| 10/19/2024 | “The numbness of his loss had passed, and the pain would hit me out of nowhere, doubling me over, racking my body with sobs. Where are you? I would cry out in my mind. Where have you gone? Of course, there was never any answer.” – Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games It is so hard to not be able to talk to your loved one and hear his or her reply. Write down what you want to say in a notebook you keep for that purpose. Do it as often as you need to feel you have an outlet for the words you want to say to your loved ones. After a couple of weeks, read back what you have written. You may be surprised with your progress and how quickly you change as you work through your grief. |
| 10/15/2024 | “What they never tell you about grief is that missing someone is the simple part.” – Gail Caldwell, Let’s Take the Long Way Home: A Memoir of Friendship Everyone in our lives plays a role. We have teachers, entertainers, confidants, and more. The loss of someone created empty places. Was this the person you loved to go over the events of your day with or the person who helped you solve problems? Start to think about the role or roles that your loved one had in your life. That awareness will help you to eventually fill in the missing pieces. |
| 10/14/2024 | “Though I knew in my mind that others had felt such loss, this loss was mine, and I felt that no one would ever understand it, and to try to explain the loneliness and pain I felt would be futile.” – Linda Hawley, Dreams Unleashed Being alone with your thoughts and memories can be the most isolating. There are not a lot of distractions to free your mind from thinking about your loss. There is no way to prevent yourself from ever being alone again. However, have an awareness that these will be times when you are vulnerable. Your active awareness of the fact that grief will come during these times will help you as you learn to better cope with your grief. |
| 10/9/2024 | “Tears of grief are unique. They contain chemicals that aren’t found in the more mundane droplets of moisture that bathe the eyes, as if our tears wash us free of some noxious cause of sorrow. And tonight, after crying until I am empty, I have a rare glimpse of my own interior landscape – wounds piled like tiny skeletons into the reef of conscious adult life. I am aground amid my conquered traumas, stranded as a consequence of my achievements.” – Carol Cassella If you need to cry, then cry. However, you must also make time to feel joy as well. Look at photos or videos that make you laugh – be it a familiar sitcom or snapshots of baby animals. Making time to cry should be balanced with making time to feel genuine happiness. |
| 10/7/2024 | “It may be a cat, a bird, a ferret, or a guinea pig, but the chances are high that when someone close to you dies, a pet will be there to pick up the slack. Pets devour the loneliness. They give us purpose, responsibility, a reason for getting up in the morning, and a reason to look to the future. They ground us, help us escape the grief, make us laugh, and take full advantage of our weakness by exploiting our furniture, our beds, and our refrigerator. We wouldn’t have it any other way. Pets are our seat belts on the emotional roller coaster of life–they can be trusted, they keep us safe, and they sure do smooth out the ride.” – Nick Trout, Tell Me Where It Hurts: A Day of Humor, Healing and Hope in My Life as an Animal Surgeon Science has proven that petting a soft animal is a great stress reliever. Of course, grief is one of the greatest sources of stress there is, especially because you can feel so helpless. If you don’t have a pet, volunteer to walk a neighbor’s dog or spend some time at a local animal shelter. It may be a case of “feeling” is believing, but you will be amazed with how calming petting a dog or cat can be. |
| 10/2/2024 | “I thought I could describe a state; make a map of sorrow. Sorrow, however, turns out to be not a state but a process.” – C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed Only others who have grieved can truly be a shoulder to cry on that comes with complete understanding and empathy. |
| 9/25/2024 | “I know now that we never get over great losses; we absorb them, and they carve us into different, often kinder, creatures. …We tell the story to get them back, to capture the traces of footfalls through the snow.” – Gail Caldwell, Let’s Take the Long Way Home: A Memoir of Friendship Tell a story about your loved one today to someone who hasn’t heard it. To see a new reaction to something so precious makes your loved one a part of your life now. It is so precious to feel connected again, even if it is just for a couple of moments. |
| 9/24/2024 | “Grief is love turned into an eternal missing” – Rosamund Lupton, Sister To have grief means that you have had love. A life without love would be far more difficult to bear than one with loss. |
| 9/18/2024 | “We were promised sufferings. They were part of the program. We were even told, ‘Blessed are they that mourn,’ and I accept it. I’ve got nothing that I hadn’t bargained for. Of course it is different when the thing happens to oneself, not to others, and in reality, not imagination.” – C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed The difference between what you expected grief to feel like and the reality of it may be significant. You think that you can handle it in one way, when that may not be working for you at all. You never actually know how the grief and subsequent healing processes will make you feel until you experience them. Do not worry if things are not playing out the way you thought they should. There is no right or wrong way to grieve. |
| 9/11/2024 | “To the world you may be just one person, but to one person you may be the world.” – Brandi Snyder Who would love to hear from you today? Pick up the phone and call. |
| 9/4/2024 | Tears have a wisdom all their own. They come when a person has relaxed enough to let go and to work through his sorrow. They are the natural bleeding of an emotional wound, carrying the poison out of the system. Here lies the road to recovery. — F. Alexander Magoun Some scientists believe that emotional tears are actually the body’s way of removing chemicals that build up when we are under stress. The release of those chemicals is what makes us feel better. While this is still just a theory, it is certainly common to feel better after you cry. Crying doesn’t have to be a long drawn-out event. A few tears shed may help you to get through the day as you work through your grief. Do not think of crying as a sign of weakness or as evidence that you will not get better. Think of crying as part of the process of grieving. |
| 8/28/2024 | “When you part from your friend, you grieve not; For that which you love most in him may be clearer in his absence, as the mountain to the climber is clearer from the plain.” – Khalil Gibran, The Prophet We spend a lot of our lives looking forward…forward to a vacation, a milestone, or even just the weekend. It is from loss that we realize that looking beside us is where we find the real joy. Our friends and loved ones are the people with whom we share our daily lives and with whom we build the most lasting memories. It is our shared morning coffee, a quick phone call or email, or watching a favorite tv show together that really defines the simple, yet most impactful joys of life. While the sadness of loss is startling, take it as an opportunity to look and see what is beside you now. Treasure those people and those mundane moments, for they are what really matter most. |
| 8/24/2024 | “Relationships take up energy; letting go of them, psychiatrists theorize, entails mental work. When you lose someone you were close to, you have to reassess your picture of the world and your place in it. The more your identity was wrapped up with the deceased, the more difficult the loss.” – Meghan O’Rourke To lose someone who was part of your daily life is unspeakably difficult. How can you make decisions, share your thoughts, or work through your dilemmas with anyone else in the same way? You can never replace the relationship you lost. It is a sacred entity in and of itself. You can, however, forge a new path that brings out different strengths and aspects of yourself you may not have known. Do not be afraid to discover these new pathways. This loss, while terrible, will press you to grow as a person. |
| 8/17/2024 | “Grief is not as heavy as guilt, but it takes more away from you.” – Veronica Roth, Insurgent When you experience such a profound loss, you have a kind of heaviness in your heart that feels permanent. It seems as if it will smother you with its intensity at times, and makes you question if it will ever lighten. The light will return. It may not be today, and it may not be tomorrow. The key is to keep moving forward, trying to really live in each moment. Grief is a heavy burden, but it will morph into one that you can carry given time. |
| 8/14/2024 | “Only people who are capable of loving strongly can also suffer great sorrow, but this same necessity of loving serves to counteract their grief and heals them.” – Leo Tolstoy When we love someone – be it a friend, family member, or spouse – we open ourselves up to the potential for loss. Yet, we take the plunge, and embrace these relationships, for it is through these connections that we really live. The pain of loss feels insurmountable, but opening your heart to friendship and to love are the keys to truly living again. |
| 8/5/2024 | “You endure what is supposedly unbearable, and before you know it, you would have done the impossible by bearing the unbearable.” – Donovan People told you things would slowly get better, but until you survive the first year of grief, that can be hard to believe. Looking back, you have made it through family events and milestones that seemed overwhelming. This next year will still be hard, but will not compare to what you’ve already accomplished. Continue to reach out to others to support you and rely on your inner strength when you need to. Just know that you are not alone. |
| 8/2/2024 | “You endure what is supposedly unbearable, and before you know it, you would have done the impossible by bearing the unbearable.” – Donovan People told you things would slowly get better, but until you survive the first year of grief, that can be hard to believe. Looking back, you have made it through family events and milestones that seemed overwhelming. This next year will still be hard, but will not compare to what you’ve already accomplished. Continue to reach out to others to support you and rely on your inner strength when you need to. Just know that you are not alone. |
| 7/27/2024 | “Loss reshapes us and teaches us to fill ourselves with something new. If we resist, we feel as you do. Hollow. Empty.”- Ash Krafton, Wolf’s Bane What have you done to actively work through your grief process this week? Remember to exercise, eat well, and find ways to reach out to other people. Being passive will not ease your heart. You need to make the effort to respect yourself and reconnect with the world. |
| 7/24/2024 | “You endure what is supposedly unbearable, and before you know it, you would have done the impossible by bearing the unbearable.” – Donovan People told you things would slowly get better, but until you survive the first year of grief, that can be hard to believe. Looking back, you have made it through family events and milestones that seemed overwhelming. This next year will still be hard, but will not compare to what you’ve already accomplished. Continue to reach out to others to support you and rely on your inner strength when you need to. Just know that you are not alone. |
| 7/20/2024 | “Change the way you think and you will change the way you feel.” – Charmaine Smith Ladd, Shake Hands with Yourself: A Peacemaker’s Guide to Happiness & Inner Peace Make sure you live your life through a lens of gratitude and appreciation. You are always going to be sad about your loss, but take that feeling and channel it into love for the life that is all around you. |
| 7/15/2024 | “My pain builds like storm clouds-massive, dark, and heavy with teardrops. Moisture falls torrential as if my world is a violent, eternal downpour; however, at long last the source runs dry and the bitter storm does cease. Blue skies dare to glow where the gloom has dissipated. I breathe it in, hoping to cleanse my inner soul. A laden heart tells me the truth; the clear sky is an illusion. Old pain rushes back like a flood, providing means for clouds to form and expand once again until it is too much to bear and the heaviness turns to rain. I cannot find refuge from this woe. It is my never-ending heartache.” – Richelle E. Goodrich The first time you have a relapse of grief feels overwhelming. After working hard to feel better for so many weeks, it is almost cruel to have such sadness. The return of grief is normal and will continue to happen again and again – often for years. The good news is that after the first time, you are ready for it. You don’t like it, but you expect its inevitable presence. Like rainstorms that can spoil a summer’s day at the beach, the tears of grief will come and go. What you need to do is figure out what you need to do to weather that storm. |
| 7/13/2024 | “He had pulled out of that grief, eventually – out from under the suffocating weight of it. Suffering had formed him: made him silent and deliberate, thoughtful: deep.” – Amanda Coplin, The Orchardist You will find your voice. You will be able to talk about the person you lost without your eyes filling with tears. If you are not there yet, don’t worry. That day will come soon. |
| 7/10/2024 | “I’m convinced that the world, more than ever, needs the music only you can make. And if it takes extra courage to keep playing in spite of your loss, many will applaud the effort. And who knows? Others may be inspired to pick up their broken instruments, their broken lives, and begin again.” – Steve Goodier You may have withdrawn from hobbies and pastimes you enjoy. It is hard to take pleasure in leisure activities when you are overcome with the sadness that is the hallmark of grief. Choose something you used to love doing and make a plan to go back to it this week. It could be a playing golf, going for a hike, or bowling with friends. Even if you do an abbreviated version of a favorite hobby, it will be a small, meaningful step towards your recovery. |
| 7/8/2024 | “Mrs. Sussex said Byron’s loss would grow more bearable. But here was the nub: he didn’t want to lose his loss. Loss was all he had left of his mother. If time healed the gap, it would be as if she’d never been there.” – Rachel Joyce, Perfect Grief keeps your relationship with your loved one at the forefront of your life. As it starts to fade, you may feel a sense of loss all over again. Letting go of your grief may be as challenging for you as the grief itself. Allow yourself to evolve and move beyond your sadness without guilt. You were not meant to grieve for anyone indefinitely. |
| 7/6/2024 | “In grief, part of the pain comes from our feeling that we should not suffer so – that it is fundamentally alien to our being, this even though we all suffer, and frequently. Yet we reject suffering as a basic human truth, while greeting joy as integral to our very substance.” – Wendy Beckett, Sister Wendy’s Meditations on Joy As you start to gain a small amount of perspective on this process, it may be becoming clear to you that sadness and grief are integral parts of who we are as people. We don’t deserve one or the other. They are simply what defines us as human beings. |
| 7/2/2024 | “We do not have control over many things in life and death but we do have control over the meaning we give it.” – Nathalie Himmelrich, Grieving Parents: Surviving Loss as a Couple Your grief has probably been the driving force in your life for months now. When you’re not actively grieving, you have an awareness that it’s there waiting for you. Although some aspects of it may still make you feel out of control, you have actually reclaimed parts of your life since you first experienced your loss. |
| 6/29/2024 | “What were you going to make for Christmas dinner?” one of my older children asked in a very reasonable tone. I cleared my throat, but couldn’t speak. There was no real explanation for my behavior. I’d been so intent on getting through this first Christmas without David. I’d found new rituals to replace the old, wrapped gifts, and even made cutout sugar cookies. I’d modified Christmas in order to endure it. What I hadn’t done was plan on or prepare a Christmas meal. Everyone was looking at me expectantly by this point, including my sweet, hungry grandchildren. “I forgot all about Christmas dinner,” I finally admitted. No one batted an eye.” – Mary Potter Kenyon, Refined By Fire: A Journey of Grief and Grace You may find yourself devoting lots of energy in certain parts of your life while almost completely neglecting other parts. Restoring balance takes a lot longer than you may realize. The key is to maintain a sense of patience and even humor about the inevitable mistakes you will make as you rebuild your life from this loss. |
| 6/26/2024 | “You have no idea how well you are doing,” John complimented me just a few minutes after he mentioned the Christmas card. What did that mean: That I was doing well? That I’d come to a family gathering? That I’d remembered to bring food? That I was dressed, and my hair combed? That I was wearing shoes? I wasn’t sure, but maybe just making an appearance at a family event meant I was handling things well.” – Mary Potter Kenyon, Refined By Fire: A Journey of Grief and Grace You may be feeling a bit conflicted. You want to be doing “better” in your grief process, yet it is somehow irritating when people don’t realize how hard it still is in so many ways. Having a wide range of emotions even months after your loss is normal. It’s as if you are a teenager again and you don’t really know what you want. Like the teenage years, however, this period will seem long when you are in it, but won’t last forever. |
| 6/21/2024 | “Unfortunately, there is no expiration date on grief” – Elizabeth Czukas Did you think that your grief period would be over in three months, that it would be complete within a year? Put away your calendar. You will feel frustrated if you put a timetable on this process. Just know that grieving will continue for you at your own unique pace. Try to focus on the fact that there are no expectations, no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ ways to grieve. Taking the pressure off of yourself will actually help your process to flow more naturally and with less stress. |
| 6/15/2024 | “Caring for others tends to be the first cut when we review our personal time budget. It does not necessarily fulfill the goals of my ambition; it will not pave the way for my success; it takes away from my own depleted emotional resources. It is an imposition in every way. To some of us, it is an inconvenience from which we unashamedly run. We have become experts in maintaining a grand scope of friendships and amateurs in genuine intimacy and care. Unwittingly, we have sacrificed everything on the altar of self-sufficiency – only to discover that we have sold our souls to isolation.” – Sandy Oshiro Rosen, Bare: The Misplaced Art of Grieving and Dancing Take a few minutes to write, call, or text a friend today who you may have neglected during this grieving period. These relationships need to be nurtured. While it may not be easy to reach out when you’re still not feeling like yourself, but the rewards are worth the effort. |
| 6/12/2024 | “We talk about how he and Leanne are doing knowing full well there is no sufficient answer.” – Michael Perry From the outside, people may now assume you’re doing fine. They may no longer even ask you about your loss, yet it may still be all-consuming. Remember that there are always other people who want to talk about their own losses and listen to you talk about yours. Even though time has passed, do not hesitate to join or rejoin a support group either online or in person. You may need it now more than in those first weeks when others were encouraging you to talk about your feelings. |
| 6/7/2024 | “She needed to recover. His father had died in January; it was only the end of May. They needed to stick to the routine they’d established during the intervening months. in that way, their life would return to its original shape, like a spring stretched in bad times but contracting eventually into happiness. That the world could come permanently unsprung had never occurred to him.” – David Wroblewski, The Story of Edgar Sawtelle If you knew what the grief process to this point would entail at the time of your loss would you have believed it? Would you have thought you could make it to today? Well, you did make it, and it is important for you to focus on the fact that you have survived. You are stronger than you think you are. |
| 6/5/2024 | “What made losing someone you loved bearable was not remembering but forgetting. Forgetting small things first… it’s amazing how much you could forget, and everything you forgot made that person less alive inside you until you could finally endure it. After more time passed you could let yourself remember, even want to remember. But even then what you felt those first days could return and remind you the grief was still there, like old barbed wire embedded in a tree’s heartwood.” – Ron Rash, Serena You may be battling in your head between wanting to forget and wanting to remember. In time, you will reach the balance where you have a bit of both. |
| 6/3/2024 | “Grief was like a newborn, and the first three months were hard as hell, but by six months you’d recognized defeat, shifted your life around, and made room for it.” – Ann Brashares, Sisterhood Everlasting Continuing with the simile that grief is like a newborn – when grief is new you cry all the time and your new world is a mystery to you. As you grow, you learn to handle your needs and disappointments, but there are still times when you will cry. You may still feel like a ‘newborn’ or have moved on in your evolution. Remember that along the way, you will fall down and cry, but you will learn how to cope better with time and experience. |
| 6/1/2024 | “June is gone. For the first time, the enormity of that hits me. Every muscle aches, my heart most of all. I am throbbing with how much I miss her. It hurts worse than anything. I don’t know how I’m supposed to be expected to live day to day carrying this kind of pain. I don’t know how I’m supposed to go out there, spread her ashes, and let her go. I want to stop running away from everything. I want to find something to run toward.” – Hannah Harrington, Saving June You are still having that year of firsts…the first birthday, the first long weekend, the first new year’s day without your loved one. It is hard because each first is a reminder that your life has permanently changed. Once this first year is over, however, you know that you can make it through the birthdays and through the holidays. They will always have a degree of difficulty to them, but for most people the first year is the hardest. |
| 5/29/2024 | “What people resist is not change per se, but loss.” – Ronald A. Heifetz, The Practice of Adaptive Leadership: Tools and Tactics for Changing Your Organization and the World” The changes that have happened are not what you or anyone would have wanted. As part of your healing, you need to make some positive changes. They could be a hobby or skill or even something as simple as developing a healthy habit. Make changes that bring you joy. |
| 5/28/2024 | “There is a point when grief exceeds the human capacity to emote, and as a result one is strangely composed-“ – Abraham Verghese, Cutting for Stone At the beginning of your grieving process, you may have felt like your life was going through the motions. It was like being in shock. Because of that, you may only now be starting to feel strong emotions about your loss or your feelings may have changed. That is why they refer to grief as a process. |
| 5/27/2024 | “The only language she could speak was grief. How could he not know that? Instead, she said, “I love you.” She did. She loved him. But even that didn’t feel like anything anymore.” – Ann Hood, The Knitting Circle When you are grieving, it becomes the dominant emotion in your life. While it may feel like no other emotion will thrive again, it will. You just need to be patient and trust that you will return to your old self in time. |
| 5/26/2024 | “Sydney discovers that she minds the loss of her mourning. When she grieved, she felt herself to be intimately connected to Daniel. But with each passing day, he floats away from her. When she thinks about him now, it is more as a lost possibility than as a man. She has forgotten his breath, his musculature.” – Anita Shreve, Body Surfing Your grief will be a strong presence in your life for the next couple of years. Strangely, it will be something you become accustomed to over time. It will eventually fade into the background of your life. |
| 5/25/2024 | “Loving someone means that you will inevitable grieve for them; love is an engraved invitation for grief.” – Sunshine O’Donnell, Open Me Continue to treasure the love you have for your loved one. By having loved, you can love again. |
| 5/22/2024 | “Remember that grief is a necessary pain. It’s your only way to heal. To starve it will destroy you.”~The Grimoire” – S.M. Boyce, Lichgates Do not hold back your tears, your words, and your feelings. Grieving is not always pretty, but it is how we heal our hearts from great loss. |
| 5/20/2024 | “I know now what was happening to me, what was overwhelming me, what was about to consume and almost destroy me. Didier had even given me a name for it – assassin grief, he’d once called it: the kind of grief that lies in wait and attacks you from ambush, with no warning and no mercy. I know now that assassin grief can hide for years and then strike suddenly on the happiest day, without discernible reason or exegesis. But on that day, … almost a year after Khader’s death, I couldn’t understand the dark and trembling mood that was moving in me, swelling to the sorrow I’d too long denied. I couldn’t understand it, so i tried to fight it as a man fights pain or despair. But you can’t bite down on assassin grief and will it away. The enemy stalks you, step for step, and knows your every move before you make it. The enemy is your own grieving heart and, when it strikes, it can’t miss.” – Gregory David Roberts, Shantaram Out of the blue, you will feel sadness that you did not expect. Don’t let that blast of emotion make your feel discouraged. It will happen even years after your loss when some trigger reminds you of your loved one. What you can do is to try to build the best life for yourself that you can, knowing that at times your sadness will appear without warning. |
| 5/19/2024 | “I had always turned to books, to knowledge, to help me get through everything in my life – and, sometimes, to escape it. But grief was a journey through a forest of razor blades. I walked through every painful inch of it – no shortcuts and no anesthesia.” – Michele Bardsley, Don’t Talk Back To Your Vampire Arrange to go to the movies with a friend or relative. The act of planning an afternoon or evening out is a positive step towards returning to a more normal routine, and films can provide a great way to escape from your daily activities. |
| 5/18/2024 | “What madness, to love a man as something more than human! I lived in a fever, convulsed with tears and sighs that allowed me neither rest nor peace of mind. My soul was a burden, bruised and bleeding. It was tired of the man who carried it, but I found no place to set it down to rest. Neither the charm of the countryside nor the sweet scents of a garden could soothe it. It found no peace in song or laughter, none in the company of friends at table or in the pleasures of love, none even in books or poetry. Everything that was not what my friend had been was dull and distasteful. I had heart only for sighs and tears, for in them alone I found some shred of consolation.” – Augustine of Hippo When you are ready, put on a dance or party song that you love and allow yourself to dance. Take that three or four minutes for yourself to feel alive and joyful. |
| 5/17/2024 | “A person whose head is bowed and whose eyes are heavy cannot look at the light.” – Christine de Pizan, Ditié de Jehanne d’Arc Take an empty grocery bag and walk around your neighborhood. Pick up any trash you see along your route, and dispose of it in the bag. Work towards making your environment more beautiful every day. |
| 5/16/2024 | “Everyone who lives long enough to love deeply will experience great losses. Don’t let fear of loss, or the losses themselves, take away your ability to enjoy the wonderful life that is yours.” – Barbara “Cutie” Cooper, Fall in Love for Life: Inspiration from a 73-Year Marriage You may be leery of losing someone else, because your loss is still new. Try not to let that impede your ability to connect with people in your life now. |
| 5/15/2024 | “When things get really bad, you take comfort in the placeness of a place.” – Banana Yoshimoto, The Lake Buy some fresh flowers for your home. They symbolize life and hope, two things that you need to focus on right now. |
| 5/14/2024 | “I realized that it was not that I didn’t want to go on without him. I did. It was just that I didn’t know why I wanted to go on” – Kay Redfield Jamison, Nothing Was the Same Do something that you have never done before. This doesn’t mean skydiving or running a marathon. Make your bed every day, clean out your kitchen drawers, take a class at a community college. Do something new that takes your mind in a new direction. Don’t allow your grief to stop you from growing as a person. |
| 5/13/2024 | “Still everyone, including the abbot, had said that he was running away from his grief. They’d had no idea what they were talking about. He’d cradled his grief, almost to the point of loving it. For so long he refused to give it up, because leaving it behind was like leaving her.” – Sue Monk Kidd, The Mermaid Chair It can be hard to recognize the fact that you feel some guilt trying to move on from your loss. That guilt is normal, and should not become a source of additional pain. |
| 5/12/2024 | “You can’t love your mother or father if you don’t also have the capacity to grieve their deaths and, perhaps even more so, grieve parts of their lives.” – Glenn Beck, The 7: Seven Wonders That Will Change Your Life It has been said that you never really grow up until you lose your parents. It feels almost like a rite of passage, but one that takes a long time to process and come to terms with before you can appreciate how much it changed you. |
| 5/11/2024 | “Then one morning she’d begun to feel her sorrow easing, like something jagged that had cut into her so long it had finally dulled its edges, worn itself down. That same day Rachel couldn’t remember which side her father had parted his hair on, and she’d realized again what she’d learned at five when her mother left – that what made losing someone you loved bearable was not remembering but forgetting. Forgetting the small things first, the smell of the soap her mother had bathed with, the color of the dress she’d worn to church, then after a while the sound of her mother’s voice, the color of her hair. It amazed Rachel how much you could forget, and everything you forgot made that person less alive inside you until you could finally endure it. After more time passed you could let yourself remember, even want to remember. But even then what you felt those first days could return and remind you the grief that was still there, like old barbed wire embedded in a tree’s heartwood. (51)” – Ron Rash, Serena Sometimes being able to forget aspects of your loved one is more helpful to your healing than remembering. If there are small aspects of him or her that you forget, do not feel guilty about it or wrack your brain trying to remember them. You need to allow yourself to heal, and part of that process can be forgetting aspects of that person or relationship. |
| 5/10/2024 | “Just when normal life felt almost possible – when the world held some kind of order, meaning, even loveliness (the prismatic spray of light through an icicle; the stillness of a sunrise), some small thing would go awry and the veil of optimism was torn away, the barren world revealed. They learned, somehow, to wait those times out. There was no cure, no answer, no reparation.” – David Wroblewski, The Story of Edgar Sawtelle Know that when the bad moments come – and they will invariably come – they will not last forever. You will start to have more good times than tough times. The balance will eventually shift such that you begin to feel like yourself again. It may not happen this year, but it will eventually happen. |
| 5/9/2024 | “I walk slowly, but I never walk backward.” – Abraham Lincoln It cannot be said enough…you are making progress in your grieving. It will never feel fast enough, but at some point you will realize that you are improving and slowly letting joy back into your life. |
| 5/8/2024 | “One small crack does not mean that you are broken, it means that you were put the test and you didn’t fall apart.” – Linda Poindexter It will take several years, but you will look back on this period and feel a sense of pride that you made it. |
| 5/7/2024 | “Be not afraid of growing slowly, be afraid only of standing still.” – Chinese Proverb Are you feeling frustrated that grief is still such a big part of your active thinking every day? Think back a month ago. You are making slow and steady progress. |
| 5/6/2024 | “The people who have the best advice are usually the ones who have been through the most.” – Anonymous Some day, you will be an enormous comfort to someone else who is experiencing loss. There is a wisdom that comes from this terrible journey you are on right now. |
| 5/5/2024 | “And I pray that you no longer seek happiness from the past, but rather you set your sails forward, to a land that is pure and wonderful.” – T.B. LaBerge Building new memories is as important as taking your next breath. Do not stop living because you are grieving. Find opportunities to celebrate with others and find joy in the day to day activities of life. |
| 5/4/2024 | “It’s possible to go on, no matter how impossible it seems, and that in time, the grief … lessens. It may not go away completely, but after a while it’s not so overwhelming.” – Nicholas Sparks The size and scale of your grief changes subtly over time. It ebbs and flows like the tides, and then suddenly it is smaller than it was. One of the hardest parts of grieving is being patient with yourself as you wait for it to lessen. |
| 4/27/2024 | “Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgement that something else is more important than fear.” – Ambrose Redmoon It is scary to face the world without someone you love as part of it. Find the strength to go and engage with others today. Show an interest in another person that lets them know you can be a true friend. |
| 4/26/2024 | “That was the hard thing about grief, and the grieving. They spoke another language, and the words we knew always fell short of what we wanted them to say.” – Sarah Dessen, The Truth About Forever The easiest people with whom to talk about your grief are those who have also lost someone. Those who have not want to comfort you, and want to show that they care. Until you have been through loss, however, you are only guessing at what it is truly like. |
| 4/25/2024 | “It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.” – Henry David Thoreau Look at something today that represents beauty to you. It might be the face of someone you love or a fresh flower in bloom. Appreciate the beauty around you. |
| 4/24/2024 | “We meet no ordinary people in our lives.” – C.S. Lewis What was the most unique thing about your loved one? We don’t always stop to think about what makes someone stand out, yet each person brings something special to the table. What is unique about you? Take a moment today and celebrate both of you. |
| 4/23/2024 | “We are products of our past, but we don’t have to be prisoners of it.” – Rick Warren Your loved one helped make you the person you are today, and you had the same role for your loved one. In time, your memories will bring you joy and not sorrow. This evolution will take time, but it will come if you are open to it. |
| 4/22/2024 | “You are, after all, what you think. Your emotions are the slaves to your thoughts, and you are the slave to your emotions.” – Elizabeth Gilbert Take one moment today to think: “I may be sad, but I am going to be ok. I will slowly start to feel like myself again.” Always remember that thoughts are things. |
| 4/21/2024 | “Starting today, I need to forget what’s gone, appreciate what still remains, and look forward to what’s coming next.” – Unknown Having something to look forward to is an important part of healing. Make a plan – be it lunch with a friend, tickets to an upcoming concert or show, or even booking a getaway weekend – that allows you to look forward rather than constantly looking back. |
| 4/20/2024 | “Change is the friction that makes you grow.” – Anonymous You have been grieving so long now that it has become the new normal. Allow yourself an hour today where you do something you enjoy that takes your head somewhere else. You could read a magazine, watch a movie, or enjoy a favorite television show. |
| 4/19/2024 | Never get tired of doing little things for others, sometimes those little things occupy the biggest parts of their hearts.” – Unknown Nothing takes you out of your own thoughts of sadness like the joy that comes from doing something for someone else. Make time today to show a kindness to someone in your life. |
