MartyT

Hi Jenn, Wonderful as books can be, please keep in mind that you don't have to spend money buying books in order to learn what is normal in grief. Just reading the messages posted in these forums is an education in itself, and our members' stories and experiences will help you see that you are not alone in your reactions -- that's one of the benefits of participating in forums such as these. In addition, since you have access to the Internet, you have a wealth of information about grief and mourning available to you, right at your fingertips. See, for example, some of the articles I've listed on these pages of my Grief Healing Web site: Articles by Marty Tousley Articles by Other Authors See also the links on my site's Death of a Parent page.

Dear friend, Please accept my deepest sympathy for the loss of your beloved Buzz. We all understand the special bond that exists between the two of you, and even though you don't believe in God or an afterlife, I hope it will bring you some comfort to know that, even though his body has died, your relationship with him has not ended. The love you have for Buzz will never die. It will live in your heart forever, just as long as you keep your precious memories of Buzz alive. If you explore any of the other posts in this forum, you will know how strongly we advocate learning all you can about what is normal when we lose a cherished companion animal -- such information helps us feel less "crazy" and alone. It helps us understand better our reactions, and reassures us that if others have found a way to survive such devastating losses, then somehow we will find our own way, too. I'd like to refer you to some articles that may be helpful to you, as I think they address some of your specific concerns: Coping with Pet Loss: Am I Crazy to Feel So Sad about This? When Pet Loss Feels Worse Than Losing a Relative Loss and The Burden of Guilt Do Pets Go to Heaven? Wishing you peace and healing, Marty T

And thank you, dear Walt, as well as so many of our other wonderful members, for the part you play in watching over our site. Although I monitor it very carefully, there are times in any given day when I am not present on the site, and I am deeply grateful to all of you for letting me know as soon as you see something amiss. We want to keep this site consistently welcoming and safe for all our members and visitors, so that here we will continue to feel free to authentically express our grief without fear of judgment, isolation or abandonment -- and certainly without being assaulted by irrelevant or inappropriate material such as advertising or spam. Your vigilance conveys individual ownership of and responsibility for this site, and I am so pleased to know that you think of this special place as one that belongs to every single one of us.

Dear One, In addition to the assurances you've received from Spela and Patti that this tragic death most certainly is not your fault, I want to suggest that you visit the Suicide Loss page on my Grief Healing Web site, which contains a number of links to relevant resources that you may find quite useful in this situation. See especially those sites aimed at survivors of suicide. Even though a death related to an overdose may be accidental, it is a suicide nonetheless, and the issues for the survivors of such a tragic loss are very much the same. You might also want to see some of the sites listed on my Traumatic Loss page. I'd also like to share with you the following, which I've taken from Helen Fitzgerald's The Mourning Handbook: If there was a problem of alcohol or drug abuse in the life of the deceased, you may have added issues to deal with. Substance abuse often creates discord within a family that will negatively affect relationships. Given time, your loved one might have gained control over his or her addiction and resolved the problems created by it. Deprived of that time, this person may have died with the problems unresolved, leaving you with conflicting feelings of anger, perhaps, and sorrow, not really knowing how you should feel. The nature of the substance abuse and the type of problems it creates will vary with each person. Your loved one may have been inclined to drink too much, but it may have been done in such a way that it did not interfere with your life. On the other hand, substance abuse is usually not this benign. Often a family member who has been involved with alcohol or drugs becomes verbally, sexually or physically abusive when under the influence. Paychecks or savings may have been spent on the alcohol or drugs, creating serious problems for the family. In cases like this grief is certain to be complex. If you are mourning the death of a loved one under such circumstances, think for a moment of the extra issues you have to deal with in addition to the death. Write your issues down so you can look at them, one at a time. Getting them down on paper will help you become more objective about them, and it also will make those issues less powerful and more manageable for you. If you have enlisted the help of a therapist, he or she can be more helpful when you have these particulars clearly in your mind. It may occur to you or your therapist to bring other family members into the discussion. However, you should not feel hurt if they are not as ready as you are to look at these issues. Everyone has to deal with such issues at his or her own pace. If and when they are ready, they will know that they can come to you to say whatever they have to say on the subject. For additional support contact your local mental health center or substance abuse center to learn if there is an appropriate support group you could attend, such as a support group for the adult children of alcoholic parents. -- Source: "Complicated Grief: Substance Abuse," in The Mourning Handbook, © 1994 by Helen Fitzgerald, Fireside Publishing, New York, NY I sincerely hope this information helps, my dear, and I hope you will keep us posted on how you are doing. Wishing you peace and healing, Marty T

Joanna, dear ~ We all have a hard time saying goodbye to our loved ones, and we all need a safe place where we can scream. You are most welcome to consider this as your mountain top. And rather than struggling to say goodbye to your beloved Bobby, why not shout instead, "I love you!" See Goodbye to Goodbye.

Dear STOO, You've come to the right place, and you are most welcome here. Please see the article I've just now posted in The Latest News forum, Coping with Hidden Sorrow Wishing you peace and healing, Marty T

