Widowed mom shares outrageous things people have said to her — ‘You look happy’ tops the list

Society has long been quick to pass judgment on widows, often enforcing invisible expectations and whispered critiques at every turn. From the very moment a woman loses her partner, she can find herself surrounded by a cloud of assumptions, being told how she should feel, act, and look. The sting of these judgments, for many widows, can rival the pain of loss itself. That struggle is at the heart of what Britain Dente Tomlin (@britaindentetomlin) shares in this one 'Get Ready With Me' TikTok video. In the video, she casually applies her makeup while narrating the reality of life as a young widow confronting daily scrutiny.

She directly addresses messages that seek to define her mourning. People message, “You don’t look sad,” as though grief has a fixed, recognizable shape. Her reply to that is, “What am I supposed to look like? You just want to see me fall apart?” The idea that pain must be visible to be considered valid is one she rejects, right along with the notion that her well-being should be policed by strangers.

As she continues with her makeup, she recounts another common judgment. After her husband died, knowing her health insurance was about to run out, she had surgery to fix a deviated septum. Instead of support, she was met with suspicion: “Did you get your nose done too soon?” Her answer is unapologetic: “I had to fix it while I still could.” Even her basic acts of self-care become targets for suspicion and scorn.

The platitudes keep coming. People reassure her, “He’s in a better place,” but she’s honest about what brings comfort and what doesn’t. “No, he’s not,” she replies. “He should be right here with me and his children.” She’s also told she’ll “find love again” because she’s young, but she dismisses these comments for what they are: projections and assumptions. “I didn’t want to find love again,” she says. “It was already hard enough to find the one to love me.”

Strangers go so far as to recommend therapy, but she reminds them that it’s no one’s place to prescribe care without knowing the situation or the person involved. “If I wanted to go, I would.” Her day-to-day choices, her outfits, how she parents, whether or not she dates, are each scrutinized by people who expect her to fit some mold of proper widowhood. “I met my husband in a crop top,” she laughs when someone criticizes her clothes. And to those condemning her for dating too soon, she’s unfazed, “If I want to go on a date, I’m gonna go on a date. That doesn’t mean I’ve moved on.”

One of the harshest criticisms arrives when people judge the fact that her son now sleeps in what was her husband’s room. To which her response is pretty much to the face, “That’s not how any of this works. It’s a completely different room now, made for a child.” Even more hurtful are accusations that she is to blame for her husband’s passing, a claim she responds to by saying, "If that was the case, I would be in jail."

You can follow @britaindentetomlin on TikTok for more videos about her life.