| 4/18/2024 | “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.” – Plato When you are feeling so sad and overwhelmed, it sometimes appears that everyone else is happy and content. In fact, everyone has his/her own struggles. While it may not be grief, what they are facing can be equally tough to bear. Most people put on a mask to hide their sadness, and you may be doing so to a certain degree as well. Be good to the people you meet. Show them compassion, knowing that they too have sadness to bear. |
| 4/17/2024 | “Goodbyes are only for those who love with their eyes. Because for those who love with heart and soul there is no separation. ” -Rumi Every once in a while, when you least expect it, you will say something and hear your loved one’s voice as your own. Those moments are fleeting, but are truly one of the greatest gifts. |
| 4/16/2024 | “I think validation is one of the most beautiful gifts we can give the grieving.” – Angie Cartwright When the opportunity arises, write a note or take the time to call someone who has experienced a loss. Be a real listener when they want to talk, and be a shoulder to cry on when they need to weep. Providing comfort to someone else will help heal your heart as well. |
| 4/15/2024 | “Nothing ever goes away until it teaches us what we need to know.” – Pema Chodron Take a moment, either in a journal or on a scrap of paper, to write down the most important thing you learned about yourself from the person you lost. You may have learned that you are more patient than you realized, that you love more deeply than you knew, or that you are loyal. Every person gives us a gift, and it is valuable to recognize each one as the precious treasure it is. |
| 4/14/2024 | I still miss those I loved who are no longer with me but I find I am grateful for having loved them. The gratitude has finally conquered the loss. — Rita Mae Brown It takes a very long time to feel gratitude for the relationship you had with the person you lost. There is always a part of you that will long for one more hour together. |
| 4/13/2024 | An important way to cope with grief is having an outlet, be it interpersonal, be it artistic, that will allow you to not have to contain your grief, but will give you an opportunity to express it, to externalize it to some degree. —R. Benyamin Cirlin, Grief counselor Consider taking a class in a topic that interests you. It could be an academic subject, a skill, or a sport. Alternatively, join a new club like a book discussion group or a political campaign. While you will most likely enjoy the experience of learning and being involved, one of the greatest benefits is that you will meet people who don’t know you as someone who is grieving. It can become a place to connect with others without having to be reminded of your loss. |
| 4/12/2024 | The caterpillar dies so the butterfly could be born. And, yet, the caterpillar lives in the butterfly and they are but one. So, when I die, it will be that I have been transformed from the caterpillar of earth to the butterfly of the universe. – John Harricharan Even though it is so hard to say goodbye to the people we love, they truly live on in those left behind. The skills they taught or the stories they told become your skills and your stories to pass along to someone else. Make the best parts of your loved one live on in you and those around you. |
| 4/11/2024 | When someone you love becomes a memory, the memory becomes a treasure. ~ Anonymous Take a moment today to look at a photo, watch a home movie, or hold an object that reminds you of a special time with your loved one. Laugh, cry, and remember. Put that memory in a special place in your heart to treasure always. |
| 4/10/2024 | There are things that we don’t want to happen but have to accept, things we don’t want to know but have to learn, and people we can’t live without but have to let go. ~Anonymous You may not have reached a place of acceptance about your loss yet. There are people in your life who may assume you have come to terms with what has happened, but that may not be the case. Do not waste a moment feeling badly if you still wake up in a state of disbelief. Losing someone who was a part of your life is not something that you can ever take lightly. Even if the passing was expected, the feeling of loss is often much more powerful than you thought it would be. Continue to be patient with yourself. The acceptance may take a long time, but it will eventually come. With that acceptance will be a sense of peace that will help with your healing process. |
| 4/9/2024 | “A lot of things are inherent in life -change, birth, death, aging, illness, accidents, calamities, and losses of all kinds- but these events don’t have to be the cause of ongoing suffering…If we dwelt on these positive states as much as we generally dwell on our negative thoughts and painful emotions, our lives would be transformed.” – Gina Lake, What about Now?: Reminders for Being in the Moment Grab three scraps of paper and a pen. On each individual piece, write one thing in life that you love. It could be something simple like the smell of cookies in the oven or the feeling of hope that something special is in the mail when you hear the letter carrier delivering it. They don’t have to be big or important, but you do have to find three. Then, at different times during the day today, try to remember that there are parts of life that make you happy, even though it seems like all you live with is sadness. |
| 4/8/2024 | “Love is an engraved invitation to grief.” – Sunshine O’Donnell, Open Me Take a moment today to look at your loss from another perspective. Do you wish that you hadn’t had that special relationship? Do you wish that you hadn’t had the closeness that you now miss so much? If the answer is no, then take 5 minutes to look back and remember 2 memories that make you happy. Try to practice celebrating what was special about the one you lost. |
| 4/7/2024 | “Isn’t it weird,” I said, “the way you remember things, when someone’s gone?” What do you mean?” I ate another piece of waffle. “When my dad first died, all I could think about was that day. It’s taken me so long to be able to think back to before that, to everything else.” Wes was nodding before I even finished. “It’s even worse when someone’s sick for a long time,” he said. “You forget they were ever healthy, ever okay. It’s like there was never a time when you weren’t waiting for something awful to happen.” But there was,” I said. “I mean, it’s only been in the last few months that I’ve started remembering all this good stuff, funny stuff about my dad. I can’t believe I ever forgot it in the first place.” You didn’t forget,” Wes said, taking a sip of his water. “You just couldn’t remember right then. But now you’re ready to, so you can.” I thought about this as I finished off my waffle.” – Sarah Dessen, The Truth About Forever The day will come when you can legitimately enjoy a memory without it being clouded by sadness. To look back on your loved one’s life with fondness and not through tears is a treasured gift. |
| 4/6/2024 | “And perhaps there is a limit to the grieving that the human heart can do. As when one adds salt to a tumbler of water, there comes a point where simply no more will be absorbed.” – Sarah Waters, The Little Stranger How long have I felt this way? It feels like forever. As each milestone, each birthday or holiday passes, you will start to feel a very small sense of relief. You made it through the birthday or the anniversary. Those events will always connect you to your loss, but it is never as hard as the first time. As you work through those moments, know that you are building your foundation of strength. Next year will be just a little bit easier. |
| 4/5/2024 | “Grief does not change you. It reveals you.” – John Green, The Fault in Our Stars Your grief may be the greatest challenge you have ever faced, and will test you unlike any other. In the end, you will develop a level of empathy and a strength of character that you did not know you could have. You will not be able to see the results of this process for months or even years, but know that you will grow from it. |
| 4/4/2024 | “There are some who would vow that life isn’t fair. They believe the worst is yet to come, that evil will always conquer good, and that we have no control over our fate. It’s true, there are storms that shake our foundations and monsters that threaten to tear us limb from limb. We will make terrible mistakes. We will fall short of our expectations. No one is exempt from pain and fear. But life, and what comes after, is a beautiful mixture of darkness and light, sacrifice and salvation. There is no fine line between the two, for both are needed. Where there is grief, there will be joy. Where there is heartbreak, love will follow.” – Rebecca Harris Life never feels fair when you have lost someone you love. Have you ever thought that life is unfair when you experienced joy? Our lives are all a mix of the highs of joy and the lows of grief. As hard as that is to hear right now, the feelings you are experiencing are as inevitable as the elation you felt at other times. Trying to cope with these lows is a struggle for everyone. Take time today to acknowledge that although this is a hard time, the great times will come again to create balance in your life. |
| 4/3/2024 | “It occurred to me that grief is like a tunnel. You enter it without a choice because you must get to the other side. The darkness of it plays tricks on you and sometimes you can even forget where you are or what your purpose is. I believe that people, now and again, get lost or stuck in that tunnel…” – Loretta Nyhan, Empire Girls Are you worried that you won’t find your way out of the tunnel of grief? There is always a light to follow. With time and effort, you may work your way to find the other side. If you are struggling, you may need to seek out a support group or a trusted friend to help you see that light, but do not give up! The key right now is to know that you can absolutely find a way out. |
| 4/2/2024 | “Yet that grief and this joy were alike outside all the ordinary conditions of life; they were loop-holes, as it were, in that ordinary life through which there came glimpses of something sublime. And in the contemplation of this sublime something the soul was exalted to inconceivable heights of which it had before had no conception which reason lagged behind, unable to keep up with it.” – Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina Grief and joy are the extremes of emotion. Although we think we seek joy, that is actually just a fleeting feeling. What you miss most right now is contentment, the feeling that all is calm and well. You may not be able to achieve that right now. Grief, the other extreme, is a forceful presence in your life. Although it may take a few weeks or months, contentment will return, and it will feel far sweeter for having lost it. |
| 4/1/2024 | “I picture Cully tromping through that high, deep snow. That’s how I feel physically from all of this. Moving through grief like it’s a thick drift, exhausting but enlivening. It makes your muscles ache. It makes you feel you’ve inhabited your body completely.” – Kaui Hart Hemmings, The Possibilities Grief can truly feel like an endless winter. Like the actual season in colder climates, however, the sun will eventually melt the snow and the beauty of spring will be revealed. Try to have hope today that the spring in your heart will come again as well. |
| 3/31/2024 | “People grieve in different ways, some silently, some in anger, some in spite. Rarely does grief bring out the best in people, despite what local historians like to tell you.” – Joanne Harris, Five Quarters of the Orange You may miss the “real you”, that person you were before you started to grieve. Don’t worry…that person is still there. You will return to a more caring, compassionate version of yourself on the other end of the grief process. |
| 3/30/2024 | “There is greater clarity in the still waters of sadness, something not found in the babbling brooks of more sought after emotions.” – Shaun Hick Feeling sad is your new normal. That emotion has permeated every part of your life for weeks such that you almost don’t have to be reflective and consider how you are feeling. The emotion is always sadness. Take a break from sadness today. Put your face in the sun for ten minutes or go for a walk in a local park. Take a step away from feeling down. You’ll be glad you did. |
| 3/29/2024 | “We live and we die, but we are made of sterner stuff. The carbon atoms in our fingernails, the calcium in our bones, the iron atoms in our blood — all the countless trillions of atoms of which we are made — are ancient objects. They existed before us, before the Earth itself, in fact. And after each of us dies, they will depart from our bodies and do other things. Forever.” – Keith Heyer Meldahl, Hard Road West: History and Geology along the Gold Rush Trail Physical bodies are of this earth; you learned about their components in school. Somehow death does not seem as grounded. Your loss is forcing you to face what you think happened to the essence or the spirit of your loved one. This experience is actually compelling you to look at not only your religious or cultural beliefs, but what you personally believe now that you’ve experienced loss. This process is as much spiritual as it is emotional. |
| 3/28/2024 | “Sometimes when we are drowning in our own loss we lash out–anger is momentarily easier to cope with.” – Anne Perry, No Graves as Yet You may find yourself being impatient or aggressive with close family members or friends. It’s like putting on a suit of armor. In a strange way, being angry is easier than loving someone we are suddenly afraid to lose. Recognize this emotion, and make the conscious effort to lead with kindness and compassion. |
| 3/27/2024 | “Like many people whose lives had formed around a particularly painful incident, she had grown used to providing ellipses around the event of her brother’s death to keep conversations comfortable. At some point the subconscious logic of this had spread to the rest of her life so that she rarely talked about things she had been deeply affected by. It wasn’t hard to do.” – Mira Jacob, The Sleepwalker’s Guide to Dancing You may feel like you are operating on autopilot so often that you are forgetting how to really connect. It can become a hard habit to break. Take the time today to nourish one relationship carefully. Reconnecting with others continues to be an important part of your recovery process. |
| 3/26/2024 | “Precisely because a living being may die, it is necessary to care for that being so that it may live. Only under conditions in which the loss would matter does the value of the life appear. Thus, grievability is a presupposition for the life that matters.” – Judith Butler, Frames of War: When Is Life Grievable? Try to treat each relationship and interaction with the care you wish you had brought to the love you lost. We grieve so that we can learn and grow. |
| 3/25/2024 | “I’m so sorry,” he said, because after Pamela died, he promised himself that if anyone told him the smallest, saddest story, he would answer, I’m so sorry. Meaning, Yes, that happened. You couldn’t believe the people who believed that not mentioning sadness was a kind of magic that could stave off the very sadness you didn’t mention – as though grief were the opposite of Rumpelstiltskin and materialized only at the sound of its own name.” – Elizabeth McCracken, Thunderstruck & Other Stories People search for what to say to you now that some time has passed since you suffered your loss. All you may want to hear is “I’m so sorry.” While you can’t force people to say what you’d like, you can give the gift of saying, “I’m so sorry,” to others. |
| 3/24/2024 | “Somehow, grief had seemed easier to bear when the skies were dark and a cold wind kept cats and prey inside their nests.” – Erin Hunter, Bramblestar’s Storm Eventually you will love sunny days again. Don’t push yourself. Like so many other phases of grief, your return to the sunshine will come when you are ready. |
| 3/23/2024 | “There’s always a last time. If you could remember every last time, you’d never stop grieving.” – Jonathan Tropper, This is Where I Leave You You may be spending a lot of time feeling guilty trying to remember the last time you saw your loved one or told them how you felt. It’s time to free yourself of that burden. Simply remember the love that was there. Those details do not augment or diminish that special relationship. |
| 3/22/2024 | “Sometimes it’s your fragrance that comes to me, out of the blue, on a crowded road in a Sunday afternoon. But more often, it’s memories of us that cross my mind almost every lone evening. All I want is to lessen the pain I feel every night. But every morning I wake up is another day, hopeless and miserable, with nothing but a deafening silence, a wave of tears, memories and your absence.” – Sanhita Baruah Are there certain times of the day that are harder for you than others? You may want to try shifting your routine to try to get out of the pattern of when sadness overcomes you. If sitting resting or watching tv at night is hard, start doing your laundry or cleaning your house at night. Take action steps to switch up your days so that you do not become stuck in a pattern of predictable grief. |
| 3/21/2024 | “For each person I lost I found a new layer of grief to cover myself with, and each time I tried to bring something of their essence into my own being – be it unconditional love, kindness and piety.” – A. P. J. Abdul Kalam Like your relationships in life, each grieving period is unique. Thinking that you know how your grief for someone will be is like assuming you know how each friendship or each great love will be. You learned a lot about life and about yourself when you first lost someone close to you. If this is your first loss, you are learning those things now. While they change you and give you the gift of empathy as you reconnect with others, they do not adequately prepare you to grieve again. Don’t be hard on yourself because this time is no easier. Know that this is the case for everyone. The one true gift that having grieved before gives you is the knowledge that it will ease with time. |
| 3/20/2024 | “All you need is one safe anchor to keep you grounded when the rest of your life spins out of control” – Katie Kacvinsky Think of one activity that you do that makes you feel grounded. It should be something that is low stress and that doesn’t require you to make any decisions. Take 20 minutes for yourself to give your mind a rest from the anxiety of grief. |
| 3/19/2024 | “Grief will shut your eyes off from the world, but Love opens them back up to see its beauty.” – Rachel Walden You probably only see the beauty in the world in little flashes right now. Treasure those moments. They represent hope and healing, and will only grow over time. |
| 3/18/2024 | “Allow yourself to be an anchor and anchored by others.” – Asa Don Brown As you become connected to others who are grieving, you will find that there are times when you are the anchor and times when you need one. Take pride in being there for someone else. By consoling another person who is grieving, you will find that you have strength and coping mechanisms that you didn’t appreciate you had. |
| 3/17/2024 | “In the support group, the counselor had said: When you lose a loved one, you feel as if you’re inside a confined space. Everyone else will seem to be careening along outside of this space. In time, you will become aware of an opening you are going to have to step through. It might be … a new job, a move–but you’ll know. You will step through.” – Jamie Quatro, I Want to Show You More Start a new page of your grief journal or begin a list on a new piece of paper by your bed. Write down at least three possible openings you could step through to break out of your confined space. You do not have to actually do anything on the list right now, but just write them down. In time, you will find you are desperate to make that move. |
| 3/16/2024 | “Sometimes all you can do is hug a friend tightly and wish that their pain could be transferred by touch to your own emotional hard drive.” – Richelle E. Goodrich Try to give at least three good hugs today. That means both arms around the other person and a solid, six-second squeeze. It will help you and the recipient manage stress, lower your blood pressure, and feel connected. |
| 3/15/2024 | “Rainbows introduce us to reflections of different beautiful possibilities so we never forget that pain and grief are not the final options in life.” – Aberjhani, Journey through the Power of the Rainbow: Quotations from a Life Made Out of Poetry Try to find an object in your home or something in nature that can become the visualization of hope. It may not be something typical like flowers or a rainbow. It just needs to be a constant reminder that there is beauty in this world waiting for you when you are ready to embrace it. |
| 3/14/2024 | “In this contemporary culture, what could be an effective means by which we might be able to cue one another to say, Take it easy on me, I’m grieving? Maybe if we reinvented, or re-established the practice of wearing black and created our own symbol of grieving – to wear our version of black, or maybe to color with black crayons for a while – the world around us would appropriately respond to our grief cues.” – Sandy Oshiro Rosen, Bare: The Misplaced Art of Grieving and Dancing It would definitely be easier if you could wear an external symbol to show that you’re still grieving. Because you can’t, you have to be ready to deal with unwanted questions. It is fine to say, “Even though some time has passed, the loss still seems new. I don’t even feel ready to talk about it yet.” People will appreciate a sincere response that states briefly how you are doing without having to go into depth. |
| 3/13/2024 | “Community is about sharing my life; about allowing the chaos of another’s circumstances to infringe on mine; about permitting myself to be known without constraint; about resigning myself to needing others.” – Sandy Oshiro Rosen, Bare: The Misplaced Art of Grieving and Dancing Even if you have established some relationships online that are helping you work through your grief, it is very important to connect with people in person as well. Become active in a group near your home. Be it playing a sport or taking a class or volunteering for a charity, interacting with others is crucial to your healing. Don’t be afraid to connect or reconnect with people in your community. As humans, we need to feel the warmth of a smile, the touch of a handshake, and the sound of laughter when we make an amusing remark as much as we need food and water. Don’t let your grief deprive you of these vital experiences. |
| 3/12/2024 | “The sunlight now lay over the valley perfectly still. I went over to the graveyard beside the church and found them under the old cedars… I am finding it a little hard to say that I felt them resting there, but I did. I felt their completeness as whatever they had been in the world. I knew I had come there out of kindness, theirs and mine. The grief that came to me then was nothing like the grief I had felt for myself alone… This grief had something in it of generosity, some nearness to joy. In a strange way it added to me what I had lost. I saw that, for me, this country would always be populated with presences and absences, presences of absences, the living and the dead. The world as it is would always be a reminder of the world that was, and of the world that is to come.” – Wendell Berry, Jayber Crow Find an old, tall tree near your home. It might be in a city park or down a country lane. Look up into its branches. Start to think about what this tree has seen – the generations that have taken shelter under it from the sun, the children who have tried to climb it. Life rushes by, but this tree can symbolize for you generations of people who have been here, lived and loved, and moved on. Your loss is part of what this tree has seen, and like the new leaves in spring, you will eventually grow forward from this sorrow. |
| 3/11/2024 | “And they had folded his brother’s hands across his suited chest, as if he would be preserved in this sanguine pose forever, but only the heavy callouses visible at the sides of his hands seemed real. It was only the callouses that appeared to be familiar and believable.” – Kent Haruf, Eventide Going through the rituals associated with the death of a loved one may seem like they took place in another lifetime. As more time passes, they almost feel surreal. The grief process itself is a more present part of your life for a long time. While the shock of the loss and unreal aspects of the first week or two fade quickly, the sadness can feel never ending. Keep looking back over your process. It is only in hindsight that you will detect any progress. |
| 3/10/2024 | “If it is possible to die of grief then why on earth can’t someone be healed by happiness?” – Jodi Picoult, Keeping Faith Your moments of joy are to be savored, but they won’t prevent grief from creeping in at times. Once you make peace with that, the moments with grief won’t catch you off guard any more. |
| 3/9/2024 | “Unacquainted with grief, I knew not how to appraise my bereavement; I could not rightly estimate the strength of the stroke.” – Ambrose Bierce, The Moonlit Road and Other Ghost and Horror Stories How can you measure grief? It is impossible. You need to deal with it when it flares up and be thankful when it doesn’t. |
| 3/8/2024 | “Love is infinite. Grief can lead to love. Love can lead to grief. Grief is a love story told backward just as love is a grief story told backward.” – Bridget Asher Love and grief are intertwined. You know that better than anyone. |
| 3/7/2024 | “But grief is a walk alone. Others can be there, and listen. But you will walk alone down your own path, at your own pace, with your sheared-off pain, your raw wounds, you denial, anger, and bitter loss. You’ll come to your own peace, hopefully, but it will be on your own, in your own time.” – Cathy Lamb, The First Day of the Rest of My Life Think of how you grew to care for or even love the person you lost. It was its own beautiful experience. Grieving is as unique as the love you shared with the special person you lost. |
| 3/6/2024 | “Each person’s grief journey is as unique as a fingerprint or a snowflake” – Earl Grollman The term ‘journey’ is overused these days, but your experience with grief is a unique journey. Only you know where you are and how you are feeling. Share your pain with those that care about you. |
| 3/5/2024 | I was tired of well-meaning folks, telling me it was time I got over being heartbroke. When somebody tells you that, a little bell ought to ding in your mind. Some people don’t know grief from garlic grits. There’s somethings a body ain’t meant to get over. No I’m not suggesting you wallow in sorrow, or let it drag on; no I am just saying it never really goes away. (A death in the family) is like having a pile of rocks dumped in your front yard. Every day you walk out and see them rocks. They’re sharp and ugly and heavy. You just learn to live around them the best way you can. Some people plant moss or ivy; some leave it be. Some folks take the rocks one by one, and build a wall.” – Michael Lee West, American Pie What will you do with your rocks? You may have had a plan a month ago that looks different now. Use that analogy to help you ponder how you want to cope with your grief. |
| 3/4/2024 | “But grief is the ultimate unrequited love. However hard and long we love someone who has died, they can never love us back. At least that is how it feels…” – Rosamund Lupton, Sister You will always love the person you lost. Grieving can feel lonely because you don’t get to feel their love in return. You may want to write down what you would like to say to your loved one and what you think they would say back to you. |
| 3/3/2024 | “It is grief that develops the powers of the mind.” – Marcel Proust Grief is going to pop into your mind. Its arrival is unpredictable but undeniable. What can you do? Know that it is coming, but also know that you can cope with it while it lasts. |
| 3/2/2024 | “Edgar, do you actually think that how long a person grieves is a measure of how much they loved someone? There’s no rulebook that says how to do this.” She laughed, bitterly. “Wouldn’t that be great? No decisions to make. Everything laid right out for us. But there’s no such thing. You want facts, don’t you? Rules. Proof. You’re like your father that way. Just because a thing can’t be logged, charted, and summarized doesn’t mean it isn’t real. Half the time we walk around in love with the idea of a thing instead of the reality of it. But sometimes things don’t turn out that way. You have to pay attention to what’s real, what’s in the world. Not some imaginary alternative, as if it’s a choice we could make.” – David Wroblewski, The Story of Edgar Sawtelle There is no formula for grief – no average length for how long it takes someone to recover from a tragic loss. You can’t count down to the last day of your grief What you can do is continue to celebrate the small victories. You may have smiled and laughed today, or helped someone who needed it. Enjoy the small triumphs as they come, and know that each one leads to healing. |
| 3/1/2024 | “Had any poet adequately described the wretched ugliness of a loved one turned inside out with grief?” – Kate Morton, The Forgotten Garden Your family and friends may be more worried about you than you realize. Be sure to check in with them and talk about how you are doing periodically. |
| 2/29/2024 | “Hold him in your memory find him in your dreams” – Unknown You will see your loved one again in your dreams. It will come when you least expect it and will give you some comfort. |
| 2/28/2024 | “What I have learned lately is that people deal with death in all sorts of ways. Some of us fight against it, doing everything we can to make it not true. Some of us lose our selves to grief. Some of us lose ourselves to anger.” – Carrie Jones, Entice How are you coping? What does your grief look like? There is not “right” grief and “wrong” grief. There is only your grief. |
| 2/27/2024 | “The way I pictured it, all this grief would be like a winter night when you’re standing outside. You’ll warm up once you get used to the cold. Except after you’ve been out there for awhile, you feel the warmth draining out of you and you realize the opposite is happening; you’re getting colder and colder, as the body heat you brought outside with you seeps out of your skin. Instead of getting used to it, you get weaker the longer you endure it.” – Rob Sheffield, Love is a Mix Tape Just about the time when you fear that you are not going to feel better, something will happen to give you hope. You may hear from an old friend, have the opportunity to help someone, or find yourself laughing at a funny tv show. Open yourself up to opportunities that provide positive distractions during this grieving process. You need to feel joy to help your healing process. |
| 2/26/2024 | “It takes a year, nephew… a full turn of the calendar, to get over losing someone.” – Annie Proulx, The Shipping News It would be comforting to know exactly how long the grieving process takes. Everyone you talk to has his/her own advice, and books on the subject have differing opinions as well. The truth is that it is different for everyone. Don’t feel pressured by the calendar. Your grieving period will take as long as it takes, and you cannot actively control that. Be good to yourself and work through this time with a sense of patience rather than urgency. |
| 2/25/2024 | “I wish everyone would stop crying, Tom. Uncle Joe would be so angry about it.” But she’s crying herself now. “He’d be so angry at us, Tom, for crying so much when all he did was laugh.” – Melina Marchetta, The Piper’s Son There may be days when you find yourself crying as much as you did when you first experienced your loss. Seeing something that reminds you of your loved one or running into a mutual friend can bring your loss back to the forefront of your mind. Crying is natural, and many people still have periods when they cry more often as they heal. |
| 2/24/2024 | “If he didn’t love so deeply, he couldn’t grieve so deeply. But he’s drowning in it.” – Dee Henderson, The Protector Think about how someone you know seemed when he or she was grieving. How did you feel being around that person? While it’s tough to see yourself objectively, try to determine how you may be connecting with those around you. Taking the extra effort to make them comfortable will actually help you too. |
| 2/23/2024 | “Grief … gives life a permanently provisional feeling. It doesn’t seem worth starting anything. I can’t settle down. I yawn, I fidget, I smoke too much. Up till this I always had too little time. Now there is nothing but time. Almost pure time, empty successiveness.” – C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed Begin a project that is meaningful to you. You may want to label old photos or videos, donate clothing to a charity, or reorganize your bedroom. Take on a task that generates a tangible result, so that, upon its completion, you can look at it and see what you have achieved. |
| 2/22/2024 | “I do hope that when the day comes, whether in 1, 10, or 100 years, I don’t want you to think of me and feel sad.” – Esther Earl, This Star Won’t Go Out: The Life and Words of Esther Grace Earl Do something special – be it lunch with a friend or a walk in the park with a relative – and take a photograph of it. You need to start to build some new memories centered on what you are doing today. |
| 2/21/2024 | “Grief teaches the steadiest minds to waver.” – Sophocles, Antigone Ask someone else who is grieving what he or she needs, and try to do whatever it is for that person. Any concrete things you can do to help someone else will help you with your own grief. |
| 2/20/2024 | “We bereaved are not alone. We belong to the largest company in all the world–the company of those who have known suffering.” – Helen Keller, We Bereaved There will be times when you mourn the person you were before you experienced the loss of a loved one. |
| 2/19/2024 | “Take any emotion – love for a woman, or grief for a loved one, or what I’m going through, fear and pain from a deadly illness. If you hold back on the emotions – if you don’t allow yourself to go all the way through them – you can never get to being detached, you’re too busy being afraid. You’re afraid of the pain, you’re afraid of the grief. You’re afraid of the vulnerability that loving entails. “But by throwing yourself into these emotions, by allowing yourself to dive in, all the way, over your head even, you experience them fully and completely. You know what pain is. You know what love is. You know what grief is. And only then can you say, ‘All right. I have experienced that emotion. I recognize that emotion. Now I need to detach from that emotion for a moment’.” – Mitch Albom, Tuesdays with Morrie As you experience the grief process, try to have an awareness of how you are feeling and how those who share your pain are feeling. It helps to have self awareness so that you can eventually use this time to grow and become a more thoughtful, empathetic person. |
| 2/18/2024 | “Nix still held Benny’s hand, and her grip tightened to an almost crushing force, grinding his hand bones together. It hurt, but Benny would rather have cut that hand off than take it back at that moment. If it would help Nix through this, he’d give her a pair of pliers and a vise so she could do a proper job.” – Jonathan Maberry, Dust and Decay Do a task today that you’ve been putting off for a while. It could be writing a thank you note, cleaning a closet, or some other mundane obligation. Just accomplishing something small can be extremely satisfying. |
| 2/17/2024 | “A shade of sorrow passed over Taliesin’s face. ‘There are those,’ he said gently, ‘who must first learn loss, despair, and grief. Of all paths to wisdom, this is the cruelest and longest. Are you one who must follow such a way? This even I cannot know. If you are, take heart nonetheless. Those who reach the end do more than gain wisdom. As rough wool becomes cloth, and crude clay a vessel, so do they change and fashion wisdom for others, and what they give back is greater than what they won.” Lloyd Alexander Make an extra effort to smile. Doing so can actually make you feel better. |
| 2/16/2024 | “I basked in you; I loved you, helplessly, with a boundless tongue-tied love. And death doesn’t prevent me from loving you. Besides, in my opinion you aren’t dead. (I know dead people, and you are not dead.)” Franz Wright Proactively do something today that makes another person know that you like or value them. It could be as simple as a quick complement or as elaborate as sending a gift. Take a few minutes to make that effort towards making someone else feel special. |
| 2/15/2024 | “Tears have always been easier to shed than explain.” Marty Rubin Sometimes it feels like there are no words to accurately describe what grief feels like. As with any pain, you can’t remember it with precision after the fact, which is a blessing. |
