A fellow widow and amazing writer (check out her newsletter!) inspired me this week to think and write about the ways I was supported in my early days of grief. I am definitely not a person who believes...
Today my late husband Rich will celebrate a birthday in the Afterlife. I don’t know how birthday anniversaries are celebrated in that world, but down here I will be celebrating the occasion in a unique...
By the time I exit the State of Missouri I’ve come to appreciate John Steinbeck’s astute observation, based on his own travels, that our country’s interstate highway system may be a fine solution...
Image by precious widbud Charlotte MacNaughton – Yellowknife, Canada’s Northwest Territories (Jan 2023) Way back when, back in my life before, and soon after I had started up my business, Kaleidoscope...
Yesterday was a big day for my city. In two weeks, my beloved Chiefs are headed back to the biggest football game. Like the week before, I gathered with my neighborhood crew to watch the game. If you didn’t...
One of the biggest challenges of adjusting to life as a widow is trying to hold on to the memory of the life you had as part of a long-time couple while trying to remember the “Me” before “We”...
This month I embarked on a solo trip for fun to Los Angeles and Palm Springs. I have done this once before. In 2019, before I started my Ph.D. program I went to Puerto Rico by myself. It was freeing and...
I had intended to publish last Thursday, as usual, but then experienced technical issues. Such are the vagaries of being off on the road. As you can see, I’m back online today and anxious to make up...
The Widow Clicquot Who was 4 and a half feet tall with light colored hair and grey eyes and stormed the champagne industry during the French Revolution? That’s right! Barbe-Nicole: The Lady Herself...
Image by Gary Bendig on Unsplash I have woken late this morning – almost 9 am – very late for me. But I have been drifting in and out of sleep for the past few hours – since before 6 am. I no longer...
Losing Tony hasn’t really made me question who I am as a person, but it has made me question how I should spend my time. As a couple, we each participated in activities that the other person wouldn’t...
In the spring of 2014, I was diagnosed with a thyroid disease called Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis. My doctor proclaimed it was the worst case he’d ever seen and classified my case as Myxedema, another...
Both/And thinking [the opposite of either/or thinking] recognizes the folly of assuming that the new will totally supplant the old. Seeing with Both/And eyes recognizes that two opposite realities can...
The Widow Clicquot Who was 4 and a half feet tall with light colored hair and grey eyes and stormed the champagne industry during the French Revolution? That’s right! Barbe-Nicole: The Lady Herself...
A Man Called Otto. We first meet Otto six months after his wife’s death. With no apparent family, and having cut ties with those he was once close with, a grief-stricken Otto is isolated and in constant...
What is resilience? the Sea asked the Rock Ask the tree the Rock replied What is Resilience? the Sea asked the Tree We are it the Tree replied Sky, Tree, Plants, Rock, and Sea ...
Step By Step Professionals who write about trauma these days say that when a person experiences a trauma (small or large) it is important to allow the trauma to “keep moving through” our psyche...
“The presence and companionship of dogs, the observation of their playful tactics has helped patients on their way back to normal thinking and living.” Captain Wm. Lewis Judy,Founder of National...
At the winter solstice the Sun travels the shortest path through the sky, and that day therefore has the least daylight and the longest night. [Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica] Last night I participated...
and Betwixt. I’m ill with Covid. Illness is one of those things; a part of life; an activity of the living. In between and betwixt countless other dailies that are just for me now...
In 2021, seven months after Dan died, Thanksgiving arrived. In the calendar of our family traditions Christmas arrived just 32 days later. It is hard to believe that this is only the second holiday season...
It began with a need for a garment bag the kind from the cleaners with its pre-slit hole for the hanger — dry cleaners size — with child safety warning included. I doubted I had one...
An Invitation Making art—giving form to the images that arise in our mind’s eye, our dreams, and our everyday lives—is a form of spiritual practice through which knowledge of ourselves...
When you’ve experienced multiple losses within a short period of time, you may begin to wonder how much more loss you can endure. This is known as Cumulative Grief, when one experiences multiple...
