Widow's Voice

Widowed Therapy

Resilience (Part 2) – Building Resilience

| Posted by:

In my last blog, I talked about what resilience means, and how I define the three kinds of resilience. In this instalment, let’s take a little time to learn about how we can start to build resilience. We can learn how resilience helps us to become stronger and more self-accepting of our faults and our mistakes.

Resilience is not simply being able to bounce back from setbacks, tragedies and injuries. It also includes being able to learn from the mistakes we make. It also helps us to accept the consequences of our mistakes with grace and self-love.  

Resilience Part 1 (How to Strengthen Yours)

| Posted by:

I have been doing a lot of work on resilience lately. We have all been told that the concept of resilience refers to one’s ability to “bounce back” from adversity. Being resilient helps us to recover from setbacks relatively comfortably. It also allows us the grace to move forward through difficult situations in life.

While resilience comes naturally to some, anybody can train himself to become more resilient. Like any skill, resilience can be built with time and practice so that you can feel confident in your ability to face adversity and come through it.

It’s Ok to Not Be Ok

| Posted by:

Honesty and authenticity is where my blog writing begins. There are moments in the journey that spark continuity in the conversation of my condition but there is so much else involved that I don’t know how to articulate yet. There is no manual on how to do this. The road is written as its traveled. […]

Two Questions

| Posted by:

For many of us, the idea of moving forward—of creating a new life—seems somewhat alien, I know. I think most of us feel this life has been thrust upon us, and we have no choice but to carry on. But I disagree. I think it is a mistake to think this way. I know that after maybe three or four months into my widowhood, I wanted to completely change my life and how I had previously lived. 

So now, I feel as though the sun has set on my old life; and I begin anew.

Imaginary Tigers

| Posted by:

A metaphor that my counselor used once was the idea of going into the jungle and getting attacked by a tiger. And the next time you find yourself in a similar jungle, you are consumed by the fear of the tiger to the point of running away… when there was no tiger around for miles. In fact, you might even be in a jungle where tigers don’t even live, but you’re still standing there scared of a tiger. This is what trauma can do to us.

Wrapping Loss in Love

| Posted by:

Photo by Karim MANJRA on Unsplash I spend a lot of my time reading about death, dying, and grieving, participating in webinars and holding space sessions with grief experts, people who’ve developed wise perspective on what it is to love, to lose, and to continue living. Apart from two moments since Mike’s death, I have […]

You Are Alive. You Are Whole.

| Posted by:

Anyone else reading the Outlander series? Watching it on Starz? If you haven’t, do yourself a favor. Time travel. Scotland. Relationships. Love. Passion. Trauma. Strength. Philosophy. And so much more. I’ve always been a romantic. Always. And I always will be. It’s part of who I am, and a part of me that I cherish. […]

Arriving in Community

| Posted by:

Until last Saturday, I had never been to a Camp Widow event. I watched as a team of dedicated, compassionate and talented people created a space for the LGBTQ widowed. Held at the beautiful Los Angeles LGBTQ center, was the first ever event for my subgroup in the widowed population. If you’ve attended an event, […]

Scared

| Posted by:

On March 15th, I will be moving into an apartment with my boyfriend of 2.5 years, Nick. We signed the lease on Valentines Day. (which was just a coincidence, but ended up feeling somewhat romantic and sweet). Over the past 8 years since Don’s death, I have moved 3 different times, finally ending up back […]