MartyT

Dear Ones, I am stunned by the messages posted in this thread, as I think your experiences describe so vividly the longlasting effects of untreated mental illness in a family, and how the actions of very ill parents can lead to complicated grief reactions in their children after they die. I am particularly impressed with Moon’s response, as I find myself thinking along the very same lines as she. I would encourage both acasey06 and gitane to consider getting into counseling, because it is never too late to do the work of mourning. When the unfinished business of loss is getting in the way of living your life, it is always wise to pay it the attention it demands, and if necessary, to seek outside, professional help in doing so. Earlier this morning I was reading an article in the Winter 2007 issue of the Wings Newsletter entitled Feeling the Agony of Sibling Death: My Story, by Diana Papilli. Describing how she eventually came to terms with the violent murder of her brother twenty years before, Diana writes, . . . I followed some early advice. I allowed myself to feel all of my feelings: anger, hatred, revenge, sorrow, pity, disgust, grief, regret, resentment and others. However, I did not wallow in them; not for long, anyway. I let them be and then let them pass . . . I [also] used the services of a professional counselor. I did not seek him initially for my grief, yet all of my experiences came into those sessions with me. My grief helped shape both the things inside me I wanted to keep and wanted to release. A detached but compassionate counselor can go a long way in helping overcome the most difficult of obstacles. Grief support groups offer similar benefit. Many years have passed and I sometimes have to revisit those feelings. I do not treat them as evil robbers at my threshold. Instead, I treat them as necessary assistants, showing me where I need to work next. Living a decent, joyous life despite John’s murder is the best tribute I can give to my brother. He wouldn’t want anything less.