Image by Gary Bendig on Unsplash I have woken late this morning – almost 9 am – very late for me. But I have been drifting in and out of sleep for the past few hours – since before 6 am. I no longer...
Photo and Art by Véronique Balcerzak After Mike died, I made an effort, particularly at Christmastime, to ensure there was a gift from him, not only for each of the kids, but also for myself. The first...
Recently, I had one of those weekends where I did way too much. I haven’t had one of these kinds of weekends in a while. I overcommitted myself and tried to “do it all”, without really...
It was supposed to have been Costa Rica. Or it could have been Panama. Maybe Ecuador, or even Nicaragua. Our long planned journey of a lifetime: to experience the joys of eternal spring, high in the green...
Main image by Tommaso Cantelli on Unsplash. Other pictures my own. I am a bit of an Omnivore, in that I eat everything, and always have done. I have never been a fussy eater, I have a great appetite (which...
Main Image by Zac Ong on Unsplash Last Sunday I completed a 20 km running event. My first event of that distance (or so) in three years. I wrote about the run’s run-up last week. I have so often been...
Image by Whoislimos on Unsplash I spent some deeply touching moments, minutes, hours yesterday evening, during my shift at the hospice. We have a beautiful new resident. She is a true beauty. Glorious...
Image by Greg Rakozy on Unsplash I love David Whyte’s Poetry and Writings. I love David Whyte’s voice and the way he reads his Work. I love how he turns words over, how he massages formerly unnoticed...
I saw that Bryan, until just recently our Saturday contributor, has announced his retirement from his spot on this Blog and introduced his successor. He is not the first. There is precedent for how such...
Main image by Leslie Cross on Unsplash. Other pictures my own. Last weekend, Medjool and I went to the Valais to enjoy a late summer weekend of mountain walking. The hotel and two nights’ accommodation...
While writing this blog, I was forced to revisit and relive more than just my widowed walk. I dove back in time through many memories I had forgotten or hidden. In reflecting back, how ironic was it that...
In 2023 I am going to overwinter in the desert. This week a whiff of Fall in the air prompted me to start my travel research. Of course, I knew my destination but not how best to get there. I was looking...
Photo and Art by Véronique Balcerzak After Mike died, I made an effort, particularly at Christmastime, to ensure there was a gift from him, not only for each of the kids, but also for myself. The first...
In my very first post here I said I’ve never been a New Year resolution kind of gal. I still maintain that I am not. For me, the resolutions are too specific and confined that make me feel destined to...
After the success of surprising my kids last year with a Christmas trip to Orlando, I decided to try it again this year. On Christmas morning, they woke up to a scavenger hunt that revealed we were going...
Image by Rob Wicks on Unsplash Today is my first “me day” in a fat week. I have had eight (mostly enjoyable, if also busy) continuous days of catering and making, shopping and cooking, organising and...
This week was the first anniversary of Tony’s death. Despite the strange time warp of grief, I have pulled us along into the second year. One hour, one day, one week, one month at a time. I imagine the...
I used to think I was such an emotional tough guy. It is true, of course, that I had sobbed in my bed like a baby on the night my grandmother died, after displaying what I thought had been laudable stoicism...
Image by Caleb Woods on Unsplash I survived another Christmas Day. Woohoo! I survived yet another Christmas Day. I am impressed. And of all of the above words, the word “survived” is the one that least...
This is our second Christmas without Tony but despite that, it was a first of sorts. For our first Christmas without him, I couldn’t bear the thought to be in town. I didn’t want to feel forced to...
“The presence and companionship of dogs, the observation of their playful tactics has helped patients on their way back to normal thinking and living.” Captain Wm. Lewis Judy,Founder of National...
When I first moved to Southeast Coastal Georgia in March 2020, the Pandemic was in its early stages. In our new clime, however, life went on pretty much as usual with fewer restrictions than in the Northern...
In the fall of 2020, my late husband purchased the Christmas tree of his dreams at a Lowes in Kingsland, GA. After a challenging year Rich looked forward to the joy of the holiday season he’d always...
Before Lee died, she had told Amy, her good friend, that she regretted her death was going to seriously challenge my well-being. Of course, Lee was right. Amy had shared this conversation with me in the...
