Kieron

I definitely remember Carol Burnett. Her show used to be shown a bit later than I was allowed to be up, but sometimes I would be permitted to stay up and watch it. Most of the humor went over my head, I'm afraid, but that's why YouTube has been such a blessing.

Karen, I can't resist sharing this cute illustration I found, so perfect for this time. I hope it brings a smile or even a laugh.

It's more than okay to not know. Noting that's it's been a matter of weeks since you lost her.... If I might offer you one piece of advice that I wish I had been given: don't allow other people's hints, comments, wishes, feelings and opinions --about your next steps, the ashes, belongings, personal effects, clothing, and so forth--sway you from what your heart tells you. "Should" doesn't belong in this scenario. Banish "should" from your vocabulary and give yourself a year of grace, before making any major decisions. Just be, for now. The time for action will come soon enough.

I kept the urn closed and in an out of the way spot for quite some time, as I recall. I was really annoyed at the choice of urn that his sister made at the funeral home, as he would have been perfectly fine with a nice decorative tin or a fancy bottle or a carved wooden box from the secondhand store. I was appalled at how much the thing cost her, but she wanted to buy it so I let it go. I should probably stop here. 🤣 It took 2 years before circumstances aligned for me to take them where we were happiest, in the far north of the state by the border of Canada.

Welcome, and I am sorry that what is already a hard loss in and of itself, is made harder yet by questions about what happened in the assisted living and the hospital. On top of that you have no funeral but only a burial, and the cherry on top is a pandemic keeping you isolated and unable to get the closure you desire. What a tragic sundae of sorrow. I'm afraid more and more we'll be hearing about people and families cut apart by this pandemic and left without peace. While the one I lost was not my brother, we went through similar situations in the rehabilitation residence with questionable decisions and (in)actions on the part of nurses, staff and administration, but at least at the time, I could go after them and file complaints, whereas now in the time of Covid19, I am assuming the assisted living and hospital will find a way to conveniently dodge any responsibility. I'm so sorry for this unbearable situation.

Yep, that "Single" thing irritates me no end, taking no account of what lasted for 19 years. And just the other day, he got his "stimulus check" 😒 in the mail-- after 3 years and 2 months gone! Sheesh! So then I had to check the box in the upper corner of the unopened envelope that reads, "If Recipient deceased, check here and drop in mailbox." Yes, thank you for reminding me, forcing me to re-acknowledge something painful. 🤬 I could sure use the $1200 but the penalty is pretty steep (even if I were the type to do such a thing).

Yeah, these things often have such a jolt about them, especially the first time you have to update your emergency contacts. 😣

Well, I think the left behind sensation only just came into clearer focus, for me. It's likely been there all along, just not labeled as such. I think it is worsened enough that I can give it a name, now that everyone is being encouraged to wear masks in public. Those things just distort people's speech, making it harder to communicate, and they hide smiles or grins, or other clues. I get that masks are meant to prevent spread if one is asymptomatic, but it's just one more way to cut one another off. The only upside is that it may cause us to look one another in the eye, now, instead of avoiding direct gazes like we do in a big city like I am in.

That's why the reaction buttons (Like, Upvote and Thanks) are so helpful. Sometimes there's nothing we can say, really, but we want to show caring somehow. Likewise, when I see so many horrible people still walking around, apparently without a care in the world. 🙄

One of the sensations that has come to me lately is similar to a sensation I had in the months after Mark died... what is there to look forward to? Despite it being a nice day (although windy), I took a late afternoon nap, not even sure how long. When I woke up, I thought of how much has changed here, especially being alone in this house, and just had this helpless feeling of having been left behind. Probably it was sleep-related but dang it, it was pretty overwhelming for a time. 😟

Wow, that is amazing. Clearly the world is much the poorer for his passing. 😔

It isn't pointless to say so, in my opinion. Cliches become cliches because human language is simply inadequate to convey the depth and magnitude of these traumatic events that upend a person's life. Sometimes there's no energy remaining to come up with a new way of expressing the inexpressible. So we fall back on sayings. Cliches aren't recommended when you're a writer (as I am) but for everyday use, their advantage is that everyone understands what you mean. And as you go on, other sayings take on new meaning, such as "Only the good die young." Your realize how true that is. And it sucks, just plain sucks. How's that for a cliche? 😄 As Kay says, just get through today. Take it moment by moment if necessary.

I can only echo Gwen here. I can't even grasp how a loss such as yours is being made many times harder by this pandemic. It's hard enough in more normal times, but now? Yikes, I am so very sorry this has happened to you and her. ☹️

I can personally attest to this. Normally in my work we see clients face to face, but we have been doing "telehealth" like most providers nowadays of medical, mental and even dental health (which astonishes me. Just amazing how things have pivoted to such ways of doing "care"). But phone or video chat is not the same. it's exhausting, because doing this all over the phone requires enormous concentration. Normally, you get breaks in a natural face to face chat. The natural pauses in conversation, the break in focus as people adjust their position or posture or walking around, etc, all that is missing. And you miss context clues that tell you how the person is reacting. As for video chat, well that isn't effective either, because if it's a group chat, someone will be talking for a bit, and someone else makes a natural responses such as "Yep," or "I know, right?" or some such, which causes the video to switch to that person who just said that thing in agreement/support, which then breaks the concentration you need to focus on the main speaker. Argh!!! Not to mention, we're social beings. We NEED to be around others. The very term "social distancing" is so Orwellian and so ironic that it makes me want to smack whoever came up with it. Up is down, black is white. Shades of 1984. 😵 Plus I just realized the local grief group is again cancelled for tomorrow, the first Saturday of the month.