My dear Jamie, You’ve raised some very important questions, and I will do my best to address them. First, I can assure you that you certainly are not “the only person that feels this way.” I would hope that just reading some of our other members’ posts in this very forum will convince you of that. The notion that the first year of grief is the hardest, and the time when support is needed most, is a common misconception. There is nothing magical about getting through that first year without the physical presence of your loved one ~ it simply means that you’ve managed to get through your first four seasons of grief, with all its special days (that is, the first birthday, first wedding anniversary, first holiday, etc. without your beloved), so that this year, the next time that special day comes around, you now are able to say, “I made it through this day last year, and now I know that I can do it again.” You say your doctor / therapist told you that “the second year may be harder and she was so right.” For some, the second year is indeed even harder than the first, because the protective barrier of numbness has disappeared and by now, all those secondary losses are apparent. The reality is that we need ongoing compassion and support ~ which is the point I tried to make in my post of December 29, above. You’re frustrated with those who tell you that you “have to go on,” and you are left to think, “What do they think I am doing right now?” As Harold Ivan Smith often says, the challenge for mourners is that we are grieving our loss in a “get-over-it,” “move on with it” world. He suggests that some of our friends may have no idea of what we are experiencing and no understanding of it either, especially if they’ve never experienced the loss of a close family member. His advice is this: “Focus on your grief. In the future, when your friends experience grief, as they will, your example of taking as much time as you need to work through your grief will encourage them to do the same.” He adds, “With some friends you may have to be direct, saying: ‘Let me tell you how the idea that I should be over it by now sounds to me.’ In fact, you may be doing them a big favor by having a straightforward conversation with them, so they realize how their words affect others.” You say you feel “betrayed by God so much right now,” and that, too, is normal, and more common than you might think. In his marvelous book, A Grief Observed, C.S. Lewis writes, Meanwhile, where is God? This is one of the most disquieting symptoms. When you are happy, so happy that you have no sense of needing Him, so happy that you are tempted to feel His claims upon you as an interruption, if you remember yourself and turn to Him with gratitude and praise, you will be – or so it feels – welcomed with open arms. But go to Him when your need is desperate, when all other help is vain, and what do you find? A door slammed in your face, and a sound of bolting and double bolting on the inside. After that, silence. You may as well turn away. The longer you wait, the longer the silence will become. There are no lights in the windows. It might be an empty house. Was it ever inhabited? It seemed so once. And that seeming was as strong as this. What can this mean? Why is He so present a commander in our time of prosperity and so very absent a help in a time of trouble? . . . Not that I am (I think) in much danger of ceasing to believe in God. The real danger is of coming to believe such dreadful things about Him. The conclusion I dread is not ‘So there’s no God after all,’ but ‘So this is what God’s really like. Deceive yourself no longer.’ You say that you will never understand any of this, but I respectfully disagree. I think that, like all the rest of us on this site, you are in the process of coming to an understanding of Herman’s death and the impact it has had, and will continue to have, on your life . After a death like this, there is no getting back to normal, Jamie. Over time, as you gradually sort through all of this and come to terms with it, a "new normal” begins to take shape ~ but the actual process of grief is never really finished, despite anyone else’s attempts to rush you through it. I want to share with you two excerpts from my book, Finding Your Way through Grief: A Guide for the First Year, in hopes that these words will help: Recognizing Your Own Progress How do you know you’re making progress in your grieving? Remember that change isn’t always obvious and dramatic; it is a process that takes place over time. The grief experience is different for everyone; it doesn’t happen all at once or at the same rate of speed. And unless you’re aware of the clues to recovery and their significance, your progress through grief may be so subtle and so gradual that you will not notice it at all. If you can recognize certain changes in attitudes, feelings and behaviors in yourself, you can measure your own progress through grief. Become aware of your own healing. Notice when you are able to •Drive somewhere by yourself without crying the entire time. •Get through a day without feeling tired all the time. •Concentrate on a book, movie or television program. •Not think of your loved one for a period of time, however brief. •Get through a few hours or days nearly free of pain. •Return to a daily routine. •Eat, sleep and exercise normally again. •Participate in a religious service without crying. •Accept invitations. •Listen to music you both loved without crying. •Be more aware of the pain and suffering of others around you. •Be more patient with yourself and with others. •Notice others in like circumstances, and recognize and accept that loss is a common life experience. •Reach out to another in a similar situation. •Realize that the sometimes thoughtless comments of others stem from ignorance, not malice. •Find something to be thankful for. •Be patient with yourself through grief attacks. •Feel confident again. •Accept things as they are without trying to recapture the way they used to be. •Think less about the past. •Look forward to the day ahead of you. •Reach out to the future less fearfully. •Stop and notice life’s little pleasures, the splendor of creation and the beauty in nature. •Catch yourself smiling and laughing again. •Feel comfortable spending time alone. •Remember your loved one less idealistically— as less perfect, with more human than saintly qualities. •Review both pleasant and unpleasant memories without being overcome by them. •Reinvest the time and energy once spent on your loved one. •Remodel your space: rearrange furniture; change colors and textures of walls. •Re-make your image: change your hairstyle, make-up or clothing. •Explore new foods, new places and new things. •Feel more in control of your emotions and less overwhelmed by them. •Feel freer to choose when and how to grieve. •Talk about your loss more easily. •Feel less preoccupied with yourself and your loss. •Feel a renewed interest in giving love and receiving it. •Look back and see your own progress. •Notice that time doesn’t drag as much; the weekends aren’t as long. •Notice that the good days outnumber the bad; the mood swings aren’t as wide; the time between upsets is greater. •Plan the future more effectively. •Think more clearly and feel more in control of certain aspects of your life. •Make decisions and take responsibility for the consequences. •Feel open to new and healthy relationships while maintaining old ones. •Discover abilities in yourself you haven’t developed before or didn’t even know you had. •Fill some of the roles once filled by your loved one or find others who can fill them. •Recognize that loss has played an important part in your life, and that growth can be a positive outcome. •Identify how this experience has changed you for the better: what you’ve learned, what you’ve become, and how you’ve grown. •Share the lessons you have learned through loss with others. Finding Meaning in Your Loss It is difficult to imagine surviving grief much less transcending it. How do you triumph over sorrow when it seems as if your pain will never end? When you confront the lessons of grief, you opt for surviving and transcending the pain. If you choose to do so, you can look at the pain of loss as having a specific purpose. Turning crisis into opportunity, you can find emotional and spiritual peace. You have a choice: you can either give up and withdraw into your tragedy or you can grow from the experience. You can either succumb to the pain or decide to transform yourself. The choice to grow, to transform the self is not an easy one. It requires work, perseverance and endurance. Like everything else in grief, it is a process, but it is what makes loss worth surviving. Chances are that you would trade everything you could ever gain in a heartbeat, if only that would bring your loved one back. But that is not an option. The only viable alternative is to make this pain count for something. All that happens to us in life is material for our own growth. The death of a loved one can be a turning point that alters our perspective on life. It is an opportunity to re-think, to question, to doubt who we were, what we thought we believed, how we used to live, and how we ordered our priorities. It is a chance to find meaning in our loss. There are many lessons to be learned from grief. Losing someone you love teaches you to •Stop, examine and appreciate what really matters, what’s important, what’s truly valuable in life. •Live fully in the present, knowing that the past is gone and the future is not yet. •Appreciate the value and wonder of every precious moment, without taking them for granted. •Accept the freedom and joy of spontaneity, to play, to relax and to have fun. •Find valuable insights buried in the give and take of daily life, to slow down, daydream and fantasize. •Simplify your life, so you have more time and energy to share with those you love. •Accept what’s happened to you, roll with the changes and keep on growing, believing that you’ll make it. •Be patient with yourself, allowing the grieving process to happen in whatever way it will. •Keep and develop your connections with others, knowing that you are not alone. •Share your thoughts and feelings with others openly and honestly, and sooner rather than later. •Rethink your attitude toward death as a natural part of the cycle of life. •Be grateful for the love you shared, however briefly, and appreciate what you have left. •Define yourself as a survivor rather than a victim. – ©2000 by Marty Tousley, in Finding Your Way through Grief: A Guide for the First Year See also Grief In The Second Year: Finding Your Way

Oh Janine, your beautiful post takes my breath away. Encourage her to find her “dance” and when the time is right, hopefully she will find the joy in it and it will lead her forward. What a wise and inspiring statement! Thank you so very much for that