| 2/14/2024 | “When a relationship of love is disrupted, the relationship does not cease. The love continues; therefore, the relationship continues. The work of grief is to reconcile and redeem life to a different love relationship.” W. Scott Lineberry You have lost someone you love. It might have been a romantic love, a familial love or a friendship love. The loss is palpable, leaving a gap in yourself that cannot be ignored. To work through this grief, you need to find a new love to build. It might be the love of a hobby, the love of beauty in art or nature, or the love of a shared goal with others. Call it a passion, a drive, or a purpose, you need to have something that motivates you moving forward. You may already have it in your life, but you have not cultivated it. Take the time to find or develop a new, great love. |
| 2/13/2024 | “Here’s what I know: death abducts the dying, but grief steals from those left behind.” Katherine Owen When you have experienced a loss, you can feel like a victim. Something precious was taken away from you, and there is a definite helplessness to that. You need to make the active decision to not be a victim of your grief. Feel the sadness, but work through the pain proactively each day to take back control of your life. |
| 2/12/2024 | “Grief lasts longer than sympathy, which is one of the tragedies of the grieving.” Elizabeth McCracken You probably haven’t received a sympathy card in quite a while. Most of your friends, family, neighbors and coworkers already know about your loss, and have reached out to you. You may be feeling fairly isolated and forgotten. While you can’t force people to reach out to you again, it can be helpful to reach out to someone else who needs you. Offer to run an errand for a busy parent, pick up groceries for an elderly neighbor, or send a card to someone who could use the pick-me-up that comes from being remembered. The process of acting to help another person will make you feel more alive and connected. |
| 2/11/2024 | “Tears are a river that takes you somewhere…Tears lift your boat off the rocks, off dry ground, carrying it downriver to someplace better.” Clarissa Pinkola Estés It hasn’t been too long to cry. Cry when you need to cry and dry your tears when you are ready. |
| 2/10/2024 | “Heart weeps. Head tries to help heart. Head tells heart how it is, again: You will lose the ones you love. They will all go. But even the earth will go, someday. Heart feels better, then. But the words of head do not remain long in the ears of heart. Heart is so new to this. I want them back, says heart. Head is all heart has. Help, head. Help heart.” Lydia Davis Your head seems to be healing faster than your heart. You understand your loss intellectually. Why then do you awake with the hope in your heart that it was all just a bad dream? As with all matters of love, the heart has a bigger role to play than the head would want! |
| 2/9/2024 | “Nothing that grieves us can be called little: by the eternal laws of proportion a child’s loss of a doll and a king’s loss of a crown are events of the same size.” Mark Twain When you turn on the news or read a magazine article that focuses on someone else’s tragedy, you may feel guilty because their losses may seem more “important” than yours. How can I be so upset about my situation when others have much more serious ones? You never need to feel that way. You are as justified as anyone else to have the feelings that you do about your loss. It is as personal as a fingerprint, and another person’s situation cannot diminish yours. |
| 2/8/2024 | ” I think of the chimp, the one with the talking hands. In the course of the experiment, that chimp had a baby. Imagine how her trainers must have thrilled when the mother, without prompting, began to sign her newborn. Baby, drink milk. Baby, play ball. And when the baby died, the mother stood over the body, her wrinkled hands moving with animal grace, forming again and again the words: Baby, come hug, Baby come hug, fluent now in the language of grief.” Amy Hempel Is it comforting that so many other people are grieving too? For someone, the grief process started today. For someone else, the first glimpse of hope that things would get better happened. One of the tough parts of grieving can be that it seems isolating. Wherever you are in your process, though, always know that you are not alone in your feelings. |
| 2/7/2024 | “Life Lesson 3: You can’t rush grief. It has its own timetable. All you can do is make sure there are lots of soft places around — beds, pillows, arms, laps.” Patti Davis Show yourself the same patience that you show to everyone else in your life. The key is to believe that you will heal from this. You will be changed, but you will heal nonetheless. |
| 2/6/2024 | “The depth of the feeling continued to surprise and threaten me, but each time it hit again and I bore it…I would discover that it hadn’t washed me away.” Anne Lamott Just about the time you think you are doing better, something happens that brings memories flooding back. Try not to feel discouraged. Think of grief like a toddler learning to walk. The child has to hold on at first (and cries a lot!). Over time, the steps become more steady. While the child falls as he gains his footing, his strength grows with time and the help of people who care. While the toddler will surely fall again, those falls will become less and less frequent. You too will learn to “walk”. |
| 2/5/2024 | “Sometimes she’d go a whole day without thinking of him or missing him. Why not? She had quite a full life, and really, he’d often been hard to deal with and hard to live with. A project, the Yankee old timers like her very own Dad might have said. And then sometimes a day would come, a gray one (or a sunny one) when she missed him so fiercely she felt empty, not a woman at all anymore but just a dead tree filled with cold November blow. She felt like that now, felt like hollering his name and hollering him home, and her heart turned sick with the thought of the years ahead and she wondered what good love was if it came to this, to even ten seconds of feeling like this.” Stephen King Take time to work on your other relationships today. It could be with your children, your siblings, your parents, or your friends. Make sure you stay connected to the people who matter to you. As you heal, those bonds will grow stronger and help you to return to life. |
| 2/4/2024 | “Sometimes, there was no getting over it. Sometimes, you lived with the empty place inside of you until you imploded on it, loss as singularity, or until the empty place expanded and hollowed out the rest of you so thoroughly you became the walking dead, a ghost in your own life.” Caitlin Kittredge There will still be days when you feel like you are a shell. You have to go through the motions and get through it. As you know by now, it won’t be easy. The good news is that it won’t last forever, and you will get through it. Try to find a spark of hope. You just need to weather this storm, because tomorrow will probably be a little easier. |
| 2/3/2024 | “What happens when you let go, when your strength leaves you and you sink into darkness, when there’s nothing that you or anyone else can do, no matter how desperate you are, no matter how you try? Perhaps it’s then, when you have neither pride nor power, that you are saved, brought to an unimaginably great reward.” Mark Halperin Can you let go of your grief for one day? You may not be ready quite yet. Try to involve yourself in a project or hobby today that frees your mind, even if it’s only for a short time. |
| 2/2/2024 | “I waited for dawn, but only because I had forgotten how hard mornings were. For a second I’d be normal. Then came the dim awareness of something off, out of place. Then the truth came crashing down and that was it for the rest of the day. Sunlight was reproof. Shouldn’t I feel better than I had in the dead of night.” Francine Prose When you least expect it, there will be a morning when you wake up and forget about your loss. Try not to feel guilty, for it is a sign of progress. While it may not happen again for a long time, waking up without sadness will eventually be the norm. |
| 2/1/2024 | “The weird, weird thing about devastating loss is that life actually goes on. When you’re faced with a tragedy, a loss so huge that you have no idea how you can live through it, somehow, the world keeps turning, the seconds keep ticking.” James Patterson, Angel When you walk down the street, you probably pass several people who are grieving. Can you pick them out of the crowd? No – nor can you be identified as grieving by those who don’t know you. Life goes on, but you are not alone in your grieving process. Be sure to stay connected to others so you don’t feel isolated in your process. |
| 1/31/2024 | “It (nostalgia) reassures us of past happiness and accomplishment; and, since these still remain on deposit, as it were, in the bank of our memory, it simultaneously bestows upon us a certain worth, irrespective of how present circumstances may seem to question or obscure this. And current worth, as our friendly bank loan officer assures us, is entitled to at least some claim on the future as well.” Fred Davis Memories may have been making you feel sad lately. Perhaps a special birthday or anniversary is near, and it’s been difficult to manage your emotions. However, nostalgia is a great reminder that you were and are important. You bring joy to others, and can continue to do so. As time progresses, try to see your memories as a source of empowerment rather than a source of sadness. |
| 1/30/2024 | “When you arise in the morning, think of what precious privilege it is to be alive – to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.” Marcus Aurelius Find one thing today that reminds you how beautiful life is. Photograph it and print it out. Then, use it as a visual reminder when you need it. |
| 1/29/2024 | “Start before you’re ready.” Steven Pressfield You may never feel like you are ready to reconnect with people and pursue things that interest you. Take the leap anyway…you’ll be glad you did. |
| 1/28/2024 | “In any given moment we have two options: to step forward into growth or to step back into safety.” Abraham Maslow Find the courage today to do something you would not ordinarily do. What that looks like is different for everyone, but the act of taking a risk will empower you. |
| 1/27/2024 | “There’s a loneliness that only exists in one’s mind. The loneliest moment in someone’s life is when they are watching their whole world fall apart, and all they can do is stare blankly.” F. Scott Fitzgerald When was the last time you spoke to a stranger? Hold the door for someone with a baby carriage; help someone who is struggling to carry bags to ease his/her burden; compliment someone on his/her outfit. You must make the effort to connect with others even in small ways throughout the day. |
| 1/26/2024 | “We hold on so tightly, because we’re terrified of loss. We hold on till our hands bleed. And in that self-shattering persistence, we fail to see the answer: Just let go.” Yasmin Mogahed Let yourself feel some happiness today. Allow yourself to smile. You need to feel some joy to help you balance the pain you are working through right now. |
| 1/25/2024 | “Happiness isn’t about getting what you want all the time. It’s about loving what you have and being grateful for it.” Asher Roth You are working through your grief, and that is an overwhelming process. Look for one thing today that makes you smile. You may have to search online for a comedic video or timely cartoon you find amusing. Try to reawaken that part of your emotions. |
| 1/24/2024 | “The whole world can become the enemy when you lose what you love.” Kristina McMorris There may be times when you look at those people who have not lost someone with envy. They seem like they don’t have any real problems as they live in the blissful ignorance of what it feels like before you experience great loss. Your grief changes you, but it also brings wisdom. You can now empathize and connect with others in ways that you could not truly do so before your loss. Your loss brings to you a greater understanding of life and all of its stages. |
| 1/23/2024 | “A ship is safe in harbor, but that’s not what ships are for.” William G.T. Shedd Sometimes grief makes us want to stay home alone and not engage with our friends and family. Try to go out and connect with others. Go shopping with a friend; have coffee with a relative; attend a club meeting. It’s hard to go out and be part of life, but if you try to do so it will help you to heal. |
| 1/22/2024 | “And in the end it is not the years in your life that count, it’s the life in your years.” Abraham Lincoln What have you done lately that makes you feel alive and connected to nature? Go for a bike ride, take a walk, go for a swim…there are so many ways to feel part of the greater world around you. |
| 1/21/2024 | “If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.” Mother Teresa Write an email to someone who is also impacted by loss. Talk about how you are feeling in an honest,open fashion. These are the times when we need each other. |
| 1/20/2024 | “Happiness is not the absence of problems, it’s the ability to deal with them.” Steve Maraboli You don’t need to aspire to be happy or even to “not” be sad. Just take a moment and actively reflect on how you’re feeling today. Be good to yourself, but be honest. You can recognize that you feel lonely or sad. That is a step towards feeling better. |
| 1/19/2024 | “The greatest gift you can give someone is your time, your attention, your love, your concern.” Joel Osteen Reach out to a neighbor today. Walk their dog, take in their mail…find something you can do for them to make their day a little easier. Being proactive is a critical part of your healing process. |
| 1/18/2024 | “For myself I am an optimist – it does not seem to be much use to be anything else.” Winston Churchill How can you feel optimistic when you still feel sad? It is so difficult to believe that things are going to improve when the burden of grief is so heavy to bear. You may not be ready to feel optimistic about a lot of things today. Try to feel optimistic about one….you will heal and be able to enjoy life again. Once you start having that belief, your life will slowly change. |
| 1/17/2024 | “Change the way you look at things and the things you look at change.” Wayne W. Dyer Take out a concrete object today that reminds you of your loved one. It could be a photograph, a letter, or something that belonged to that person. Even if the object initially makes you feel sad, think of at least two things about it that make you feel happy. It is not an easy assignment, and you may not be able to do it yet. Keep trying, though, as it will help you to move past your grief into a place of greater contentment. |
| 1/16/2024 | “We all make mistakes, have struggles, and even regret things in our past. But you are not your mistakes, you are not your struggles, and you are here NOW with the power to shape your day and future.” Steve Maraboli What are you going to do today? Will you be at home or are you going out? You decide today who you are going to be and what you are going to do. The control you have over yourself and your actions is actually an important part of your healing. Your loved one being gone makes you feel like you have no control. However, you do control a lot of the pieces of your life. Having an awareness of that will help you feel less like a victim of your loss. |
| 1/15/2024 | “To live in hearts we leave behind is not to die.” Thomas Campbell Write down one thing today that you learned from the person you lost. Put it in your pocket and take it out whenever you feel you need to to get through the day. Perhaps tomorrow you will not need the concrete reminder of the legacy left by such a special person in your heart. |
| 1/14/2024 | There is no passion to be found playing small – in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living.” Nelson Mandela Your grief is a setback. It is unquestionably devastating and even frightening as you piece together what feels like the shattered pieces of your life. But this is your life, and your chance to live it is today. Take a step, no matter how small, towards finding your purpose. |
| 1/13/2024 | “I suppose that since most of our hurts come through relationships so will our healing, and I know that grace rarely makes sense for those looking in from the outside.” Wm. Paul Young Are you afraid to tighten the bonds with your family and friends? Do you think that if you become closer with them that you are running the risk of losing them too? It is normal to worry about losing once you have suffered a loss. Despite your hesitancy, it is important to have bonds with others to help you rebuild after your great loss. Death is a hard but inevitable part of life. You cannot stop living, growing, and bonding with others. You need to choose to live. |
| 1/12/2024 | Grief can’t be shared. Everyone carries it alone, his own burden, his own way. Anne Morrow Lindbergh It can be surprising, even shocking, that others who had a relationship with the person you lost are grieving so differently. The fact that they are crying more than you, talking less, seem so contented, or any other difference is hard to understand. The grieving process is hugely different among us all, even when we are working through the loss of the same person. One way is not better or worse than another…it is simply different. At times, trying to talk with someone whose process does not match your own might not be helpful. Instead, you may want to turn to someone who understands and appreciates your grieving process. |
| 1/11/2024 | “Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the little voice at the end of the day that says I’ll try again tomorrow.” Mary Anne Radmacher You may have had several days, even weeks, where you felt like you were doing a little better…not great, but a little better. Then, it hit again like a ton of bricks. Grief sometimes plays cruel tricks where you think you’re handling it, and then you have a setback. This process is long and grueling. Be patient with yourself, and remember that tomorrow is another day. |
| 1/10/2024 | If you suppress grief too much, it can well redouble. Moliere You do not have to pretend to be the strong person that your family, friends, or even society assumes that you are. You may not want to cry, but you need to find an outlet for the intense emotions that come with grief. If the tears won’t come, you should do something physical to release some of that pressure. Taking a walk, running, or riding a bike can be helpful ways to handle the daunting feelings of grief. |
| 1/9/2024 | Thinking and talking about death need not be morbid; they may be quite the opposite. Ignorance and fear of death overshadow life, while knowing and accepting death erases this shadow. Lily Pincus It is important that you find someone in your life who has also lost someone close to them. It may be a family member, but it could also be someone that you connect with online or as part of a support group. You may not need to talk about your loss every day, but there will be days that you need to have someone to whom you can just say, “Today is tough,” knowing that the person on the other end of the phone or who reads your email understands. Having that moment where you feel safe and understood is important. If you haven’t found someone to fill that role, you should begin trying to do so. It will help those flashes of pain much easier to bear. |
| 1/8/2024 | Death ends a life, not a relationship. Jack Lemmon What defines a relationship? Many would argue that a relationship is the bond you have with another person. That bond, of course, varies a lot depending upon the person with whom you share it. However, the connection that you have is one that is everlasting, and most certainly transcends death. When your partner passes on, the relationship still remains. You don’t have to use the past tense when you think about your loved one. Say to yourself, “I love this person,” rather than, “I loved this person.” It is a small change, but one that will help your heart know that you don’t have to abandon that relationship, but to see it as an important part of your life today. |
| 1/7/2024 | “Grief is a curious thing, when it happens unexpectedly. It is a Band-aid being ripped away, taking the top layer off a family. And the underbelly of a household is never pretty, ours no exception.” Jodi Picoult Everyone responds to grief differently. Some people talk about their feelings at length, some seem angry with the world, and others withdraw. Within your own family, people may be grieving differently. Know that even if each family member is responding differently, that you all have the same shared experience. Try to reach out to one another with love and understanding. Be good to each other as you try to work through this challenge together. |
| 1/6/2024 | “Shock is a merciful condition. It allows you to get through disaster with a necessary distance between you and your feelings.” Lisa Kleypas Do you wish you still felt the way you did a month ago? You were numb and going through the motions of your life to just “get through” the obligations that come with the death of a loved one. Now, you’re not shocked anymore, and the slow realization of the truth has moved into your psyche. This stage is tough, because it feels so final. Hang on and don’t feel discouraged. It takes a lot of patience to work through the first few months after such a tragedy. |
| 1/5/2024 | “There’s a fine edge to new grief, it severs nerves, disconnects reality–there’s mercy in a sharp blade. Only with time, as the edge wears, does the real ache begin.” Christopher Moore You probably need to hear it again today. You are feeling sad, and you think that feeling is never going to end. The grief becomes almost frustrating with its endless presence. It is still a new loss, even if the calendar tells you otherwise. Know that the grief will be there, and know that it will be a painfully slow in easing its grasp on your heart. |
| 1/4/2024 | “Grieving doesn’t make you imperfect. It makes you human.” Sarah Dessen When you go out and see all the people busily leading their lives, it feels like you are the only one grieving. Everyone seems purposeful and fully occupied with the events of their day. At times like that you may feel truly alone in your grief. However, people from the outside looking at you might not realize your struggle. They don’t ask you how you are because they assume you are healing, and that you are doing ok. Most people who are grieving are hiding their pain from the outside world. You are not alone…you are simply unaware of the millions of others who feel like you do. |
| 1/3/2024 | “Before you can live a part of you has to die. You have to let go of what could have been, how you should have acted and what you wish you would have said differently. You have to accept that you can’t change the past experiences, opinions of others at that moment in time or outcomes from their choices or yours. When you finally recognize that truth then you will understand the true meaning of forgiveness of yourself and others. From this point you will finally be free.” Shannon L. Alder You have to forgive yourself for all of the things you wish you’d done differently in your relationship with your loved one. If you had died first, he/she would have been facing this struggle instead. Would you want that? Forgive yourself so you can heal. Living your life is a gift to be treasured. Don’t allow yourself to wallow in regret. Be the best person you can today to show you have learned from your past mistakes. |
| 1/2/2024 | “You attend the funeral, you bid the dead farewell. You grieve. Then you continue with your life. And at times the fact of her absence will hit you like a blow to the chest, and you will weep. But this will happen less and less as time goes on. She is dead. You are alive. So live.” Neil Gaiman After a while, people stop asking you how you are doing. After a while, people assume that you must have gotten used to your loss. It may take longer than people who have not been through grief realize how long it takes to return to some kind of normalcy again. Yet, you must eventually do so. There is nothing to be gained by trapping yourself in your grief forever. So…grieve, cry, and then live. |
| 1/1/2024 | “…acceptance is yet another of life’s “here’s a side of hurt” lessons and it is never truly acceptance unless it has cost us something to arrive there. Why, you ask? Because, I answer. Inadequate yet true.” Libba Bray When your anger has cooled, and your tears have dried, you will eventually find yourself in a place of reluctant acceptance. You never have to like what has happened, but you will learn to accept that, for whatever reason, it did. |
| 12/31/2023 | “See, as much as you want to hold on to the bitter sore memory that someone has left this world, you are still in it. And the very act of living is a tide: at first it seems to make no difference at all, and then one day you look down and see how much pain has eroded.” Jodi Picoult You will not feel like you have made any progress in healing from your loss for so long that the idea of feeling better seems implausible. Then, out of nowhere, you will suddenly realize that you are doing a little better. Celebrate that moment. It is a long journey to get there, and worthy of your pride. |
| 12/30/2023 | People think they know you. They think they know how you’re handling a situation. But the truth is no one knows. No one knows what happens after you leave them, when you’re lying in bed or sitting over your breakfast alone and all you want to do is cry or scream. They don’t know what’s going on inside your head–the mind-numbing cocktail of anger and sadness and guilt. This isn’t their fault. They just don’t know. And so they pretend and they say you’re doing great when you’re really not. And this makes everyone feel better. Everybody but you.” William H. Woodwell Jr. You may not be an athlete, but you have a game face. When you go out into the world, you hide that piece of you that is broken…that piece that is grieving. It is good to have a life outside of the grief. It helps to have parts of your day that distract you from how you are feeling inside. In time, those parts will grow and grow until they begin to crowd out the sadness in your heart. |
| 12/29/2023 | “You cannot die of grief, though it feels as if you can. A heart does not actually break, though sometimes your chest aches as if it is breaking. Grief dims with time. It is the way of things. There comes a day when you smile again, and you feel like a traitor. How dare I feel happy. How dare I be glad in a world where my father is no more. And then you cry fresh tears, because you do not miss him as much as you once did, and giving up your grief is another kind of death.” Laurell K. Hamilton Guilt is grief’s unfortunate partner. We feel guilty because our grief is keeping us from connecting to the living. We feel guilty because we are not grieving as much as we once did. Let go of the guilt. The grief process is a natural part of losing someone we care about. As you come out of the grieving period, be happy, not guilty, that you can return to being the person your loved one knew. |
| 12/28/2023 | “Whoever said that loss gets easier with time was a liar. Here’s what really happens: The spaces between the times you miss them grow longer. Then, when you do remember to miss them again, it’s still with a stabbing pain to the heart. And you have guilt. Guilt because it’s been too long since you missed them last.” Kristin O’Donnell Tubb You may be desperate to feel better, yet almost afraid to let go of the pain. You do not need to feel guilty for trying to live a normal life again. The person you lost does not want you to stop living. As you heal, know that it is normal to feel wary about your return to normalcy. It is part of your healing. Coming out of mourning does not mean you no longer feel love for the person you lost. It means that it is time to reestablish yourself as a vital, living person again. |
| 12/27/2023 | “No matter how bad your heart is broken, the world doesn’t stop for your grief.” Faraaz Kazi You may find yourself questioning why no one else around you appears to be sad. How can there be laughter and dancing? How can you be upset because your soup is cold when my heart is broken forever? The world may seem very frivolous right now. Try to not let that make you feel angry or isolated. You are not the only person grieving. Reach out to others who are experiencing the same struggle. It will help the world feel more like a place of healing and less chaotic. |
| 12/26/2023 | “When one person is missing the whole world seems empty.” Pat Schweibert We never think about how our life is a careful balance. Everyone with whom we interact regularly plays a part in creating our world, a web of people who make us feel comfortable, safe, and loved. When we lose an integral part of that web, we feel lost. The balance is upset, and we feel like we will topple over from the grief and the uncertainty of this terrible change. You may feel like things are “out of whack” for a long time. That is normal. Over the next months and years, you will be able to methodically reset the balance, so that you return to a feeling of normalcy. Know that you are resilient and that you can make it through this unbalanced period of your life. |
| 12/25/2023 | Friendship doubles our joy and divides our grief. Swedish Proverb Many times when people grieve, their first instinct is to isolate themselves from others. You may need to cry, or to just sit in silent reflection as you continue to try to process what has happened. However, in conjunction with your personal grieving, it is often beneficial to take the time to talk about your sadness with people you trust. Having a friend, support group, or counselor can make a tremendous difference as you try to re-assimilate to the life you led before this tragedy. Being able to talk and to listen to the advice and stories of others helps you to reconnect. Isolating yourself is easy, but it shows great courage and fortitude to share these vulnerabilities with others. Take a chance and talk about what you are going through…you’ll be glad you did. |
| 12/24/2023 | Love is stronger than death even though it can’t stop death from happening, but no matter how hard death tries it can’t separate people from love. It can’t take away our memories either. In the end, life is stronger than death. Anonymous People talk about the importance of memories when you have had a loss. It is true that they are often referred to as treasured, and that is an accurate description. Yet, our memories can also evoke the most pain when the loss is still fresh in our minds. Trying to find the balance between the happiness and sadness of our memories is one of the hardest parts of grieving as time passes. You want to look at photographs, watch home videos, or read letters to keep your connection to your loved one fresh. At the same time, these items can also be difficult reminders of the acute pain you are feeling as you adjust to the loss. The key is to find the balance that is best for you. The answer for each person is different. For some, looking at such images, crying for a few minutes, and then moving on is cathartic. For others, it is too hard to see them at this point. Follow your gut instinct when deciding whether you are ready to look at concrete images of your loved one. If you have to turn over a photograph to help heal, then that is what you should do. Continue to be patient with yourself, and do what feels right. Most importantly, know that the way you grieve should be personal, and that there is no “best” way to work through the process. |
| 12/23/2023 | “Everyone grieves in different ways. For some, it could take longer or shorter. I do know it never disappears. An ember still smolders inside me. Most days, I don’t notice it, but, out of the blue, it’ll flare to life.” -Maria V. Snyder When grief is your every day, it’s hard to imagine not having that weight on your shoulders. It’s hard to fathom that there is even the possibility of a life without it. However, as it fades and your hope builds of a life free of that constant sorrow, know that there will be flare-ups. There will be a little reminder that brings it all flooding back. The good news is that the reminders are not permanent. They will startle you, but then fade away. These bonds do not break, but the level of intensity softens over time, allowing you to slowly move forward. |
| 12/22/2023 | “Youth offers the promise of happiness, but life offers the realities of grief.” Nicholas Sparks, No matter your age or your background, the process of grief is the last step in truly growing up. Your life before loss was one of a kind of childlike innocence compared to the life you have now. However, it is not without hope or value. The love and understanding you can bring to others has a depth and intensity unlike any other. Your appreciation for life and its joys makes you a richer, stronger person. This does not happen overnight. This depth of character builds in conjunction with your grief process. It is the phoenix rising from the pain of loss. Use this gift to enhance the lives of those around you. |
| 12/21/2023 | “Grief is a most peculiar thing; we’re so helpless in the face of it. It’s like a window that will simply open of its own accord. The room grows cold, and we can do nothing but shiver. But it opens a little less each time, and a little less; and one day we wonder what has become of it.” Arthur Golden Your grief may fade away completely one day, or it may always play a role in your consciousness. No matter its intensity, it will evolve into something you can become accustomed to over time. |
| 12/20/2023 | “So it’s true, when all is said and done, grief is the price we pay for love.” E.A. Bucchianeri Take a minute today to remember three times when your loved one made you laugh and smile. Relive those beautiful memories in your head. Those sweet moments are why you feel such sadness. Know that they were worth it. |
| 12/19/2023 | “There should be a statute of limitation on grief. A rulebook that says it is all right to wake up crying, but only for a month. That after 42 days you will no longer turn with your heart racing, certain you have heard her call out your name. That there will be no fine imposed if you feel the need to clean out her desk; take down her artwork from the refrigerator; turn over a school portrait as you pass – if only because it cuts you fresh again to see it. That it’s okay to measure the time she has been gone, the way we once measured her birthdays.” Jodi Picoult Your process of grief is not following anyone else’s timetable. It may take you two years to feel like someone else does in two months. Think of when you learned to walk or learned to read or learned to drive. Everyone’s timetable is different for every part of life. Grieving is no different. Be patient with your heart. You will grieve as you need to for as long as you need to do so. |
| 12/18/2023 | “They say time heals all wounds, but that presumes the source of the grief is finite” Cassandra Clare There is something so special about learning something new about the person you have lost. Hearing a new story or finding a letter you forgot about is an unexpected joy. While these moments are undeniably special, they can also rekindle the sadness of your loss. Try to treasure these artifacts as gifts, rather than focus on the feeling of emptiness they may evoke. Your loved one will always be with you, and these new connections only strengthen the bond you will always have. |
| 12/17/2023 | “And grief still feels like fear. Perhaps, more strictly, like suspense. Or like waiting; just hanging about waiting for something to happen. It gives life a permanently provisional feeling. It doesn’t seem worth starting anything. I can’t settle down. I yawn, fidget, I smoke too much. Up till this I always had too little time. Now there is nothing but time. Almost pure time, empty successiveness.” C.S. Lewis When you are grieving, it feels like your time is monopolized by nothing but waves of emotion. Reflecting on how you are doing, you may be feeling worried that your life seems to have changed so much in such a short amount of time. Do not panic. As all-encompassing as your grief is now, this intensity will not last much longer. You may already be feeling better than you did just a couple of weeks ago. Take a moment or two and celebrate the healing you’ve already done. |
| 12/16/2023 | “Someone experiencing the stages of grief is rarely aware of how his behavior might appear to others. Grief often produces a “zoom lens effect,” in which the focus is entirely on oneself, to the exclusion of external considerations.” Sol Luckman Grief sends us into survival mode: we do the bare minimum to exist because the majority of our energy is directed towards grieving. Do not spend time worrying about the details of your life that you may have neglected during the early days of your grief. Instead, choose one thing today that helps you feel more connected to your old life and do it. |
| 12/15/2023 | “Tears aren’t for the people we’ve lost. They’re for us. So we can remember, and celebrate, and miss them, and feel human.” C.J. Redwine We are filled with such emotions about the person we lost and the relationship we lost. The feelings are so strong that we have to let them go by crying. Never feel shame in that. |
| 12/14/2023 | “Somehow the thought she might be next wasn’t nearly as terrifying as the realization he was gone.” Marcha A. Fox There is an inherent fear in facing a life without your loved one. You can’t change what has happened, and you can’t make everything “ok”. What you can do today is to take a look at that fear and share your emotions with someone you trust. Just saying out loud, “I’m really scared to go on living without this person” can help ease your fear and pain. |