Dear Ones, Sometimes the loss we’ve experienced is considered by others to be less significant than the death of a family member, and as a result, we may feel shunted aside or marginalized in our own grieving process. It may feel as if we don't have permission to grieve -- which can make it even more difficult to come to terms with our loss. At such times, it is important to recognize that the pain we are feeling is very real and worthy of our grief. We don't grieve deeply for those we do not love. Here, in this warm and caring place, you are encouraged to acknowledge the significance of your relationship with the one you have lost, if only to yourself, and to honor your grief as a measure of the love you feel for that special someone. And it does not matter to us whether your special someone had two legs or four, human skin or feathers, scales or fur. Loving is loving, loss is loss, and pain is pain. What we are experiencing when this happens to us is what grief expert Ken Doka describes as Hidden Sorrow or Disenfranchised Grief. Accordingly, I am pasting into this message an article by him that I hope will shed some light on all of this for all of us. Grief: Coping with Hidden Sorrow Dorothy’s ex-husband died just six months ago. They had shared 15 years of life together, children and lots of memories – some bad, many good. People now come up to her on the street and comment casually on her loss, some even congratulate her! But Dorothy feels grief. “Whom do I talk to?” Even now her new spouse seems uncomfortable – threatened by her memories. Greg is a 13-year-old junior-high school student. His older brother recently died of AIDS, but Greg doesn’t want any of his friends to know his brother was gay. His grief is very private. Marie is a 70-year-old woman. She has been very depressed and withdrawn lately, ever since her prize terrier, Perzi, died. When Perzi was alive, she had security, companionship, and a compelling reason to walk and socialize. Now, she has none of these. She can’t talk about her grief either. “People will think I’m just a silly old senile woman. Imagine grieving for a dog!” Mark, a 22-year-old, moderately retarded man who lives at home, now refuses to sleep without a light. He easily cries and becomes frustrated. His regression is perplexing to his father. It happened soon after his grandmother died. She, too, lived at the house. “But it’s not like Mark really understood,” his mother adds. What is Disenfranchised Grief? Each of these persons is experiencing grief, but in every case, the grief is disenfranchised. The individual’s loss is not publicly recognized or acknowledged by others – sometimes not even by themselves. Because their grief cannot be shared, these grievers face special pain and problems. By understanding these unique grief experiences, we can sensitize ourselves to the burden of hidden sorrow and more effectively cope with our own losses. Grief can become disenfranchised for many reasons. Every society has conventions about grieving – rules that define for whom, how, for what, and for how long people should grieve. In our society the “who” is generally family: spouses, parents, grandparents, children, grandchildren and siblings have recognized rights to grief. The grief of others often is not considered. We are attached to all sorts of people besides family. We can develop strong relationships with any people – fiances, friends, co-workers, neighbors, teachers and therapists, to suggest a few. And when these people die, we experience grief. Non-traditional Relationships Even more complicated are relationships that are hidden, or viewed negatively. Lovers and persons who live together, whether heterosexually or homosexually (or even platonically) face added burdens, which points to another aspect of disenfranchised grief. Sometimes it is not only others that inhibit grief. Sometimes we disenfranchise our own grief, because we are ashamed to talk about the relationship or loss. Characteristics of the Griever Often, conceptions of who can grieve a loss are based not only on relationships, but sometimes on the characteristics of the griever. Certain grievers, such as the very old or very young or the developmentally disabled, are often ignored. Many think these individuals just cannot possibly understand. They may not understand or express grief in the same way as others, but this doesn’t mean that they do not feel the loss. Emily is a good example of this. Emily is a 91-year-old resident of a nursing home. She is quite ill and at times confused. Recently her 69-year-old son Bob died. The family decided not to tell her, because they believed it would only upset her. Meanwhile, Emily wonders what terrible thing she did that would make Bob stop calling and visiting. “You know Bob,” she’s told, “he’s so busy, traveling all the time.” But where are the funny postcards that Bob always sent that gave her such joy and pride? Hidden Losses Sometimes grief is disenfranchised because the loss is not recognized. Not everyone experiences loss after an abortion, but some women (and some men) do. Many people discount the loss of a newborn or a miscarriage with the comment, “It’s not as if they knew the child.” Yet this ignores the great attachment that can form during the months and even years of planning, hoping, trying and waiting. Humans can also form very close attachments with animals and deeply mourn their loss. Losses Other Than Death Losses outside of death are often unrecognized, too. Margaret provides yet another example of disenfranchised loss. Though she cares daily for her husband, Tom, she grieves the loss of companionship and mourns the Tom who once was before he had Alzheimer’s. The man she loved is no longer there, and he will never come back. She may be married, but she is really a hidden widow with silent sorrow. Stigmatized Deaths And finally there are deaths that disenfranchise. Here too the shame of the loss is so great that grievers, even family members, are embarrassed to admit loss or share grief. Like Greg, whose brother died of AIDS, the Richardses and the Vasquezes also find it hard to talk about their sons’ deaths from AIDS. To share that loss with others means that they have to deal with the fears, questions and disapproval of others. For the same reasons, Rita finds it hard to discuss her son’s suicide; and Maria is ashamed to mention her son or to tell that he died trying to commit a robbery. Problems of Exclusion Each situation of disenfranchised grief, like any other grief, is different. Individuals will react in their own way. But disenfranchised grievers do share common problems. First, they are often excluded from caring for dying persons. As painful as it can often be, caring for a dying person can help in the experience of grieving and frequently alleviates guilt, providing opportunities for closure. It is hard to deny the reality of death when one faces the evidence daily. When Martin was dying of AIDS, his lover Bill was excluded from the hospital by Martin’s parents. He is still haunted by that absence. Second, disenfranchised grievers are often excluded from funeral rituals. Sometimes, as in Bill’s case, this is intentional. But often it is unintended. It is simply that no one thinks to tell the disenfranchised or to bring them to the funeral. For example, when Mark’s grandmother died, the family just assumed that since Mark is retarded there was no point in taking him to the funeral or even asking him if he wanted to attend. In some other cases, the person’s role in the life of the deceased is ignored. Helen was informed when Nora, her 78-year-old best friend, died. But no family member asked Helen’s thoughts on arrangements. It made Helen sad since Nora had often told her exactly how she wanted to be buried. Lack of Closure In many cases of disenfranchised grief there are no funeral rituals. Pet loss, divorces, abortions, sometimes even parental loss may all lack the sense of closure that a funeral ritual can offer. This exclusion is unfortunate since funeral rituals can be helpful to grievers. But again, disenfranchised grievers excluded from either planning or attending the ritual cannot derive those therapeutic benefits. Even when they do attend, they may find themselves in an awkward position. The ritual itself can be discomforting. This was Dorothy’s experience when she attended her ex-husband’s funeral. She did not know where to sit. Friends of her husband seemed strained and confused about what to say to her, or whether to first acknowledge her or her husband’s widow. Even the funeral service highlighted her isolation. “The rabbi acknowledged everyone – my kids, his brother, his wife, friends, everyone but me.” And the service greatly angered her. “He [the rabbi] spent so much time talking about their relationship [that of her ex-husband and his new wife] – how wonderful it was. I kept thinking, ‘How does he praise that adulteress? What about the commandments?’” Absence of Social Support Disenfranchised grievers often lack social support. One thing that helps greatly in grief is sharing the loss with empathic others. Being able to talk about loss and receive help from others can be a healing process. Conversely, not being able to discuss loss, not to feel others’ support, complicates grief. Disenfranchised grievers experience their loss in diverse ways. Others may not know about their loss. They cannot share their pain. They may not get time off from work. For example, when Bill’s lover died, Bill could not tell his co-workers, because few of them knew he was gay. Legal Difficulties Disenfranchised grievers can face other problems as well. There may be practical and legal difficulties. When Martin died, Bill had protracted property battles with Martin’s parents and difficulties with his landlord, since only Martin’s name was on the lease. Disenfranchised grievers experience strong feelings that are often complicated or exacerbated by the relationship, by the type of loss or by isolation. These lead to the central paradox of disenfranchised grief: though grief is often intense, the social support that assists other grievers is absent. Suggestions What can you do if you are experiencing hidden loss? The first important step is to realize that wherever there has been attachment, grief is a natural and normal response to loss. Simply recognizing your grief can ease some of the isolation of disenfranchised grief. Think about the loss. If you are fortunate enough to have empathetic friends, share your feelings and reactions with them. If that is not possible, consider a self-help group or a grief counselor. Try to find ways to acknowledge the loss. If the funeral ritual was not helpful, you may consider your own private rituals. That is what Bill did. Excluded from any meaningful role in Martin’s funeral, he decided to invite some friends for a private memorial service at a sympathetic church. Dorothy and her children shared a quiet dinner at what had once been their family’s favorite restaurant, sharing their memories, both good and bad, of her ex-husband and her children’s father and remembering their lives together and apart. If you choose to mark the loss with your own private rituals, remember the needs of other mourners. Sylvia, for example, remembers her long-standing extramarital relationship with Ted by leaving long-stemmed roses on his grave on significant holidays. Unfortunately, her actions have greatly increased the anger and grief of Ted’s wife. It would have been better if Sylvia had been sensitive enough not to intrude on another’s grief. If others around you are experiencing disenfranchised grief, listen to their loss. Respect their grief even if you don’t necessarily understand or approve of the relationship. And remember that grievers such as the very young, the developmentally disabled, the confused, the disoriented, and the distressed may not always understand or express loss in traditional ways, but that does not mean their attachments are not felt nor that their losses are not grieved. What Does the Future Hold? Experiences such as divorce and AIDS that can lead to disenfranchised grief show no signs of abating. As developmentally disabled persons live longer, they too are far more likely to experience losses of parents and even siblings. Dr. Therese A. Rando, a noted grief therapist, fears that as cases of disenfranchised grief rise, psychologists will see more and more complicated mourning. But perhaps that can be avoided if we remember that people exist in multiple relationships. We have a tremendous capacity to form meaningful attachments that extend over time and even species. And whenever these attachments are lost, we reaffirm that there is grief. [source: Kenneth J. Doka, Bereavement Magazine, May 1992 Reprinted with permission from Bereavement Publications, Inc. (888-604-4673)]