My dear friend, Sadly enough, the death of a friend too often is dismissed as insignificant, or somehow less important than the death of a family member, which leaves the bereaved feeling isolated, unsupported, and left alone to deal with the heartache of loss. If grief is neither acknowledged nor supported, if it goes underground and remains hidden from others, it can become troublesome in any case, but most especially in a situation such as yours: when you are young and less experienced with loss; when the losses are multiple; and when you are away at school and separated from home and familiar surroundings, from your own family and the families of the friends you have lost. In his insightful article, Friendgrief: The Adolescent as the Forgotten Mourner, Rabbi Earl Grollman writes, Time does not automatically heal suffering. Time does not completely heal a broken heart; it only instructs how to live with it. For the young . . . a romance that ends with death can seem especially cruel. It may hurt so much that the survivor may wish to die, too. Such pain can be so enormous, and the anguish so intense. Try to reach out to your parents and other family members. Explain honestly what you are feeling. They’re not mind readers. They won’t understand unless you tell them. Don’t withdraw from friends and others. They may be experiencing similar emotions but are also afraid to share their feelings. Teachers, guidance counselors, clergy, and health care professionals may be of tremendous help during this disquieting period. You might drop by and visit the family of your friend and share some of your memories. As you relive these experiences, you will not only help them, but yourself as well. Healing involves being willing to hurt more now in order someday to hurt less. The invisible consequences of a close acquaintance’s death must be understood, expressed, and shared. Friendgrief is a painful reality for young and old alike. [source: “Friendgrief: The Adolescent as the Forgotten Mourner,” by Rabbi Earl A. Grollman, in Journeys: A Newsletter to Help in Bereavement, January 2007, page 3, published by Hospice Foundation of America, www.hospicefoundation.org, 800-854-3402.] It concerns me that you say “people (my doctor, therapist, college advisor, and whoever else) discount my losses by telling me to leave them (my friends) in the past, move on, and meet other people.” If that is the case, I am left to wonder what these people know and understand about the normal grief process, and what qualifies them to be counseling you in your grief – and I would strongly encourage you to look elsewhere for the help you need and deserve. How do you find grief support in your own community? Call your telephone operator or public library and ask for the numbers for your local mental health association or your local suicide prevention center. Either agency will have good grief referral lists, and you need not be suicidal to get a grief referral from a suicide prevention center. Use the Yellow Pages and call hospitals and hospices near you. Ask to speak with the Bereavement Coordinator, Social Worker, or Chaplain's Office to get a local grief referral. Many hospitals and hospices provide individual and family grief support to clients for up to one year following a death, and offer bereavement support groups to the general public at no cost. In addition, The National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization maintains a database of hospices for each state in the United States. To search for a hospice in your own community, click on Find a Hospice Program. You might also find this article helpful, along with other resources you’ll find listed on the Death of a Friend page of my Grief Healing Web site: Coping with Friendship Endings because of Death, by Jan Yager.

Disloyalty After much grief work, and with pain and emotional anguish as constant and intractable companions, the bereaved will suddenly experience an unexpected moment without painful thought of the loved one at all, and this can feel shocking and horrifying. Guilt and shame rapidly ensue as the bereaved self-punish with recriminations about the inadequacy of their feelings. “I did not love enough; I am not hurting enough; I am a terrible person” are some of the torturous messages with which the bereaved can flog themselves. It is as if after the death of a significant loved one, every thought, every moment and every breath must be spent in emotional pain for the loss. It is as if the entire future of the bereaved must be spent on a state of mourning, bereft of any feeling other than sadness. “How dare I smile and laugh when my dear one is dead and can experience nothing?” “How dare I eat and actually taste my food and enjoy it when my loved one cannot eat or breathe?” “How dare I notice the deep blue of the sky, enjoy the warmth of the sun, the sweetness of a rose while my loved one experiences nothing?” “How dare I smile at a kitten, laugh at a joke, forget my horrible loss?” The fear is that we are forgetting. This is compounded by the fear that we have not grieved enough, hurt enough, been in pain enough, mourned enough. What this also means is that we fear that we have not loved enough. The dangerous misconception is that, if we had truly loved enough, if we were adequately honoring the memory of our beloved, we should never, ever, even for a split second, be free of the pain and grief of loss. The misconception further brutalizes with the erroneous idea that the survivor’s life and future must constantly focus on the loss. That is what individual grief experience teaches during the earlier phases of bereavement, and it is appropriate then. It serves an important emotional purpose. It makes the loss real, emotionally. It has always been real intellectually, but our hearts, our souls, our psyches are very different form our computer-like brains. Brains and computers deal with facts; emotions do not compute. Conversely, our hearts, souls, and psyches do not understand unwanted factual change; they operate on feelings, on emotions. They do not understand computer-brain language. Eventually the computer-brain and the emotional mind can communicate, but this is eventually. They must catch up with each other, and they must find a common language, which can take a long time. As we live with grief, day-to-day, week-to-week, month-to-month, the loss becomes more and more real. It is only by living with loss for a very long time, and through many experiences, that it becomes reality on a gut level, emotional plane. Many different experiences must be experienced without the loved one during this process. An unchanged world must be lived in by the bereaved whose personal world has been irrevocably changed beyond recognition. Only after much anguish can the bereaved come to recognize, on an emotional level, that their loss is forever. It is then that another entire level of the pain of living in a world without the loved one must be faced. It is then that the issues of smiling, of laughing, of enjoyment must be dealt with. It is forgetting? Is it disloyal to the loved one? Is it selfish? Is it uncaring? Is it proof that the grieved is an inadequate person? No, it is not. Just as our psyches protect us with shock and with denial, permitting reality into consciousness bit by handleable bit, so as not to overwhelm, so do our psyches protect us later in the course of bereavement. Grief takes a tremendous amount of energy — probably every bit of energy that an individual possesses. Never underestimate that expenditure of energy or the physical toll that it can take. After a while the huge amount of energy that is needed just to get out of bed, shower and get dressed, drive the care without crashing it, do the laundry, breathe, function . . . to live with loss . . . exhausts. Once energy disappears, the grieving are in danger of becoming completely overwhelmed and unable to function. With the impending absence of all available energy, they are at great risk for physical and emotional illness. At this time the psyche will protect our valuable remaining energy, permitting us brief respites form the awesome burden of grief. Our minds permit distraction from our grief, from the memory of our loved one for a brief second, or eventually even for minutes and hours. This is not disloyal, it is necessary. We cannot persevere in life without respite. Before a loss, each individual is comprised of a great variety of interests and abilities. This is what makes each person unique and interesting. After a loss, it is as if all interest and abilities are devalued and the entire focus is on the loss. This is healthy and appropriate for awhile. After a time, remaining focused only on the loss and continually negating every other aspect of life becomes dangerous, because we humans erroneously assume that it’s “wrong” to focus on anything other than our loss. Our psyches protect us by making us notice autumn leaves, the aroma of coffee and other distractions from grief, allowing us to go on and to safeguard the precious stores of remaining energy. These mini-vacations form grief permit mourners to maintain health. With time, the mini-vacation will expand to hours, which is needed and normal. It does not mean that you are forgetting or that you are disloyal to your loved one. Hopefully, you will experience happiness and find interest and meaning again. Because you survived does not mean that your life must be punishment. You have suffered. Your love will never die. You deserve some happiness, and it is not disloyalty. Because your brain knows this, it forces you to be distracted at times. Now, YOU must accept and allow yourself this respite and stop punishing yourself afterwards. by Susan Arlen, M.D., Bereavement Magazine, January / February 1995, pp. 32-33. Reprinted with permission from Bereavement Publications, Inc. (888-604-4673), grief@bereavementmag.com