| 12/13/2023 | “What was I going to do? The choices seemed basic and slim: Die. Exist. Live. I wanted to die, but with two young children to care for and a husband, that wasn’t an option. Exist. I could do that. I was doing that now. but how flat and lifeless. How dreary and endless the long march would be until I met Charlotte again. The only option that resonated with me was to live. But how? I wanted to want to live. That was the best I could do in that moment.” Sukey Forbes The obligations of your life may be the only driving forces propelling you forward right now. Rely on those routines to keep you going until you are ready to face your feelings. |
| 12/12/2023 | “Sorry doesn’t make anything better. It’s just a word to fill the space of a loss of words.” Shari J. Ryan Be grateful today for the people in your life who have reached out to you to try to lift your spirits. Take the time to thank them. |
| 12/11/2023 | “Grief is one illness that defies all remedies; it must ever run its course.” Brandy Purdy You can pretend that your grief is not there or hide it, but it will stay with you until it has run its course. The feeling of grief may make you impatient or angry. Instead, try to find a place of acceptance. Because you cannot force the process to be over, you need to just acknowledge that that is where your heart is right now. Time will be the best healer. |
| 12/10/2023 | “To better handle grief, become the passenger, not the driver.” Todd Stocker Letting people help you is as therapeutic for them as it is for you. Just remember that a time will surely come when you can repay the favor. |
| 12/9/2023 | “It’s easy to be forgetful when you’re grieving, even forget those things that you believe most people wouldn’t.” Liz Fichera Don’t hesitate to ask for help, even though some time has passed since your loss. Those who have lost someone know the truth – that the grief process is overwhelming for a period of time far longer than one would imagine. |
| 12/8/2023 | “Someone dies, there oughta be something. It oughta shake the world! You’re not supposed to walk away!” Lisa Henry Some days you may wish that the rest of the world could match the way you are feeling inside. It almost seems wrong that life goes on all around you when your world still seems to be upside-down. It’s hard to believe today, but there will come a time when you are grateful that the world is ready and waiting to take you back. |
| 12/7/2023 | “I watch and listen, helpless to help. There is no point in saying “This, too, shall pass,” For a time we do not even want it to pass. We hold on to grief, fearing that its lifting will be the final betrayal.” Ahdaf Soueif You need to take the time you need to grieve. While some might see it as almost a luxury, it is actually a necessity for your physical and emotional health. |
| 12/6/2023 | “Sarah, though, was still sometimes ruled by stark pain, lost to everything else. Grief slipped away, only to attack from behind. It changed shape endlessly. It lacerated her, numbed her, stalked her, startled her, caught her by the throat. It deceived her eye with glimpses of Charles, her ear with the sound of his voice. She would turn and turn, expecting him, and find him gone. Again. Each time Sarah escaped her sorrow, forgetful amid other things, she lost him anew the instant she remembered he was gone.” Kate Maloy Have you thought you heard your loved one’s voice? When that happens, you will feel a mixture of hope and sorrow all in an instant. Recognize that voice was hard, but that eventually, it will actually make you feel more nostalgia than sorrow. |
| 12/5/2023 | “You who have never “been there” in the throes of grief, have no idea what is going on inside the head of the grieving spouse: the scattered thoughts, the constant worry that we will forget something or someone in our fog-induced state, that strange feeling of not quite “being all there” when out in social situations, the pall that covers everything, like a cloak of sadness that never lifts.” Mary Potter Kenyon It seems that most of your energy is directed at grieving. Mundane tasks may not get done and obligations may be forgotten. Make a list of what has to be done and forgive yourself for what doesn’t. In a few months, you will be able to handle your responsibilities without it, but for now it will help to keep you on track. |
| 12/4/2023 | “Grief is always sudden as winter, no matter how long the autumn.” J. Aleksandr Wootton Even if you thought you’d be ready for a death, you probably found that you weren’t. You may have a sense of relief for the person if he or she was in pain or a sense of gratitude if the death was fast or painless. No matter the circumstances, death is final; the mourning phase is no easier under any circumstance. The stark winter-like feeling of a loss is universal. There is no way to soften that blow. |
| 12/3/2023 | “The tough times start,” he said, “the day the last casserole dish is returned.” Michael Perry There is a palpable silence when the rituals surrounding a death are over. It feels like this is the new normal, but it is just a transitional phase. You can fill your home again with sounds and life and love when you are ready to do so. Until then, don’t let the silence frighten you. It will not last forever. |
| 12/2/2023 | “It didn’t help when he told David that his mother would always be with him, even if he couldn’t see her. An unseen mother couldn’t go for long walks with you on summer evenings, drawing the names of trees and flowers from her seemingly infinite knowledge of nature; or help you with your homework, the familiar scent of her in your nostrils as she leaned in to correct a misspelling or puzzle over the meaning of an unfamiliar poem; or read with you on cold Sunday afternoons when the fire” John Connolly Try to be patient when people say the “wrong” thing to you about your loss. In general, people have good intentions. Focus on the spirit of their comments vs. the content of them. |
| 12/1/2023 | “Respect your needs and limitations as you work through your grief and begin to heal” American Pregnancy Association People may be asking you what they can do to help. While well-intentioned, that question can feel overwhelming. You might want to reply with a comment like, “Thank you so much for asking. This has been so tough for me…I don’t even know what I need. It would be great if I could call you if I need something later.” That way you acknowledge the person’s offer and keep the door open in case you realize later that you could use the help. |
| 11/30/2023 | “When those you love die, the best you can do is honor their spirit for as long as you live. You make a commitment that you’re going to take whatever lesson that person or animal was trying to teach you, and you make it true in your own life… it’s a positive way to keep their spirit alive in the world, by keeping it alive in yourself.” Patrick Swayze If you could capture the essence of your loved one using one word, what would it be? Do one thing today to bring that word to life. |
| 11/29/2023 | “There are as many sorrows as there are people who feel them and there are no rules… It is solitary… Grief is such a lonely thing. There is no-one in it with you – others may grieve for the same soul, but they do not grieve exactly for what you also grieve. No-one has lost precisely what you have lost. Not exactly, never exactly. We are in it alone… Oh it is wild and it is lonely. It is as if you’ve woken to a world that you recognise but it has been tilted, somehow – coated, or rubbed down, or made colder or less bright. It echoes where it should not echo; where it should echo, it is as echoless as a single, muffled thud. And grief is not merely sadness, as if sadness alone was not enough to bear. I had imagined the sorrow to be as deep as a well, a howling grief, but I had not imagined the other feelings that have no right to be there, which seem wholly misplaced in a state of grieving – rage, impatience, self-pity, disgust. They come from the dark and rush in upon you…” Susan Fletcher Even when there are people swirling around you, you may feel very lonely in your own skin. It is almost ironic that the times you feel the most isolated may be the times when you are surrounded by the most people. Change your focus from the group as its own entity to one individual. Reach out and talk to that person. Making a one-on-one connection will help you feel more connected again. |
| 11/28/2023 | “It takes so little… to lose it; grief and disappointment can takes one’s faith away so easily that you might wake one morning and have none left.” Susan Fletcher What were your views of God or some sort of higher power before your loss? Have they changed as a result of it? For many people, their faith and spirituality are rocked to the core when they experience the losses of people they love. You may be directing your anger at God for allowing this loss to happen or for not giving you some sort of obvious sign that everything is going to be ok. This doesn’t mean that you can never feel faith and spirituality again. This experience may be a test of your beliefs. When you are ready, you may find that although it has undergone some shifts, your faith is there waiting for you. You don’t have to feel worry or guilt. Anger and doubt are normal feelings when you have experienced great loss. Continue to focus on your own healing, and your faith will restore itself alongside your heart. |
| 11/27/2023 | “Century after century, the belief that an individual’s physical health was independent of his or her emotional health has so dominated medical thought that there has even been open contempt for anyone who would dare to claim that a person’s physical well-being is the sum of its internal and external influences.” Sandy Oshiro Rosen Stop and step outside of yourself. Think about your physical and mental well-being as if you were a friend meeting you on the street. If you can honestly say that an outsider would be worried, take a positive step towards improving your physical and mental help today. If you don’t know what to do, reach out to someone you trust and gain an actual outsider’s perspective and advice. |
| 11/26/2023 | “Grief is beautiful?’ She thought it was the most dreadful feeling possible. At best she viewed the world through a haze, and at worst everything looked black. ‘It means you’ve loved another with all your heart,’ Luka said. ‘What’s the use of being alive if you’ve never loved like that, not even once?” Belinda Alexandra How could anyone be ready to look for a silver lining? Grief is like a blanket covering you from top to bottom. However, try to take a moment to look at your loss from another angle. The love you had was special enough to make you feel this overwhelming sadness. That love is something to be treasured and grateful for during these difficult days. |
| 11/25/2023 | “An observant friend will recognize the signs of the rise of grief: eyes that easily well with tears, a smile that is difficult to sustain, a tendency to withdraw. And ultimately, perhaps we each need to create our own symbol of grieving – to wear our version of black, or maybe to color with black crayons for a while.” Sandy Oshiro Rosen Don’t be afraid to visit with friends, family or neighbors. You don’t have to be ‘ready’ to see people. If you wait until you are feeling better, you will simply become more and more isolated. Take the risk, and be vulnerable. The people in your life will welcome the chance to be there for you. |
| 11/24/2023 | “In order to heal, you have to first be broken.” Renee Dyer Own the fact that you are devastated by this loss. There is no shame in feeling grief. |
| 11/23/2023 | “Laine taped the last box shut. That was it, then: All of Gavin’s belongings put away; some for charity, some for the dump, some to be saved for a happier ‘one day’ that Laine felt, right now, was as distant as the stars.” Stephen M. Irwin Packing up someone’s personal effects can feel so final. A person’s physical belongings almost represent the false hope that he or she is somehow coming back. Packing everything away is a tangible reminder that this is not the case. It can be helpful to create something new to represent that person’s life. From a photo book or collage to a framed item such as a letter or memento, these visualizations can help you feel more connected to your loved one as you deal with his or her personal items. |
| 11/22/2023 | “She lost much of her appetite. At night, an invisible hand kept shaking her awake every few hours. Grief was physiological, a disturbance of the blood. Sometimes a whole minute would pass in nameless dread – the bedside clock ticking, the blue moonlight coating the window like glue – before she’d remember the brutal fact that had caused it.” Jeffrey Eugenides Grief can consume you body and soul. The overwhelming stress can impact your health, especially in the areas of eating and sleeping. If you have tried to eat an appropriate number of calories per day – not too many or too few – and been physically active, that can help. If you are still struggling with these areas, you should make an appointment to see your doctor. Don’t be afraid to talk to a professional to protect your health during this difficult time. |
| 11/21/2023 | “Before I lost my father, I never understood the rituals surrounding funerals: the wake, the service itself, the reception afterward,the dinners prepared by well-meaning friends and delivered in plastic containers, even the popular habit of making poster boards filled with photos of the dear departed. But now I know why we do those things. It’s busywork, all of it. I had so much to take care of, so many arrangements to make, so many people to inform, I didn’t have a moment to be engulfed by the ocean of grief that was lapping at my heels. Instead, I waded through the shallows, performing task after task, grateful to have duties to propel me forward.” Wendy Webb After all of the rituals surrounding the death of your loved one were over, and the tasks that you inevitably had to do afterwards were completed, you may have felt another wave of loss. Now what should you do? You could put your emotions on auto-pilot when there were specific things to be done, but the future may now seem to be looming like an overwhelming burden. Make a task list that you can accomplish within the next month. Include easy tasks and those that may require more effort. Outlining what you need to do over the next four weeks will help you feel more grounded. You may want to make a new list next month or you may find you no longer need it. Continue to make task lists for as long as they provide you with a sense of comfort and stability. |
| 11/20/2023 | “Absence is a house so vast that inside you will pass through its walls and hang pictures on the air.” Pablo Neruda It can feel almost painful to be in the same place where you lived before your loss. Everywhere you look are triggers that bring you back to the time before the death of your loved one. Try to take a proactive approach to living in that space. Photograph the places in your home that remind you of the person you lost. Create a book with the pictures and short narratives telling the memories associated with each spot. In time, those memories will instill feelings of nostalgia instead of grief. |
| 11/19/2023 | “… They took it upon themselves to start the laborious process of cranking up life again, after death has stopped us all in its tracks.” Diane Setterfield What small steps are you ready to take to begin the process of recovering from your loss? Choose something you can do without fear, such as going for a walk or sending a short email to a friend. You don’t have to push yourself to revert back to the same exact life you had before your loss, but you do have to take steps towards a gradual recovery. |
| 11/18/2023 | “She always used to suspect that the price for happiness, the price for enjoying the company of a person you loved, was the steadily increasing risk of losing them, and at times, when she considered the possibility that she might lose Isabel or Clancy or, in the early days, Todd, Bernice didn’t think she could stand it, didn’t think she could go on living in a universe whose laws forced her to submit to such a terrible fear. Now she sees what a small price it is to pay, what staggering joy she received in return. You should be willing to pay that price for as little as a few days or hours with a person you love, she thinks, rubbing her fingers across a patch of linoleum the years have worn down to a cloudy smear.” Stephen Lovely Is it worth all of the grief and sadness you are feeling now to have had the relationship you lost? Look deep into your heart. The answer will always be an emphatic ‘YES!’ |
| 11/17/2023 | “I think grief and fear are going to come to him suddenly. They’ll be undiluted and words won’t work. We’re all going to get hit and won’t know how to hit back. I wish I knew the answers, how to help myself and the people who will hurt all around me.” Kaui Hart Hemmings You may feel frustrated that you don’t have just the right words to comfort those in your life who have suffered the loss along with you. You understand the intensity of the sorrow, yet have no remedy to give. Sometimes just saying, “I know how you’re feeling,” can be enough. |
| 11/16/2023 | “I knew I was being an idiot. But I figured if I kept being an idiot, if I didn’t actually accept the truth, then the truth would become false.” Sherman Alexie Sometimes, you need to “turn off” your grief to give your mind and heart a break. Go to the movies or turn on a feel-good tv show. While you won’t be able to sustain these kinds of distractions for long, it helps to give yourself time to rest from the pain of grieving. |
| 11/15/2023 | “Adam pressed his hand to his face. Sighed. “Right. It’s just that… He died. And I’m so freaking angry…” Kristina McBride Do you wish you could still talk to your loved one? Record what you wish you could have said. While you never need to play it back, the process of saying what you wanted to say can be cathartic. |
| 11/14/2023 | “We don’t forget, but something vacant settles in us.” Roland Barthes When you are ready, creating a photobook, editing home movies, or crafting a scrapbook of memories of your loved one can be a way to build a lasting tribute to that person that will bring you solace in the months and years ahead. |
| 11/13/2023 | “There are silences and silences. No one of them is like another. There is the silence of grief in velvet-draped rooms of a plushly carpeted funeral parlor which is far different from the bleak and terrible silence of grief in a widower’s lonely bedroom.” Dean Koontz When the loneliness of grief surrounds you, pick up the phone to call or text someone in your life. If you have any children in your life – be it your own children, grandchildren, nieces or nephews, or even neighbors, spending time with them can be a wonderful distraction. Their laughter, lively banter, and shrieks of surprise at life’s unexpected moments can fill your heart with hope when you need it most. |
| 11/12/2023 | “I think I am beginning to understand why grief feels like suspense. It comes from the frustration of so many impulses that had become habitual. Thought after thought feeling after feeling action after action had H. for their object. Now their target is gone. I keep on through habit fitting an arrow to the string then I remember and have to lay the bow down. So many roads lead through to H. I set out on one of them. But now there’s an impassable frontier-post across it. So many roads once now so many culs de sac.” C.S. Lewis Our relationships become like habits. Who do you call when you have good news to tell? Who do you trust when you want to share a secret? Who is an empathetic listener? We return to the same people in our lives to fill certain needs, and when one of the pieces of our life’s puzzle is gone, we feel the loss emotionally and at an almost instinctual level. When we are tired or distracted by other parts of our lives, we can even forget our loss to the point of being surprised when it returns to the forefront of our minds. This can be startling on many levels. While this can, without question, be troubling, know that it is normal. Your grief may shock you at times, but those times will pass and you will slowly adjust to this difficult change. |
| 11/11/2023 | “…this woman, moved by some private sorrow as much as the words being spoken, cried almost silently, unobserved by others, apart from Mma Ramotswe, who stretched out her hand and laid it on her shoulder. Do not cry, Mma, she began to whisper, but changed her words even as she uttered them, and said quietly, Yes, you can cry, Mma. We should not tell people not to weep – we do it because of our sympathy for them – but we should really tell them that their tears are justified and entirely right.” Alexander McCall Smith Being comfortable enough to talk and even cry in front of trusted family members and friends shows them that you are ready to receive them back into your life. By sharing your emotions, you are opening yourself up to help from those who care about you. |
| 11/10/2023 | “Listen, Harper. I realize how hard this is for you.” A flash of anger heats up in my chest. She doesn’t understand. She can’t. If she did, she’d leave me alone instead of trying to force me to talk about this.” Hannah Harrington Take time today to connect with the people who have reached out to you. At times, their actions may seem frustrating or invasive, but they are often navigating unfamiliar waters; most people don’t know quite what to say or do to try to help someone grieve. Make sure they know how much their support means to you. |
| 11/9/2023 | It feels weird, being out in the real world again. Around people just living their lives like normal. Their presence is oppressive. The very fact that the world is going on as usual, like nothing ever happened, makes me want to scream. I know it’s irrational to expect everything to grind to a halt because of June, but still. A wave of anxiety builds in my chest, my head pounding so loud it drowns out the noise of people talking and tapping away on their laptops. Hannah Harrington It is easy to feel resentment towards those who are not grieving. As hard as it can be to be rational, it is important to remember that everyone takes a turn feeling loss. Your degree of pain will lessen over time, and it will become clear that times of grief define our lives as much as times of joy. |
| 11/8/2023 | “I wonder if I were to have an X-ray at the little hospital, would the machine see my grief? Is it like rust, arheum about the heart?” Sebastian Barry You don’t have to feel self-conscious around other people about your grief. In fact, you would be surprised how few people realize the extent of it. Those who have not grieved would not know enough to suspect, and those who have grieved or are grieving now are, for the most part, more focussed on their own process. |
| 11/7/2023 | “Peace is the result of retraining your mind to process life as it is, rather than as you think it should be” Wayne W. Dyer There is no part of you that wants to accept what has happened. Your greatest responsibility is to move from disbelief to some form of acceptance. |
| 11/6/2023 | “My life is now divided into two periods: With June and After June. I can’t wrap my mind around the idea of it.” Hannah Harrington While you might give anything to go back to the time before you experienced this loss, that is, unfortunately, not a possibility. This new reality may feel like one of the biggest challenges you’ve ever faced – and it may very well be, but you need to continue to learn how to face your grief and find your own ways to cope with it when it comes. |
| 11/5/2023 | “She’d not known grief would come in waves, brought on by the smallest of things. Nor had she realized that ordinary acts of living would continue even after the loss of a love and that it would remain possible to get caught up in the moment of a simple pleasure before remembering.” Tess Thompson Try to enjoy something mundane today. Savor that cup of coffee, smile at a baby in a carriage, or pet the dog in the park. You need to find simple sources of joy. |
| 11/4/2023 | “The idea of immortality, that like a sea has ebbed and flowed in the human heart, with its countless waves of hope and fear, beating against the shores and rocks of time and fate, was not born of any book, nor of any creed, nor of any religion. It was born of human affection, and it will continue to ebb and flow beneath the mists and clouds of doubt and darkness as long as love kisses the lips of death. It is the rainbow – Hope shining upon the tears of grief.” Robert G. Ingersoll Whether or not you believe in a form of eternity, know that your loved one will live forever in your heart and memories. |
| 11/3/2023 | “There is a feeling of disbelief that comes over you, that takes over, and you kind of go through the motions. You do what you’re supposed to do, but in fact you’re not there at all.” Frederick Barthelme You may still be checking in and out of your life. You are present and engaged at times, but at other times, may feel like you are going through the motions. If you reflect back on the first days after your loss, you will probably find that you are engaged more often than you were at first. See that as an improvement to focus upon, rather than feeling badly about the times you feel disconnected. |
| 11/2/2023 | “The only education in grief that any of us ever gets is a crash course. Until Caroline had died I had belonged to that other world, the place of innocence, and linear expectations, where I thought grief was a simple, wrenching realm of sadness and longing that gradually receded. What that definition left out was the body blow that loss inflicts, as well as the temporary madness, and a range of less straightforward emotions shocking in their intensity.” Gail Caldwell You probably used to think you knew what grief was like. Experience teaches you that it is not a condition with a predictable recovery period. Rather, it is like an emotion. Grief is complicated and can dominate your thoughts. Like a teenager getting accustomed to strong, new emotions, those who are grieving do not suddenly stop grieving, but have to learn how to live with it. |
| 11/1/2023 | “What if it’s as simple as one moment? One tiny thing, like that kiss on the rocks? What if I’d kissed him a little longer? Would he be alive right now? Or what if I’d stayed with him Friday night, what if I’d been with him… wherever he was?” Kristina McBride We all play the “what if” game. It’s as if we think a small change on our part would guarantee a different outcome. Try to not get caught up in the “I wish I had…” mindset. You cannot change the past, and you do not have the ultimate control over what happens to others. What you can do is live for today. Be kind; be thoughtful; be proactive. Creating a better today is a much better use of your time than wallowing in the yesterdays that you cannot change. |
| 10/31/2023 | “When someone you love dies, and you’re not expecting it, you don’t lose her all at once; you lose her in pieces over a long time – the way the mail stops coming, and her scent fades away from the pillows and even from the clothes in her closet and drawers. Gradually, you accumulate the parts of her that are gone. Just when the day comes – when there’s a particular missing part that overwhelms you with the feeling that she’s gone, forever – there comes another day, and another specifically missing part.” John Irving Looking at your loved one’s possessions may bring you nothing but sadness right now. It is so hard to see his/her things, and may be even harder to consider parting with them. You do not have to make final decisions about these possessions right away. Instead, you may consider simply organizing and storing them. The act of sorting through these items now gives you the scope of the task of making long term decisions later. |
| 10/30/2023 | “Grief is like the ocean; it comes on waves ebbing and flowing. Sometimes the water is calm, and sometimes it is overwhelming. All we can do is learn to swim.” Vicki Harrison Have you taken the time to write thank you notes to those who either sent flowers or donations at the time of your loved one’s death? While there is no set timetable for this, make sure to take a few minutes to write a personal note to acknowledge those who made the effort to honor your loved one. |
| 10/29/2023 | “So this, Harriet thought, gazing at her black-clad reflection, was what bearing up looked like. The eyes in the mirror stared at her, somehow, while fixing themselves far away. Bearing up, then, must be this: the feeling of perfect frozen stillness, so that to raise your hand was a wrenching and unnatural event. It was not being able to sleep or eat, and the small placid tone in which she heard herself decline the food. It was the presentiment that there must be a crack or a hole somewhere at hand down which she was to throw and extinguish herself, since there must surely be something provided to make this bearable.” Jude Morgan Are you eating more or less than you used to before your loss? Like sleeping patterns, grief can contribute to changes in appetite as well. If your eating habits have changed, keep a food journal for a week. Then, look at it with a critical eye to see what changes you need to make to protect your health. Even though you may not be thinking about your own needs right now, you need to take good care of yourself throughout this process. |
| 10/28/2023 | “I didn’t want him to think I was giving up – I wasn’t. I simply couldn’t put myself together just yet.” Markelle Grabo Be sure to vocalize how you are feeling to friends and family throughout your grieving process. Tell them explicitly that you appreciate when they try to help/reach out to you. Go on to say exactly what you need from them. This will make all of you feel more connected and comfortable. |
| 10/27/2023 | “We have such numerous interests in our lives that it is not uncommon, on a single occasion, for the foundations of a happiness that does not yet exist to be laid down alongside the intensification of a grief from which we are still suffering.” Marcel Proust Grief is pervasive – it seeps into every part of our lives. Its appearance is not a surprise – the surprise is the timing of its arrival. |
| 10/26/2023 | “I’ve grieved enough for his life cut short and for mine for running on for so long with so little in it. It’s weakness now, but I suppose I am crying out of a general sense of loss. Maybe I am mourning for the human condition.” Rosie Thomas Part of grief is disappointment. It is hard to let go of the plans you had with your loved one – the “what could have been” can be hard to let go of for a long time. |
| 10/25/2023 | “Synthesis is the gateway to Transcendence, because once you accept that you are forever changed and that life is forever different, you have to ask, “What are you going to do about that fact? Will the change be for the better or for worse?” It’s the loss itself that becomes the catalyst for meaning.” Ashley Davis Bush When you are ready, you can begin to look for new meaning in your life. This does not mean that you are letting go of your loved one. Instead, you are honoring that person by finding meaning in your own life. |
| 10/24/2023 | “That was the thing about being bereaved. People were overcome with sympathy. They did things for you without even considering whether or not it was the right thing to do.” Brenna Yovanoff People want to reach out to you, especially in the first year of your bereavement. They may not know what to do or say, but take the time to tell them how much you appreciate their efforts. |
| 10/23/2023 | “Which would you choose if you could: pleasure for yourself despite your friends or a share in their grief?” Sophocles Your friends who have grieved may be better able to help you through this time than those who feel sympathy but not understanding. |
| 10/22/2023 | It amazes me what humans can do, even when streams are flowing down their faces and they stagger on, coughing and searching, and finding.” Markus Zusak Look back and feel proud of the times you put on a brave face. Keep going! |
| 10/21/2023 | “This is your loss. Grieve as you must. Do what it takes to heal.” Unknown It is helpful to find people to talk with and grieve with as you heal. Always remember, however, that it is your process and your decision how you go through this. |
| 10/20/2023 | “It seemed like a mistake. And mistakes ought to be rectified, only this one couldn’t be. Between the way things used to be and the way they were now was a void that couldn’t be crossed. I had to find an explanation other than the real one, which was that we were no more immune to misfortune than anybody else, and the idea that kept recurring to me…was that I had inadvertently walked through a door that I shouldn’t have gone through and couldn’t get back to the place I hadn’t meant to leave. Actually, it was other way round: I hadn’t gone anywhere and nothing was changed, so far as the roof over our heads was concerned, it was just that she was in the cemetery.” William Maxwell With so many other parts of your life that are sad, you can take action to “fix” what is wrong. With death, there is no way to rectify the situation. You have to find a place of acceptance. That is the journey you are on now – one that you certainly didn’t want to be a part of. You cannot change what has happened, but need to work towards feeling better. |
| 10/19/2023 | “I will not forget you. I have written your name on the palms of my hands.” Isaiah 49:15-16 There is comfort in the concept that your loved one is always with you in your heart. |
| 10/18/2023 | “For grief is felt not so much for the want of what we have never known, as for the loss of that to which we have been long accustomed.” Pericles The ordinary things are the things you probably miss the most. The phone calls, the emails, or the private jokes are the parts of our lives that create the biggest holes when they are taken from us. It will take time to build some new memories and relationships, but if you put forth the effort, you will reconnect. |
| 10/17/2023 | “It’s like she has her heart in her hand and it’s broken. She’s holding it out and showing me all the little pieces. Or maybe it’s my heart.” Nyrae Dawn It can feel frustrating that you don’t see the world in the same way anymore. The loss of someone seems to hang over you like a dark cloud that you may not always look at, but that you know is there. Your are not alone. Many people share your struggle right now. It is a universal feeling, but one that will fade over time. Just know that many people are going through the same experience right now. |
| 10/16/2023 | “Great griefs exhaust. They discourage us with life. The man into whom they enter feels something taken from him. In youth, their visit is sad; later on, it is ominous.” Victor Hugo As part of the grieving process, some people find that they sleep more than normal. If you are struggling to return to your normal sleep schedule, it may help to increase your level of exercise. By taking a walk when you feel like you want to take a nap, you may increase your ability to stay awake longer and improve your mood as well. |
| 10/15/2023 | “For in grief nothing “stays put.” One keeps on emerging from a phase, but it always recurs. Round and round. Everything repeats. Am I going in circles, or dare I hope I am on a spiral? But if a spiral, am I going up or down it? How often — will it be for always? — how often will the vast emptiness astonish me like a complete novelty and make me say, “I never realized my loss till this moment”? The same leg is cut off time after time.” C.S. Lewis Working through grief is not like learning to ride a bicycle or how to swim. There’s no moment where you can definitively say you’ve “mastered” grief. Rather, it is a somewhat frustrating process of small achievements followed by a series of setbacks. That is why reaching out to others to talk about the way you are feeling as you work through the process is so critical. |
| 10/14/2023 | “What I was afraid of was my own grief, the weight of it, the ineluctable corrosive force of it, and the stark awareness I had of being, for the first time in my life, entirely alone, a Crusoe shipwrecked and stranded in the limitless wastes of a boundless and indifferent ocean.” John Banville The feeling of being completely alone as you grieve is normal, and may come to you in waves. When you feel despondent, keep in mind that even though it may not seem temporary, the feeling will pass as you re engage with the things and people in your life. |
| 10/13/2023 | “Grief is a curious thing, when it happens unexpectedly. It is a Band-Aid being ripped away, taking the top layer off a family. And the underbelly of a household is never pretty, ours no exception. There were times I stayed in my room for days on end with headphones on, if only so that I would not have to listen to my mother cry. There were the weeks that my father worked round-the-clock shifts, so that he wouldn’t have to come home to a house that felt too big for us.” Jodi Picoult As you go through your grief process, make sure that you are aware of the impact you may be having on those around you. Even if it’s difficult, make the effort to keep your home life as normal as possible. The people in your life are concerned about you, and will be upset to see you suffering. Take the time to share how you are feeling, and not isolate yourself from those who care about you. |
| 10/12/2023 | “What’s even more messed up than funerals, is the way people treat you after the funeral. Like you’re diseased or something.” Denise Jaden Initiate conversations with people you suspect feel a bit uncertain what to say to you. Making them comfortable will help you feel better and more connected too. |
