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Grief Healing Discussion Groups

Paul S

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About Paul S

  • Birthday 01/31/1963

Previous Fields

  • Your relationship to the individual who died
    NA
  • Date of Death
    Mom: 7 Nov 2005; Dad: 5 Sept 1995; Sister: 19 March 1988; childhood friend 19 April 1995.
  • Name/Location of Hospice if they were involved:
    NA

Contact Methods

  • MSN
    n/a
  • Website URL
    http://sobercatholic.com
  • ICQ
    n/a
  • Yahoo
    n/a
  • Jabber
    n/a
  • Skype
    n/a

Profile Information

  • Your gender
    Male
  • Location (city, state)
    Buffalo, NY
  • Interests
    Catholicism. Writing/Blogging. Pro-Life activism. Addiction recovery. Gardening and permaculture. Tolkien, Star Trek.

Recent Profile Visitors

956 profile views
  1. Yeah, we still have some of her meds. It seems strange not seeing her around; I keep expecting her to come around. I still check my rocking chair before sitting down just in case she's on it. (at only 5 pounds, she was little.)
  2. Boots crossed the Rainbow Bridge about two hours ago. She had tried to get up from where she was and stumbled, attracting our attention. I picked her up and brought her over to a couch and cuddled her, a few minutes passed and her breathing began to become labored and she finally died in my arms. We'll bury her tomorrow. She was diagnosed with kidney failure. She hadn't eaten much this past week and we had been giving her subcutaneous fluids to help to. But these past few days she just declined in activity and today was her final day. Boots was a cutie-pie. She absolutely loved getting belly rubs. She'd easily flop down on her side and spread her four legs wide and exposing her fluffy underside. She'd probably happily accept them for hours, if my hands were up to it! She didn't meow, she squeaked. Boots also was a shameless moocher. I mean, really: if I or my wife had food out, she'd be right nearby imitating a vulture perched awaiting a meal. (Our vet says that mooching is a sign that a cat has hyperthyoidism, which she did have.) This included our weekly pill-sorting out session. Rose and I have these weekly pill-box things and when we'd sort our meds and place them in the boxes, Boots would be right there, thinking "Oh, food! Gimme!" She also oftentimes threatened to interrupt the card games my wife and I frequently play; I sometimes tried to bribe Boots with extra tuna or bellyrubs if she would just jump on the playing table and mess up the cards (when my wife was winning. Nope. Wouldn't help me out. Grrls.) She was a good lap cat, crawling into my lap and often burrowing her head in the crook of my arm. Sometimes she'd lick my shirt. Boots liked doing that; not my skin, the cloth. And she ruled the house with a mighty paw. We have another cat, a male Bombay named Ninja who weighs in at 12.5 lbs, to Boots' 5 lbs. Boots totally intimidated him. She didn't care he was bigger. She called the shots. (Ninja is a total luvadub. Craves belly rubvs, too. Always tried to play with Boots, but she'd have none of it. :-( )
  3. (It's been years since I last posted; I was primarily active wayback in 2005-07 in the aftermath of my Mom's death and once in a great while due to my melancholic temperament I get all wistful and wonder what's up with 😍 Marty😍 and the forums in general. This place saved my sanity and was a massive aid in helping me cope in between counseling sessions. Anyway, on with this topic... ) I have found from my personal experience that writing is therapeutic. Any kind of writing that you can do concerning your loss, your grief, and coping with it all. Even if it's just posting a lot to these forums, letting it all out, or starting a blog elsewhere and sharing stuff; writing helps to objectify the pain and hurt and gets it 'out there' where it's observable. You needn't even do all the sharing publicly, as you do on here or on a blog, just keep a private journal that only you can see and read. One great method of writing as therapy is fiction. Just place the entire scenario in fictional form. Dramatize it. Change names if needed, invent new people, perhaps people you imagined would come to your rescue but didn't exist in reality. Put in stuff you wish happened. Whatever You don't have to be good. You don't even have to even publish it (either traditionally through a publisher or by way of self-publishing on Amazon or Smashwords, etc.) One of my favorite writers, Flannery O'Connor, said “I write because I don't know what I think until I read what I say.” You'd be surprised at what comes out when you start writing about your experiences. Stuff seems to come from nowhere. But in the end, I always feel better, like I'm no longer alone. And you'll understand yourself and where you've been better.
  4. We brought our garage cat inside yesterday, on the one week anniversary of Mr. Onyx's passing. Ninja is black, also, although smaller. She isn't him, but it's nice to see another black cat around.
  5. Yes, I thought your username was familiar.
  6. He was buried in a garden we've been planning that's next to the house and patio. We wrapped him in an old nightgown that belonged to my wife, Rose (he adored and worshipped her. Seriously, followed her around like a puppy and gazed up at her with total affection and wonder) and placed him in a plastic bag with another laid on top (to help deaden any scent from searching wild noses). With him was a catnip mouse, a catnip scented bag, and some string he like to play with. There's a nice mound there, between two rose bushes we planted last year, and hostas that I rescued from my parent's grave a few years ago (no one was able to tend their graves anymore so I transplanted perennials from it to my house.) Incidentally, it was my Mom's death in November 2005 that initially brought me here. I was fairly active from 12/05 thru mid-2007. This place was VERY helpful in getting me to adjust to the "new normal" and "moving on" without "leaving behind."