Dear Ones, You may be interested in the article I've just posted in The Latest News Forum entitled Disloyalty. Your comments also remind me of a wonderful piece from Stephanie Ericsson's book that appears on the Comfort for Grieving Hearts page of my Grief Healing Web site: Dare I Smile? One day, about five weeks after you died, I was happy. It was a bright and brisk winter day, and I was buying Christmas presents. That day I thought about what might make my friends happy, and it made me happy. I bought funny little gifts that cost too much, and wrapped them in a rainbow tangle of ribbons. I was ashamed that I was smiling. What if someone saw me happy? Would they think I was glad you had died? Was I? Don’t get me wrong, I had smiled in those five weeks, I had laughed at black humor, or smiled constipated smiles that tried to relieve people of their utter helplessness. I had smiled and said I was fine to avoid the true answer. No one could do anything about my pain, and their pain, at the sight of my pain, was too much for me to handle. This happiness was unprompted. It came from within. It came from a reinstatement of love within me. It came from getting out of myself for a few hours to give to others. It was healing. I wanted to hide my smiles, but at the same time I wanted to relish the warmth of them. I had earned these smiles. I had missed them, missed happiness. That day I began to realize that I would, someday, be happy again. — Stephanie Ericsson, in Companion through the Darkness

Shelley, dear ~ as someone posted elsewhere in one of our forums, there are real people behind all these messages, and the friendship you feel here is real. If that is all you have right now, then celebrate it and let it be enough. If love required the physical presence of the beloved, then none of us would be able to maintain our relationships with our deceased loved ones. All of us here know (or are learning) how to continue to love in the absence of the ones we love. Whether we can see you or not, whether you can see us, we still are able to love one another. I, too, hope your trip to Disney is over the top and FUN. No one deserves it more than you do. Take all of your friends here with you in your heart, and we will keep you safe in ours.

Shelley, dear ~ Please see the article I've just posted in our Latest News forum, Understanding Secondary Losses in Grief.