| 10/11/2023 | “When I saw your strand of hair I knew that grief is love turned into an eternal missing.” Rosamund Lupton Finding something that belonged to your loved one that you forgot about is such a bittersweet surprise. Eventually, those moments will make you smile more than they make your cry. |
| 10/10/2023 | “We all have our sorrows, and although the exact delinaments, weight and dimensions of grief are different for everyone, the color of grief is common to us all. I know, he said, because he was human, and therefore, in a way, he did.” Diane Setterfield When you look at people on the street or on television, do you categorize them as those who have grieved and those who have not? It feels like the world is now divided into two camps. The grief process is so intense yet so universal, that it can help you form an instant bond with a stranger. |
| 10/9/2023 | “Everyone was eating, talking softly, glancing at me, hugging me, eating. It was as if someone had turned the volume down. Everything looked normal, but the sound was muted. Death did this, set all this weirdness in motion, made people appear out of nowhere carrying casseroles, saying ‘I’m sorry’ over and over, death muffled their voices.” Joan Abelove There are moments during the initial grieving period where you feel almost as if you are watching yourself going through the motions. You are in shock, even if the death was expected. Look back at that person. Do you recognize yourself? You have already moved on and started to heal from this terrible event. Feel good about the progress you have made so far and realize that you will continue to grow. |
| 10/8/2023 | “Emma dropped the paper. Her first impression was of a weak feeling in her stomach and in her knees; then of blind guilt, of unreality, of coldness, of fear; then she wished that it were already the next day. Immediately afterwards she realized that that wish was futile because the death of her father was the only thing that had happened in the world, and it would go on happening endlessly.” Jorge Luis Borges It is hard to not relive the moment you found out your loved one passed away again and again. It is like watching a movie where part of you hopes there will be a different outcome, yet you simultaneously know that the end result cannot be changed. Perhaps people relive that memory to try to finally find acceptance. Know that you will not always feel the need to replay it so often as you become more resigned to what has happened. |
| 10/7/2023 | “The worst of it is over now, and I can’t say that I am glad. Lose that sense of loss – you have gone and lost something else. But the body moves toward health. The mind, too, in steps. One step at a time. Ask a mother who has just lost a child, How many children do you have? “Four,” she will say, ” – three,” and years later, “Three,” she will say, ” – four.” Amy Hempel One of the hardest parts of grieving is finding a balance between your grieving and your healing. You may feel off-center as you try to navigate the uncertainty of the transition between extreme, raw grief, and the gradual acceptance of your loss. |
| 10/6/2023 | “Grief was like a seizure that shook me like a storm.” Patricia Cornwell Be sure to eat healthy foods. While you have heard this all your life, it is especially important when you are grieving. Your body needs healthy foods to help you maintain yourself and begin to feel good again. |
| 10/5/2023 | “The closest bonds we will ever know are bonds of grief. The deepest community one of sorrow.” Cormac McCarthy If you have not done so already, look into joining a grief support group. If you have, reach out to one of the fellow members and be a shoulder to cry on or a friend to listen. Bonding with others and connecting with people who have experienced loss is an important part of your healing process. |
| 10/4/2023 | “How many times can a heart be shattered and still be pieced back together? How many times before the damage is irreparable?” Gwenn Wright No matter how hard it is to get through each day, know that you are actually a lot stronger than you think you are. |
| 10/3/2023 | “While grief is fresh, every attempt to divert only irritates. You must wait till it be digested, and then amusement will dissipate the remains of it.” Samuel Johnson There is no better feeling than when you forget your grief and laugh. Embrace it…it will come again just as unexpectedly. |
| 10/2/2023 | “I loathe a friend whose gratitude grows old, a friend who takes his friend’s prosperity but will not voyage with him in his grief” Euripides One of the greatest things you can learn from your grief period is who your true friends are. It also teaches you how to truly be a good friend in return. |
| 10/1/2023 | In matters of the heart – be they positive or difficult – there are no right or wrong ways to behave. Your emotions evolve and change as you get older and have more experiences. Even you cannot predict how you will feel when good or bad things happen to you with certainty. Try to not judge yourself either in the moment or when you look back on this period. No one is doing it “right”, for there is no rulebook for grief. |
| 9/30/2023 | “He’d lived long enough to know that everyone handled grief in different ways, and little by little, they all seemed to accept their new lives.” Nicholas Sparks Think back to the week after you lost your loved one. If you are honest, you can see that you have made progress in your healing. Take time to feel good about that today. |
| 9/17/2023 | “It was the meanest moment of eternity.” Zora Neale Hurston Grief makes you so aware of the concept of forever. If you can try to spend less of your time and energy focusing on that, it will help. Instead, try to work on your current relationships and put energy into fostering them. |
| 9/16/2023 | “Ten years, she’s dead, and I still find myself some mornings reaching for the phone to call her. She could no more be gone than gravity or the moon.” Mary Karr Getting used to the change in your everyday routine may still be a challenge. It is hard to realize how vital someone is to your everyday life until he or she is gone. |
| 9/15/2023 | “One fire burns out another’s burning, One pain is lessen’d by another’s anguish.” William Shakespeare Reading about other people’s grief will help you feel less isolated or alone. Seek out an online group or look for human interest magazines or books. Read the stories of others who have been where you are now. You will find ideas and strategies that you might not have discovered on your own that could really help you as you go through this process. |
| 9/14/2023 | “I thought I could describe a state; make a map of sorrow. Sorrow, however, turns out to be not a state but a process.” C.S. Lewis Only others who have grieved can truly be a shoulder to cry on that comes with complete understanding and empathy. |
| 9/13/2023 | “She heard him mutter, ‘Can you take away this grief?’ ‘I’m sorry,’ she replied. ‘Everyone asks me. And I would not do so even if I knew how. It belongs to you. Only time and tears take away grief; that is what they are for.” Terry Pratchett It would be amazing if there was a magic wand to make you feel better. Someone could wave it, and you would no longer have that pain in your gut. Unfortunately, grief is not solved by magic. Rather, it is eased by the passage of time. |
| 9/12/2023 | “It’s odd, isn’t it? People die every day and the world goes on like nothing happened. But when it’s a person you love, you think everyone should stop and take notice. That they ought to cry and light candles and tell you that you’re not alone.” Kristina McMorris Being busy and distracted can provide you the rest you need from grieving. Make a “to do” list today with at least three things on it that you can do. Cross off each one as it’s completed to give you a real sense of accomplishment. Remember that they don’t have to be big things. They simply need to be tasks you can finish and, subsequently, cross off your list. It will make you feel much better to look at that paper at the end of the day and know you met these small goals. |
| 9/11/2023 | “Do not stand at my grave and weep, I am not there, I do not sleep. I am in a thousand winds that blow, I am the softly falling snow. I am the gentle showers of rain, I am the fields of ripening grain. I am in the morning hush, I am in the graceful rush Of beautiful birds in circling flight, I am the starshine of the night. I am in the flowers that bloom, I am in a quiet room. I am in the birds that sing, I am in each lovely thing. Do not stand at my grave bereft I am not there. I have not left.” Mary Elizabeth Frye Some people say they can feel their loved one’s spirit around them. Depending on your religious beliefs, you may have a strong opinion on whether this is possible or not. There may be items in your home or neighborhood that trigger the feeling that your loved one is by your side. Rather than worrying about whether or not this is true, focus on the hopeful comfort this passing feeling provides. |
| 9/10/2023 | “Grief loves the hollow; all it wants is to hear its own echo.” Hisham Matar Try to listen to a piece of music that makes you feel joy. While you may not yet be able to enjoy an upbeat party song, find a calm, cheerful song that makes you feel happy. |
| 9/9/2023 | “All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one’s heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.” Cormac McCarthy Seek out something beautiful today. Go to a greenhouse or a flower shop. The beauty of nature helps you to feel hope again… a hope that the world can deliver happiness as well as sorrow. |
| 9/8/2023 | “When it comes to death, we know that laughter and tears are pretty much the same thing.” Sherman Alexie Have you been able to laugh yet? Can you see the humor in everyday things as you once did? With great loss and sadness comes an inability to feel the joys of life right away. If you have been unable to laugh, try to expose yourself to things that may elicit that emotion. It is part of your return to yourself. |
| 9/7/2023 | “I know now that we never get over great losses; we absorb them, and they carve us into different, often kinder, creatures. …We tell the story to get them back, to capture the traces of footfalls through the snow.” Gail Caldwell Tell a story about your loved one today to someone who hasn’t heard it. To see a new reaction to something so precious makes your loved one a part of your life now. It is so precious to feel connected again, even if it is just for a couple of moments. |
| 9/5/2023 | “The mystery of death, the riddle of how you could speak to someone and see them every day and then never again, was so impossible to fathom that of course we kept trying to figure it out, even when we were unconscious.” Francine Prose Have you picked up the phone to call your loved one before you remembered that you can’t? Have you started to say something and then stopped yourself before the words came out? The adjustment is hard. The phone or the computer or the empty chair may be a constant reminder of that hollow place in your heart. It might help to write down the words to describe how you’re feeling on a piece of paper. Then, rip it up and dispose of it. It is all part of the slow healing process. |
| 9/4/2023 | “When you lose your parents, the sadness doesn’t go away. It just changes. It hits you sideways sometimes instead of head-on. Like now.” Jude Watson Your loss may make you feel out of control. That can lead to a downward spiral across all parts of your life. To help, find a way to feel like you are in charge of other aspects of your day. Whether it be speaking up at a condo meeting, working in a political campaign, or reorganizing a drawer, making decisions and acting on them will help you take control of your healing and your life. |
| 9/3/2023 | “I have lived with you and loved you, and now you are gone. Gone where I cannot follow, until I have finished all of my days.” Victoria Hanley When you are in mourning, your instinct may be to withdraw from society until you feel better. However, by isolating yourself, you are actually perpetuating your sorrow. Try to be social. Call a friend to go to lunch or visit a neighbor you haven’t seen for a while. Making the effort will help your psyche more than spending time alone will. |
| 9/2/2023 | “We are imperfect mortal beings, aware of that mortality even as we push it away, failed by our very complication, so wired that when we mourn our losses we also mourn, for better or for worse, ourselves. as we were. as we are no longer. as we will one day not be at all.” Joan Didion It is hard to look at people who have not grieved without feeling some envy. It is comparative bliss to not be in mourning; whatever daily troubles you have do not compare to the irrevocable pain of losing someone you love. Be aware of that feeling, but don’t let it cloud your thoughts. You will not always feel so raw, and while you cannot take back the changes to your spirit that grief makes, you will develop an acceptance of death and loss as a result of this experience. |
| 9/1/2023 | “The whole world can become the enemy when you lose what you love.” Kristina McMorris There will be times when you feel more anger than sorrow. While this is natural, do not let the anger take over how you see the world. Know that this feeling will pass, and that the anger is not true anger, but rather a form of your sadness. |
| 8/31/2023 | “We were promised sufferings. They were part of the program. We were even told, ‘Blessed are they that mourn,’ and I accept it. I’ve got nothing that I hadn’t bargained for. Of course it is different when the thing happens to oneself, not to others, and in reality, not imagination.” C.S. Lewis The difference between what you expected grief to feel like and the reality of it may be significant. You think that you can handle it in one way, when that may not be working for you at all. You never actually know how the grief and subsequent healing processes will make you feel until you experience them. Do not worry if things are not playing out the way you thought they should. There is no right or wrong way to grieve. |
| 8/30/2023 | “It’s funny, how one can look back on a sorrow one thought one might well die of at the time, and know that one had not yet reckoned the tenth part of true grief.” Jacqueline Carey One of the few positives about your grief is that it puts the rest of life’s problems in perspective. |
| 8/29/2023 | “No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear. I am not afraid, but the sensation is like being afraid. The same fluttering in the stomach, the same restlessness, the yawning. I keep on swallowing.” C.S. Lewis Fear or feelings like fear are a normal byproduct of grief. The challenge is to not let that fear morph into anger. Be sad that your loved one is gone, not angry at the world over your loss. |
| 8/28/2023 | “I knew what it was like to lose someone you loved. You didn’t get past something like that, you got through it.” Jodi Picoult It bears repeating that you never “get over” your loss. You simply learn to live with it. |
| 8/27/2023 | “Each of us has his own rhythm of suffering.” Roland Barthes It may be frustrating that others close to your loved one do not feel the same way that you do about your loss. Everyone’s grief, like everyone’s love, is different. Accepting that will help you find peace. |
| 8/26/2023 | Suppressed grief suffocates, it rages within the breast, and is forced to multiply its strength. Ovid If you hide how you are feeling, it slowly consumes you. Go online, call a friend, or find a grief support group. Pretending that you are “handling” your grief alone does not make it go away. Rather, ignoring it may make it grow until it is too tough to bear. |
| 8/25/2023 | “Grief is depression in proportion to circumstance; depression is grief out of proportion to circumstance.” Andrew Solomon When you are grieving, you feel down. It seems like it is a constant presence at times. This is normal and typical. It may frighten you, but you do not need to be afraid. Grief fades very slowly. |
| 8/24/2023 | “To the world you may be just one person, but to one person you may be the world.” Brandi Snyder Who would love to hear from you today? Pick up the phone and call. |
| 8/23/2023 | “We need people in our lives with whom we can be as open as possible. To have real conversations with people may seem like such a simple, obvious suggestion, but it involves courage and risk.” Thomas Moore If the people close to you are not grieving in the same way that you are, you may want to go online to find a support group of individuals whose journey is like your own. Having open, honest discussions about your feelings are therapeutic and necessary to your well being. |
| 8/22/2023 | “One day someone is going to hug you so tight. that all of your broken pieces will stick back together” Anonymous Give someone a hug. It is good for your soul, and makes you feel connected. |
| 8/21/2023 | “Please believe that things are good with me, and even when they’re not, they will be soon enough. And I will always believe the same about you.” Stephen Chbosky When you run into people who know about your loss, it may be hard for them to say the “right” thing or pose the right question. People often ask, “How are you doing?” with the best of intentions. What response can you give? “I’m doing fine” is certainly not the sentiment you want to share, yet how can you tell them what it’s really like? When faced with this, you may want to say something like, “It’s so nice of you to ask. I really miss _____. We were so close, and it’s a tough adjustment. How are you doing?” That way, you are honest while being sensitive to the feelings of the other person. You have shared the truth, that this is tough, while keeping the conversation going and turning the spotlight back onto the other person. You have probably been asked this question a lot already, and you need to be ready with an answer that you are comfortable saying in response to it. |
| 8/20/2023 | “Keep your face always toward the sunshine – and shadows will fall behind you.” Walt Whitman While Walt Whitman was using the idea of sunshine and shadows as a metaphor, take some time to literally get some sunshine. It is easy to withdraw when you are grieving, but the fresh air and sunshine can help elevate your mood. Put your face in the sun, and feel the warmth of the rays. |
| 8/19/2023 | “The only person who can pull me down is myself, and I’m not going to let myself pull me down anymore.” C. Joybell C. Some days you may wake up feeling so down that it seems like “getting through” is the best you can do. No one in your life can make you feel differently – you have all the power in that situation. |
| 8/18/2023 | To spare oneself from grief at all cost can be achieved only at the price of total detachment, which excludes the ability to experience happiness. Erich Fromm You may be avoiding your friends and family. Seeing them brings up all the sadness that you are trying to hide away from as you grieve. Do not shut out those who care about you because you are afraid of feeling vulnerable and overwhelmed. Let them share their strength with you, and be shoulders upon which to cry. |
| 8/17/2023 | Tears have a wisdom all their own. They come when a person has relaxed enough to let go and to work through his sorrow. They are the natural bleeding of an emotional wound, carrying the poison out of the system. Here lies the road to recovery. F. Alexander Magoun Some scientists believe that emotional tears are actually the body’s way of removing chemicals that build up when we are under stress. The release of those chemicals is what makes us feel better. While this is still just a theory, it is certainly common to feel better after you cry. Crying doesn’t have to be a long drawn-out event. A few tears shed may help you to get through the day as you work through your grief. Do not think of crying as a sign of weakness or as evidence that you will not get better. Think of crying as part of the process of grieving. |
| 8/16/2023 | “In days that follow, I discover that anger is easier to handle than grief.” Emily Giffin You may want to blame the universe for your loved one’s death. You may want to curse at the sky or fate or whatever force may have taken the gift of this person from you. Anger is fast and anger provides you with a quick release. You know that it is misplaced, and that after you feel it you are still left with the pain. But if it helps you to cope for a moment, then go ahead and curse the sky. It is only natural to feel anger as the one who was left behind. |
| 8/15/2023 | “Every morning, I wake up and forget just for a second that it happened. But once my eyes open, it buries me like a landslide of sharp, sad rocks. Once my eyes open, I’m heavy, like there’s too much gravity on my heart.” Sarah Ockler For longer than you expect, your loss will be your first conscious thought when you wake up each morning. It may be weeks, or months, or years. Then one day, out of nowhere, you will have another thought first. Do not feel badly. That is a milestone in your healing. |
| 8/14/2023 | “Now something so sad has hold of us that the breath leaves and we can’t even cry.” Charles Bukowski When death comes, even an expected one, there is always a degree of shock. It is so final. You may think you know how you’ll react, but the reality may not match your prediction. Grieve in your own way. The person who doesn’t cry is no less sensitive. The person who never talks about it to others is not cold hearted. Grief is like life, we all handle it differently. |
| 8/13/2023 | “My heart has joined the Thousand, for my friend stopped running today.” Richard Adams When we suffer a loss, we feel very alone. It is ironic, for grief, like love, is one of the most human and timeless of experiences. When you grieve, you are joining millions who have walked that path before you. |
| 8/12/2023 | “I saw the world in black and white instead of the vibrant colours and shades I knew existed.” Katie McGarry You may be wondering why after more than a month of living with this loss, you still don’t enjoy music or laugh at jokes or see beauty around you. Grief is a slow moving entity, and it will take time before you are ready to appreciate the joy that is around you. Be patient, for the colors of your life will return. |
| 8/11/2023 | The cure for grief is motion. Elbert Hubbard As you work through your grief, it is important to go from focusing on your thoughts to addressing your physical being. One of the best things you can do is to begin some form of light exercise as you work through these difficult days. Take a 15-20 minute walk in your neighborhood each day. If you have to get up earlier or go to bed later, make the time. As you walk, see the children in carriages, the dogs pulling on their leashes, and all the life that still surrounds you. Moving is good for your head and your heart. You do not have to do anything radical or strenuous. Simply walk, and you will be amazed at how effective a tool it is for gradually helping you to heal and reconnect. |
| 8/10/2023 | “When you part from your friend, you grieve not; For that which you love most in him may be clearer in his absence, as the mountain to the climber is clearer from the plain.” Khalil Gibran We spend a lot of our lives looking forward…forward to a vacation, a milestone, or even just the weekend. It is from loss that we realize that looking beside us is where we find the real joy. Our friends and loved ones are the people with whom we share our daily lives and with whom we build the most lasting memories. It is our shared morning coffee, a quick phone call or email, or watching a favorite tv show together that really defines the simple, yet most impactful joys of life. While the sadness of loss is startling, take it as an opportunity to look and see what is beside you now. Treasure those people and those mundane moments, for they are what really matter most. |
| 8/9/2023 | “Words are like nets – we hope they’ll cover what we mean, but we know they can’t possibly hold that much joy, or grief, or wonder.” Jodi Picoult It is nearly impossible to express in words the grief you are feeling. Know that you don’t have to be able to do that. Reach out and hold the hand of someone else who is in pain. That will say it all. Make that hug last a little longer or pat that person on the back. The power of an empathetic touch will help heal you both. |
| 8/8/2023 | “Every widow wakes one morning, perhaps after years of pure and unwavering grieving, to realize she slept a good night’s sleep, and will be able to eat breakfast, and doesn’t hear her husband’s ghost all the time, but only some of the time. Her grief is replaced with a useful sadness. Every parent who loses a child finds a way to laugh again. The timbre begins to fade. The edge dulls. The hurt lessens. Every love is carved from loss. Mine was. Yours is. Your great-great-great-grandchildren’s will be. But we learn to live in that love.” Jonathan Safran Foer I will never have another moment in my life when I feel better. I have to live this way forever. I hate feeling this way, but I don’t see a way out. This is my life now, and I have no other option. This is your truth for weeks, months, or longer. However, the hope seeps in unexpectedly. There will be a quick glimpse of joy, a brief laugh. Hold on…it will certainly happen to you too. Like a thief in the night, you won’t see it coming. Just know that one day it will come as a sweet relief from the pain of your loss. |
| 8/7/2023 | You may be filled with overwhelming fear, loneliness, and sorrow. You feel isolated even when people are around you. You are going through the motions, trying to put on a brave face. Through this haze, you need to keep your eyes open. Paths will cross, and opportunities will sneak in when you least expect them. Despite your sorrow, you must hold on to a glimmer of hope. You can bond again. If you can believe it, it will happen. Someone unexpected will need you, and your openness to caring for another person will help to heal your heart. |
| 8/6/2023 | “Relationships take up energy; letting go of them, psychiatrists theorize, entails mental work. When you lose someone you were close to, you have to reassess your picture of the world and your place in it. The more your identity was wrapped up with the deceased, the more difficult the loss.” Meghan O’Rourke To lose someone who was part of your daily life is unspeakably difficult. How can you make decisions, share your thoughts, or work through your dilemmas with anyone else in the same way? You can never replace the relationship you lost. It is a sacred entity in and of itself. You can, however, forge a new path that brings out different strengths and aspects of yourself you may not have known. Do not be afraid to discover these new pathways. This loss, while terrible, will press you to grow as a person. |
| 8/5/2023 | “But when I do feel all the strength go out of me, and I fall to my knees beside the table and I think I cry, then, or at least I want to, and everything inside me screams for just one more kiss, one more word, one more glance, one more.” Veronica Roth Do you play that game in your head? If you only had one wish, you would go back and do things differently…treasure that person more and forget the small things. When you think you can’t bear it anymore, write a letter. Tell your loved one how much you care and wish that you had one more moment together. Describe what you would do given the chance. Putting your thoughts on paper will free your mind from holding them. Everyone has regrets about how much better things could have been. This is a common human experience, one that we all share. Bring any regrets to your current relationships. Tell the people around you that you love them, that you value time with them, that they are important. Take any regrets and use them as tools to make your life today richer for you and those you love. Make the way you live now a living tribute to the person you lost. |
| 8/4/2023 | “Deep grief sometimes is almost like a specific location, a coordinate on a map of time. When you are standing in that forest of sorrow, you cannot imagine that you could ever find your way to a better place. But if someone can assure you that they themselves have stood in that same place, and now have moved on, sometimes this will bring hope” Elizabeth Gilbert It seems almost impossible that you will ever feel like you did before this great loss. It’s almost as if your life is now divided into two distinct parts: before this tragedy and after it. Know that this process is going to be long, and, at times, feel like it is standing still. Be good to yourself. It requires patience and hope that you will be able to enjoy life again. It will come. Hang on and believe that you will slowly step back to the “old you”. That person will emerge from the sorrow so slowly that at first you may not even realize it has happened. |
| 8/3/2023 | “It is useless for me to describe to you how terrible Violet, Klaus, and even Sunny felt in the time that followed. If you have ever lost someone very important to you, then you already know how it feels, and if you haven’t, you cannot possibly imagine it.” Lemony Snicket Well-meaning friends and acquaintances are asking you how you’re doing. Is there a good answer to that question? You say, “I’m fine,” a meaningless lie to make the moment go away. The only people who know how you are have been where you are. The others are not unkind, they are simply unaware. They have no idea how one day their lives will change in such profound ways. These changes are so significant that it feels like they alter your DNA. You want to tell them to enjoy their innocence, to relish their days without true loss. But you can’t, because you appreciate that they are trying to be kind. So, give a small smile, tell them you’re fine, and ask them about their lives. It is a part of grieving and growing, and will help to heal your broken heart. |
| 8/2/2023 | “You think you’ve accepted that someone is out of your life, that you’ve grieved and it’s over, and then bam. One little thing, and you feel like you’ve lost that person all over again.” Rachel Hawkins It’s going to happen. You don’t know where or when, but it is a certainty that it will transpire. You will run into someone who hasn’t heard about your loss, or you’ll find an unexpected memento, or hear a quote that is just like something your loved one used to say. Feel the mixed emotions that flood into your head at that moment. You will want to laugh and cry and scream at once. It is part of grieving, and it is a moment in time that will join the hundreds of other such moments you are coping with now. It is overwhelming, but fleeting. Know that it will come, and then let it float over you. You will move forward, stronger for having survived it. |
| 8/1/2023 | “To weep is to make less the depth of grief.” William Shakespeare There is no shame in crying to cope with grief. Cry a little, and then move on. You may have two weeks without tears and then cry every day for a month. Do not worry that you will never recover from your loss. You will make it a part of you, and it will open your heart to commiserate with others. Cry when you need to so that you can live and love with an open heart. |
| 7/31/2023 | “Grief can destroy you –or focus you. You can decide a relationship was all for nothing if it had to end in death, and you alone. OR you can realize that every moment of it had more meaning than you dared to recognize at the time, so much meaning it scared you, so you just lived, just took for granted the love and laughter of each day, and didn’t allow yourself to consider the sacredness of it. But when it’s over and you’re alone, you begin to see that it wasn’t just a movie and a dinner together, not just watching sunsets together, not just scrubbing a floor or washing dishes together or worrying over a high electric bill. It was everything, it was the why of life, every event and precious moment of it. The answer to the mystery of existence is the love you shared sometimes so imperfectly, and when the loss wakes you to the deeper beauty of it, to the sanctity of it, you can’t get off your knees for a long time, you’re driven to your knees not by the weight of the loss but by gratitude for what preceded the loss. And the ache is always there, but one day not the emptiness, because to nurture the emptiness, to take solace in it, is to disrespect the gift of life.” Dean Koontz Look back at your friendship, your love, and your caring for the one who has passed on. Celebrate what made it great. Share your stories with those who knew that person and are feeling the loss as well. Look for online forums as places to commiserate with others who are grieving. Taking active steps to cope with your sense of sadness will help you to heal and help others to feel less alone. |
| 7/30/2023 | “Grief is not as heavy as guilt, but it takes more away from you.” Veronica Roth When you experience such a profound loss, you have a kind of heaviness in your heart that feels permanent. It seems as if it will smother you with its intensity at times, and makes you question if it will ever lighten. The light will return. It may not be today, and it may not be tomorrow. The key is to keep moving forward, trying to really live in each moment. Grief is a heavy burden, but it will morph into one that you can carry given time. |
| 7/29/2023 | “When someone you love dies, and you’re not expecting it, you don’t lose her all at once; you lose her in pieces over a long time – the way the mail stops coming, and her scent fades from the pillows and even from the clothes in her closet and drawers. Gradually, you accumulate the parts of her that are gone. Just when the day comes – when there’s a particular missing part that overwhelms you with the feeling that she’s gone, forever – there comes another day, and another specifically missing part.” John Irving To see the clothes in the closet, the handwriting that is so familiar on scraps of paper around the house, and the small unfinished tasks left behind can be so bittersweet. You want to see the familiar, the mundane, to feel like life has not changed. The sadness comes from knowing that there are no new stories or everyday items to keep your connection alive. As time passes, you will find strength in these items. Treasure the sights, the smells, the small pieces of your loved ones. Make a memory box to keep them for the times you need to feel your connection in a tangible way. As time passes, you won’t need to look as often, but there is comfort in knowing they are there if you do. |
| 7/28/2023 | “No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear.” C.S. Lewis You may be asking yourself how you can possibly move on with your life. Your world has changed, and this new reality is unbearable. Try to recognize that a big part of how you are feeling is fear. You may be afraid that you will never experience joy again, that you will never want to participate in activities that used to bring you pleasure, or that you will never connect to others as you once did. Be patient with yourself. The early days can feel unbearable…with each one as overwhelming as the one before. The process of grief takes time, perhaps longer than you might expect. You do not need to feel afraid, because you are not alone. Others feel as you do. You may want to reach out to a support group in your area to talk with people who are also experiencing loss. You do not need to be frightened, because there are many people who feel as you do right now. |
| 7/27/2023 | “Only people who are capable of loving strongly can also suffer great sorrow, but this same necessity of loving serves to counteract their grief and heals them.” Leo Tolstoy When we love someone – be it a friend, family member, or spouse – we open ourselves up to the potential for loss. Yet, we take the plunge, and embrace these relationships, for it is through these connections that we really live. The pain of loss feels insurmountable, but opening your heart to friendship and to love are the keys to truly living again. |
| 7/26/2023 | “You will lose someone you can’t live without, and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up. And you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly – that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp.” Anne Lamott Living with loss changes you. You see both joys and sorrows with a new perspective, and a greater appreciation of their importance. The loss of someone heightens your feelings towards those who are still a part of your life. To love and care with an open heart is one of the gifts afforded you by suffering through the pain of grieving. |
| 7/25/2023 | “The pleasure of remembering had been taken from me, because there was no longer anyone to remember with. It felt like losing your co-rememberer meant losing the memory itself, as if the things we’d done were less real and important than they had been hours before.” John Green An integral part of sharing a relationship with someone is building memories together. The loss of a friend or loved one means the loss of reliving those joint experiences. It is the everyday parts of life, be it running into someone at the market or seeing a favorite movie, that can be hardest to bear. Keep a memories journal as a place to write down these stories as they trigger in your memory. This book can be a place to write how you are feeling or even just how much you miss that special person. Journaling brings healing and gives you a positive outlet for these strong emotions. |
