Rick died six years ago today. Not always being a rational person, I decided the best way to handle this awful anniversary would be to sleep through today. That didn’t work. For one reason, my cat did not agree with ...
Not too long into my own widowhood journey, I noticed something that happens once the newness of our loss has worn off for everyone but us: many of my friends, most of my lovely, wonderful support group had all but ...
It isn’t black veils over gray hair. It isn’t wrinkly hands clasped in front of them standing at the cemetery. It isn’t (always) a 90 year old staring out the window at gloomy clouds day after day. There is no ...
Within the first few months after my husband died, I very quickly learned that grief can be a lot of things: anguish, pain, anger, love, numbness. I mean, there are five stages after all. One word I haven’t heard when ...
“Year two is harder than the first.” In the early days after losing my husband, Joe, I’d read how the second year of widowhood and grief is often harder than the first. 'Uhh, yea right,' I’d say to myself, usually ...
When my husband was alive, he would say that my constant sacrificing and never-saying-no personality were self-inflicted wounds. If I complained about how tired I was because I took on a task I didn’t really want to do – because ...
I’m babysitting my two young grandsons for a four-day weekend while their folks are out of town. These two like all sorts of music. They may ask the Amazon Alexa to play Daft Punk, Justin Bieber, rap or hard rock, ...
When someone we love leaves this mortal coil, people are quick to assure us that they are still with us. I honestly always believed that too, based on my own experiences with departed relatives. I have had so many lovely ...
The below creative nonfiction piece was recently published in Heartspace II: Real Life Stories on Loss and Renewal, an anthology collection edited by Cathy Brooks Edwards. This is second book in the Heartspace series and states that it is “an ...
I have written in-depth about social media. It has benefits and flaws just like everything else, but I have to admit that it was incredibly helpful in the early days of my grief. Initially, I didn't think that I would ...