We've talked a lot about time as it relates to grief, and how long it "should" take to "complete" the mourning process. In this helpful article, the author delineates all that may be lost when a loved one dies ~ which may help us explain to relatives, friends, and co-workers why there can be no time limits placed upon this process: Understanding Secondary Losses in Grief Loss forever changes the world of the bereaved. It’s a new environment, personal and social, an environment where the lost object is no longer present. An ending has occurred that demands new beginnings. Before that happens, a period of transition takes place. During this time, the bereaved closely examines what has been lost and what has been gained as a consequence of the ending. What has actually changed? What continues the same? What is new? What experiences, roles, expectations, values, opportunities, fantasies are to be given up? What new ones must be assumed? All of the current and potential losses that follow as a result of the loss are to be identified. Each identified secondary loss requires its own grief response. Unfinished business that involves the loss is also to be identified. Appropriate ways to adjust and accommodate are sought out. It is often difficult for the family and friends of an individual who has recently experienced the loss of a loved one to understand why the grieving process lasts so long. Family and friends want to see their loved one be happy and “get on with life.” It is important, therefore, to be aware of the many secondary losses that can accompany grief. This awareness may help the grieving person, as well as others who care about this individual, to be more patient and move more gently during this period of grief – which often can last at least two to five years. The following are some of the many different losses a person may experience after the death of a loved one: 1. Loss of the Loved One – the loss that is obvious, and consequently considered by many to be the only loss. 2. Loss of a Large Chunk of Self – the part of the self that was given to the other person in love, and that at death seems to be violently wrenched from one’s being. 3. Loss of Identity – the “roles of service” used in the relationship: the feeling of wholeness that is lost when the other person is no longer present and the role is no longer played. 4. Loss of Self-Confidence – the failure to recognize one’s own personal wholeness, leading to feelings of inadequacy, of not being able to do anything right. 5. Loss of Chosen Lifestyle – being forced to begin a new way of life despite one’s personal wishes or choice (e.g. being single again; being childless again). 6. Loss of Security – the uncertainty of not knowing what to expect, what will happen next, or how one will emotionally react or respond. 7. Loss of Feeling Safe – the vulnerability of feeling exposed to the cold winds of life all alone. 8. Loss of a Known Family Structure – the instant change in family composition. 9. Loss of the Familiar Way of Relating to/with Family and Friends – the avoidance of family and friends stemming from their not knowing how to respond to the bereaved’s changed interests, as well as the sadness and anger that often are felt by the bereaved. 10. Loss of the Past – despite the support and acceptance of new friends and acquaintances, their lack of a sense of the bereaved’s past journey of his/her history with the deceased. 11. Loss of the Future – the fear of thinking ahead, of imagining next year or next month or next week without the loved one; the fear that whatever future there is will be as painful as the present moment. 12. Loss of Direction – the sense that nothing seems to matter anymore, that there is no purpose in life. 13. Loss of Dreams – the disappearance of all those plans: for “spending the rest of my life with the person I love,” of “seeing my child grow up,” of “having my parents be grandparents.” 14. Loss of Trust – the insecurity that interferes with trusting oneself, and makes trusting anyone else nearly impossible. 15. Loss of Sharing with a Loved One – having no one (a best friend, a confidant) to listen to the little things (and the big events) of day-to-day living, or to share in the “growing-up years” of a child. 16. Loss of Ability to Focus – the difficulty in focusing on what seems to be the “non-essentials” of the rest of life because one’s entire being is so affected by the loss. 17. Loss of Ability to See Choices – the sense that the bereaved has no control at all over his/her life, since the new life-style was not a conscious choice. 18. Loss of Ability to Make Decisions – the insecurity and lack of trust in oneself that leads to the looking to others for direction and advice (“What should I do?”), followed by confusion and indecision because everyone gives a different answer. 19. Loss of A Sense of Humor – the failure to see anything as funny because one of the most important people in one’s life is no longer around. 20. Loss of Health – the physical problems resulting from the emotional stress and strain of grief work: nausea, migraine headaches, muscle knots, back problems, etc. 21. Loss of Inner Happiness and Joy – the difficulty in recognizing happiness in one’s own life coupled with the normal tendency to look outside oneself for a source of inner happiness. 22. Loss of Patience with Self – the desire to feel better now coupled with feelings of inadequacy and failure, as the feelings of grief normally last for two to five years. It is very important to note that some individuals may experience additional losses not mentioned in this list, and some of the losses listed might not be experienced by everyone who is grieving. This list is presented to help all of us (grievers, friends, relatives and helpers) understand why nothing can replace the grieving process: the period of time it takes for the wound of loss to become a scar, and for the darkness of grief to become the light of life. – Adapted from “Levels of Loss” by Sr. Mary Agnes Sermersheim, OSB, in Hope Line Newsletter, September 2003, Hope for Bereaved, Syracuse, NY, 315-475-9675, hopeforbereaved@cnymail.com See also "Moving After Loss: The Grief of Leaving a Home You Love," by Harriet Hodgson, Open to Hope, January 17, 2014

Good points all, Serl. I’d also like to add this thought about friendships. Unlike a therapeutic relationship (whose focus is on the client and the client’s needs) a friendship is a “two-way street” that, in most cases, requires us to give to the other as much as we get back. Like a good marriage, if it is to last, a close friendship requires fairly constant tending, and also requires that we overlook each other’s faults and shortcomings. In short, maintaining a close friendship is work, and sometimes it can be harder work than we may be capable of doing at the time, given the circumstances in which we find ourselves. We’ve often said here that mourning is hard work, too, although of a different kind ~ but work nonetheless, and it requires a great deal of energy, most especially in the beginning. I suspect that when we are in the depths of grief, we have precious little energy left over to invest in our friendships, and even less interest in and awareness of the other's needs. Over time, I think, our friends begin to notice this, and some of them may not be willing to put more into maintaining a relationship with us than we are able to give back to them. They simply grow weary of our gloominess. Such “fair weather” friends may take a vacation from us and come back later when the weather’s nicer and they think we’re better, or they may abandon us completely, deciding never to be friends with us again. It also seems rather unrealistic to me to expect that we are able to go out and find and develop new friendships at this point in our grief process. We are too needy, too focused on ourselves, too exhausted even to get out of bed in the morning, too vulnerable to whatever insensitivity we may encounter from strangers much less from our friends! The only place we feel even remotely as if we belong is with a therapist, a grief counselor, or with others who are in mourning, too ~ such as the people we would find in an in-person support group or in an online discussion group such as this one. This feeling does not last forever, thank Heaven ~ but it certainly is common in the early period of grief. One of the best descriptions of the differences between a friendship and a therapeutic relationship appears in an excerpt from a book by Terry Wise, Waking Up: Climbing through the Darkness, which I’m attaching as a Word document (see below). In the excerpt, Terry is discussing with her therapist her frustration that she's being treated as a client rather than a friend. (Maylissa, I cannot recommend Terry’s book highly enough to you. It is the amazing account of her long, lonely and exhausting experiences as a caregiver for her husband, his death from ALS, her nearly successful suicide attempt afterward, her later recollection of the early childhood abuse she suffered at the hands of her father, and what she learns about herself in therapy. Her book is one of the most powerful personal accounts of depression – and the therapy she obtained for it – that I’ve ever read.) MaintainingTherapeuticBoundaries.Wise.doc

I just used that URL and it came up fine for me, so I think the address is correct. You might try putting "http" in front of the "www." Meanwhile I will edit David's post so his URL becomes a hyperlink.

I think we all agree that this is a matter of individual choice. I just want to reiterate the very important point made by Harold Ivan Smith that I mentioned in an earlier post, because it's something we may not think about until it's too late: Some individuals will never get around to [deciding what to do with the box containing cremated remains]. Later, their own executors have been surprised to find a box and ask, “What’s this?” If a loved one's cremains are kept in the home, it's important to take the extra step of (carefully and respectfully) placing them in a sealed container, then letting someone else know where and how those cremains are being kept (that is, in what container, and where that container is located in the home).