| 7/24/2023 | “The reality is that you will grieve forever. You will not ‘get over’ the loss of a loved one; you will learn to live with it. You will heal and you will rebuild yourself around the loss you have suffered. You will be whole again but you will never be the same. Nor should you be the same nor would you want to.” Elisabeth Kübler-Ross Hope is the one constant. The hope that you will feel better, that you will “get over” such an enormous loss is as constant as the knowledge that the sun will rise at the beginning of each new day. You do need hope, but hope that’s directed towards living for today. Reach out to someone else. Channel yourself into positive things that are around you. Your new hope should be that you live your life as fully as you can each day. |
| 7/5/2023 | “It’s odd, isn’t it? People die every day and the world goes on like nothing happened. But when it’s a person you love, you think everyone should stop and take notice. That they ought to cry and light candles and tell you that you’re not alone.” Kristina McMorris Being busy and distracted can provide you the rest you need from grieving. Make a “to do” list today with at least three things on it that you can do. Cross off each one as it’s completed to give you a real sense of accomplishment. Remember that they don’t have to be big things. They simply need to be tasks you can finish and, subsequently, cross off your list. It will make you feel much better to look at that paper at the end of the day and know you met these small goals. |
| 7/4/2023 | “Do not stand at my grave and weep, I am not there, I do not sleep. I am in a thousand winds that blow, I am the softly falling snow. I am the gentle showers of rain, I am the fields of ripening grain. I am in the morning hush, I am in the graceful rush Of beautiful birds in circling flight, I am the starshine of the night. I am in the flowers that bloom, I am in a quiet room. I am in the birds that sing, I am in each lovely thing. Do not stand at my grave bereft I am not there. I have not left.” Mary Elizabeth Frye Some people say they can feel their loved one’s spirit around them. Depending on your religious beliefs, you may have a strong opinion on whether this is possible or not. There may be items in your home or neighborhood that trigger the feeling that your loved one is by your side. Rather than worrying about whether or not this is true, focus on the hopeful comfort this passing feeling provides. |
| 7/3/2023 | “Grief loves the hollow; all it wants is to hear its own echo.” Hisham Matar Try to listen to a piece of music that makes you feel joy. While you may not yet be able to enjoy an upbeat party song, find a calm, cheerful song that makes you feel happy. |
| 7/2/2023 | “All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one’s heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.” Cormac McCarthy Seek out something beautiful today. Go to a greenhouse or a flower shop. The beauty of nature helps you to feel hope again… a hope that the world can deliver happiness as well as sorrow. |
| 7/1/2023 | “When it comes to death, we know that laughter and tears are pretty much the same thing.” Sherman Alexie Have you been able to laugh yet? Can you see the humor in everyday things as you once did? With great loss and sadness comes an inability to feel the joys of life right away. If you have been unable to laugh, try to expose yourself to things that may elicit that emotion. It is part of your return to yourself. |
| 6/30/2023 | “I know now that we never get over great losses; we absorb them, and they carve us into different, often kinder, creatures. …We tell the story to get them back, to capture the traces of footfalls through the snow.” Gail Caldwell Tell a story about your loved one today to someone who hasn’t heard it. To see a new reaction to something so precious makes your loved one a part of your life now. It is so precious to feel connected again, even if it is just for a couple of moments. |
| 6/29/2023 | “Grief is love turned into an eternal missing” Rosamund Lupton To have grief means that you have had love. A life without love would be far more difficult to bear than one with loss. |
| 6/28/2023 | “The mystery of death, the riddle of how you could speak to someone and see them every day and then never again, was so impossible to fathom that of course we kept trying to figure it out, even when we were unconscious.” Francine Prose Have you picked up the phone to call your loved one before you remembered that you can’t? Have you started to say something and then stopped yourself before the words came out? The adjustment is hard. The phone or the computer or the empty chair may be a constant reminder of that hollow place in your heart. It might help to write down the words to describe how you’re feeling on a piece of paper. Then, rip it up and dispose of it. It is all part of the slow healing process. |
| 6/27/2023 | “When you lose your parents, the sadness doesn’t go away. It just changes. It hits you sideways sometimes instead of head-on. Like now.” Jude Watson Your loss may make you feel out of control. That can lead to a downward spiral across all parts of your life. To help, find a way to feel like you are in charge of other aspects of your day. Whether it be speaking up at a condo meeting, working in a political campaign, or reorganizing a drawer, making decisions and acting on them will help you take control of your healing and your life. |
| 6/26/2023 | “I have lived with you and loved you, and now you are gone. Gone where I cannot follow, until I have finished all of my days.” Victoria Hanley When you are in mourning, your instinct may be to withdraw from society until you feel better. However, by isolating yourself, you are actually perpetuating your sorrow. Try to be social. Call a friend to go to lunch or visit a neighbor you haven’t seen for a while. Making the effort will help your psyche more than spending time alone will. |
| 6/25/2023 | “We are imperfect mortal beings, aware of that mortality even as we push it away, failed by our very complication, so wired that when we mourn our losses we also mourn, for better or for worse, ourselves. as we were. as we are no longer. as we will one day not be at all.” Joan Didion It is hard to look at people who have not grieved without feeling some envy. It is comparative bliss to not be in mourning; whatever daily troubles you have do not compare to the irrevocable pain of losing someone you love. Be aware of that feeling, but don’t let it cloud your thoughts. You will not always feel so raw, and while you cannot take back the changes to your spirit that grief makes, you will develop an acceptance of death and loss as a result of this experience. |
| 6/24/2023 | “The whole world can become the enemy when you lose what you love.” Kristina McMorris There will be times when you feel more anger than sorrow. While this is natural, do not let the anger take over how you see the world. Know that this feeling will pass, and that the anger is not true anger, but rather a form of your sadness. |
| 6/23/2023 | “We were promised sufferings. They were part of the program. We were even told, ‘Blessed are they that mourn,’ and I accept it. I’ve got nothing that I hadn’t bargained for. Of course it is different when the thing happens to oneself, not to others, and in reality, not imagination.” C.S. Lewis The difference between what you expected grief to feel like and the reality of it may be significant. You think that you can handle it in one way, when that may not be working for you at all. You never actually know how the grief and subsequent healing processes will make you feel until you experience them. Do not worry if things are not playing out the way you thought they should. There is no right or wrong way to grieve. |
| 6/22/2023 | “It’s funny, how one can look back on a sorrow one thought one might well die of at the time, and know that one had not yet reckoned the tenth part of true grief.” Jacqueline Carey One of the few positives about your grief is that it puts the rest of life’s problems in perspective. |
| 6/21/2023 | “No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear. I am not afraid, but the sensation is like being afraid. The same fluttering in the stomach, the same restlessness, the yawning. I keep on swallowing.” C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed Fear or feelings like fear are a normal byproduct of grief. The challenge is to not let that fear morph into anger. Be sad that your loved one is gone, not angry at the world over your loss. |
| 6/20/2023 | “I knew what it was like to lose someone you loved. You didn’t get past something like that, you got through it.” Jodi Picoult, Change of Heart It bears repeating that you never “get over” your loss. You simply learn to live with it. |
| 6/19/2023 | “Each of us has his own rhythm of suffering.” Roland Barthes It may be frustrating that others close to your loved one do not feel the same way that you do about your loss. Everyone’s grief, like everyone’s love, is different. Accepting that will help you find peace. |
| 6/18/2023 | Suppressed grief suffocates, it rages within the breast, and is forced to multiply its strength. Ovid If you hide how you are feeling, it slowly consumes you. Go online, call a friend, or find a grief support group. Pretending that you are “handling” your grief alone does not make it go away. Rather, ignoring it may make it grow until it is too tough to bear. |
| 6/17/2023 | “Grief is depression in proportion to circumstance; depression is grief out of proportion to circumstance.” Andrew Solomon When you are grieving, you feel down. It seems like it is a constant presence at times. This is normal and typical. It may frighten you, but you do not need to be afraid. Grief fades very slowly. |
| 6/16/2023 | “To the world you may be just one person, but to one person you may be the world.” Brandi Snyder Who would love to hear from you today? Pick up the phone and call. |
| 6/15/2023 | “We need people in our lives with whom we can be as open as possible. To have real conversations with people may seem like such a simple, obvious suggestion, but it involves courage and risk.” Thomas Moore If the people close to you are not grieving in the same way that you are, you may want to go online to find a support group of individuals whose journey is like your own. Having open, honest discussions about your feelings are therapeutic and necessary to your well being. |
| 6/14/2023 | “One day someone is going to hug you so tight. that all of your broken pieces will stick back together” Anonymous Give someone a hug. It is good for your soul, and makes you feel connected. |
| 6/13/2023 | “Please believe that things are good with me, and even when they’re not, they will be soon enough. And I will always believe the same about you.” Stephen Chbosky, The Perks of Being a Wallflower When you run into people who know about your loss, it may be hard for them to say the “right” thing or pose the right question. People often ask, “How are you doing?” with the best of intentions. What response can you give? “I’m doing fine” is certainly not the sentiment you want to share, yet how can you tell them what it’s really like? When faced with this, you may want to say something like, “It’s so nice of you to ask. I really miss _____. We were so close, and it’s a tough adjustment. How are you doing?” That way, you are honest while being sensitive to the feelings of the other person. You have shared the truth, that this is tough, while keeping the conversation going and turning the spotlight back onto the other person. You have probably been asked this question a lot already, and you need to be ready with an answer that you are comfortable saying in response to it. |
| 6/12/2023 | “Keep your face always toward the sunshine – and shadows will fall behind you.” Walt Whitman While Walt Whitman was using the idea of sunshine and shadows as a metaphor, take some time to literally get some sunshine. It is easy to withdraw when you are grieving, but the fresh air and sunshine can help elevate your mood. Put your face in the sun, and feel the warmth of the rays. |
| 6/11/2023 | “The only person who can pull me down is myself, and I’m not going to let myself pull me down anymore.” C. Joybell C. Some days you may wake up feeling so down that it seems like “getting through” is the best you can do. No one in your life can make you feel differently – you have all the power in that situation. |
| 6/10/2023 | To spare oneself from grief at all cost can be achieved only at the price of total detachment, which excludes the ability to experience happiness. Erich Fromm You may be avoiding your friends and family. Seeing them brings up all the sadness that you are trying to hide away from as you grieve. Do not shut out those who care about you because you are afraid of feeling vulnerable and overwhelmed. Let them share their strength with you, and be shoulders upon which to cry. |
| 6/9/2023 | Tears have a wisdom all their own. They come when a person has relaxed enough to let go and to work through his sorrow. They are the natural bleeding of an emotional wound, carrying the poison out of the system. Here lies the road to recovery. F. Alexander Magoun Some scientists believe that emotional tears are actually the body’s way of removing chemicals that build up when we are under stress. The release of those chemicals is what makes us feel better. While this is still just a theory, it is certainly common to feel better after you cry. Crying doesn’t have to be a long drawn-out event. A few tears shed may help you to get through the day as you work through your grief. Do not think of crying as a sign of weakness or as evidence that you will not get better. Think of crying as part of the process of grieving. |
| 6/8/2023 | “Respect your needs and limitations as you work through your grief and begin to heal” American Pregnancy Association People may be asking you what they can do to help. While well-intentioned, that question can feel overwhelming. You might want to reply with a comment like, “Thank you so much for asking. This has been so tough for me…I don’t even know what I need. It would be great if I could call you if I need something later.” That way you acknowledge the person’s offer and keep the door open in case you realize later that you could use the help. |
| 6/7/2023 | “Every morning, I wake up and forget just for a second that it happened. But once my eyes open, it buries me like a landslide of sharp, sad rocks. Once my eyes open, I’m heavy, like there’s too much gravity on my heart.” Sarah Ockler, Twenty Boy Summer For longer than you expect, your loss will be your first conscious thought when you wake up each morning. It may be weeks, or months, or years. Then one day, out of nowhere, you will have another thought first. Do not feel badly. That is a milestone in your healing. |
| 6/6/2023 | “Now something so sad has hold of us that the breath leaves and we can’t even cry.” Charles Bukowski, You Get So Alone at Times That it Just Makes Sense When death comes, even an expected one, there is always a degree of shock. It is so final. You may think you know how you’ll react, but the reality may not match your prediction. Grieve in your own way. The person who doesn’t cry is no less sensitive. The person who never talks about it to others is not cold hearted. Grief is like life, we all handle it differently. |
| 6/5/2023 | “My heart has joined the Thousand, for my friend stopped running today.” Richard Adams, Watership Down When we suffer a loss, we feel very alone. It is ironic, for grief, like love, is one of the most human and timeless of experiences. When you grieve, you are joining millions who have walked that path before you. |
| 6/4/2023 | “I saw the world in black and white instead of the vibrant colours and shades I knew existed.” Katie McGarry, Pushing the Limits You may be wondering why after more than a month of living with this loss, you still don’t enjoy music or laugh at jokes or see beauty around you. Grief is a slow moving entity, and it will take time before you are ready to appreciate the joy that is around you. Be patient, for the colors of your life will return. |
| 6/3/2023 | The cure for grief is motion. Elbert Hubbard As you work through your grief, it is important to go from focusing on your thoughts to addressing your physical being. One of the best things you can do is to begin some form of light exercise as you work through these difficult days. Take a 15-20 minute walk in your neighborhood each day. If you have to get up earlier or go to bed later, make the time. As you walk, see the children in carriages, the dogs pulling on their leashes, and all the life that still surrounds you. Moving is good for your head and your heart. You do not have to do anything radical or strenuous. Simply walk, and you will be amazed at how effective a tool it is for gradually helping you to heal and reconnect. |
| 6/2/2023 | “When you part from your friend, you grieve not; For that which you love most in him may be clearer in his absence, as the mountain to the climber is clearer from the plain.” – Khalil Gibran, The Prophet We spend a lot of our lives looking forward…forward to a vacation, a milestone, or even just the weekend. It is from loss that we realize that looking beside us is where we find the real joy. Our friends and loved ones are the people with whom we share our daily lives and with whom we build the most lasting memories. It is our shared morning coffee, a quick phone call or email, or watching a favorite tv show together that really defines the simple, yet most impactful joys of life. While the sadness of loss is startling, take it as an opportunity to look and see what is beside you now. Treasure those people and those mundane moments, for they are what really matter most. |
| 6/1/2023 | “Words are like nets – we hope they’ll cover what we mean, but we know they can’t possibly hold that much joy, or grief, or wonder.” – Jodi Picoult, Change of Heart It is nearly impossible to express in words the grief you are feeling. Know that you don’t have to be able to do that. Reach out and hold the hand of someone else who is in pain. That will say it all. Make that hug last a little longer or pat that person on the back. The power of an empathetic touch will help heal you both. |
| 5/31/2023 | “Every widow wakes one morning, perhaps after years of pure and unwavering grieving, to realize she slept a good night’s sleep, and will be able to eat breakfast, and doesn’t hear her husband’s ghost all the time, but only some of the time. Her grief is replaced with a useful sadness. Every parent who loses a child finds a way to laugh again. The timbre begins to fade. The edge dulls. The hurt lessens. Every love is carved from loss. Mine was. Yours is. Your great-great-great-grandchildren’s will be. But we learn to live in that love.” – Jonathan Safran Foer, Everything Is Illuminated I will never have another moment in my life when I feel better. I have to live this way forever. I hate feeling this way, but I don’t see a way out. This is my life now, and I have no other option. This is your truth for weeks, months, or longer. However, the hope seeps in unexpectedly. There will be a quick glimpse of joy, a brief laugh. Hold on…it will certainly happen to you too. Like a thief in the night, you won’t see it coming. Just know that one day it will come as a sweet relief from the pain of your loss. |
| 5/30/2023 | You are filled with overwhelming fear, loneliness, and sorrow. You feel isolated even when people are around you. You are going through the motions, trying to put on a brave face. Through this haze, you need to keep your eyes open. Paths will cross, and opportunities will sneak in when you least expect them. Despite your sorrow, you must hold on to a glimmer of hope. You can bond again. If you can believe it, it will happen. Someone unexpected will need you, and your openness to caring for another person will help to heal your heart. |
| 5/29/2023 | “Relationships take up energy; letting go of them, psychiatrists theorize, entails mental work. When you lose someone you were close to, you have to reassess your picture of the world and your place in it. The more your identity was wrapped up with the deceased, the more difficult the loss.” – Meghan O’Rourke To lose someone who was part of your daily life is unspeakably difficult. How can you make decisions, share your thoughts, or work through your dilemmas with anyone else in the same way? You can never replace the relationship you lost. It is a sacred entity in and of itself. You can, however, forge a new path that brings out different strengths and aspects of yourself you may not have known. Do not be afraid to discover these new pathways. This loss, while terrible, will press you to grow as a person. |
| 5/28/2023 | “But when I do feel all the strength go out of me, and I fall to my knees beside the table and I think I cry, then, or at least I want to, and everything inside me screams for just one more kiss, one more word, one more glance, one more.” – Veronica Roth, Allegiant Do you play that game in your head? If you only had one wish, you would go back and do things differently…treasure that person more and forget the small things. When you think you can’t bear it anymore, write a letter. Tell your loved one how much you care and wish that you had one more moment together. Describe what you would do given the chance. Putting your thoughts on paper will free your mind from holding them. Everyone has regrets about how much better things could have been. This is a common human experience, one that we all share. Bring any regrets to your current relationships. Tell the people around you that you love them, that you value time with them, that they are important. Take any regrets and use them as tools to make your life today richer for you and those you love. Make the way you live now a living tribute to the person you lost. |
| 5/27/2023 | “Deep grief sometimes is almost like a specific location, a coordinate on a map of time. When you are standing in that forest of sorrow, you cannot imagine that you could ever find your way to a better place. But if someone can assure you that they themselves have stood in that same place, and now have moved on, sometimes this will bring hope” – Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love It seems almost impossible that you will ever feel like you did before this great loss. It’s almost as if your life is now divided into two distinct parts: before this tragedy and after it. Know that this process is going to be long, and, at times, feel like it is standing still. Be good to yourself. It requires patience and hope that you will be able to enjoy life again. It will come. Hang on and believe that you will slowly step back to the “old you”. That person will emerge from the sorrow so slowly that at first you may not even realize it has happened. |
| 5/26/2023 | “It is useless for me to describe to you how terrible Violet, Klaus, and even Sunny felt in the time that followed. If you have ever lost someone very important to you, then you already know how it feels, and if you haven’t, you cannot possibly imagine it.” – Lemony Snicket, The Bad Beginning Well-meaning friends and acquaintances are asking you how you’re doing. Is there a good answer to that question? You say, “I’m fine,” a meaningless lie to make the moment go away. The only people who know how you are have been where you are. The others are not unkind, they are simply unaware. They have no idea how one day their lives will change in such profound ways. These changes are so significant that it feels like they alter your DNA. You want to tell them to enjoy their innocence, to relish their days without true loss. But you can’t, because you appreciate that they are trying to be kind. So, give a small smile, tell them you’re fine, and ask them about their lives. It is a part of grieving and growing, and will help to heal your broken heart. |
| 5/25/2023 | “You think you’ve accepted that someone is out of your life, that you’ve grieved and it’s over, and then bam. One little thing, and you feel like you’ve lost that person all over again.” – Rachel Hawkins, Demonglass It’s going to happen. You don’t know where or when, but it is a certainty that it will transpire. You will run into someone who hasn’t heard about your loss, or you’ll find an unexpected memento, or hear a quote that is just like something your loved one used to say. Feel the mixed emotions that flood into your head at that moment. You will want to laugh and cry and scream at once. It is part of grieving, and it is a moment in time that will join the hundreds of other such moments you are coping with now. It is overwhelming, but fleeting. Know that it will come, and then let it float over you. You will move forward, stronger for having survived it. |
| 5/24/2023 | “To weep is to make less the depth of grief.” -William Shakespeare There is no shame in crying to cope with grief. Cry a little, and then move on. You may have two weeks without tears and then cry every day for a month. Do not worry that you will never recover from your loss. You will make it a part of you, and it will open your heart to commiserate with others. Cry when you need to so that you can live and love with an open heart. |
| 5/23/2023 | “Grief can destroy you –or focus you. You can decide a relationship was all for nothing if it had to end in death, and you alone. OR you can realize that every moment of it had more meaning than you dared to recognize at the time, so much meaning it scared you, so you just lived, just took for granted the love and laughter of each day, and didn’t allow yourself to consider the sacredness of it. But when it’s over and you’re alone, you begin to see that it wasn’t just a movie and a dinner together, not just watching sunsets together, not just scrubbing a floor or washing dishes together or worrying over a high electric bill. It was everything, it was the why of life, every event and precious moment of it. The answer to the mystery of existence is the love you shared sometimes so imperfectly, and when the loss wakes you to the deeper beauty of it, to the sanctity of it, you can’t get off your knees for a long time, you’re driven to your knees not by the weight of the loss but by gratitude for what preceded the loss. And the ache is always there, but one day not the emptiness, because to nurture the emptiness, to take solace in it, is to disrespect the gift of life.” – Dean Koontz, Odd Hours Look back at your friendship, your love, and your caring for the one who has passed on. Celebrate what made it great. Share your stories with those who knew that person and are feeling the loss as well. Look for online forums as places to commiserate with others who are grieving. Taking active steps to cope with your sense of sadness will help you to heal and help others to feel less alone. |
| 5/22/2023 | “Grief is not as heavy as guilt, but it takes more away from you.” – Veronica Roth, Insurgent When you experience such a profound loss, you have a kind of heaviness in your heart that feels permanent. It seems as if it will smother you with its intensity at times, and makes you question if it will ever lighten. The light will return. It may not be today, and it may not be tomorrow. The key is to keep moving forward, trying to really live in each moment. Grief is a heavy burden, but it will morph into one that you can carry given time. |
| 5/21/2023 | “When someone you love dies, and you’re not expecting it, you don’t lose her all at once; you lose her in pieces over a long time – the way the mail stops coming, and her scent fades from the pillows and even from the clothes in her closet and drawers. Gradually, you accumulate the parts of her that are gone. Just when the day comes – when there’s a particular missing part that overwhelms you with the feeling that she’s gone, forever – there comes another day, and another specifically missing part.” – John Irving, A Prayer for Owen Meany To see the clothes in the closet, the handwriting that is so familiar on scraps of paper around the house, and the small unfinished tasks left behind can be so bittersweet. You want to see the familiar, the mundane, to feel like life has not changed. The sadness comes from knowing that there are no new stories or everyday items to keep your connection alive. As time passes, you will find strength in these items. Treasure the sights, the smells, the small pieces of your loved ones. Make a memory box to keep them for the times you need to feel your connection in a tangible way. As time passes, you won’t need to look as often, but there is comfort in knowing they are there if you do. |
| 5/20/2023 | “No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear.” – C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed You may be asking yourself how you can possibly move on with your life. Your world has changed, and this new reality is unbearable. Try to recognize that a big part of how you are feeling is fear. You may be afraid that you will never experience joy again, that you will never want to participate in activities that used to bring you pleasure, or that you will never connect to others as you once did. Be patient with yourself. The early days can feel unbearable…with each one as overwhelming as the one before. The process of grief takes time, perhaps longer than you might expect. You do not need to feel afraid, because you are not alone. Others feel as you do. You may want to reach out to a support group in your area to talk with people who are also experiencing loss. You do not need to be frightened, because there are many people who feel as you do right now. |
| 5/19/2023 | “Only people who are capable of loving strongly can also suffer great sorrow, but this same necessity of loving serves to counteract their grief and heals them.” – Leo Tolstoy When we love someone – be it a friend, family member, or spouse – we open ourselves up to the potential for loss. Yet, we take the plunge, and embrace these relationships, for it is through these connections that we really live. The pain of loss feels insurmountable, but opening your heart to friendship and to love are the keys to truly living again. |
| 5/18/2023 | “You will lose someone you can’t live without, and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up. And you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly – that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp.” – Anne Lamott Living with loss changes you. You see both joys and sorrows with a new perspective, and a greater appreciation of their importance. The loss of someone heightens your feelings towards those who are still a part of your life. To love and care with an open heart is one of the gifts afforded you by suffering through the pain of grieving. |
| 5/17/2023 | “The pleasure of remembering had been taken from me, because there was no longer anyone to remember with. It felt like losing your co-rememberer meant losing the memory itself, as if the things we’d done were less real and important than they had been hours before.” – John Green, The Fault in Our Stars An integral part of sharing a relationship with someone is building memories together. The loss of a friend or loved one means the loss of reliving those joint experiences. It is the everyday parts of life, be it running into someone at the market or seeing a favorite movie, that can be hardest to bear. Keep a memories journal as a place to write down these stories as they trigger in your memory. This book can be a place to write how you are feeling or even just how much you miss that special person. Journaling brings healing and gives you a positive outlet for these strong emotions. |
| 5/16/2023 | “I will not say, do not weep, for not all tears are an evil.” – J.R.R. Tolkien You may be trying to hide your tears. It might feel like you are being strong by not crying. To cry is not to be weak, but rather to release your sorrow so that you can let go of it and move forward. You may need to cry every day. Cry…but then dry your eyes and live your life with joy until the next time you need to shed the inevitable tears that come with the grieving process. Crying is a natural part of healing. Cry, but then laugh and smile as you live a full and meaningful life. |
| 5/15/2023 | “The reality is that you will grieve forever. You will not ‘get over’ the loss of a loved one; you will learn to live with it. You will heal and you will rebuild yourself around the loss you have suffered. You will be whole again but you will never be the same. Nor should you be the same nor would you want to.” – Elisabeth Kübler-Ross Hope is the one constant. The hope that you will feel better, that you will “get over” such an enormous loss is as constant as the knowledge that the sun will rise at the beginning of each new day. You do need hope, but hope that’s directed towards living for today. Reach out to someone else. Channel yourself into positive things that are around you. Your new hope should be that you live your life as fully as you can each day. |
| 5/12/2023 | “When those you love die, the best you can do is honor their spirit for as long as you live. You make a commitment that you’re going to take whatever lesson that person or animal was trying to teach you, and you make it true in your own life… it’s a positive way to keep their spirit alive in the world, by keeping it alive in yourself.” Patrick Swayze If you could capture the essence of your loved one using one word, what would it be? Do one thing today to bring that word to life. |
| 5/11/2023 | “There are as many sorrows as there are people who feel them and there are no rules… It is solitary… Grief is such a lonely thing. There is no-one in it with you – others may grieve for the same soul, but they do not grieve exactly for what you also grieve. No-one has lost precisely what you have lost. Not exactly, never exactly. We are in it alone… Oh it is wild and it is lonely. It is as if you’ve woken to a world that you recognise but it has been tilted, somehow – coated, or rubbed down, or made colder or less bright. It echoes where it should not echo; where it should echo, it is as echoless as a single, muffled thud. And grief is not merely sadness, as if sadness alone was not enough to bear. I had imagined the sorrow to be as deep as a well, a howling grief, but I had not imagined the other feelings that have no right to be there, which seem wholly misplaced in a state of grieving – rage, impatience, self-pity, disgust. They come from the dark and rush in upon you…” Susan Fletcher Even when there are people swirling around you, you may feel very lonely in your own skin. It is almost ironic that the times you feel the most isolated may be the times when you are surrounded by the most people. Change your focus from the group as its own entity to one individual. Reach out and talk to that person. Making a one-on-one connection will help you feel more connected again. |
| 5/10/2023 | “When those you love die, the best you can do is honor their spirit for as long as you live. You make a commitment that you’re going to take whatever lesson that person or animal was trying to teach you, and you make it true in your own life… it’s a positive way to keep their spirit alive in the world, by keeping it alive in yourself.” Patrick Swayze If you could capture the essence of your loved one using one word, what would it be? Do one thing today to bring that word to life. |
| 5/9/2023 | “There are as many sorrows as there are people who feel them and there are no rules… It is solitary… Grief is such a lonely thing. There is no-one in it with you – others may grieve for the same soul, but they do not grieve exactly for what you also grieve. No-one has lost precisely what you have lost. Not exactly, never exactly. We are in it alone… Oh it is wild and it is lonely. It is as if you’ve woken to a world that you recognise but it has been tilted, somehow – coated, or rubbed down, or made colder or less bright. It echoes where it should not echo; where it should echo, it is as echoless as a single, muffled thud. And grief is not merely sadness, as if sadness alone was not enough to bear. I had imagined the sorrow to be as deep as a well, a howling grief, but I had not imagined the other feelings that have no right to be there, which seem wholly misplaced in a state of grieving – rage, impatience, self-pity, disgust. They come from the dark and rush in upon you…” Susan Fletcher Even when there are people swirling around you, you may feel very lonely in your own skin. It is almost ironic that the times you feel the most isolated may be the times when you are surrounded by the most people. Change your focus from the group as its own entity to one individual. Reach out and talk to that person. Making a one-on-one connection will help you feel more connected again. |
| 5/8/2023 | “You endure what is supposedly unbearable, and before you know it, you would have done the impossible by bearing the unbearable.” – Donovan People told you things would slowly get better, but until you survive the first year of grief, that can be hard to believe. Looking back, you have made it through family events and milestones that seemed overwhelming. This next year will still be hard, but will not compare to what you’ve already accomplished. Continue to reach out to others to support you and rely on your inner strength when you need to. Just know that you are not alone. |
| 5/7/2023 | “Change the way you think and you will change the way you feel.” – Charmaine Smith Ladd, Shake Hands with Yourself: A Peacemaker’s Guide to Happiness & Inner Peace Make sure you live your life through a lens of gratitude and appreciation. You are always going to be sad about your loss, but take that feeling and channel it into love for the life that is all around you. |
