So, last week, you may have noticed that my post was strangely invisible in here. Yeah. That is because I totally forgot to write one. I realized this fact somewhere around the time when my name was being called out loud by my friend and Soaring Spirits board member Janine. We were in San Diego. At Camp Widow West. At the Saturday night formal…
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Seeds of Change
Growing up in Virginia my parents always had a lovely garden. They still do, actually. Every year they compost and dig and plant and in the summers appear beautiful tomatoes, beans, eggplants, lettuce and lots of other things. I wasn’t much into digging in the dirt when I was a kid though, so when I moved into my first house with Mike in Los…
Rose-scented Conversations
Language has changed for me in this time since Chuck died.I’m certain I’m not the only one who has heard people say “Your fillintheblank would want you to be happy”. Happy is one of the words that has changed for me. Happiness is a fleeting thing and I’m not concerned about being happy. Life is deeper than that for me now. I hope someday I…
Lost Time
John’s hospital stay threw me out of sync. Not just in terms of the stress that came out of that situation with the additional health implication for him because of Daddy’s illness, but I’ve lost another week of time in my brain… I still feel like I lost a year. Over the weekend our church community celebrated the marriage of two members,…
Fear Armor
My guy is currently on his way to learn to paraglide. I couldn’t go with him because of a prior engagement so I’m waiting to hear that he is back on the ground. I know he’s more likely to die in a car crash than on this contraption in the air today, but many things could go wrong. Most likely they won’t, but they could. I’ll be anxious, but only in…
Here I Go Again on My Own
Being here in the United States on my own this week has been a very enlightening experience. I have had moments of feeling vulnerable and isolated and also moments of incredible confidence, like I can take on the world. After my husband died it’s been a struggle to adjust to being alone again. I know I can do things without him – I just don’t…
What is a Partner?
As an artist, I believe that every piece I create is coming through me from some other source and meant for one person out there. I’ve come to believe this because of it happening to me with many of my photographs and written pieces. Someone will come forward to share how important my image was to them, and how perfectly it aligned with something…
A World of Support: Camp Widow
When I found the Soaring Spirits International website, just after I’d finally gone online with my story and shortly before I became one of the seven widow’s blogging here at Widow’s Voice, I found a deep solace in the smiling faces on the photos of past events at Camp Widow. Here was a group of people dedicated to a beautiful community of…
Next Year~and a Goal
Today I watched the flashmob video from Camp Widow. I was inspired to watch it after seeing the tutorial video on the Soaring Spirits Loss face book page.The tutorial. I barely got through it and only got through it with tears coming from my eyes and my chest feeling tight and sorrow filling every part of my body. And the whys of that were…
Not again…
I didn’t get to write last week… I was with my son in our local children’s hospital after he developed an autoimmune thingy. First while being assessed in emergency after some four hours of the usual waiting and it’s 2am, the doctors tell me even though he isn’t a typical presentation they suspect something called Kawasaki’s Disease, and the…
Survivors Club
I’ll be missing Camp Widow West this weekend for the first time since Dave died. I didn’t feel a drive to go this year. I know exactly what I’ll be missing not going, and that makes me sad, but the need to go has faded. I’m not sure what I’ll do next year when camp time comes around. I’m so incredibly grateful for its existence. I found Soaring…
My Parallel Universe
I’ve had a really tough few weeks. In some ways, it has almost felt like I’m right back at the start – crying from the moment I wake up without him in my bed until I pass out each night from exhaustion. Thankfully, it has lifted again in recent days but in the depth of this latest low I realised I was withdrawing from the people in my life in a…