That is an excellent point, Shelley. You and others may be interested in some of the outstanding resources listed on the Grief at Work page of my Grief Healing Web site. You might consider printing and taking to your work place one or more of these articles, just to raise some consciousness about this issue, or to get a conversation going about it. You could post an article on a bulletin board, leave it on a table in the coffee or "break" room, or give it to your co-workers or your supervisor to read. Eventually you might even persuade your supervisor to offer a workshop or an inservice on the topic.

Dear Haley, Families often wonder what they should do with a loved one's cremated remains. It goes without saying that cremated remains should be treated with the same respect that would be given a person’s dead body. They should not be left on a shelf in a closet, for example, or in the trunk of a car. You can choose from a variety of options. You may decide to have your mother's cremated remains buried in a family plot or placed within a mausoleum. You may place the cremated remains in an urn which then can be placed in a columbarium, a building especially designed to store urns. Each urn in a columbarium is assigned a recessed compartment, or niche, which is encased in glass or ornamental stone. An alternative is to place the urn in a special urn garden in a cemetery. This gives all your family members (as well as future generations) a place to come on special days of remembrance, to pay their respects to your deceased mother. Experience tells us that over a period of time, family members find it reassuring to have some special place where they can visit, to remember and “be with” the loved one who has died. Some families prefer to keep the cremated remains at home, in a special place of honor and remembrance. Nevertheless, in his book, Grievers Ask, Harold Ivan Smith does make the point that in some cases, keeping cremated remains at home can be a problem, or it can lead to problems later: The decision regarding what to do with the cremated remains should be planned as you would plan for a burial. Cremation offers a potential for denial and postponement. Many grievers do not immediately pick up their loved one's cremains. Other mourners delay the scattering or committing the cremated remains because that will 'finalize' their loss . . . Some individuals delay disposition of the cremated remains as a way of avoiding the finality of death. Some individuals will never get around to it. Later, their own executors have been surprised to find a box and ask, “What’s this?” [pp. 155-156] Scattering the cremated remains is another option, although it’s important to understand that once this is done, it is final and irreversible. For some, the scattering of cremated remains is a very traumatic experience. For others, thinking of a loved one as “scattered somewhere out there” is just too vague. Whatever is done with your mother's cremated remains, I encourage you to talk over all the options with your family members, so that it’s not a unilateral decision, the wishes (or presumed wishes) of your deceased mother are honored, and all the survivors are comfortable with the choices made. You might also find this earlier thread helpful: Letting Go of the Ashes

Dear Pebbles, We're all so very sorry to learn that your dad is dying ~ but we are here to support you as you travel through the difficult days ahead. I invite you to read the messages in these particular threads: My Dad Passed 10 Years Ago, My Mom is Leaving Now. I Can't Tell Them See also Should I Tell My Dad He's Dying?

Dear Ones, Another interesting article on this topic: What If Someone Happened Along?

Annie, please read all the messages in this thread: Sorting Through Papers ~ Grieving Deeply for Four Months

My dear Hildie, We're so very sorry that it is the death of your beloved husband that brought you to this place, but we're pleased to know that you had the courage to find your way here and introduce yourself to all of us. You are so right ~ your life as you knew it, as you had lived it up to now, as you had always hoped it would be, is over, and nothing, nothing, nothing will ever be the same. It will take a very long time before you find a new normal, before you learn how to be in this world without the physical presence of your beloved, before you discover who you are now, and who you will become. But you are not alone here. You have found your way to some of the most patient, caring, compassionate, and understanding people you will ever know. We welcome you with gentle hearts, and we extend our tender hands to you as you travel along this difficult journey.

Dear Shubom, It’s very hard to tend to another’s broken heart when your own heart has been broken, too. On the other hand, it may be that in the encounter you had with this man, your own tears already conveyed what words cannot. If talking to him in person is too difficult for you, you might consider simply writing a note and leaving it on his desk. A short and simple message, written in your own hand, will suffice – as long as it is true for you. Something like this, for example: I’m so sorry for your loss. I’m praying for you. I want you to know I’m thinking of you at this sad and difficult time. I know what I went through when my parents died and I still cry for them. If you have a need to cry, too, please know that I’m okay with it. [You might also add that he can cry in your presence whenever he needs to – but say it only if it’s true for you.] I wish you comfort, and I hope to be among those you find comforting in the weeks and months ahead. You might also want to re-visit this message thread, which includes Paul S's perspective as a male struggling with grief: Need Help in Knowing What to Do See also the Grief at Work page of my Grief Healing Web site.