  7. He's buried. It wasn't difficult, the ground wasn't frozen, or maybe angels were helping me. It didn't take long. Hard to say about the other kitteh's feelings. I think he resented their existence (to be polite about it.) Anyway, he's now in his final resting place on Earth. I long to be reunited with him someday in Eternity.
  8. I'm in western NY, just south of Buffalo. I'm going to bundle up, heavy-duty Long John undergarments, layered clothing atop that, and the determination that grief can supply.
  9. And today we bury Mr.Onyx. Or at least attempt to as this is Winter and the ground is hard and frozen. Perhaps not so much as his resting place will be near the house. This has been rough.
  10. Thanks for the video, Marty. I tried to play it but got through perhaps 2 minutes before crying. I did add it to a playlist on my YouTube channel, for revisiting later when I can handle it.
  11. That's OK, I understand. Just a few days ago I was dressing for an interview, and I completely forgot how to tie a tie. I'll be 51 in a few weeks.
  12. Thanks... (but my name is Paul, not "Ron." )
  13. Mr. Onyx, (whom I nicknamed "SpeedBump" after his penchant for laying right between wherever anyone was sitting and wherever a doorway is, as well as slowly walking down the hallway before you) died an hour ago. We don't know how old he was as we didn't get him as a kitten. His previous human died from cancer and untreated alcoholism and we took him in as no one else could. He lived with my wife and I for almost exactly 6 years. He is survived by two other kittehs, Jerrie and Ninja. He had an amazing impact on our lives, bringing much joy, love and FUN into them. He even had his own Facebook account! (Which we'll probably take down in a few days after downloading the archive. I may create a memorial Page for him, there.) We will bury him in a garden, next to the house, and we'll plant stuff around him that would attract the birds and bunnies he so loved to watch from the patio window.
  14. Hello all. I was a fairly active member of this site from after my Mom died in 2005 until the summer of 2007. I basically stopped posting because I felt I had "processed" my Mom's death, and moved on. ("Moving on" is not the same as "leaving her" behind. She's still with me, spiritually.) Once in a while I'd return to lurk and see what is going on here. This place saved my sanity and I have a debt of gratitude to Marty. I'd scroll through old posts (mine and other's) and reread things and wonder about people who had helped me here and who also have moved on (an assumption. A huge majority of those who posted around when I was active seem to have also stopped). Anyway, and here is the point I'm getting to: today was Mother's Day and it seems that a lot of my friends (Facebook one) are experiencing their first Mother's Day without their Mom. That got me to thinking of the Grief Healing Discussion Groups. And so I wandered back here. And I am very pleased to have found this new forum. I wish it had been around wayback in 2007, I might not have left! But the idea of a forum where people who have "made it through" the grief, but still ponder the loss years later, can meet and discuss and share. I like this quote from the forum's description: ...You may wish to share with others what you've learned along the way, some signs of your own progress, how this experience has changed you, what discoveries you've made about yourself, or where you plan to go from here... My Mom's death had changed me. The forge I was put through afterwards made a new me. I worked through the grief. It made my religious faith more spiritual, and my spirituality more religious. I no longer view death as an enemy, but at the very least a process, and at best a passage through to our eternal home. It brought my Mom, my Dad, a sister, and others away from This Place ( the world) and into a safer and happier place. (One thing I learned when I was first involved here was the discovery that I hated "They're in a better place." Ick.) Death, particularly my Mom's as that was the one that hit me the hardest, has reminded me that This is Not All That There Is. Death had become to me a reminder that life has importace, it is impermanent, and we may leave behind something. What that something is depends, but it is all that there will be from us, once we are gone. It could be children, creative works, money for endowing institutions, or just a happy legacy of helping others that people will pay forward. My religion teaches that there is an afterlife, and what we do here impacts it. And so the eternal is a focus of my actions. Death has united me (somewhat) with the eternal. And I do not fear death. I actually look forwards to it. Of course I say that now. I'm 49 and mostly healthy! Ask me when I'm on my deathbed! I hope that I'd still "look forwards to it." But right now, facing the reality of my own death is too abstract. When faced with the reality of it, I can't say with certainty. I like to think I'll be prepared, though. I'm here and I hopen that those who were active from late 2005 through 2007 wander back here somehow and see this forum and the "New Beginnings" one. It is weird to miss people you never met in person. But like the people in real life I met at face-to-face grief counseling sessions and support groups, I think a special bond is created. Those drawn together by a loved one's death are connected across the times and distances.
  15. is into his "new normal". It does get better. it takes Faith.

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