Widow's Voice

Staci Sulin

Staci Sulin

About Staci Sulin

It is my privilege to write to you each week and I hope my blog inspires you to question what is stirring in your heart. I encourage you to lean into your grief. And, to feel it to it's depth. This isn't easy, but it is the only way through this mess.

I believe that we are lead back towards life and living when we allow ourselves to be still, and sit in the "nothingness" where grief lives. Visiting this empty place is difficult, but it is necessary. This quiet place holds the blueprints of our new, changed life.

I know you are scared to go to the edge of this place; admittedly, I am too. But, we have to take a leap of faith. With time, I am gathering momentum, and I am going to leap and build my wings on the way down.

It has been over three years since Mike died and I realize that what I fear most about the future is not the risks and uncertainty. What I am afraid of is letting the opportunities for change pass me by. I am afraid that I will settle into an ordinary life when I want an extraordinary life.

I am worried that I will play small, when my potential is big. As I write to you each week I am challenging us both not to shrink. I am keeping us accountable. I do not want either of us to fall back into an easy comfortableness when we can leap forward, towards a bold life. I want you to manifest the best in yourself. Go on, begin to recreate a beautiful life for yourself.

From the Ledge with Wings in Hand,

Staci

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Love of My Life

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After a lot of reflection, I finally understood  and realized that I was left to minister myself the love Mike can no longer physically and emotionally provide to me.  When you are widowed,  you are invited into a new relationship with yourself.  You are given the opportunity to build a deep, loving relationship with yourself.  This relationship is built on a foundation of unconditional love for yourself.  And, arguably, this relationship with Self may be the most important relationship of your life. 

I have found that with practice, I am becoming more proficient at self love and self care. 

I have become my own friend.  My  own champion.  My own companion.  I am a lover of myself. 

And, this is a beautiful way to honor my dead lover.   

Four Years Without Him…

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It has been hard, but I  have accepted that there is no returning to who I was.  In the fifth year of widowhood that is before me, I will try to focus on who I am becoming.  I will continue recreating myself.  And, I will work to become more comfortable with who I am.  While I become this new woman, I recognize that both my potential and lost possibilities coexist inside me.  This is one of the hallmarks of widowhood.  Another dualism I acknowledge is that both grief and hope can coexist in the same heart.  

Fall

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Each year, I feel myself falter and fall when the leaves change color because I know that Mike’s death date is looming large.   Thankfully, over the years, I have learned to trust that I can and I will break my fall using my own grit and grace.  With time, I have come to value and appreciate the beauty in my own strength.  Now, I believe in myself the same way Mike believed in me.  This is big, big stuff.  This is Mike continuing to love on me from across dimensions.  

I have come to know my own capability.  Finally, I see what he saw in me.  It is ironic that it took Mike’s death for me to see myself in the light he saw me in.   With this reflection, I now have the ability to fiercely love myself – the way he once did.  What a way to honor the big love he had for me.  In his absence, I can love myself wholly and madly for him and because of him.  This is how Mike’s love lives on.  And, this feels pretty wonderful.

For the Millionth time, Now What?

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Living forward  is a tedious act.  We live and we grieve… the two things are not exclusive of one another.  Early on I did not understand this.  I thought I had to find a “cure” for my grief.  I have discovered that there isn’t such a thing.  Grief exists because the love exists.  And, like our love, our grief will remain in some capacity – forever.  There is no other way for it to be.  And, I am okay with this.  I have to be.

Love Tears…

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It is nearly four years since Mike died and yes I still cry, but now my recovery time is quick.  The turn around between tears and living can be compared to the space between breaths.  It is almost indistinguishable.  The time between my tears falling and my life interrupting is fleeting at best.  Tears fall and I don’t miss a beat anymore.  I guess you could say that I have become very proficient at living with the grief.

My life, like every widowed person’s life, is a delicate balance between soul crushing missing and a both feeble and fierce attempt at living as normal of a life as possible.  There, hidden among my regular routine life, is an ache that runs so deep inside me that if feels like it is not even separate from me.

My grief is part of who I am.  And, really, my grief is not grief at all.  It is love. 

My tears are not necessarily tears of sadness, more accurately, they are love tears.

On the Cusp

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I can feel change… I am on the cusp of a beautiful new life.  After fumbling along the dim and rutted path of grief, I have finally come to a clearing.  I have found my way out of the dark and I am standing on the edge of a peaceful place.  A place that will lead me back to the light.  I have a hunch that I am headed towards a wonderful life.  A life I have desperately wanted to recreate since he died.  I can actually feel a full and authentic life waiting for me just around the corner.  It is calling out to me. I have been directionless for so long, but somehow I now know the way out.  I will find my way out by instinct.  I will follow my heart.  I will travel by feel. 

I feel like I am heading toward the homestretch.  I have used up nearly all my reserve energy fighting my way back to life; and, now, I am on a type of natural high.  And, I am going to make a break for it.  I imagine myself sprinting toward the new life I sense waiting for me.  I am madly running toward my new life.  I am bolting towards the unknown like my life depends on it. And, in a very real way it does. 

Where do I belong?

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Life after the death of the person you love is weird. It is confusing. Mind numbing. Empty. Lacklustre. And, a bunch of other feelings and things. I’m sitting in my car typing this.  I’m parked in the culdesac across from what used to be Mike’s house. Our house.  The place where our little love story […]

Becoming…

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There are qualities that I yearn to possess again.  Things both tangible and otherwise.  There are attributes both big and small that I miss about the woman I used to be.  Namely, I miss her joy.  I miss being joyful and joy filled.  I miss being completely enamoured with my life.  I miss being happy.  I miss feeling content.  I miss being at ease in my own life.

Mike brought to life all these things inside me; and, without him, I have not been able to successfully recreate any of this.  After nearly four years, I have been unable to find my place in the world without him.  I endlessly search for a sense of belonging.  I work tirelessly to reestablish a feeling of contentment and I have been largely unsuccessful.  All feelings of joy and peace that I have experienced since he died have been fleeting at best.  *Sigh.

Yes, I miss him, but it is more than just missing Mike now.  I miss what he brought to my life and who he brought out in me; and it bothers me that without him I seem unable to manufacture my own sense of happiness.  I miss all that I was when I was his.  I miss sharing my life with a man who utterly adored me.  I miss being wildly and madly in love.  I miss the all the richness Mike brought to my life.  I miss the woman I was when he walked the Earth by my side.  And, I hate that it is so ridiculously hard to live without some of the best things you ever had.  But, I am doing it because I was not given a choice.  We are all persisting and living forward because life demands that of us, but this sure is weighty stuff.