Maylissa, dear, I guess it depends on what you're looking for in a friendship. I once heard a radio psychologist tell a caller (who was complaining about her friend’s lack of empathy for her particular situation) that she needed to remember that her best friend was not put on this earth to meet all her needs or to be her therapist. At the moment I heard it, I thought it was a pretty harsh response, but the more I thought about it, I realized that sometimes I do expect much more from my husband or my adult children or my closest friends than they are capable of giving. (That’s one of the benefits of being in counseling or therapy – rather than burdening your family or your friends with your problems, or being mad at them for failing to give you the attention you so desperately need and deserve, you can tell yourself that you can save whatever’s bothering you until your next appointment, and take it to your counselor or therapist.) When we're particularly needy or hurting about something, the sad truth is that we can simply wear our good friends out. And rare is the friend (or spouse!) who can bear up under the weight of our sorrow and can outlast our need to talk about our grief. (Remember the comment about looking for milk in a hardware store?) Not everyone is comfortable sitting with and listening to another’s pain and sorrow. Maybe they’ve never lost a loved one, so they’ve had no experience with grief – or they’ve never loved an animal as intensely as you love your Sabin and Nissa. The sad fact is that most people (especially men, in our culture at least) simply don’t know how to help – they feel helpless in the face of grief, and watching a dear friend or a loved one in pain and not being able to help is more than they can bear. They also grossly underestimate how long it takes to go through this mourning process, so their expectation is that we “should be feeling better by now” is way off, too. That’s why we look to support groups and online message boards like this one to find the compassion, support, patience and understanding that we need. We quickly learn that it is the people who have experienced grief first-hand who truly understand, who accept us exactly as we are, without judgment or reproach. I can tell you that some of the most wonderful friendships I have are those I've found and developed via the Internet, because my computer puts me in touch with like-minded people who share many of my own interests. Many such people are authors whose works I admire. Whenever I read a book that I really like, for example, I make a point to send an e-mail message to the author (nowadays an e-mail address is included in a book's "About the Author" section, and if not, you can Google the author's name and / or contact him / her through the book's publisher. I’ve never had much trouble tracking down a particular author.) As an author myself, I know how much I appreciate it when a reader takes the time to let me know what he or she thinks of my writing, or to tell me how one of my articles may have helped in a specific situation. I also know and deeply appreciate how much work good writing really is, and I like to give credit where it is due. In almost every case, these authors have written back to me. Not all of them come to Phoenix, but if and when they do, I do my best to attend their programs so I can meet them in person. Even if we’ve never met, we’re still able to develop and maintain our close relationships via e-mail and land-mail. One of the things I would suggest, Maylissa, given your passion for animals and holistic veterinary medicine, is to begin writing to some of the authors whose books you've recommended to me and others (Kim Sheridan comes to mind). This might be a way for you to begin to find and get to know people who share your interests – and you never know where it may lead. I understand that you’re “exhausted with brain function at an all-time low,” and certainly reaching out to authors and writing to them takes time and energy and commitment – but so does composing the messages you post on this message board. So does fretting, arguing with a spouse, beating up on oneself and not sleeping at night. So does going to the doctor to deal with high blood pressure and ulcers. The issue isn’t how much time and energy something takes but rather, how we want to invest our time and energy. Sometimes the best thing we can do to make ourselves feel better is to force ourselves to do something that makes us feel good about ourselves.

Shelley, dear ~ In your post yesterday you said, I am going to try and stand up for myself more, which sounds to me like a New Year's Resolution! As I was doing some work for Hospice of the Valley this afternoon, I came across this article, which I think could have been written just for you: I Hereby Resolve: •That I will grieve as much and for as long as I feel like grieving and that I will not let others put a time-table on my grief. •That I will grieve in whatever way I feel like grieving, and I will ignore those who try to tell me what I should or should not be feeling and how I should or should not be behaving. •That I will cry whenever I feel like crying, and that I will not hold back my tears just because someone else feels I should be “brave” or “getting better” or “healing” by now. •That I will talk about my loved one as often as I want to, and that I will not let others turn me off just because they can’t deal with their own feelings. •That I will not be afraid or ashamed to seek professional help if I feel it is necessary. •That I will try to eat, sleep and exercise every day in order to give my body strength it will need to help me cope with my grief. •To know that I am not losing my mind and I will remind myself that loss of memory, feelings of disorientation, lack of energy, and a sense of vulnerability are normal parts of the grief process. •To know that I will heal, even though it takes a long time. •To let myself heal and not feel guilty about feeling better. •To remind myself that the grief process is circuitous – that is, I will not make steady upward progress. And when I find myself slipping back into the old moods of despair and depression, I will tell myself that “slipping backward” is also a normal part of the grief process and these moods, too, will pass. •To try to be happy about something for some part of every day, knowing that at first, I may have to force myself to think cheerful thoughts so eventually they can become a habit. •That I will reach out at times and try to help someone else, knowing that helping others will help me to get over my depression. •That even though my loved one is dead, I will opt for life, knowing that is what my loved one would want me to do. – by Nancy A. Mower, in Bereaved Parents Share, January 1998, PO Box 460, Colton OR 97017

Oh Trudy, what a touching example of the power of the rituals of remembrance, and what a beautiful tribute to your dear mother! Surely she is smiling down on all of you right now, from her special place in Heaven. Your lovely story has left me in tears ~ thank you so very much for sharing it all of with us!

Pamela, dear ~ I'm so very sorry to learn of the death of your precious PJ, and clearly she was your Joy. What an adorable face! Thank you so much for including those darling pictures of her. Surely your heart is breaking into pieces with the loss of her. It's good to know that you have access to an "in person" pet loss support group, and I know that the dear people here on our site will help you to hold on until January 8th. If you're able to concentrate long enough to do it, I hope you'll read through some of the messages posted in this Forum -- here you will find so many stories similar to your own, all by animal lovers like yourself who are coping with the heartbreaking loss of their own beloved fur babies. If you haven't found it already, I hope you will pay a long visit to my Grief Healing Web site, especially the Articles and Books page and the Pet Loss Links pages. There you will find a great deal of information, comfort and support, which I hope will help you make some sense of what you are feeling. At the very least, know that we are thinking of you at this sad and difficult time, and holding you in our hearts. Wishing you peace and healing, Marty T