| 5/6/2023 | “The point is to turn your grief into love. The roses are helping you find grace.” – Holly Lynn Payne, DAMASCENA – The Tale of Roses and Rumi You have been learning more about life from death than you thought possible. Turn that sadness into empathy and love for other people. Make an effort to make someone else’s day better and, in return, you will start to appreciate the value of life that becomes heightened by suffering through grief. |
| 5/5/2023 | Loss reshapes us and teaches us to fill ourselves with something new. If we resist, we feel as you do. Hollow. Empty.” – Ash Krafton, Wolf’s Bane What have you done to actively work through your grief process this week? Remember to exercise, eat well, and find ways to reach out to other people. Being passive will not ease your heart. You need to make the effort to respect yourself and reconnect with the world. |
| 5/4/2023 | “We all have our sorrows, and although the exact delineations, weight and dimensions of grief are different for everyone, the color of grief is common to us all.” – Diane Setterfield, The Thirteenth Tale Go online and read the stories of others who are grieving. You will feel comfort from and a connection to these people that you did not expect. |
| 5/3/2023 | “I had met death before, in different forms–I knew quite well the pattern of my grieving. First came shock, and then tears, and then a bitter anger, followed by a softer grief that time would wear away.” – Susanna Kearsley, The Splendour Falls Even if you know the expected order of grief, the process is still overwhelming at times. Think about where you think you are in your grief today. Are you sad, angry, or perhaps somewhere in-between. Looking objectively at how you are doing can help you manage your emotions as you work through the process. |
| 5/2/2023 | “My pain builds like storm clouds-massive, dark, and heavy with teardrops. Moisture falls torrential as if my world is a violent, eternal downpour; however, at long last the source runs dry and the bitter storm does cease. Blue skies dare to glow where the gloom has dissipated. I breathe it in, hoping to cleanse my inner soul. A laden heart tells me the truth; the clear sky is an illusion. Old pain rushes back like a flood, providing means for clouds to form and expand once again until it is too much to bear and the heaviness turns to rain. I cannot find refuge from this woe. It is my never-ending heartache.” – Richelle E. Goodrich The first time you have a relapse of grief feels overwhelming. After working hard to feel better for so many weeks, it is almost cruel to have such sadness. The return of grief is normal and will continue to happen again and again – often for years. The good news is that after the first time, you are ready for it. You don’t like it, but you expect its inevitable presence. Like rainstorms that can spoil a summer’s day at the beach, the tears of grief will come and go. What you need to do is figure out what you need to do to weather that storm. |
| 5/1/2023 | “There need not be a purpose to a person’s death, other than that they have lived the length of their days on this Earth and now begin the longer part of their existence.” – Brian M. Holmes, What Are You Crying About? Defeating Grief for Christians You may be searching for a deeper meaning in your loved one’s life or even your own as part of your grief process. The truth is that the meaning of someone’s life doesn’t have to be profound. We all contribute something to the fabric of our relationships. Like the square of a much larger quilt, it may seem insignificant on its own, but its absence makes a big empty spot. What is one thing that stands out to you about your loved one? Did that person give a great hug when you visited? Was he or she a good listener? Perhaps your loved one was someone you could really trust. Think about that contribution today as your own tribute to that special person. |
| 4/30/2023 | “He had pulled out of that grief, eventually – out from under the suffocating weight of it. Suffering had formed him: made him silent and deliberate, thoughtful: deep.” – Amanda Coplin, The Orchardist You will find your voice. You will be able to talk about the person you lost without your eyes filling with tears. If you are not there yet, don’t worry. That day will come soon. |
| 4/29/2023 | “Funerals seem less about comforting the souls of these dearly departed than about comforting the people they leave behind.” – Rin Chupeco“347 Funerals, like weddings, are a blur for those at the center of the ceremony. Now that some time has passed and the shock has diminished, you may want to stop and truly celebrate the person you lost. Organize a small dinner or simple get-together that you term a celebration of life. Give those who loved that person a chance to remember and share the beauty of that life with others who are feeling the same way. |
| 4/28/2023 | “My grief lies all within; and these external manner of laments are merely shadows of the unseen grief that swells with silence in the tortur’d soul.” – William Shakespeare, Richard II You get dressed and go about your day wearing a mask. Outsiders have no idea how hurt you still feel. Over time, you have learned how to “look the part” of someone who has recovered from this terrible loss. You may be feeling worried today that the rest of your life will feel like putting on a play, that you will have to hide your true emotions forever. In the months and years to come, however, the balance will shift. You will have to hide your grief less and less as you return to your former self. Don’t feel you have to rush the process, but know that it’s not unusual to worry about its duration. |
| 4/27/2023 | “I’m convinced that the world, more than ever, needs the music only you can make. And if it takes extra courage to keep playing in spite of your loss, many will applaud the effort. And who knows? Others may be inspired to pick up their broken instruments, their broken lives, and begin again.” – Steve Goodier You may have withdrawn from hobbies and pastimes you enjoy. It is hard to take pleasure in leisure activities when you are overcome with the sadness that is the hallmark of grief. Choose something you used to love doing and make a plan to go back to it this week. It could be a playing golf, going for a hike, or bowling with friends. Even if you do an abbreviated version of a favorite hobby, it will be a small, meaningful step towards your recovery. |
| 4/26/2023 | “We don’t really want answers, we don’t want explanations, and we don’t want closure. … We want an end to suffering … but we shouldn’t leave it up to God to alleviate suffering. … He is waiting for us to do it. That’s what we are here for.” – ARON MOSS Turn your focus from how you are feeling to what you are doing. That small shift will make a significant impact on your life. |
| 4/25/2023 | “Mrs. Sussex said Byron’s loss would grow more bearable. But here was the nub: he didn’t want to lose his loss. Loss was all he had left of his mother. If time healed the gap, it would be as if she’d never been there.” – Rachel Joyce, Perfect Grief keeps your relationship with your loved one at the forefront of your life. As it starts to fade, you may feel a sense of loss all over again. Letting go of your grief may be as challenging for you as the grief itself. Allow yourself to evolve and move beyond your sadness without guilt. You were not meant to grieve for anyone indefinitely. |
| 4/24/2023 | “Grief can destroy you – or focus you. You can decide a relationship was all for nothing if it had to end in death, and you alone. Or you can realize that every moment of it had more meaning than you dared to recognize at the time, so much meaning it scared you, so you just lived, just took for granted the love and laughter of each day, and didn’t allow yourself to consider the sacredness of it. But when it’s over and you’re alone, you begin to see it wasn’t just a movie and a dinner together, not just watching sunsets together, not just scrubbing a floor or washing dishes together or worrying over a high electric bill. It was everything, it was the why of life, every event and precious moment of it. The answer to the mystery of existence is the love you shared sometimes so imperfectly, and when the loss wakes you to the deeper beauty of it, to the sanctity of it, you can’t get off your knees for a long time, you’re driven to your knees not by the weight of the loss but by gratitude for what preceded the loss. “And the ache is always there, but one day not the emptiness, because to nurture the emptiness, to take solace in it, is to disrespect the gift of life.” – Dean Koontz, Odd Hours It can be startling how much more you learn about a relationship when it’s over than when you were part of it. One of the hardest parts of death is that now that you’ve had time to figure out the relationship and appreciate its best parts, you don’t have the chance to apply that understanding to it any longer. What you can do, however, is take that learning and apply it to other parts of your life. What did you do well in that relationship and how can you take that understanding and use it to make other partnerships grow stronger? |
| 4/23/2023 | “In grief, part of the pain comes from our feeling that we should not suffer so – that it is fundamentally alien to our being, this even though we all suffer, and frequently. Yet we reject suffering as a basic human truth, while greeting joy as integral to our very substance.” – Wendy Beckett, Sister Wendy’s Meditations on Joy As you start to gain a small amount of perspective on this process, it may be becoming clear to you that sadness and grief are integral parts of who we are as people. We don’t deserve one or the other. They are simply what defines us as human beings. |
| 4/22/2023 | “Maybe this is a second doctoral program: advanced learning about life, death, marriage, mothering, family, faith, patience, prayer. My degree will be ‘Doctor of Life,’ and I will be in good company. So many of us earn our ‘Doctor of Life’ degrees.” – Christina G. Hibbert Psy.D. Like an academic degree, you have been advancing through the stages of grief, being tested along the way. A few years from now you will look back and be amazed that you made it through this period and feel a sense of relief that you were able to survive it. |
| 4/21/2023 | “Suffering ain’t a favor we do for the dead. If Remy was to see me now, he’d want the both of us to carry on without him. Remy knew I loved him while he was here and now he ain’t and that’s an end to it. Ain’t no use in resting in the past nor leaning heavily onto grief.” – Samuel Snoek-Brown, Hagridden Some people seem to walk through grief unscathed. Don’t be fooled. Grief changes everyone. The only difference is that some people are better at compartmentalizing their feelings than others. |
| 4/20/2023 | “Never compare your grief. You – and only you walk your path.” – Nathalie Himmelrich, Grieving Parents: Surviving Loss as a Couple How long did it take you to learn to read? …to drive?…to commit to a relationship? Grief is as personal as every other part of your life. Do not worry because you perceive that your sibling or friend is coping better than you are. Just keep your head looking straight ahead and walk your own path. |
| 4/19/2023 | “We do not have control over many things in life and death but we do have control over the meaning we give it.” – Nathalie Himmelrich, Grieving Parents: Surviving Loss as a Couple Your grief has probably been the driving force in your life for months now. When you’re not actively grieving, you have an awareness that it’s there waiting for you. Although some aspects of it may still make you feel out of control, you have actually reclaimed parts of your life since you first experienced your loss. |
| 4/18/2023 | “Sorrow on another’s face often looks like coldness, bitterness, resentment, unfriendliness, apathy, disdain, or disinterest when it is in truth purely sadness.” – Richelle E. Goodrich Make the effort to reach out to someone who appears closed off or unfriendly. You may discover that they are actually grieving too. |
| 4/17/2023 | “This is the real power of joy, to make us certain that, beneath all grief, the most fundamental of realities is joy itself.” – Wendy Beckett, Sister Wendy’s Meditations on Joy The percentages of joy and sorrow in your life have been skewed for a long time. The sorrow has been dominant and the happiness has been fleeting. A large component of your healing is restoring the balance between these opposite emotions. |
| 4/16/2023 | “She was no longer wrestling with the grief, but could sit down with it as a lasting companion and make it a sharer in her thoughts.” – George Eliot Somehow, your grief just becomes another part of you. It doesn’t happen overnight, but at some point you will become aware that it is just another component of your character. |
| 4/15/2023 | “When my mother died, I thought I’d drown in sorrow. But my grandmother said something very wise, and I’ve always held it close to my heart. She said that not even the sea is infinite, and neither is grief.” – Teresa Frohock What advice would you give to someone who is grieving? Your ability to answer that question today proves that you are making progress in your own grief process. |
| 4/14/2023 | “What were you going to make for Christmas dinner?” one of my older children asked in a very reasonable tone. I cleared my throat, but couldn’t speak. There was no real explanation for my behavior. I’d been so intent on getting through this first Christmas without David. I’d found new rituals to replace the old, wrapped gifts, and even made cutout sugar cookies. I’d modified Christmas in order to endure it. What I hadn’t done was plan on or prepare a Christmas meal. Everyone was looking at me expectantly by this point, including my sweet, hungry grandchildren. “I forgot all about Christmas dinner,” I finally admitted. No one batted an eye.” – Mary Potter Kenyon, Refined By Fire: A Journey of Grief and Grace You may find yourself devoting lots of energy in certain parts of your life while almost completely neglecting other parts. Restoring balance takes a lot longer than you may realize. The key is to maintain a sense of patience and even humor about the inevitable mistakes you will make as you rebuild your life from this loss. |
| 4/13/2023 | “You have no idea how well you are doing,” John complimented me just a few minutes after he mentioned the Christmas card. What did that mean: That I was doing well? That I’d come to a family gathering? That I’d remembered to bring food? That I was dressed, and my hair combed? That I was wearing shoes? I wasn’t sure, but maybe just making an appearance at a family event meant I was handling things well.” – Mary Potter Kenyon, Refined By Fire: A Journey of Grief and Grace You may be feeling a bit conflicted. You want to be doing “better” in your grief process, yet it is somehow irritating when people don’t realize how hard it still is in so many ways. Having a wide range of emotions even months after your loss is normal. It’s as if you are a teenager again and you don’t really know what you want. Like the teenage years, however, this period will seem long when you are in it, but won’t last forever. |
| 4/12/2023 | “When my late father died – now I’m in mourning for my late mother – that sense of grief and bereavement suddenly taught me that so many things that I thought were important, externals, etc., all of that is irrelevant. You lose a parent, you suddenly realize what a slender thing life is, how easily you can lose those you love. Then out of that comes a new simplicity and that is why sometimes all the pain and the tears lift you to a much higher and deeper joy when you say to the bad times, “I will not let you go until you bless me.” – Jonathan Sacks Mark your calendar or put a reminder on your phone to look back at this period one year from now. Find at least one thing you have learned from this experience that you think has made you a better person. It may surprise you to see that there are actually some positive gains that arise out of this terrible experience. |
| 4/11/2023 | “They say (she had read somewhere) that no one ever disappears, up in the atmosphere, stratosphere, whatever you call space–atoms infinitely minute, beyond conception of existence, are up there forever, from the whole world, from all time.” – Nadine Gordimer Sometimes it brings people comfort to “talk” to their loved ones. Simply saying out loud what you would say to them can be cathartic. No matter your belief system, the temporary feeling that you can say what you want to say to your loved one can help clear your mind as you slowly heal from this loss. |
| 4/10/2023 | “In the midst of the darkness of loss, I found light. Admittedly, in those first weeks, it might have been but a single small spark I sensed deep inside of me, but that spark guided me in the twisted, dark journey of grief. As I stumbled over the roots of hopelessness and despair, that light grew to illuminate my path, a path I sometimes felt very alone on. At some point in the journey I’d turned around, and there was God. That is grace.” – Mary Potter Kenyon, Refined By Fire: A Journey of Grief and Grace Look carefully today for a spark of hope. Even in your darkest moments, you will find it is there. |
| 4/9/2023 | “No one can take your grief from you; it belongs to you and you alone.” – Cassandra Clare, Clockwork Princess You can’t expect someone else to take control of your grieving process. Friends and family can advise you, but it is up to you and you alone to take charge of your own emotions. You know when you are ready and when you need to push yourself a bit beyond what is comfortable. Do not take on the role of a passive observer in your own life. |
| 4/8/2023 | “Unfortunately, there is no expiration date on grief” – Elizabeth Czukas Did you think that your grief period would be over in three months, that it would be complete within a year? Put away your calendar. You will feel frustrated if you put a timetable on this process. Just know that grieving will continue for you at your own unique pace. Try to focus on the fact that there are no expectations, no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ ways to grieve. Taking the pressure off of yourself will actually help your process to flow more naturally and with less stress. |
| 4/7/2023 | “Those who have endured the scars of life, sorrows of the Heart, the grief of loss, pain of body, mind or spirit, and have fathomed the unexplainable sufferings of life have the greatest capacity to Love and live a joyful life by opening their hearts to the promptings of compassion. Love is seeing yourself in the sufferings of others and Joy is your service to them.” – Tom Hackett This loss has stretched open your heart in ways you could not have predicted. Reach out and connect to someone who needs you. Do something today to start to re-fill that empty place. |
| 4/6/2023 | “Accepting death doesn’t mean you won’t be devastated when someone you love dies. It means you will be able to focus on your grief, unburdened by bigger existential questions like, “Why do people die?” and “Why is this happening to me?” Death isn’t happening to you. Death is happening to us all.” – Caitlin Doughty This loss feels very personal, and it is. The emotions that it evokes are, in many ways, unique to you. Your friends and relatives may be grieving very differently than you are, and this disparity can be unsettling at times. In the weeks and months to come, however, you will start to rationalize what has happened. Loss, while devastating, is a part of our human existence. Although the emotional acceptance is slow and painful, you may be ready to start accepting it intellectually. That is an important first step in coming to terms with what has happened. |
| 4/5/2023 | “I aspire to be the widow my husband would be proud of….still.” – Mary Lee Robinson Do you think that your loved one would want you to give up on life because of his or her death? Take a moment today to reflect on who your loved one would want you to be. |
| 4/4/2023 | “…I told her that letting go is not a choice, in many ways. You try to move on, perhaps. But it comes of its own accord, in the end; it happens when it is ready to, and it mostly comes by without announcement or being noticed at all. I’ll always miss my husband. I won’t ever be the person I was before… You don’t mend fully, I tell her. But you mend enough, in time.” – Susan Fletcher, The Silver Dark Sea Emotionally, you are probably not where you thought you would be a year ago. Your mind, heart, and body have been through so much in these past months. For many people, making peace with a loss takes years. The changes are so gradual, that you may be convinced that you will never recover. We don’t recover when we want to, we recover when we can. Be patient with yourself, and trust that while there will be many setbacks, you will eventually find a place of acceptance. |
| 4/3/2023 | “The importance of humor is primarily to puncture fixed ideas – to make us step back and realize that our situation, whatever it may be, is, in the grand scheme of things, always contingent and arbitrary and ephemeral. And that helps us to deal with our emotions and to keep going. Holding on to one perspective, on the other hand, whether it takes the form of grief or anger or a particular political standpoint, is often destructive to us and to those around us” – Paul Murray Have you laughed recently? You may have chuckled or had a small giggle, but have you had a big, belly laugh? You may not really, truly “laugh until your cry” at all this year; you may not be ready to let go and laugh fully. When that moment does finally come, try to see it as a triumph. It is a signal that you can live life and embrace joy again. |
| 4/2/2023 | “Caring for others tends to be the first cut when we review our personal time budget. It does not necessarily fulfill the goals of my ambition; it will not pave the way for my success; it takes away from my own depleted emotional resources. It is an imposition in every way. To some of us, it is an inconvenience from which we unashamedly run. We have become experts in maintaining a grand scope of friendships and amateurs in genuine intimacy and care. Unwittingly, we have sacrificed everything on the altar of self-sufficiency – only to discover that we have sold our souls to isolation.” – Sandy Oshiro Rosen, Bare: The Misplaced Art of Grieving and Dancing Take a few minutes to write, call, or text a friend today who you may have neglected during this grieving period. These relationships need to be nurtured. While it may not be easy to reach out when you’re still not feeling like yourself, but the rewards are worth the effort. |
| 4/1/2023 | “I know this: there is no sense to grief. There is no pattern or shape or texture, and there are no books or stories which can lessen the pain at losing a person you have loved, and will always love. There are no rules, with loss.” – Susan Fletcher, The Silver Dark Sea Some days, you may feel like your grief has faded to a certain degree while others may be hugely challenging. Unlike other large changes in your life, the pattern of your emotions are unpredictable with grief. Continue to be patient with yourself as you experience a wide range of feelings and responses. |
| 3/31/2023 | “Even when it seems that there is no one else, always remember there’s one person who never ceased to love you – yourself.” – Sanhita Baruah Through all of this, don’t forget to look out for yourself. Your health, contentment, and well being continue to matter. |
| 3/30/2023 | “We talk about how he and Leanne are doing knowing full well there is no sufficient answer.” – Michael Perry From the outside, people may now assume you’re doing fine. They may no longer even ask you about your loss, yet it may still be all-consuming. Remember that there are always other people who want to talk about their own losses and listen to you talk about yours. Even though time has passed, do not hesitate to join or rejoin a support group either online or in person. You may need it now more than in those first weeks when others were encouraging you to talk about your feelings. |
| 3/29/2023 | “It had been many months since I’d shed tears for Tomaso, but grief is like that. It’s not a continuous process; it comes in waves. You can keep it at bay for a time, like a dam holding back a lake, but then something triggers an explosion inside of you, shattering the wall and letting loose a flood.” – Paul Adam, Paganini’s Ghost Like a flood, the shock of an unexpected onset of grief saturates every part of you. You literally can feel like you are drowning. Just like actual flood waters, however, the grief will recede back again. This flood of emotions is never easy to manage, but will be less frequent as you heal. |
| 3/28/2023 | “One of the grubby truths about a loss is that you don’t just mourn the dead person, you mourn the person you got to be when the lost one was alive. This loss might even be what affects you the most.” – Meghan O’Rourke, The Long Goodbye You may resent the fact that you can never go back to being a person who hasn’t suffered a great loss. That is normal. Take a moment today to appreciate some of the growth that this loss has cultivated, such as increased compassion, empathy, and sensitivity to others. While you would never hope to have a loss, you can start to see how its impact has led to a degree of personal growth. |
| 3/27/2023 | “Grief dares us to love once more.” – Terry Tempest Williams, Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place Your loss created a void in your life, an empty place that feels almost like an open wound. Over time, your desire to fill it will increase, but you will never “replace” your loved one. Rather, that place will fill from unexpected sources: the casual friend who evolves into a trusted confidant, the sibling who used to be “too busy” to talk becomes your most treasured family member. You just need to be open to rebuilding your emotional life into a composition that you did not anticipate. |
| 3/26/2023 | “Rejection is one of the worse forms of pain. Loss is the worst. Grief haunts until you allow yourself to move on.” – Angelica Hopes As unreasonable as it may sound, there are times when you may feel a sense of rejection from your loved one’s death. You may even be asking why you have to cope with this great loss at all. No matter the circumstances, you need to see that no part of it was intended to make you feel alone. If it is still hard to accept that the death was not intended to bring this pain, then you may want to consider talking to someone to help you resolve this. |
| 3/25/2023 | “She needed to recover. His father had died in January; it was only the end of May. They needed to stick to the routine they’d established during the intervening months. in that way, their life would return to its original shape, like a spring stretched in bad times but contracting eventually into happiness. That the world could come permanently unsprung had never occurred to him.” – David Wroblewski, The Story of Edgar Sawtelle If you knew what the grief process to this point would entail at the time of your loss would you have believed it? Would you have thought you could make it to today? Well, you did make it, and it is important for you to focus on the fact that you have survived. You are stronger than you think you are. |
| 3/24/2023 | “When someone you love dies, you get a big bowl of sadness put down in front of you, steaming hot. You can start eating now, or you can let it cool and eat it bit by bit later on. Either way, you end up eating the whole thing. There’s really no way around it.” – Ralph Fletcher, Fig Pudding There are so many metaphors for how you are feeling. People write them to try to show that grief is a universal experience, so that you don’t feel isolated. While everyone’s grief is unique, it is the commonality of it that joins together those who have lost someone close to them. |
| 3/23/2023 | “What made losing someone you loved bearable was not remembering but forgetting. Forgetting small things first… it’s amazing how much you could forget, and everything you forgot made that person less alive inside you until you could finally endure it. After more time passed you could let yourself remember, even want to remember. But even then what you felt those first days could return and remind you the grief was still there, like old barbed wire embedded in a tree’s heartwood.” – Ron Rash, Serena You may be battling in your head between wanting to forget and wanting to remember. In time, you will reach the balance where you have a bit of both. |
| 3/22/2023 | “And this evening when I close my eyes against the darkness and think about her, I’ll imagine iridescent wings fluttering, if only for a moment, against cloudless blue skies.” – Nancy Stephan, The Truth About Butterflies: A Memoir Don’t be disappointed if your loved one has not appeared in your dreams. That will happen, and it is a moment to treasure. |
| 3/21/2023 | “Grief was like a newborn, and the first three months were hard as hell, but by six months you’d recognized defeat, shifted your life around, and made room for it.” – Ann Brashares, Sisterhood Everlasting Continuing with the simile that grief is like a newborn – when grief is new you cry all the time and your new world is a mystery to you. As you grow, you learn to handle your needs and disappointments, but there are still times when you will cry. You may still feel like a ‘newborn’ or have moved on in your evolution. Remember that along the way, you will fall down and cry, but you will learn how to cope better with time and experience. |
| 3/20/2023 | “I’d long thought that a surfeit of sensitivity could be a killing thing, too much insight malignant in its own right. The best survivors–there are studies that show it–are those blessed with an inordinate ability to deny. And keep on marching.” – Jonathan Kellerman, Blood Test There may be times when it is easier to pretend that your loss never happened. While you intellectually will always know it took place, you may need to turn off that part of your emotions to give yourself a break from the sorrow. |
| 3/19/2023 | “June is gone. For the first time, the enormity of that hits me. Every muscle aches, my heart most of all. I am throbbing with how much I miss her. It hurts worse than anything. I don’t know how I’m supposed to be expected to live day to day carrying this kind of pain. I don’t know how I’m supposed to go out there, spread her ashes, and let her go. I want to stop running away from everything. I want to find something to run toward.” – Hannah Harrington, Saving June You are still having that year of firsts…the first birthday, the first long weekend, the first new year’s day without your loved one. It is hard because each first is a reminder that your life has permanently changed. Once this first year is over, however, you know that you can make it through the birthdays and through the holidays. They will always have a degree of difficulty to them, but for most people the first year is the hardest. |
| 3/18/2023 | “Every hour that passed added to her grief, because it bore her further away from the living man, and because it was a tiny foretaste of the eternity she would have to spend without him. Again and again she found herself forgetting, for the space of a heartbeat, that he was gone forever and that she could not turn to him for comfort.” – J.K. Rowling, The Casual Vacancy Go online or to your favorite newspaper to find out the names of the books on the bestsellers list. Escape into a good book – one that takes you to another place or time. There is something so peaceful and soothing about relaxing with a good book, and it will help you feel calm as you cope with the stress of your loss. |
| 3/17/2023 | “Among other things, Kathryn knew, grief was physically exhausting.” – Anita Shreve, The Pilot’s Wife Grief can affect your sleep patterns. You may be sleeping more or less than normal. If you find that your sleep is significantly different since your loss, then you should be sure to see your healthcare provider. |
| 3/16/2023 | “What people resist is not change per se, but loss.” – Ronald A. Heifetz, The Practice of Adaptive Leadership: Tools and Tactics for Changing Your Organization and the World” The changes that have happened are not what you or anyone would have wanted. As part of your healing, you need to make some positive changes. They could be a hobby or skill or even something as simple as developing a healthy habit. Make changes that bring you joy. |
| 3/15/2023 | “There is a point when grief exceeds the human capacity to emote, and as a result one is strangely composed” – Abraham Verghese, Cutting for Stone At the beginning of your grieving process, you may have felt like your life was going through the motions. It was like being in shock. Because of that, you may only now be starting to feel strong emotions about your loss or your feelings may have changed. That is why they refer to grief as a process. |
| 3/14/2023 | “The only language she could speak was grief. How could he not know that? Instead, she said, “I love you.” She did. She loved him. But even that didn’t feel like anything anymore.” – Ann Hood, The Knitting Circle When you are grieving, it becomes the dominant emotion in your life. While it may feel like no other emotion will thrive again, it will. You just need to be patient and trust that you will return to your old self in time. |
| 3/13/2023 | “Sydney discovers that she minds the loss of her mourning. When she grieved, she felt herself to be intimately connected to Daniel. But with each passing day, he floats away from her. When she thinks about him now, it is more as a lost possibility than as a man. She has forgotten his breath, his musculature.” – Anita Shreve, Body Surfing Your grief will be a strong presence in your life for the next couple of years. Strangely, it will be something you become accustomed to over time. It will eventually fade into the background of your life. |
| 3/12/2023 | “Loving someone means that you will inevitably grieve for them; love is an engraved invitation for grief.” – Sunshine O’Donnell, Open Me Continue to treasure the love you have for your loved one. By having loved, you can love again. |
| 3/11/2023 | “The difference between shallow happiness and a deep, sustaining joy is sorrow. Happiness lives where sorrow is not. When sorrow arrives, happiness dies. It can’t stand pain. Joy, on the other hand, rises from sorrow and therefore can withstand all grief. Joy, by the grace of God, is the transfiguration of suffering into endurance, and of endurance into character, and of character into hope–and the hope that has become our joy does not (as happiness must for those who depend up on it) disappoint us.” – Walter Wangerin Jr., Reliving the Passion: Meditations on the Suffering, Death, and the Resurrection of Jesus as Recorded in Mark. You will endure this experience. There will undoubtedly be pain, but the joys in your life will help you to survive it. |
| 3/10/2023 | “Psychoanalysis is often about turning our ghosts into ancestors, even for patients who have not lost loved ones to death. We are often haunted by important relationships from the past that influence us unconsciously in the present. As we work them through, they go from haunting us to becoming simply part of our history. (243)” – Norman Doidge, The Brain That Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science Your loss has changed who you are. As with any difficult experience, you will look back in a few years and know how it has changed you. |
| 3/9/2023 | “Remember that grief is a necessary pain. It’s your only way to heal. To starve it will destroy you.”~The Grimoire” – S.M. Boyce, Lichgates Do not hold back your tears, your words, and your feelings. Grieving is not always pretty, but it is how we heal our hearts from great loss. |
| 3/8/2023 | “He felt lighter than he had in weeks, and he realized that the monster he had been running from wasn’t really a monster after all. It was simply that place in the heart that holds the measure of your history, the joy and the grief, the laughter and the tears, the magic and the wonder; all the ingredients that add up to the story of a life well lived.” – Lilli Jolgren Day, The Wonder of Ordinary Magic When you start to find some happiness again, you will feel physically lighter and more energetic than you have in months. If this has not happened for you yet, try not to be discouraged. As with all things with the heart and mind, everyone’s pace is different. |
| 3/7/2023 | “I know now what was happening to me, what was overwhelming me, what was about to consume and almost destroy me. Didier had even given me a name for it – assassin grief, he’d once called it: the kind of grief that lies in wait and attacks you from ambush, with no warning and no mercy. I know now that assassin grief can hide for years and then strike suddenly on the happiest day, without discernible reason or exegesis. But on that day, … almost a year after Khader’s death, I couldn’t understand the dark and trembling mood that was moving in me, swelling to the sorrow I’d too long denied. I couldn’t understand it, so i tried to fight it as a man fights pain or despair. But you can’t bite down on assassin grief and will it away. The enemy stalks you, step for step, and knows your every move before you make it. The enemy is your own grieving heart and, when it strikes, it can’t miss.” – Gregory David Roberts, Shantaram Out of the blue, you will feel sadness that you did not expect. Don’t let that blast of emotion make your feel discouraged. It will happen even years after your loss when some trigger reminds you of your loved one. What you can do is to try to build the best life for yourself that you can, knowing that at times your sadness will appear without warning. |