Dear Ones, The following poem was submitted by Joanna Crow: As I lie in bed at nightMy heart begins to ache As I think about you Tears fall from my face. No one knows my pain Nor will they ever see how much you were to me For what it meant to lose you I'll never be the same Each day I cry As I remember you A year has gone by And NEVER forgetting you...

My dear friend, We are so very sorry to learn of the death of your beloved Kelly. Thank you for including a picture of her, so we all can see what a beauty she is! You said, My only hope is that she will stay true to our promise, and that she will be waiting for me when it is mine time to pass over. Does any one else belive that, or am I just trying to hang on to something? I think you will find that here, in this special, caring place, you are among many, many animal lovers who believe as you do, that our precious animal companions will be waiting for us, just on the other side of the Rainbow Bridge. See also, Where Do We Go from Here? Wishing you peace and healing, Marty T

My dear Candi, Please know that your precious cousin Brent is in our prayers, and that you are being held in gentle thought and prayer as well. You may wish to add Brent's name to a prayer circle on the Internet. Here is one place specifically designed for our soldiers in Iraq -- be sure to give the site a minute or two to load, and then scroll down a bit till you come to the links listed there: Prayers for the Military See also this beautiful piece: BeliefNet's Prayer Wall for Soldiers

Walt, dear, Your Jeannie is as beautiful as we had imagined her to be. Thank you for sharing these touching pictures that portray and preserve some of your most treasured moments together. Like your love for Jeannie, these photographs are forever. As the song by Paul Simon goes, Time it was ~ And what a time it was! A time of innocence A time of confidences Long ago, it must be ~ I have a photograph Preserve your memories They’re all that’s left you.

My dear John, I just want to add my voice to everyone else's to assure you that on this site you are one of our most precious treasures, we care deeply for you, we are here for you, and you are not alone. I want to gently suggest to you, John, that these days -- this birthday, this one-year anniversary of Jack's death -- are only as important and as significant as you choose to make them. Be careful lest you attach so much significance to a given date that you give it the power to overwhelm you with dread and despair. Think about it for a moment. Do you think you will be missing Jack any less on June 16 or August 1 than you will be missing him on June 15 or July 31? Oftentimes the anticipation of a birthday or an anniversary date is worse than the actual day, because we torture ourselves so much ahead of time by thinking how awful it is going to be for us! Keep in mind that you are in charge of how you choose to regard these days -- and any other days -- on your own calendar. Perhaps you can use this time before these special days to plan ahead on how you choose to spend them -- even if you plan to do nothing special at all. Even if you plan to be alone, you can build some comfort and healing into them. Just don't set yourself up for a bad day. As this first year draws to a close, for example, you might think about planning a memorial ritual (private or not) that could serve as your rite of passage, to mark a shift in the way you mourn, or as an official end to this first year of mourning. Whatever you decide to do, John, please know that we feel your pain, and we are holding you in gentle thought and prayer at this sad and difficult time. Wishing you peace and healing, Marty T

