle to dating again as a widow? Acting like a teenager, after 20 years of marriage in Aikman’s case.
“I felt like I was in high school,” says Aikman, 57, “The idea of going out with a brand-new person and doing those awkward first date things was crazy to consider.”
Dawn Jiosi, 48, a fellow group member who is raising two kids alone after her husband’s death in 2008, found dating “exhilarating and nerve-wracking at the same time.
“Each step of the process makes you realize. . . ‘I am doing this, he is gone,’ ” she says. “You simply realize it’s great to feel alive again.”
SEEKING CUPID
When Aikman found herself wanting to date again, she scratched her head: Where do those rare single 40-somethings meet each other?
She tried online dating, and met a few people, but no long-term candidates.
Jiosi’s advice: Get out of the house as much as you can. That’s how she met her current boyfriend, when she tagged along with friends to a racetrack.
“I kept a pretty booked social calendar,” she says. “I set the intention: I want to be out there, want to meet new people, I want to get out of this space I’m in.”
ADVENTURE TIME
In the book, after a conversation about when it’s appropriate to “bonk” again, group member Lesley Jacobs says, “We’re having so much fun. Who knew [us] poor, sad women could have such a ball?”
And, as Aikman found, that’s the secret: fun. And boy, did the group have some of that — taking trips to places like the Galapagos Islands to hike and kayak.
“The fact that I lost what I used to have shouldn’t stop me from enjoying life,” Aikman says. “Becoming more open and happier made it easier to find someone new to fall in love with.”
Aikman married again in 2008 to Bob, a writer and divorced dad she met through friends who had a teenage daughter and an old dog with one eye.
“Now [the group] just gets together casually like regular friends,” she says. “They threw a big surprise party for me a couple weeks ago to celebrate the launch of the book. The friendship is still very strong and important to me, as much as ever.”