Since becoming an involentary widow almost 8 years ago, I have changed in many positive ways. I am more empathetic. I am more sympathetic. I am less judgemental of people’s lives and situations and circumstances. I listen better. I stop to talk with people more. I find more meaning and beauty in very tiny things. I exist in the moment…
Widowed Suddenly
Grief Mistakes
Soon after the sudden death of my husband, almost 8 years ago now, I began trying to navigate my new reality and world that I never asked for or wanted. I didnt know what the hell I was doing. There are no guidelines or handbook for how to “widow” properly. I hadn’t even put away all of our dishes and kitchen items and gifts from a few years…
Accepting Fear
Last week, I wrote about dealing with fear. More specifically, the fear of more bad things happening. Of the feeling of waiting for the other shoe to drop. I think it’s normal when you’ve experienced any major loss to begin to fear another one coming. So for the past six months or so, I’ve been having an increasingly big fear of someone else…
Trauma Triggers: Is This Still a Thing?
In July, it will have been 8 years since my husband’s sudden death from cardiac arrest bulldozed into my life. Eight years. There are so many days when I trick myself into thinking that Im really okay now and maybe this wont affect me anymore. And then I get knocked over by something such as this ……. On Wednesday, I went to the gym…
Dealing with Fear
This past six months or so I’ve been noticing a bit of a looming feeling in the background of my mind. Things in my life are relatively dialed in for the time being. I have a new life, a family, a routine of day to day things. I have dealt with enough of the bigger stressors that I now have more time and energy to tackle and explore smaller…
Scared to Remain, Scared to Change
I have always hated change. Especially when something would change drastically or quickly, and I didnt have much choice in the matter. Like that time when I was about 7 years old and we went on a class field trip to a Maple Farm, and I somehow ended up with a gigantic ball of maple syrup in my long, curly, gorgeous hair. And then my dad, for…
A Life Unfinished …
It hangs in mid-air, swaying through the trees, like an echo, sometimes, and other times, like a scream. That life unfinished, the one we didn’t get to have, because you died. It lingers there, in the breeze, like a hundred-thousand question marks, and never any answer. That life unfinished haunts me sometimes. I wish I had a book I…
When Love Wins out Over Fear
It’s been a little over a month now since Mike proposed. I’ve had a few hard triggers. Trying to think about planning a wedding has been tough at first. The last time I was going to marry someone, he died before we ever got to the big day. He died before we ever even got into the true planning. So needless to say, that part of me that remembers…
Superbowl Sunday and a Brand New Life
The year was 2005, and it was a cold day in February. I looked out the window of my New Jersey apartment, which sat on the Hudson River. NYC looked back at me. I put the coffee pot on, and started making the meatballs and sauce. My Nana Mary’s lasagna recipe, with bow tie pasta and meatballs and ribs on the side. I had made it for Don the…
An Expert on Death
This afternoon, I was honored to be a guest-lecturer / speaker for a large class of mostly pharmacy students at Ohio State University, who will one day be future practioners. Due to the magic of the inter-webs, I spoke to the large class of students and the professor, from the comfort of my room in smalltown Massachusetts. They are learning about…
Don’t Die
“Don’t Die” It’s an instruction that Sarah has given to me as I walk out the door to work more times than I can count. Sometimes, it’s fairly innocuous. Other times, it’s said with a fervent, if not pleading “PLEASE don’t die today”; usually after waking up from a particularly emotional dream. It’s not a “tic” or…
All the Things We Didnt Do
This past week, some married friends went away on a family vacation, and asked me and Nick if we could stay at their house for 5 days while they were gone, dog-sitting and house-sitting. We were both happy to do it. Not only did it help our friends out, but it also gave us an opportunity to spend some quality alone time together. Without getting…