Dear Babs, If you’ve read any of the other posts in these forums, I’m sure you’ve discovered that this feeling of “being completely overwhelmed by grief! Past and present!” is not unusual. Your observation that grief can stem from losses other than death is absolutely accurate, too. What is more, any given loss will engender many secondary losses. Read this excerpt from Alexandra Kennedy's book, The Infinite Thread: Healing Relationships Beyond Loss Over a lifetime we will experience many losses. We live by losing, leaving and letting go. These are essential parts of the ever-changing world, as much a part of life as night, wind and rain. We cannot save ourselves, nor those we love, from the sorrow that is part of life. Parents die, friends drop away, cherished possessions are lost. Our children grow up and leave home. We lose spouses and partners to divorce or death; sometimes we lose them emotionally long before. As we age, we will confront all that we never were or never will be. We will be faced with the grief of unfulfilled dreams. With each major loss, we often encounter multiple losses. For example, the death of a parent can lead to many other losses-- of our identity as their child, of our family history, and sometimes of friends as they retreat from the intensity of our grief. Losing a job can lead to the loss of self-confidence, identity, and power. A miscarriage or infertility can bring about the loss of the dream of having a family. A divorce can result in the loss of a lifestyle, home, friends, and identity. [To read more, Go to Alexandra Kennedy and under Strategies for Grieving, click on Healing Daily Losses.] You ask, “Is this normal...reliving past pain and grief along with the present?” and the answer is yes, of course. Present losses almost always reawaken past losses, Babs, and I suspect that, even if the issues are not the same, whatever present difficulties and challenges you’re having in your young marriage now may reawaken memories of whatever difficulties you may have had in your first marriage and frighten you into thinking, “Oh, no! Here I go again.” In other posts you’ve indicated that your mother was on a hospice service when she died – have you investigated what bereavement services are offered by that hospice? You’re trying so hard to manage so much – have you considered bereavement counseling and / or joining a grief support group? I hope you realize that you do not have to be doing this grief work all by yourself. It seems to me that you could benefit from having someone you trust who will listen to you and help you sort out and work through all that you are feeling and experiencing, Babs. Coming here is fine, and I hope you will continue to do so – but you may find that talking to someone “in person” would help as well. Wishing you peace and healing, Marty T

Dear One, As Father's Day and the anniversary of your father's death lie just over the horizon, it's not surprising to me that you're "having a hard day." And as you so wisely observe, when someone so important to us has died, there are many special days throughout the year that can be especially hard ones for us. Your mother is right: you will never, ever "get over" this loss of your father; over time you just find ways to live with the reality of it, as you find different ways to carry your father's memory, his love and his legacies with you into the future. I want to point you to two earlier posts in this forum that discuss dealing with the death of a parent at an early age. Although in these two cases the parent who died was a mother rather than a father, I think the content of the messages may be of particular interest to you: Can't Sleep, posted on Feb. 14, 2006 Gone and Forgotten, posted on May 9, 2005 Wishing you peace and healing, Marty T

Dear Mary Jo, First, I agree completely with Shell that there is nothing wrong with you, and it seems to me that what is happening to you now makes perfect sense. When we don’t take the time to mourn a significant loss in our lives, the grief that we feel doesn’t get resolved; it just goes dormant and lies there until we give it the attention it requires. You say that after your friend Judy died, “I went right back to work. Really iwent back to over work.” I don’t know the circumstances of Judy's death or what actions you took at the time your friend died, what rituals you engaged in to honor and remember her, or whether you ever took the time you needed to mourn her death, but from what you describe, it sounds as if you did everything you could to keep busy, perhaps in an effort to keep at bay your intense feelings of loss. It’s interesting to me that when you came back from Kenya, during the time you were not working (and when you were not keeping busy with the distractions of work), you started having dreams about Judy. It’s as if your unconscious mind took advantage of the pause in your busy life, and found a way to remind you that you still had grief work to do. It’s also interesting that, once you started talking to others about your dreams, the dreams stopped – perhaps an indication that paying attention to your dreams and giving voice to your feelings about Judy’s physical absence in your life was helpful to you. The way that you remembered Judy’s birthday is an example of how even if we do forget or try hard to forget, our bodies still remember our feelings. On the actual date of her birthday you were too busy and distracted to notice the importance of that day, but the next day, as you were preparing to go to church and were in a different mind-set, perhaps a more spiritual one, your guard was down, your body tuned in and remembered, and you suddenly realized that Friday was Judy’s birthday. Unexpected and unwelcome as they may have been, your tears that followed were a natural and normal reaction. This was simply a sudden upsurge of grief, brought on by the trigger of suddenly remembering what was an important date in Judy's life. Your post reminds me of a topic that appeared in this forum in April of 2005. The response I posted is addressed to a woman whose father died seven years before, but I think what I said to her will have resonance for you as well, as it deals with the matter of delayed grief. Just click on this link and you’ll go right to my post: Grieving 7 Years After the Death Wishing you peace and healing, Marty T