Image by precious widbud Charlotte MacNaughton – Yellowknife, Canada’s Northwest Territories (Jan 2023) Way back when, back in my life before, and soon after I had started up my business, Kaleidoscope...
Yesterday was a big day for my city. In two weeks, my beloved Chiefs are headed back to the biggest football game. Like the week before, I gathered with my neighborhood crew to watch the game. If you didn’t...
One of the biggest challenges of adjusting to life as a widow is trying to hold on to the memory of the life you had as part of a long-time couple while trying to remember the “Me” before “We”...
The Widow Clicquot Who was 4 and a half feet tall with light colored hair and grey eyes and stormed the champagne industry during the French Revolution? That’s right! Barbe-Nicole: The Lady Herself...
Image by Gary Bendig on Unsplash I have woken late this morning – almost 9 am – very late for me. But I have been drifting in and out of sleep for the past few hours – since before 6 am. I no longer...
Losing Tony hasn’t really made me question who I am as a person, but it has made me question how I should spend my time. As a couple, we each participated in activities that the other person wouldn’t...
A Man Called Otto. We first meet Otto six months after his wife’s death. With no apparent family, and having cut ties with those he was once close with, a grief-stricken Otto is isolated and in constant...
In my very first post here I said I’ve never been a New Year resolution kind of gal. I still maintain that I am not. For me, the resolutions are too specific and confined that make me feel destined to...
It is pretty special to be able to post on the occasion of my birthday. I note that today, Saturday January 14, is also Organize Your Home Day, an Awareness Observances that encourages us to declutter...
Recently, I had one of those weekends where I did way too much. I haven’t had one of these kinds of weekends in a while. I overcommitted myself and tried to “do it all”, without really...
After the success of surprising my kids last year with a Christmas trip to Orlando, I decided to try it again this year. On Christmas morning, they woke up to a scavenger hunt that revealed we were going...
Posting here each Saturday has been an incredible opportunity. I love when someone tells me they’ve shared my post(s) with someone else who’s lost a spouse or experienced another kind of significant...
Today my late husband Rich will celebrate a birthday in the Afterlife. I don’t know how birthday anniversaries are celebrated in that world, but down here I will be celebrating the occasion in a unique...
One of the biggest challenges of adjusting to life as a widow is trying to hold on to the memory of the life you had as part of a long-time couple while trying to remember the “Me” before “We”...
“The presence and companionship of dogs, the observation of their playful tactics has helped patients on their way back to normal thinking and living.” Captain Wm. Lewis Judy,Founder of National...
Image by Kristopher Fuller on Unsplash Today I have lived two full years longer than Mike lived. He never quite made 20,000 days, and I am now well over that milestone. I have been lucky to have… 730...
One of the most difficult parts of the mourning process many widowed people experience is the loss of future occasions including holidays and anniversaries. We find ourselves listening to long-time married...
In last Saturday’s post, I shared the continuing process of spreading my late husband’s cremains throughout multiple watery locations. Choosing these meaningful places for this journey has been...
I’ve found it difficult to recall the rapidly unfolding events that occurred this week one year ago. The beautiful fall weather in the South features lack of the nearly year-round humidity. Clear Cerulean...
While writing this blog, I was forced to revisit and relive more than just my widowed walk. I dove back in time through many memories I had forgotten or hidden. In reflecting back, how ironic was it that...
Photos my own, taken at the Holy Trinity Anglican Church in Geneva, Switzerland Yesterday, unusually, I went to church. Twice. And I spoke. From the pulpit. Yes – really. I had been invited – some...
Yesterday I felt like I hit the grief guardrail at 75 miles an hour. I knew it was coming and I knew I couldn’t turn fast enough. It was emotionally inevitable and, as much as I wanted to avoid it, I...
I don’t know how to navigate this. I don’t know how to balance out this future placed bereavement. I have been pressuring myself to “figure it out” because I feel overwhelmed by a lot in life right...
Happy Anniversary, my love. Just a couple of kids who fell in love and were married just out of high school. Who knew we’d spend 51+ years together on this earth? A spark made it possible. The spark...
