Category Archives: on grieving

“a brief (grief) note” (image 2/brief text)… Points to know, especially if you’re grieving the sudden death of a child, or support someone who is . . . Migrating through grief. Notes, quotes, info, examples, images, connections, stories related to the Parental Bereavement Readjustment Model.

Grief grabbed me again

5 minute read

For the first few months after Sam’s death, I suffered stabbing headaches in and around my eyes. 

“Narrow-angle glaucoma,” the ophthalmologist said. “Yours is the worst I’ve seen.” 

I wondered if the pain was from not crying. I didn’t ask. The question sounded ridiculous in my head: My son, he’s gone, and it hurts when I cry, so I wonder, did this happen, this buildup—of tears?—because I’ve been stopping myself from crying? Suppressing grief, like pruning branches, I’ve learned, only causes it to mushroom.

(an excerpt from Willower: Rewriting Life After Unimaginable Loss: Chapter 8. Grieving)

It’s been over eighteen years since my little boy died. So I wasn’t expecting this.

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on reinventing

2 minute read

life

Every single one of us has a completely unique and deeply personal journey that we take on this thing we call life . . . Find the courage to take the wheel and steer it wherever your heart desires.

— Mel Robbins

FOR THE LAST FEW MONTHS, I’ve been feeling like I’m floundering, languishing. Sitting in the passenger’s seat (or some days, the backseat) staring at the weeds, at life, along the soft shoulder as they pass by; instead of taking the wheel, looking forward, and navigating from the driver’s seat.

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on walking

1 minute read

walking on

In grief, all we can do is take notes and learn as we go, keep walking through the damage—talk and share and create as we speak—and stay at it, try to make something of it, our loss, and find new meaning in that.

(excerpt from Willower: Rewriting Life After Unimaginable Loss: Chapter 9. Migrating)
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grieving is hard work

1 minute read

a grief note

Grieving, like writing, is hard work, done mostly in solitude.

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now, in the after

5 minute read

How do I let go, set myself free—set him free?

For years, I had a purpose: to write (to finish) my story (my book).

Every day, that finish line up ahead is what kept me running; gave me energy enough to keep going, editing, rewriting. There was always something to do in order to finish.

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side effects of rewriting

reading time 2 minutes

In grief, sometimes you’ll feel stuck.

What if, instead of seeing the idea of being stuck as a negative, we think of it as being anchored for a period of time. Which sounds okay, doesn’t it? Anchoring yourself in the silence, in meditation, in the remembering? In grief, the rewiring process that goes on deep inside you sometimes requires a serious shutdown—a rebooting of sorts.

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