My dear Maylissa, I read your post to Laura this morning. As always, your suggestions are thorough, your advice is specific and I am grateful that you are there for her in such a caring way. Because I place such a high value on your input and participation in this and all our other forums, I feel a need to share with you (and others who may read this) some of my own thoughts about this particular case, and I hope that you will bear with me as I have another go at this. In my response to Laura, I took into account several observations. The first is that by her own description she is very angry and upset, “not thinking properly right now,” and probably not in the best frame of mind to decide what she should or shouldn’t do about any of this. That is not to say that her feelings are not justified, nor does it mean that she should simply forget about what happened and “sweep it under the rug.” As I said in my message to her, once she acknowledges, expresses and discharges all the energy of her anger and feels better in control of her emotions, once she is able to examine more dispassionately all the facts in this case, she may very well decide that her anger at her vet is justified, and when she feels ready to do so, she is free to confront him constructively in whatever way she chooses, hopefully in a way that her message will be heard. She is also free to pursue any other avenue she chooses, including reporting the vet or taking legal action. Second, before I constructed my response to Laura, I consulted with a veterinarian here in Phoenix. (This vet is highly qualified and I know her to be a very caring soul; she also participates in my pet loss support group, and I have the highest respect for her.) I asked that she give me her objective medical opinion based on the facts as Laura presented them in her posts of May 26 and May 29 (which this vet later read), and I incorporated the information she gave me in what I later said to Laura. Since these posts appear in a public forum, I am ever mindful that whatever I say can be read by many other people in addition to the person who started a particular topic, and I try to construct my responses accordingly. While your suggestions are logical and sensible, Maylissa, not every animal guardian reading Laura’s story has the time, the energy, and the resources (in terms of access, time and money), to pursue the avenues you’ve suggested, and I think those limitations must be acknowledged. When a person is emotionally traumatized and in the midst of coping with an unexpected outcome such as this, it is difficult to take such factors into careful consideration. When one has just learned frightening and overwhelmingly bad news, it is not an easy time to sit down and logically and dispassionately evaluate all the costs and options, based on one’s own needs and resources. Sometimes decisions get made that later cause great emotional turmoil and financial hardship. I do not know Laura’s particular circumstances, and even if she could afford the expense of seeking treatment for her kitten, I don't know whether the outcome would be any different. What I do know is that many animal lovers simply cannot afford the time and money and emotional costs that your suggestions may require, and they experience enormous pain, heavy guilt and overwhelming feelings of inadequacy when they cannot come up with the necessary resources. I don’t want anything I say or do to add to that level of pain and guilt, especially when I don't know anything about whatever resources they may have at their disposal and I don't know if the outcome would be changed even if no expense were spared. My response to Laura was intended to offer understanding and acceptance of her feelings and, until she feels better able to DO something, some alternative ways of looking at her situation that might offer her some comfort and hope in caring for her kitten whose vision is now impaired. With all my heart, I hope that is what I accomplished. Most sincerely, Marty T

My dear Laura, I'm so very sorry to learn that this has happened to you and Nike, and I can only imagine how shocked and upset you must feel about all of it. I’m sure your mind is filled with questions, medical and otherwise. Since I'm not a veterinarian, I'm not qualified to answer whatever medical questions you may have as to what went wrong in this usually uncomplicated surgery, but I certainly do believe that you deserve some answers, and I sincerely hope that at some point, when you feel in better control of your emotions, you will take your questions back to the veterinarian who operated on your kitten. To come to terms with this, you need information about what happened to Nike that may have caused this blindness or partial blindness, an opportunity to discuss what went wrong and what might have been done differently, and reassurance that what happened was not due to negligence on your veterinarian's part. It is certainly understandable that you are feeling very angry at your vet, perhaps even angry at yourself for asking the vet to spay your kitten in the first place, when (as far as you knew) there was nothing wrong with Nike to begin with. I don’t for a moment want to discount or minimize your feelings, and I think that under the same set of circumstances, any one of us would feel exactly the same as you are feeling now. But at a time like this it's important to remember that neither you nor your vet intentionally set out to bring any harm to your beloved Nike, and neither one of you would ever wish blindness on a kitten or any other animal. The sad reality is that there are always risks associated with anesthesia and surgery, including sudden death. We animal lovers sometimes overlook the fact that, like its human counterpart, veterinary medicine is not an exact science, and mistakes are always possible. It is also possible that your kitten may have had a congenital defect or some other pre-existing condition that went undetected until this anesthesia exacerbated it. Unfortunately, both you and your veterinarian are human, terrible accidents do happen, and neither one of you foresaw what was going to happen to your kitten during this surgery. I’ve said elsewhere in these forums that anger is a powerful emotion that can be frightening, but feeling angry doesn't necessarily imply that you will lose control or take your anger out unfairly on others. Nevertheless, before you can get through it, let go of the intense emotions attached to it and move on, your anger must be admitted, felt and expressed, if only to yourself. When you simply acknowledge feelings of anger to yourself or to a trusted other (or even here, in the safety of this forum) without actually doing anything about them, no harm is done, to you or to anyone else. On the other hand, if you suppress that anger and hold on to it, eventually you may explode, turn it inward and get depressed, or aim it at innocent others. I encourage you to find ways to discharge the energy of your anger -- perhaps through physical exercise, writing, or talking. Then, if after examining all the facts in this case you decide that your anger at your vet is justified, when you feel ready to do so, you can confront him constructively (in a letter, phone call or in person) with what happened and how you feel about it. As you say, regardless of whatever you decide to do next, you’re still left with the reality of living with Nike’s vision impairment, but you may find that Nike’s reaction to her disability will surprise you. Animals have other keen senses that enable them to compensate when one of their senses is impaired. And one of the most wonderful things about our animal friends is that they tend to cope with disabilities with far more resiliency and flexibility than we humans do. In addition to all of that, your Nike is blessed to have you as her guardian, and you are there to offer her all the acceptance, love and protection she will ever need. A quick search on the Internet tells me that there are lots of articles and Web sites devoted to the topic of blindness in companion animals. See, for example, BlindPets.com. See also Eye Problems in Cats. In response to a reader’s question about sudden-onset blindness in her friend’s kitten, one veterinarian responded: I do not think that this kitten will have many problems if it is a house cat. We have several blind patients in our practice at any time and I suspect that most veterinary hospitals do. Pets that are congenitally blind or who experience blindness after a chronic degenerative process tend not to be particularly bothered by their condition. As long as your friend keeps the furniture in approximately the same places and the litterpans, food and water bowls and other of life's necessities in the same places the kitten will probably do fine. Wishing you peace and healing, Marty T