Dear Ones, As we usher in this brand new year and decide what we plan to do with it, I offer these thought-provoking words from Pat Schwiebert, RN, Executive Director of Grief Watch: What Does Time Have to Do with Grief? What does time have to do with grief? Everything. Just consider how, in “normal life,” our lives are run by the clock and the calendar. Some of us have a clock in every room so we can keep close track of the time. Few of us have the courage to live without wearing a watch because we’re afraid we might be late for something. Time is precious to us. We live in a society that reminds us that every moment counts, and some of us are masters at cramming as much activity as possible into every moment. And when we are grieving our experience still has much to do about time. Time stands still. When we are grieving we may feel like the rest of the world is going on as usual while our life has stopped. Just last week, after my friend died, I passed a neighbor watering his lawn. He seemed totally unaffected by, and most likely unaware of Sarah’s death. How could that be? He only lives a block away. Didn’t he feel the same shift in the universe that I felt when she died? Doesn’t he realize someone really special is missing? Time’s up. Most people will allow us about a one month grace period where we are permitted to talk about our loss and even to cry openly. During this time our friends will probably seem to be attentive to our needs. But when the month is up they may be thinking, if not actually telling us, that it’s time to move on, and that we need to get over “it”. They want us to get back to normal. We may be surprised how many of our friends (and relatives too) will become uncomfortable with our need to dwell on our sorrow. They may not appreciate that it takes time to readjust our life to the loss. Maybe what they are really saying is, “Time’s up for me to be able to be present to you in your grieving time.” Because of this we may need to redefine what is normal for us, and choosing some new best friends—friends who are willing and able to walk along side us on our personal journey of grief, and who will allow us to determine when our “time’s up”. Doing Time. Grief may make us feel imprisoned in our own version of hell. We won’t like who we are. We won’t like it that our loved one has gone. We won’t like it that our friends can’t make us feel better. We just want out of here, and we’re not sure we want to do the work that grief requires in order to be set free from this bondage. Some of us will remain in this uncomfortable place for a short time while others of us may feel like we have been given a longer sentence. Wasting time. Though in real life I pride myself in being a master at multitasking, in the land of grief I’m much less sure of myself. I find it hard to make decisions because, in my new situation, I don’t trust myself to make the right choice. I want someone else to be responsible if something goes wrong. Sometimes my wasting time is about not having the energy to get started. I am physically exhausted and my body refuses to make an effort to reclaim my former self. And I admit, quite frankly, that I’m not sure I even care enough about anything to make the effort. What’s the use, since it seems like everything I love sooner or later gets taken away from me. Looking back in time. When we grieve we spend most of our time, at least at first, looking back. It seems safer that way. That’s where our missing loved ones are. If we were to look forward, that would mean we would have to imagine our lives without those we have lost. And that’s what we aren’t ready to accept--not yet. So we spend a lot of time thinking how we should have been able to prevent their dying, or wondering if we used our time with them well, as we remember the good times, bad times, silly and sad times. We think we have to keep those memories in front of us, or surely we will forget those whom we have lost. First times. It is natural for us to gauge our life after a loss as we anticipate and then go through the first times --first day, the first week, the first month, the first time we venture out in public, the first time we went back to school, or church, or work, the first summer, the first Christmas, the first vacation, the first time we laughed. These first times are like benchmarks, notches in our belt that prove we are surviving when you weren’t sure we wanted to, or didn’t know we could. Dinnertime. There’s an empty chair at the table. There’s the conversation that seems to be just noise, having little to do with the absent one about whom we are all thinking but not daring to speak. We still prepare more food than we now need because we haven’t yet figured out how to cook for one less person. Sometimes the food seems to have no taste, and is not able to do what we want it to do--to fill that huge hole within us. Time out. Sometimes what we need to do is to take a time out from our regular activities to reflect on what has happened to our personal world, as we knew it before our great loss. To do so is not to run away from life but simply to realize that to act as if nothing has happened doesn’t work. This loss is too big to allow us to pretend that it hasn’t had a big impact on us. It’s in the quiet time, when we shut off our thinking, and empty out the chatter in our head that the healing begins. Others will have to be okay with our need to bow out for a while. Remember that during grief our job is to take care of ourselves, not to take care of our friends. When it’s time to re-enter a normal routine, it’s our choice what we will reinstate and what we decide to lay aside. Loss tends to redefine our priorities. What used to be important may not be as important now. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Time heals what reason cannot. In the end, time will change things. The intensity we experience when grief is new, where we can see nothing but our loss, and where every moment is filled with thoughts of the one who died will gradually diminish and become softer. Time forces the big picture of life back into our vision whether we like it or not. This happens in our lives all the time. Remember how when we first fell in love with someone, we were totally preoccupied with only that other person, until gradually a more balanced existence was restored. Or when we did (what we thought was) some terrible thing and we were sure everybody would never let us forget it, we came to find out a few months down the road that most people had forgotten the incident. In the months (maybe years) following a loss, life will eventually start to re-emerge, and life on this planet will once again seem possible. This will not happen because we come to understand the death more clearly but because, with the passage of time, the unanswered questions will become easier to live with. Time will not remove grief entirely. The scars of our grief will remain and we may find ourselves ambushed by a fresh wave of grief at any time. But needing to know the answers to the “why” questions won’t seem quite so important as it once was. Time is a gift that we have taken for granted. We’ve been given our lives one moment at a time. This is good. Questions or comments? Contact the author Pat Schwiebert R.N. at pat@tearsoup.com Reprinted from Grief Watch NewsletterVolume 3, Issue 3 October 2003 http://www.griefwatch.com

Dear Derek and Kay, Julie Donner Andersen, a self-described WOW (wife of a widower), has written a wonderful article on this very topic, entitled How Long Is Long Enough? I've attached it to this message as a Word file. HowLongIsLongEnough.doc