Rochestergal

The only way I could heal was to be selfish, which was very foreign to me. I was worried about my daughter and my therapist said, "she is an adult, and if you want to be of any value to anyone you must think of yourself first." I did, I explained it to my daughter and husband and we all went our separate grieving ways, not abandoning each other, but each figuring out what to do and realizing it had to be done individually. We all grieved differently, but weekly we would sit down, cry and do whatever we needed to do to start healing. Some weeks we would not meet, others we met a couple of times. Communication was the key and understanding that the process would be individualized. Today, almost two years later we are closer than ever and trust each other with everything. We still have moments of sadness, but they are getting further apart and do not last as long. God Bless everyone on this painful journey. Please be gentle and non-judgement with yourselves.

Marty, thank you for the editing to my post. I wanted to make it clear that Tom Zuba helped us to turn our grief around and he deserves a mention of his book, in addition to my therapist. Thank you also Marty for creating this site. Websites, blogs and social media sites are tremendous tools that grievers now have to express themselves, not to make light of our situation, but what a time it is to grief with all these healthy and helpful options; if you are willing.

To call it a shock was an understatement! Madeline was the perfect child, never gave us anything problems what so ever; she was accepted as a transfer student to Cornel University a month after she died; her dream school. With this said; I found a counselor who herself, lost her son in a tragic car accident when he was 23 yrs old; he too was a perfect child. She was 4 years into her grief journey when I started with her, she was a Godsend to me. I also follow life coach Tom Zuba, who in the span of 15 years, lost his wife and daughter suddenly and then a son to cancer at age 13, his book and being part of a grief Facebook counseling was a great healing tool for us. Grieving is hard, hard work and you have to be willing to open your wound to receive the beginning of healing. Tom Zuba has coined the phrase "a new way to do grief", which means not closing yourself off, not living in the past, not holding yourself accountable for the death no matter what the circumstances were, and valuing yourself and your life to rebuild. The old way to do grief does not work and it compounds pain on top of pain; shutting yourself off, keeping "busy" to "forget"about your pain, feeling guilty. In his book Permission to Mourn: A New Way To Do Grief, he tells us to give ourselves permission to cry, wail, talk about your loved one until you no longer feel it is necessary, stop blaming yourself and others and much, much more. Shutting down and trying to forget only makes the situation worse, the phrase "letting it all hang out" is how you heal. A lot of people are terrified at the thought of opening yourself wide open to feel the pain and isolation but, it is the first steps to healing. Your heartbreak will never go entirely away, but we were not put on Earth to suffer and like everything else we do and know about life, it a choice you make - be in pain and misery or turn it around. Thank you for your kind words; it is appreciated and much healing to you.

My sweet daughter age 20, died suddenly in a freak car accident on Labor Day 2014. Like you can imagine we were devastated and are coping as best as can be imagined. We were abandoned by some friends and family like everyone here. We have had some time to process these feelings and I came to the conclusion that anyone who abandoned us never really had our back to begin with; they were fair weather friends and family. It took us a while to come to that conclusion; we were hurt and angry and focused too much time on them, while not giving much thought to who was actually there for us. The number of those who stuck by us, while we were on the emotional roller coaster was small, but their humanity and compassion far outweighed the others. During periods of heavy grieving, I was fixated on those who abandoned us; it was a waste of time. I no longer need/want them in our life and we are no longer hurt or angry; it is, what it is. We are still in the long process of redefining who we are as a family and as people. Focusing on them would be a hindrance to our new normal. Redefining our lives is hard work, just like grieving is. Unchartered waters and uncertainty, which is if you think about it, life itself; every day is different. Changing yourself and your life is very difficult, especially as you get older, but necessary. When I reached the realization that some people were not there for us; it opened my mind and life to other experiences, once again it was not easy, but for me in order to move forward I had to. We had a happy, loving family before our daughter died and we need to get that happy back in tribute to our sweet daughter. This is what she would want, no doubt and we are doing all we can to honor her, in our own way and in the way of our family life. Madeline died, but it does not mean we died along with her, even though for a while it felt like that. Our lives will never be the same, but we are doing all we can to get back on a healthy track. I exercise daily; go to tap dance class, yoga and journal my feelings. We also count our considerable blessings; our other sweet daughter who is in pain and lost her sibling, our intact and happy marriage, our good health, our financially stable life; it took us a long time to realize this. We know that on and off for the rest of our lives, we will grieve. But we are still alive and must go on, not only for ourselves but for Madeline, who loved life more than anything. God Bless everyone here who is hurting; I hope my words alleviated some of your pain and you appreciate the people in your life that did not abandon you. Below is a photo of Madeline, taken two months before she died.