Bless your precious heart, Walt. It's so good to hear from you again, and I'm pleased to know that you are reading two of my very favorite authors. I met Tom Attig a couple of months ago (he was here in Phoenix as a guest speaker for a bereavement conference) and he is just as genuine, warm and wonderful a person as I had hoped he would be. When I introduced myself to him after his presentation and asked him to sign my copies of his books, I said to him, "You don't know this, but I've read your books and I've been in love with you for years." He smiled warmly, took the books and inscribed the first one: "Marty, nice to meet you. I love you, too. Tom Attig." Needless to say, I was smitten Your love for your precious Jeannie is indeed true and everlasting, Walt, and you will never, ever forget her. I will not forget you. I have carved you on the palm of my hand. — Isaiah 49:15 The truest words of all: I will not forget you. You are in my waking thoughts, my sweetest memories, my dearest dreams. I will not forget you. You have touched my soul, opened my eyes, changed my very experience of the universe. I will not forget you. I see you in the flowers, the sunset, the sweep of the horizon and all things that stretch to infinity. I will not forget you. I have carved you on the palm of my hand. I carry you with me forever. — Ellen Sue Stern, Living With Loss, 1995

Note to John, Derek and others: For your convenience, I've taken the liberty of editing John's post of May 25, 2006 (in the Loss of a Spouse, Partner, Significant Other forum under the topic, "Confused") , so that by clicking on any of John's suggested book titles, you'll be taken directly to Amazon's description and reviews of each book listed. You are under no obligation to purchase any of these books; this simply gives you a way to get a little more information about each one. To see John's list, click on Grief Bibliography To see my own list of books I've read and personally recommend (some of which are the same as John's ), go to the Articles and Books page of my Grief Healing Web site, then scroll down until you come to the section entitled Suggestions for Further Reading. If you have a book that spoke to you in a special way or that you found to be particularly helpful, please let us know, so we can add it to our lists!

My dear Cyndy, You say you feel like you’re mourning a dream, not a real person, and therefore you somehow don’t have a legitimate “right” to grieve and you don’t even have the necessary qualifications to belong on this site. Let me assure you that you do have the right to grieve, and most especially here, in this place, in this forum! The loss of a dream is yet another kind of death, and your loss is just as real as anyone else’s. I am reminded of a beautiful passage by author Robert Fulghum that I have posted on the Comfort for Grieving Hearts page of my Grief Healing Web site: When we’ve changed our religious views or political convictions, a part of our past dies. When love ends, be it the first mad romance of adolescence, the love that will not sustain a marriage, or the love of a failed friendship, it is the same. A death. Likewise in the event of a miscarriage or an abortion: a possibility is dead. And there is no public or even private funeral. Sometimes only regret and nostalgia mark the passage. And the last rites are held in the solitude of one’s most secret self — a service of mourning in the tabernacle of the soul. — Robert Fulghum, in From Beginning to End You are the only one who knows in your heart of hearts just how much this particular person meant to you, Cyndy, and so you are the only one who can measure exactly what you have lost, now that you know he has died. Loss is loss, and pain is pain. Please don’t judge yourself for how and what you are feeling. We simply cannot control how we feel – and feelings aren’t right or wrong, good or bad – they just are. You say you have no one to talk to about this, but you do have us, my dear. You will find the people here to be among the most compassionate, understanding, caring, non-judgmental ones you will ever hope to meet, and you are completely safe here. You ask, “Why do I miss him so much now?” I think it’s because before, when he was alive, even though you didn’t think about him all the time, on some level you always knew that he was still there, somewhere, should you ever wish to find him. In a sense, you became accustomed to loving him in his absence, and deep inside your heart you could keep hope alive that one day you might see him again. Now you are faced with the reality that his absence is forever, and that is very hard to accept. You say you want to grieve, and you’re aware of some very real feelings commonly associated with grief, such as “being angry at him, both for dumping me and for the stupid way he died.” You’re also feeling guilty “for lying to everyone and using an illness as an excuse to retreat from life.” Please know that anger and guilt are two of the most common reactions in loss: anger at the one who died, anger at God for letting this happen, anger at ourselves and anger at the world – and guilt for whatever we think we did or failed to do when the person was alive. You are a human being reacting in a very normal way to having lost very someone dear to you. Please accept your feelings as normal and completely understandable. Judge yourself not by what you are feeling, but rather by what you do with what you are feeling. When we simply acknowledge (if only to ourselves) what we are feeling and why we are feeling that way, oftentimes the energy generated by those feelings simply dissipates, and no one else is hurt. When we fuss and stew and push our feelings away or try to bury or deny them, they can come out in other ways we can't always control, usually every which-way but straight! This is why it helps so much when we are in mourning to do some reading about grief – it helps to know what is normal, what we can expect, and what we can do to manage our own reactions. It helps us feel more in control, or at least less "crazy" and certainly better informed about what we are experiencing. (The pages on my Grief Healing Web site are a good place to start.) You also say, “I feel that writing about him helps,” and I think therein lies a clue for how you might help yourself. You might consider writing a letter to this man, telling him everything you need to say to him. Whether he can “read” what you write is not the point – the objective here is to get down on paper whatever thoughts and feelings you have about all of this, to get it out of your mind and heart and onto the paper (or the computer screen) so you no longer have to carry all of it around inside of you. That in itself can be very healing, Cyndy. You might also try to have this man write a letter back to you! Some suggest that, if you’re right-handed, you write your letter to him with your right hand, then use your left hand to write the letter that comes back (through you) from him. You could construct an entire ritual around this exercise: pick a quiet time and place when you’re all alone; put some soft music on the stereo, light some candles, find some paper and a pen, and let the words just come through your hands. If you want to do so, burn the letters when you’re finished, as a symbolic way of saying goodbye and letting him go. This is your ritual, and you can construct it in any way you like, and design it to accomplish whatever objectives you choose. Another alternative is to find a safe and quiet place and have a good long conversation with him in your heart and in your mind. (See my article, Creating Personal Grief Rituals, for more ideas.) And even though this man died several months ago, Cyndy, you still can hold a memorial service for him -- in the solitude of your most secret self, your very own service of mourning, in the tabernacle of your very own soul. Wishing you peace and healing, Marty T

