WIDOW – just the word sounds ominous. Death, mourning, black clothes.

For women who find themselves widowed, these things are just the start, as they come to terms with life without the person who has literally become their ‘other half’.

Financial matters, attending events, going on holiday, even eating and sleeping become things they will now do alone, maybe for the first time in decades.

But there is a place where people will know what they are feeling and want to help.

On a Friday in central Oxford, the ‘girls’ from the Botley branch of the National Association of Widows enjoy their weekly coffee and a chat.

All of these women have lost their husbands. Some have lost partners of 50 years or more.

Some were widowed before their children were even grown up.

But there is laughter, fun, a feeling of companionship and not a black item of clothing in sight.

“There is a traditional image of widows,” says Pat Siret, 80, from Eynsham. “But we’re not women who sit around weeping and reminiscing. We have all had our hearts broken by the loss of our husbands, but we have helped each other cope.”

They are a jolly group, yet all admit they were lost and alone until they found each other.

Joyce Howe, 92, was 56 when her husband Bill, 58, died.

They were returning from a holiday in Spain when Bill, landlord of the Lamb and Flag pub in St Giles, suffered a brain haemorrhage.

With two sons and the prospect of decades alone, Mrs Howe was ‘talked into’ attending a meeting of the newly established Oxford branch of the NAW. She said: “I got there and thought ‘this isn’t for me, I’m too young to be a widow’.

“But I kept going to the meetings and it kind of mushroomed.”

Mrs Howe joined the committee and over the coming years even travelled to St Petersburg in Russia, to help widows there.

She is now national chairman as well as Botley chairman and has made many friends.

She said: “Joining the NAW was the best thing I ever did, and it was also good for my family because it made me stronger and able to stand alone.”

Mrs Siret’s husband Charlie died eight years ago, aged 75, a year after they celebrated 50 years of marriage.

Former Radcliffe Infirmary nurse Mrs Siret, who lives in Eynsham, said: “You are on your own while everyone else is with someone else. It is extremely lonely.

“For months after Charlie died, seeing couples out together felt like a knife in my heart. That’s why the widows group became my lifeline.

“It wasn’t until about a year after Charlie’s death that I went along.

“I half expected it to be full of people feeling down and depressed, but it was the opposite. Within a short while I was laughing and sharing anecdotes and now enjoy lovely walks, lunches and holidays with a lot of new friends.”

Oxford Branch of the NAW meets on the second Saturday in the month at Seacourt Hall, Botley. Call Mrs Howe on 01865 559081.

For more details on the NAW go to nawidows.org.uk