Welcome, and it sounds like you have already found some awareness that your feelings are not wrong or selfish or anything else-- just natural. I'd like to mention this sentence you wrote. The fear you describe is, in my experience anyway, an illusion. It's an illusion that makes us back away from the intensity we're afraid will destroy us, as if we were on a beach, witnessing a huge ocean wave rising higher and higher, reaching for the sky and threatening to crash down on our head. And it will crash down, and it will bring you to your knees, as it should. But then it passes over you and then it recedes for awhile. Yes, it will come again, but the intensity is a little bit less each time. Unfortunately, most of us are not taught much about death and dying and the aftermath of it, so when it happens, we're overwhelmed and knocked off our feet. it's like Marty says, "It's when we use all our energy to deny or to bury what we are feeling that we run into trouble." And then there's this remark: So then, here it sounds like you were given a clue to what was going on inside him to make him the way he was. Authoritarian cultures with stern and harsh patriarchal structures are incredibly damaging to both men and women, although in different ways. It prevents boys and men from really being able to be able to express gratitude, gentleness and love, at least not without lots of practice. You don't really specify, but here's another clue, when you mentioned your own father: Sounds like he's another one caught in that same kind of culture. Graduating with honors is no small feat, but maybe that was something that was frowned on in the culture...? At any rate I hope you'll continue to draw inspiration and understanding from some of the articles here. 🙂

Kay, perhaps Namza's post needs its own thread, to reduce confusion? I think the post was meant as a stand-alone but got attached to someone else's thread. At least that's how I read it. 🙂

omg talk about "foot in mouth disease." 🙄 Sorry, Gwen!

Oh, definitely. Even though the most important figure in my life who's passed on isn't my father, I find myself appreciating many things that he enjoyed, or using some of the same sayings or turns of phrase. It brings me a bit of comfort to use his cooking utensils and cast iron pans, as if I am assisting with their intended purpose, versus letting them sit idle. Like the previous comment says, we may unconsciously pick up habits or mannerisms from one another. These become so much part of us that we forget where it all came from. And, I would suggest, it may also be that we are wanting to feel closer to the person who is gone, in whatever way we can. The following clip from YouTube captures some of what you may be feeling. The artist, Luka Bloom, is not mainstream but he has a great many fans. As he says, the song is about his father who passed away, and it's called "The Man Is Alive." If nothing else, listen to it for the guitar solo. The Man Is Alive

This is indeed wearing us down... 🙁 Gwen, when I read about your video chat getting canceled, I immediately thought, wouldn't it be great to have a video chat for this group? It would sure erase the isolation in short order! I'm kind of camera-shy but even I would go for it about now. 😁

From Page 3 of the PDF: You’re annoyed everyone is complaining about stuff that your grief has had you coping with for weeks/months/years. Are your friends suddenly complaining about isolation, overwhelm, and feelings of uncertainty about the future? Does it sound a lot like what you’ve been coping with for a long time? Are these things your friends haven’t historically been sympathetic about? Hopefully this isn’t coming up for you, but we have heard loud and clear that it is coming up for some people. It isn’t that you don’t empathize with your friends. Quite the opposite, in fact. You empathize deeply. It might just feel a little annoying that it took something like this for them to empathize with you. And this: You're relieved your loved on isn't here. Maybe this is because they were ill and the risk of getting COVID-19 on top of that illness would have been overwhelming. This. So much this. Thank you, Kay.

Kay, they're real eggs, and it's not paint but dyes, like super-charged versions of the Paas color tabs that we used to mix with vinegar when I was a kid, to dye Easter eggs. The designs are ancient, from pre-historic times. They are so old they have no copyright whatsoever. I have dozens of books with examples of these so it's like choosing from a vast library. You can mix and match. The 8 pointed star is very ancient, and I have mentioned it represents the sun, light, warmth returning victorious over wintertime that has ended. The netting or cross-hatching around the star represents sifting or separating good from evil. The only part I made that's nontraditional was the blue mountain shapes. Those aren't traditional but I like them.

I am, too. I figure it eventually comes back around, since everything moves in a circle, even if it's a long, wide arc that takes years to bend back around to its origination point. Johnny, best of luck riding out your waiting period! I'm sure you'll be fine. 😃

Well, as for me, I'm doing okay although my work hours have been reduced. At least I still have a job, and some income, since we're considered "essential" during a stay-at-home order here. Luckily the bank suspended my mortgage payments for 90 days without question, so I guess all those years of paying on time made it a slam-dunk. So I'll be fine for awhile, but not for months on end. 😕 Speaking of essential, I may break down and get a hair clipper because my hair grows like a weed,, and try to do it myself, hopefully not having to wear a hat after. 🤪 We've had a few nice days so I've been poking around the yard seeing what's coming up green. Being an introvert by nature, I've adapted to this new routine relatively well, but as another introvert friend put it, "I can handle it but I don't appreciate it being imposed on me." On the plus side, it caused 2 friends/acquaintances who had drifted away to resurface, so that is nice, even if all we do is phone chat, or text back and forth. I used some cold, rainy days to design another Ukrainian Easter egg, so there's that (see below). Folklore tells us that there's an evil monster out there that is chained somewhere out in the wild world, and is the source of evil. It is chained to a mountain, to keep evil in check. Every year, it sends out its minions to see whether these Easter eggs are being made by the people. If only a few are being made, then evil flourishes, but if the people make many of them, the monster's chains are tightened and evil is kept under tighter restraints. So I guess I'd better get busy. 😁

Ugh, it just dawned on me that today would be the monthly support group, locally, and it would be cancelled, for obvious reasons. Crap. 😒

Anniversaries are always, always hard, and I cannot begin to imagine the experience you are describing. 😔