My dear Penny, Let me add my voice to all the others in expressing our deepest sympathy to you for this unimaginable horror. I'm so very sorry -- but also very grateful that you've found your way to this warm and caring place, where you can be surrounded by others who are familiar with the agonizing grief of losing a mother to death. And it's simply unrealistic to think that you can manage this overwhelming grief all by yourself – especially when you are coping not only with the loss of your mother, but also with a death by homicide, and that at the hands of your own father! Grief doesn't get much more complicated than this. I am relieved to know that as a survivor of homicide, you are seeing a counselor on a weekly basis. In addition to that, if you haven’t done so already, I strongly encourage you to educate yourself about the subject. Read what others have written about it (see, for example, What to Do When the Police Leave by Bill Jenkins; you can go to Amazon.com to read the description and reviews, or ask for it at your local library. See also Bill's Web site, Homicide: Resources for Death, Grief and Survivors of Homicide). Visit other Web sites devoted to this subject, such as Gateway to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder Information and National Center for Victims of Crime. See also the many links I have listed on the Traumatic Loss page of my Grief Healing Web site. Such sites will assure you that you are not alone in this tragedy, will offer you some very practical ways to manage your grief, and will help you to recognize that if others can survive this most devastating of losses, then you can do it, too. The best thing you can do for yourself right now is to acknowledge that you cannot do this alone. You've already done that by getting yourself to a counselor and by coming to this site, and I hope that you will follow through with some of these additional resources. My prayer for you is that the day will come when the good memories you have of your beloved mother will outweigh the bad. As we so often point out to one another on this site, the way you come to peace about all of this is one day at a time, and if that's too much, you work at it one hour or even one minute at a time. You asked whether talking to your Mr. Bear is crazy, and I loved Shell’s response to you about that -- I would only add that it is the situation you are in that is "crazy," Penny -- not you. Feeling as if you are crazy is not the same as being crazy or having a mental illness. What you are feeling and experiencing is a normal reaction to this horrible, tragic event. I know that with support and understanding, you will make it through the difficult times of outrage, sadness and longing still ahead, and I hope and pray that one day you will discover that through this horrible tragedy, your own life can be more meaningful than ever before. For now, please know that we’re all thinking of you and holding you in our hearts. Wishing you peace and healing, Marty T

Amanda, dear, It's been one full year since your mother's death, and you said: I dont feel any better and dont know if i ever will . . . i want to get over it . . . I need to find a way to get through this but im lost for ideas,I wish someone would do something so i could shout and scream and let some of my anger and hurt out . . . i cant cry i almost feel numb apart from my stomach being tied up in knots. I am going to keep busy today,tommorrow is my husbands birthday so i have to keep happy for that,I cant be a depressed bore,can I? Despite all your efforts to "get over it," Amanda, it seems as if your grief is still sitting there, patiently waiting for you to deal with it. It hasn't gone anywhere. Hard as you try to go numb and keep yourself from crying, your body resists and your stomach continues to churn. Hard as you work to keep busy and put on a happy face, you're still crying on the inside. Much as you "wish someone would do something," you really are the only person who can do whatever needs to be done here. As one wise man put it, "your family, friends and support group may help get you on the right path, but very early in the process you have to get behind the wheel. Only you can complete the road to recovery." You say you need to find a way to get through this, but you're at a loss for ideas. In addition to the wise advice you've already received from Shell and Maylissa, I want to point you to one of the earlier posts in this forum that deals with delayed grief, as I think may be helpful to you, too. It appears under the topic, Grieving 7 Years After Death, dated April 15, 2005. Click on this link to go directly to it: http://hovforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?show...1628entry1628 Wishing you peace and healing, Marty T

Bless you, Mary Beth, for sharing with the rest of us the progress you are making in your own grief journey. In the words of Harold Ivan Smith, you're a veteran pilgrim on the motherloss trail, and your example gives your fellow travelers inspiration and hope. We are grateful for your presence. Wishing you continued peace and healing, Marty T

Shubom said, It was hard and I struggled, but finally I was able to lighten up and come to a neutral state, where I could at least laugh and smile. It was hard ! Vero said, It was my first Mother's Day without my mom yesterday and it was really hard. Actually, the whole week leading to Mother's Day was even worse than the actual day ... But I did something really nice to make me feel closer to her. I just want to congratulate both of you, and to say that I am very proud of you. You each made a conscious effort to rise above what you were feeling and to behave in a manner different from what you were feeling -- until your feeling state changed somewhat to match more closely how you were acting. There is a lesson here: you do have some measure of control over how you are feeling at any given moment, perhaps more than you ever realized. I don't for a moment mean to imply that this is easy. As you already know, it takes enormous effort and great courage, but it can be done. You both are discovering that you can learn to manage your grief instead of letting it manage you. Good for you!

