I feel compelled, now that I’ve passed the 3 year mark of my widowhood (as of April 21), to write one of those numbered lists of what helped me get through to this mark… Really, honestly, though, I couldn’t tell you how I’ve gotten here. All I can tell you is that I look in the mirror at myself and ask how the FUCK have you done this? How…
Widowed Emotions
Broken Hearts Club
For the past week, I have poured myself into the creation of my new grief workshop. It’s finally getting real now. Which is scary and exciting all at the same time. The fundraiser is over, and by the end, I raised $1700 to help with the creation of all of this. Amazingly, 95% of those donations were from widowed people. None of my close non-widow…
1000 days
Dear Dan, This week we reached another milestone, albeit not exactly a traditional one. On Tuesday, it had been 1000 days since I kissed you goodbye. The reason I know this is because I put a ‘countdown’ ap on my phone after you died, so I’d always know how many months, weeks or days since you’d been gone. Isn’t that a strange thing to want to…
Dreams Coming True
In my first post for this year I spoke about setting my goal for 2016. In this piece I wrote, “I’m sick of treading water, I want to start swimming again in 2016. I want to propel myself forward and feel like my life is moving ahead again. So this year I’ve chosen ‘growth’ as my mantra. It took me a while to settle on this word, because…
Swimming with Sharks
So my stepdaughter calls the other day – the one who lives here in Kona near me – and tells me she went out on a boat trip with a group of people and they decided to go pretty far out to see what interesting creatures they might find. When they are way out there they all get into the water. She says they did see two bottlenose dolphins, which is…
Oh, the Road of Crazy~
I really am crazy. I know it. But I must do a fairly good job of appearing not only not crazy but really rational and okay, because nobody else thinks I’m crazy. They would if they knew what my heart really looks like and what the inside of my mind looks like. But none of that is evident on the outside.It isn’t that I’m holding back to any…
Passion from Pain
In just 3 days my fundraiser for the Meaningful Making e-course will be complete. In the past month and a half, I have raised over double my goal to begin work on making this online workshop. It will be geared towards those grieving, with the premise that students will use a combination of creative acts and storytelling in order to express their…
The Lows
It’s been a hard week. On Saturday I finally received notification from the courts with the date of the preliminary hearing on my foreclosure mediation. I’ve been saying how I’m going to be ok with this whole situation but it’s been much more emotional than I thought it would be. It’s the beginning of the end of something, one way or another. And…
The Landscape of Love after Love
I’m writing you this morning from the bed of a roadside motel in West Virginia. The walls inside are all wood, the entire place looking like a big log cabin. It’s cozy feeling, with ruffled curtains, checkered blue and white bedspreads and warm corner lamps. I’ve woken up in a good mood, which I am infinitely grateful for, and hoping I can…
A Recipe for Life after Loss
So here we are again, at yet another holiday in the “after” life… only this one for me is very different. Firstly, I’m in Ohio, not Texas. Mike, Shelby and I are up early. The two of them are in the kitchen starting to cook up a feast for Easter while I write this. In about 5 hours, Mike’s family will be over and we will be doing a whole…
Wear Your Damn Watch!
I wanted to share someone else’s story today… one that she shared with me recently that I felt had such a powerful message for us all. I met Tara at my first Camp Widow back in 2014, and I remember having a great conversation with her one night over a few drinks out on the patio. She made an impression on me that night that has always stuck. A…
The Pulse Beat of Love Over Everything Else~
I have to remind myself, as many of us do, I expect, that this widowhood is, as I learned in AA, a matter of progress, not perfection. Because I, for one, consistently seem to expect more of myself than is realistic. By which I mean, I continually scan my body and mind and heart to see where I am in this grief and why I’m not further along, even…