Dear MaryBeth, What a lovely idea, and I thank you for the opportunity to tell everyone here about my own dear mother. I hope many of our other members will follow suit. I wrote this in honor of my mother, and read it as our family gathered for her memorial service on her birthday, March 27, 1994: EVELYN CECILIA MERRITT March 27, 1916 - October 6, 1993 "To live in hearts we leave behind is not to die." Before we move any further forward in our lives, it's important that we pause to pay tribute to Evelyn Cecilia Merritt, to remember the special person that she was, and to say goodbye. It would be so unfair of us to remember her only as she was in the five years since the cruel stroke that so dramatically changed her circumstances. Her life of 77 years was so much more than that. As our mother and our grandmother, she was there from our beginnings, and so she is a significant part of who we, her children and her grandchildren, have become. She gave so much to all of us — and these are but a few of the things she gave to me. I know that it was my mother who taught me to be on time, to be organized and neat. She taught me to be mindful of the needs of others, to be financially responsible and to always pay my bills. She taught me a love for reading, for music, for romance. She taught me to tell my children — frequently and often — how very much I love them. And most of all, I think, she taught me how to love: how to give it and receive it — first with my parents and my sister, then with my husband and my children, and with all the special people in my life. She certainly taught me that it was okay to cry — and to always carry Kleenex in my pocket! When I was little and before television came along, I loved to listen to her sing along when my father would play his banjo. She knew all those wonderful old love songs that were popular during World War II, and I remember thinking she had the most beautiful voice in the world. I loved to find her there when I'd get home from school, and I still remember all the smells of oatmeal raisin cookies and homemade applesauce, of bouquets of fresh-cut lilacs and lillies of the valley wafting through our home. I loved to crawl in bed with her and my sister, snuggling all together as she'd read to us chapters from our favorite books: The Little Lame Prince, Little Women, or The Secret Garden. I loved to watch her face and listen to her voice as she'd interact with babies or with animals. She was wonderful with both. She'd have you believe that she hated cats and wanted nothing to do with dogs, but for all her protestations, she always succumbed to their charms and took them full force into her heart. Because she permitted it and put up with it, most of my childhood and adolescence was filled with goldfish and guppies, dogs and cats and kittens, a turtle and a parakeet, rabbits and bunnies and ducks. Every one of them adored her, and she taught me to love them, too. I've always thought of my father as the one who slew the imaginary dragons under my bed when I was little, and taught me to handle the real ones when I got bigger. But it was my mother who watched over my sister and me when we were little — and understood that we were little. It was she who played with us, nurtured our imaginations and indulged our childishness — because she knew that children we still were. Even when we were pre-schoolers, it seemed as if our father expected us to behave like fully developed, miniature adults. But it was Mother who let us act like silly little girls — and sometimes she would act like one right along with us! We'd have her to tea in our playroom, and we’d all pretend she was our dear friend, “Evelina”, who’d come to visit us. When Mother would leave for a week to visit her brothers and sisters in Detroit in those early years, we'd miss her terribly. We'd steal away from our sitter, Aunt Mary, to the spare bedroom closet, and burrow ourselves into the folds of Mother's Persian lamb coat. It was as soft and as lovely as she was, and it smelled every bit as beautiful. I remember how all my friends in high school simply loved my mother. I realize now that it's because she paid such close attention to them, treated them with respect, and really listened to what they had to say. They all called her "Mom," and it always made me feel so proud and so very fortunate when they'd tell me I had the neatest mother in the world. To be sure, there were things about my mother that I truly didn't like. Her passive, accepting attitude about so much that happened to her always bothered me terribly, but her child-like Catholic faith was the driving force in her life. She believed strongly that whatever happened was somehow meant to be, because it was God's will. It never seemed to occur to her that she herself could do anything directly to affect the circumstances in her life, and that always bothered me. I do remember one time, though, when she made a drastic change. She had gone on a trip to Florida with our Aunt Lorraine. She left as the brunette we had always known and returned to us as a blonde. She was a stranger in our midst! I remember feeling furious with her. How dare she change so fundamental a part of herself without our prior knowledge and consent?! It took weeks for my sister and me to get over our anger and forgive her. Looking back on it now, I realize it was one of the few things Mother ever decided to do completely on her own, without consulting us first. That was forty years ago, and to her credit, she remained a blonde the rest of her life. I always knew the life I'd lead as an adult would be quite different from the one my mother had. We lived in different times. She was bound to the domestic realm and, taking after my physician father, in addition to having a family, I was determined to have a career and to be a practitioner of nursing. But it was in my mother's presence that I found comfort, warmth and nourishment, and it was in her face that I first saw feelings being felt and expressed. It was from my mother that I learned about being a woman, about relationships of nurturance and commitment, about how to be a mother, about how to be a nurse. When I'd fall and hurt myself, she'd gather me in her softness and soothe away my tears. She mothered me and nursed me, both physically and emotionally — whether I was flat on my back in a body cast for nearly a year, or tethered to a hospital bed with a broken leg in traction for five months. She wasn't out nursing someone else's child; she was home with me. She bathed me, fed me, medicated me, entertained me. She listened to me, cried with me and encouraged me when I'd be feeling sorry for myself. She was there for me 24 hours a day, seven days a week, month in and month out, and never once did I hear her complain. As an adult I had some very special times with my mother. I loved the times she came alone to visit us in Princeton and in Boston, and I would have her all to myself. She was so much fun to be with, so easy to please, and we enjoyed so many things together — the theater, sightseeing, touring beautiful old houses and neighborhoods, good food, music, conversation. We'd listen to her favorite singers and musicians from the 30's and 40's: Glenn Miller, Eddie Arnold, Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett, Les Paul and Mary Ford. I'd get her to tell me stories about her early life as a young girl growing up in Detroit; how she met, fell in love with and married my father; how she felt when Pearl Harbor was bombed and, without consulting her first, my father enlisted in the Army Medical Corps. (He would be shipped overseas, not to be seen by her and her two little babies for two long years. I can only imagine how frightened and alone she must have felt!) In My Mother, Myself, Nancy Friday wrote that when she stopped seeing her mother with the eyes of a child, she saw the woman who helped her give birth to herself. It used to bother me that throughout my entire career, my mother never expressed much interest in my experience and training as a psychiatric nurse. A retired nurse herself, I think she thought of nursing more as taking care of someone's physical needs. But I'm grateful that, in the five years since her stroke and for the six months or so I lived in Florida before she died, I was able to spend a lot of quality time with my mother, both in person and over the phone, using all my therapeutic skills to help her with her emotional needs. I believe I gave her back some of the rewards of the work I've been able to pursue because of the wonderful habits she taught me: patience, empathy, tenderness, and paying loving attention. I've come to see how my mother helped me give birth to the best parts of myself. In the last year of her life, as if by grace (or divine intervention) our extended family was all together for a time, and we were able to include Mother in some of our most treasured family moments: unpacking as we moved into our home in Florida; Mother's 77th birthday party; our progressive Easter brunch, dinner and dessert; our Mother's Day picnic at the Pines; Ben and Carol's beautiful wedding; celebrating Christmas and Thanksgiving all in the same week before my husband and I packed up the dishes (and everything else) and moved to Arizona. The last few years of Mother's life were incredibly painful and difficult for her. It's a great comfort to know that now, finally, an eternity of peace and happiness enfolds her. She never got to visit us in Arizona, and we know she would have loved it — especially the breathtakingly beautiful and spiritual place that is Sedona. But we will bring her to Sedona, and at the Chapel of the Holy Cross we will cast her ashes to the wind. Then the breath of her spirit will be carried eastward across the land, to her children and her grandchildren, and whenever the wind blows, we will think of her, and feel her touch, and know that she is with us.