| 3/6/2023 | “I had always turned to books, to knowledge, to help me get through everything in my life – and, sometimes, to escape it. But grief was a journey through a forest of razor blades. I walked through every painful inch of it – no shortcuts and no anesthesia.” – Michele Bardsley, Don’t Talk Back To Your Vampire Arrange to go to the movies with a friend or relative. The act of planning an afternoon or evening out is a positive step towards returning to a more normal routine, and films can provide a great way to escape from your daily activities. |
| 3/5/2023 | “What madness, to love a man as something more than human! I lived in a fever, convulsed with tears and sighs that allowed me neither rest nor peace of mind. My soul was a burden, bruised and bleeding. It was tired of the man who carried it, but I found no place to set it down to rest. Neither the charm of the countryside nor the sweet scents of a garden could soothe it. It found no peace in song or laughter, none in the company of friends at table or in the pleasures of love, none even in books or poetry. Everything that was not what my friend had been was dull and distasteful. I had heart only for sighs and tears, for in them alone I found some shred of consolation.” – Augustine of Hippo When you are ready, put on a dance or party song that you love and allow yourself to dance. Take that three or four minutes for yourself to feel alive and joyful. |
| 3/4/2023 | “A person whose head is bowed and whose eyes are heavy cannot look at the light.” – Christine de Pizan, Ditié de Jehanne d’Arc Take an empty grocery bag and walk around your neighborhood. Pick up any trash you see along your route, and dispose of it in the bag. Work towards making your environment more beautiful every day. |
| 3/3/2023 | “Everyone who lives long enough to love deeply will experience great losses. Don’t let fear of loss, or the losses themselves, take away your ability to enjoy the wonderful life that is yours.” – Barbara “Cutie” Cooper, Fall in Love for Life: Inspiration from a 73-Year Marriage You may be leery of losing someone else, because your loss is still new. Try not to let that impede your ability to connect with people in your life now. |
| 3/2/2023 | “When things get really bad, you take comfort in the placeness of a place.” – Banana Yoshimoto, The Lake Buy some fresh flowers for your home. They symbolize life and hope, two things that you need to focus on right now. |
| 3/1/2023 | “I realized that it was not that I didn’t want to go on without him. I did. It was just that I didn’t know why I wanted to go on” – Kay Redfield Jamison, Nothing Was the Same Do something that you have never done before. This doesn’t mean skydiving or running a marathon. Make your bed every day, clean out your kitchen drawers, take a class at a community college. Do something new that takes your mind in a new direction. Don’t allow your grief to stop you from growing as a person. |
| 2/28/2023 | “Still everyone, including the abbot, had said that he was running away from his grief. They’d had no idea what they were talking about. He’d cradled his grief, almost to the point of loving it. For so long he refused to give it up, because leaving it behind was like leaving her.” – Sue Monk Kidd, The Mermaid Chair It can be hard to recognize the fact that you feel some guilt trying to move on from your loss. That guilt is normal, and should not become a source of additional pain. |
| 2/27/2023 | “You can’t love your mother or father if you don’t also have the capacity to grieve their deaths and, perhaps even more so, grieve parts of their lives.” – Glenn Beck, The 7: Seven Wonders That Will Change Your Life It has been said that you never really grow up until you lose your parents. It feels almost like a rite of passage, but one that takes a long time to process and come to terms with before you can appreciate how much it changed you. |
| 2/26/2023 | “Then one morning she’d begun to feel her sorrow easing, like something jagged that had cut into her so long it had finally dulled its edges, worn itself down. That same day Rachel couldn’t remember which side her father had parted his hair on, and she’d realized again what she’d learned at five when her mother left – that what made losing someone you loved bearable was not remembering but forgetting. Forgetting the small things first, the smell of the soap her mother had bathed with, the color of the dress she’d worn to church, then after a while the sound of her mother’s voice, the color of her hair. It amazed Rachel how much you could forget, and everything you forgot made that person less alive inside you until you could finally endure it. After more time passed you could let yourself remember, even want to remember. But even then what you felt those first days could return and remind you the grief that was still there, like old barbed wire embedded in a tree’s heartwood. (51)” – Ron Rash, Serena Sometimes being able to forget aspects of your loved one is more helpful to your healing than remembering. If there are small aspects of him or her that you forget, do not feel guilty about it or wrack your brain trying to remember them. You need to allow yourself to heal, and part of that process can be forgetting aspects of that person or relationship. |
| 2/25/2023 | “Just when normal life felt almost possible – when the world held some kind of order, meaning, even loveliness (the prismatic spray of light through an icicle; the stillness of a sunrise), some small thing would go awry and the veil of optimism was torn away, the barren world revealed. They learned, somehow, to wait those times out. There was no cure, no answer, no reparation.” – David Wroblewski, The Story of Edgar Sawtelle Know that when the bad moments come – and they will invariably come – they will not last forever. You will start to have more good times than tough times. The balance will eventually shift such that you begin to feel like yourself again. It may not happen this year, but it will eventually happen. |
| 2/24/2023 | “I walk slowly, but I never walk backward.” – Abraham Lincoln It cannot be said enough…you are making progress in your grieving. It will never feel fast enough, but at some point you will realize that you are improving and slowly letting joy back into your life. |
| 2/23/2023 | “One small crack does not mean that you are broken, it means that you were put to the test and you didn’t fall apart.” – Linda Poindexter It will take several years, but you will look back on this period and feel a sense of pride that you made it. |
| 2/22/2023 | “Be not afraid of growing slowly, be afraid only of standing still.” – Chinese Proverb Are you feeling frustrated that grief is still such a big part of your active thinking every day? Think back a month ago. You are making slow and steady progress. |
| 2/21/2022 | “The people who have the best advice are usually the ones who have been through the most.” – Anonymous Some day, you will be an enormous comfort to someone else who is experiencing loss. There is a wisdom that comes from this terrible journey you are on right now. |
| 2/20/2023 | “And I pray that you no longer seek happiness from the past, but rather you set your sails forward, to a land that is pure and wonderful.” – T.B. LaBerge Building new memories is as important as taking your next breath. Do not stop living because you are grieving. Find opportunities to celebrate with others and find joy in the day to day activities of life. |
| 2/19/2023 | “It’s possible to go on, no matter how impossible it seems, and that in time, the grief … lessens. It may not go away completely, but after a while it’s not so overwhelming.” – Nicholas Sparks The size and scale of your grief changes subtly over time. It ebbs and flows like the tides, and then suddenly it is smaller than it was. One of the hardest parts of grieving is being patient with yourself as you wait for it to lessen. |
| 2/18/2023 | “But the struggles make you stronger and the changes make you wise. And happiness has its own way of taking its sweet time.” – Gary Allen It will be so liberating to wake up and feel contentment, rather than disappointment that your loss is there to greet you. True happiness returns slowly, but know that it will come. |
| 2/17/2023 | “Stop holding on to what hurts, and start making room for what feels good.” – Unknown You can grieve and miss your loved one without focusing on the pain of the loss. Mourn and cry, but let go of the anger & fear. |
| 2/16/2023 | “Isn’t it funny how day by day nothing changes, but when you look back, everything is different.” – C.S. Lewis Change happens so slowly that it is hard to see without looking back. You have made progress in your healing. It may not be progress that you are acutely aware of, but it is there. Feel some pride today in the work you have done, and hope in what you will do moving forward. |
| 2/15/2023 | “Never regret a day in your life. Good days give you happiness and bad days give you experience. Both are essential in life.” – Anonymous It is easy to look back and wish you had made different choices. “If only I had done this or said that.” You can only live in the moment and do your best today. |
| 2/14/2023 | “Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anybody can start today and make a new ending.” – Maria Robinson You’ve probably been spending a lot of time looking back and reflecting on times you spent with your loved one. Don’t forget to look forward as well. |
| 2/13/2023 | “Live in the present, remember the past, and fear not the future, for it doesn’t exist and never shall. There is only now.” – Christopher Paolini Try to live in the moment. What do you need to do right now? Can you do it? Yes – you can. Living in the moment will help you start to put your loss into perspective. It is a part of who you are right now, but it is not the only part. |
| 2/12/2023 | “Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgement that something else is more important than fear.” – Ambrose Redmoon It is scary to face the world without someone you love as part of it. Find the strength to go and engage with others today. Show an interest in another person that lets them know you can be a true friend. |
| 2/11/2023 | “That was the hard thing about grief, and the grieving. They spoke another language, and the words we knew always fell short of what we wanted them to say.” – Sarah Dessen, The Truth About Forever The easiest people with whom to talk about your grief are those who have also lost someone. Those who have not want to comfort you, and want to show that they care. Until you have been through loss, however, you are only guessing at what it is truly like. |
| 2/10/2023 | “It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.” – Henry David Thoreau Look at something today that represents beauty to you. It might be the face of someone you love or a fresh flower in bloom. Appreciate the beauty around you. |
| 2/9/2023 | “We meet no ordinary people in our lives.” – C.S. Lewis What was the most unique thing about your loved one? We don’t always stop to think about what makes someone stand out, yet each person brings something special to the table. What is unique about you? Take a moment today and celebrate both of you. |
| 2/8/2023 | “We are products of our past, but we don’t have to be prisoners of it.” – Rick Warren Your loved one helped make you the person you are today, and you had the same role for your loved one. In time, your memories will bring you joy and not sorrow. This evolution will take time, but it will come if you are open to it. |
| 2/7/2023 | “You are, after all, what you think. Your emotions are the slaves to your thoughts, and you are the slave to your emotions.” – Elizabeth Gilbert Take one moment today to think: “I may be sad, but I am going to be ok. I will slowly start to feel like myself again.” Always remember that thoughts are things. |
| 2/6/2023 | “Starting today, I need to forget what’s gone, appreciate what still remains, and look forward to what’s coming next.” – Unknown Having something to look forward to is an important part of healing. Make a plan – be it lunch with a friend, tickets to an upcoming concert or show, or even booking a getaway weekend – that allows you to look forward rather than constantly looking back. |
| 2/5/2023 | “Change is the friction that makes you grow.” – Anonymous You have been grieving so long now that it has become the new normal. Allow yourself an hour today where you do something you enjoy that takes your head somewhere else. You could read a magazine, watch a movie, or enjoy a favorite television show. |
| 2/4/2023 | “Never get tired of doing little things for others, sometimes those little things occupy the biggest parts of their hearts.” – Unknown Nothing takes you out of your own thoughts of sadness like the joy that comes from doing something for someone else. Make time today to show a kindness to someone in your life. |
| 2/3/2023 | “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.” – Plato When you are feeling so sad and overwhelmed, it sometimes appears that everyone else is happy and content. In fact, everyone has his/her own struggles. While it may not be grief, what they are facing can be equally tough to bear. Most people put on a mask to hide their sadness, and you may be doing so to a certain degree as well. Be good to the people you meet. Show them compassion, knowing that they too have sadness to bear. |
| 2/2/2023 | “Goodbyes are only for those who love with their eyes. Because for those who love with heart and soul there is no separation. ” -Rumi Every once in a while, when you least expect it, you will say something and hear your loved one’s voice as your own. Those moments are fleeting, but are truly one of the greatest gifts. |
| 2/1/2023 | “I think validation is one of the most beautiful gifts we can give the grieving.” – Angie Cartwright When the opportunity arises, write a note or take the time to call someone who has experienced a loss. Be a real listener when they want to talk, and be a shoulder to cry on when they need to weep. Providing comfort to someone else will help heal your heart as well. |
| 1/31/2023 | “Nothing ever goes away until it teaches us what we need to know.” Pema Chodron Take a moment, either in a journal or on a scrap of paper, to write down the most important thing you learned about yourself from the person you lost. You may have learned that you are more patient than you realized, that you love more deeply than you knew, or that you are loyal. Every person gives us a gift, and it is valuable to recognize each one as the precious treasure it is. |
| 1/30/2023 | I still miss those I loved who are no longer with me but I find I am grateful for having loved them. The gratitude has finally conquered the loss. — Rita Mae Brown It takes a very long time to feel gratitude for the relationship you had with the person you lost. There is always a part of you that will long for one more hour together. |
| 1/29/2023 | An important way to cope with grief is having an outlet, be it interpersonal, be it artistic, that will allow you to not have to contain your grief, but will give you an opportunity to express it, to externalize it to some degree. —R. Benyamin Cirlin, Grief counselor Consider taking a class in a topic that interests you. It could be an academic subject, a skill, or a sport. Alternatively, join a new club like a book discussion group or a political campaign. While you will most likely enjoy the experience of learning and being involved, one of the greatest benefits is that you will meet people who don’t know you as someone who is grieving. It can become a place to connect with others without having to be reminded of your loss. |
| 1/28/2023 | The caterpillar dies so the butterfly could be born. And, yet, the caterpillar lives in the butterfly and they are but one. So, when I die, it will be that I have been transformed from the caterpillar of earth to the butterfly of the universe. – John Harricharan Even though it is so hard to say goodbye to the people we love, they truly live on in those left behind. The skills they taught or the stories they told become your skills and your stories to pass along to someone else. Make the best parts of your loved one live on in you and those around you. |
| 1/27/2023 | When someone you love becomes a memory, the memory becomes a treasure. ~ Anonymous Take a moment today to look at a photo, watch a home movie, or hold an object that reminds you of a special time with your loved one. Laugh, cry, and remember. Put that memory in a special place in your heart to treasure always. |
| 1/26/2023 | There are things that we don’t want to happen but have to accept, things we don’t want to know but have to learn, and people we can’t live without but have to let go. ~Anonymous You may not have reached a place of acceptance about your loss yet. There are people in your life who may assume you have come to terms with what has happened, but that may not be the case. Do not waste a moment feeling badly if you still wake up in a state of disbelief. Losing someone who was a part of your life is not something that you can ever take lightly. Even if the passing was expected, the feeling of loss is often much more powerful than you thought it would be. Continue to be patient with yourself. The acceptance may take a long time, but it will eventually come. With that acceptance will be a sense of peace that will help with your healing process. |
| 1/25/2023 | “A lot of things are inherent in life -change, birth, death, aging, illness, accidents, calamities, and losses of all kinds- but these events don’t have to be the cause of ongoing suffering…If we dwelt on these positive states as much as we generally dwell on our negative thoughts and painful emotions, our lives would be transformed.” – Gina Lake, What about Now?: Reminders for Being in the Moment Grab three scraps of paper and a pen. On each individual piece, write one thing in life that you love. It could be something simple like the smell of cookies in the oven or the feeling of hope that something special is in the mail when you hear the letter carrier delivering it. They don’t have to be big or important, but you do have to find three. Then, at different times during the day today, try to remember that there are parts of life that make you happy, even though it seems like all you live with is sadness. |
| 1/24/2023 | Love is an engraved invitation to grief.” – Sunshine O’Donnell, Open Me Take a moment today to look at your loss from another perspective. Do you wish that you hadn’t had that special relationship? Do you wish that you hadn’t had the closeness that you now miss so much? If the answer is no, then take 5 minutes to look back and remember 2 memories that make you happy. Try to practice celebrating what was special about the one you lost. |
| 1/23/2023 | “Isn’t it weird,” I said, “the way you remember things, when someone’s gone?” What do you mean?” I ate another piece of waffle. “When my dad first died, all I could think about was that day. It’s taken me so long to be able to think back to before that, to everything else.” Wes was nodding before I even finished. “It’s even worse when someone’s sick for a long time,” he said. “You forget they were ever healthy, ever okay. It’s like there was never a time when you weren’t waiting for something awful to happen.” But there was,” I said. “I mean, it’s only been in the last few months that I’ve started remembering all this good stuff, funny stuff about my dad. I can’t believe I ever forgot it in the first place.” You didn’t forget,” Wes said, taking a sip of his water. “You just couldn’t remember right then. But now you’re ready to, so you can.” I thought about this as I finished off my waffle.” – Sarah Dessen, The Truth About Forever The day will come when you can legitimately enjoy a memory without it being clouded by sadness. To look back on your loved one’s life with fondness and not through tears is a treasured gift. |
| 1/22/2023 | “And perhaps there is a limit to the grieving that the human heart can do. As when one adds salt to a tumbler of water, there comes a point where simply no more will be absorbed.” – Sarah Waters, The Little Stranger How long have I felt this way? It feels like forever. As each milestone, each birthday or holiday passes, you will start to feel a very small sense of relief. You made it through the birthday or the anniversary. Those events will always connect you to your loss, but it is never as hard as the first time. As you work through those moments, know that you are building your foundation of strength. Next year will be just a little bit easier. |
| 1/21/2023 | “Grief does not change you. It reveals you.” – John Green, The Fault in Our Stars Your grief may be the greatest challenge you have ever faced, and will test you unlike any other. In the end, you will develop a level of empathy and a strength of character that you did not know you could have. You will not be able to see the results of this process for months or even years, but know that you will grow from it. |
| 1/20/2023 | “There are some who would vow that life isn’t fair. They believe the worst is yet to come, that evil will always conquer good, and that we have no control over our fate. It’s true, there are storms that shake our foundations and monsters that threaten to tear us limb from limb. We will make terrible mistakes. We will fall short of our expectations. No one is exempt from pain and fear. But life, and what comes after, is a beautiful mixture of darkness and light, sacrifice and salvation. There is no fine line between the two, for both are needed. Where there is grief, there will be joy. Where there is heartbreak, love will follow.” Rebecca Harris Life never feels fair when you have lost someone you love. Have you ever thought that life is unfair when you experienced joy? Our lives are all a mix of the highs of joy and the lows of grief. As hard as that is to hear right now, the feelings you are experiencing are as inevitable as the elation you felt at other times. Trying to cope with these lows is a struggle for everyone. Take time today to acknowledge that although this is a hard time, the great times will come again to create balance in your life. |
| 1/19/2023 | “It occurred to me that grief is like a tunnel. You enter it without a choice because you must get to the other side. The darkness of it plays tricks on you and sometimes you can even forget where you are or what your purpose is. I believe that people, now and again, get lost or stuck in that tunnel…” Loretta Nyhan, Empire Girls Are you worried that you won’t find your way out of the tunnel of grief? There is always a light to follow. With time and effort, you may work your way to find the other side. If you are struggling, you may need to seek out a support group or a trusted friend to help you see that light, but do not give up! The key right now is to know that you can absolutely find a way out. |
| 1/18/2023 | “Yet that grief and this joy were alike outside all the ordinary conditions of life; they were loop-holes, as it were, in that ordinary life through which there came glimpses of something sublime. And in the contemplation of this sublime something the soul was exalted to inconceivable heights of which it had before had no conception which reason lagged behind, unable to keep up with it.” – Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina Grief and joy are the extremes of emotion. Although we think we seek joy, that is actually just a fleeting feeling. What you miss most right now is contentment, the feeling that all is calm and well. You may not be able to achieve that right now. Grief, the other extreme, is a forceful presence in your life. Although it may take a few weeks or months, contentment will return, and it will feel far sweeter for having lost it. |
| 1/17/2023 | “I picture Cully tromping through that high, deep snow. That’s how I feel physically from all of this. Moving through grief like it’s a thick drift, exhausting but enlivening. It makes your muscles ache. It makes you feel you’ve inhabited your body completely.” – Kaui Hart Hemmings, The Possibilities Grief can truly feel like an endless winter. Like the actual season in colder climates, however, the sun will eventually melt the snow and the beauty of spring will be revealed. Try to have hope today that the spring in your heart will come again as well. |
| 1/16/2023 | “People grieve in different ways, some silently, some in anger, some in spite. Rarely does grief bring out the best in people, despite what local historians like to tell you.” Joanne Harris, Five Quarters of the Orange You may miss the “real you”, that person you were before you started to grieve. Don’t worry…that person is still there. You will return to a more caring, compassionate version of yourself on the other end of the grief process. |
| 1/15/2023 | “There is greater clarity in the still waters of sadness, something not found in the babbling brooks of more sought after emotions.” – Shaun Hick Feeling sad is your new normal. That emotion has permeated every part of your life for weeks such that you almost don’t have to be reflective and consider how you are feeling. The emotion is always sadness. Take a break from sadness today. Put your face in the sun for ten minutes or go for a walk in a local park. Take a step away from feeling down. You’ll be glad you did. |
| 1/14/2023 | “We live and we die, but we are made of sterner stuff. The carbon atoms in our fingernails, the calcium in our bones, the iron atoms in our blood — all the countless trillions of atoms of which we are made — are ancient objects. They existed before us, before the Earth itself, in fact. And after each of us dies, they will depart from our bodies and do other things. Forever.” – Keith Heyer Meldahl, Hard Road West: History and Geology along the Gold Rush Trail Physical bodies are of this earth; you learned about their components in school. Somehow death does not seem as grounded. Your loss is forcing you to face what you think happened to the essence or the spirit of your loved one. This experience is actually compelling you to look at not only your religious or cultural beliefs, but what you personally believe now that you’ve experienced loss. This process is as much spiritual as it is emotional. |
| 1/13/2023 | “Sometimes when we are drowning in our own loss we lash out–anger is momentarily easier to cope with.” Anne Perry, No Graves as Yet You may find yourself being impatient or aggressive with close family members or friends. It’s like putting on a suit of armor. In a strange way, being angry is easier than loving someone we are suddenly afraid to lose. Recognize this emotion, and make the conscious effort to lead with kindness and compassion. |
| 1/12/2023 | “Like many people whose lives had formed around a particularly painful incident, she had grown used to providing ellipses around the event of her brother’s death to keep conversations comfortable. At some point the subconscious logic of this had spread to the rest of her life so that she rarely talked about things she had been deeply affected by. It wasn’t hard to do.” Mira Jacob, The Sleepwalker’s Guide to Dancing You may feel like you are operating on autopilot so often that you are forgetting how to really connect. It can become a hard habit to break. Take the time today to nourish one relationship carefully. Reconnecting with others continues to be an important part of your recovery process. |
| 1/11/2023 | “Precisely because a living being may die, it is necessary to care for that being so that it may live. Only under conditions in which the loss would matter does the value of the life appear. Thus, grievability is a presupposition for the life that matters.” Judith Butler, Frames of War: When Is Life Grievable? Try to treat each relationship and interaction with the care you wish you had brought to the love you lost. We grieve so that we can learn and grow. |
| 1/10/2023 | “I’m so sorry,” he said, because after Pamela died, he promised himself that if anyone told him the smallest, saddest story, he would answer, I’m so sorry. Meaning, Yes, that happened. You couldn’t believe the people who believed that not mentioning sadness was a kind of magic that could stave off the very sadness you didn’t mention – as though grief were the opposite of Rumpelstiltskin and materialized only at the sound of its own name.” Elizabeth McCracken, Thunderstruck & Other Stories People search for what to say to you now that some time has passed since you suffered your loss. All you may want to hear is “I’m so sorry.” While you can’t force people to say what you’d like, you can give the gift of saying, “I’m so sorry,” to others. |
| 1/9/2023 | “Somehow, grief had seemed easier to bear when the skies were dark and a cold wind kept cats and prey inside their nests.” Erin Hunter, Bramblestar’s Storm Eventually you will love sunny days again. Don’t push yourself. Like so many other phases of grief, your return to the sunshine will come when you are ready. |
| 1/8/2023 | “There’s always a last time. If you could remember every last time, you’d never stop grieving.” Jonathan Tropper, This is Where I Leave You You may be spending a lot of time feeling guilty trying to remember the last time you saw your loved one or told them how you felt. It’s time to free yourself of that burden. Simply remember the love that was there. Those details do not augment or diminish that special relationship. |
| 1/7/2023 | “Sometimes it’s your fragrance that comes to me, out of the blue, on a crowded road in a Sunday afternoon. But more often, it’s memories of us that cross my mind almost every lone evening. All I want is to lessen the pain I feel every night. But every morning I wake up is another day, hopeless and miserable, with nothing but a deafening silence, a wave of tears, memories and your absence.” Sanhita Baruah Are there certain times of the day that are harder for you than others? You may want to try shifting your routine to try to get out of the pattern of when sadness overcomes you. If sitting resting or watching tv at night is hard, start doing your laundry or cleaning your house at night. Take action steps to switch up your days so that you do not become stuck in a pattern of predictable grief. |
| 1/6/2023 | “For each person I lost I found a new layer of grief to cover myself with, and each time I tried to bring something of their essence into my own being – be it unconditional love, kindness and piety.” A. P. J. Abdul Kalam Like your relationships in life, each grieving period is unique. Thinking that you know how your grief for someone will be is like assuming you know how each friendship or each great love will be. You learned a lot about life and about yourself when you first lost someone close to you. If this is your first loss, you are learning those things now. While they change you and give you the gift of empathy as you reconnect with others, they do not adequately prepare you to grieve again. Don’t be hard on yourself because this time is no easier. Know that this is the case for everyone. The one true gift that having grieved before gives you is the knowledge that it will ease with time. |
| 1/5/2023 | “All you need is one safe anchor to keep you grounded when the rest of your life spins out of control” Katie Kacvinsky Think of one activity that you do that makes you feel grounded. It should be something that is low stress and that doesn’t require you to make any decisions. Take 20 minutes for yourself to give your mind a rest from the anxiety of grief. |
| 1/4/2023 | “Grief will shut your eyes off from the world, but Love opens them back up to see its beauty.” Rachel Walden You probably only see the beauty in the world in little flashes right now. Treasure those moments. They represent hope and healing, and will only grow over time. |
| 1/3/2023 | “Allow yourself to be an anchor and anchored by others.” Asa Don Brown As you become connected to others who are grieving, you will find that there are times when you are the anchor and times when you need one. Take pride in being there for someone else. By consoling another person who is grieving, you will find that you have strength and coping mechanisms that you didn’t appreciate you had. |
| 1/2/2023 | “In the support group, the counselor had said: When you lose a loved one, you feel as if you’re inside a confined space. Everyone else will seem to be careening along outside of this space. In time, you will become aware of an opening you are going to have to step through. It might be … a new job, a move–but you’ll know. You will step through.” Jamie Quatro, I Want to Show You More Start a new page of your grief journal or begin a list on a new piece of paper by your bed. Write down at least three possible openings you could step through to break out of your confined space. You do not have to actually do anything on the list right now, but just write them down. In time, you will find you are desperate to make that move. |
| 1/1/2023 | “Sometimes all you can do is hug a friend tightly and wish that their pain could be transferred by touch to your own emotional hard drive.” Richelle E. Goodrich Try to give at least three good hugs today. That means both arms around the other person and a solid, six-second squeeze. It will help you and the recipient manage stress, lower your blood pressure, and feel connected. |
| 12/31/2022 | “Rainbows introduce us to reflections of different beautiful possibilities so we never forget that pain and grief are not the final options in life.” Aberjhani, Journey through the Power of the Rainbow: Quotations from a Life Made Out of Poetry Try to find an object in your home or something in nature that can become the visualization of hope. It may not be something typical like flowers or a rainbow. It just needs to be a constant reminder that there is beauty in this world waiting for you when you are ready to embrace it. |
| 12/30/2022 | “In this contemporary culture, what could be an effective means by which we might be able to cue one another to say, Take it easy on me, I’m grieving? Maybe if we reinvented, or re-established the practice of wearing black and created our own symbol of grieving – to wear our version of black, or maybe to color with black crayons for a while – the world around us would appropriately respond to our grief cues.” Sandy Oshiro Rosen, Bare: The Misplaced Art of Grieving and Dancing It would definitely be easier if you could wear an external symbol to show that you’re still grieving. Because you can’t, you have to be ready to deal with unwanted questions. It is fine to say, “Even though some time has passed, the loss still seems new. I don’t even feel ready to talk about it yet.” People will appreciate a sincere response that states briefly how you are doing without having to go into depth. |
| 12/29/2022 | “Community is about sharing my life; about allowing the chaos of another’s circumstances to infringe on mine; about permitting myself to be known without constraint; about resigning myself to needing others.” Sandy Oshiro Rosen, Bare: The Misplaced Art of Grieving and Dancing Even if you have established some relationships online that are helping you work through your grief, it is very important to connect with people in person as well. Become active in a group near your home. Be it playing a sport or taking a class or volunteering for a charity, interacting with others is crucial to your healing. Don’t be afraid to connect or reconnect with people in your community. As humans, we need to feel the warmth of a smile, the touch of a handshake, and the sound of laughter when we make an amusing remark as much as we need food and water. Don’t let your grief deprive you of these vital experiences. |
| 12/28/2022 | “The sunlight now lay over the valley perfectly still. I went over to the graveyard beside the church and found them under the old cedars… I am finding it a little hard to say that I felt them resting there, but I did. I felt their completeness as whatever they had been in the world. I knew I had come there out of kindness, theirs and mine. The grief that came to me then was nothing like the grief I had felt for myself alone… This grief had something in it of generosity, some nearness to joy. In a strange way it added to me what I had lost. I saw that, for me, this country would always be populated with presences and absences, presences of absences, the living and the dead. The world as it is would always be a reminder of the world that was, and of the world that is to come.” Wendell Berry, Jayber Crow Find an old, tall tree near your home. It might be in a city park or down a country lane. Look up into its branches. Start to think about what this tree has seen – the generations that have taken shelter under it from the sun, the children who have tried to climb it. Life rushes by, but this tree can symbolize for you generations of people who have been here, lived and loved, and moved on. Your loss is part of what this tree has seen, and like the new leaves in spring, you will eventually grow forward from this sorrow. |
| 12/27/2022 | “And they had folded his brother’s hands across his suited chest, as if he would be preserved in this sanguine pose forever, but only the heavy callouses visible at the sides of his hands seemed real. It was only the callouses that appeared to be familiar and believable.” Kent Haruf, Eventide Going through the rituals associated with the death of a loved one may seem like they took place in another lifetime. As more time passes, they almost feel surreal. The grief process itself is a more present part of your life for a long time. While the shock of the loss and unreal aspects of the first week or two fade quickly, the sadness can feel never ending. Keep looking back over your process. It is only in hindsight that you will detect any progress. |
| 12/26/2022 | “If it is possible to die of grief then why on earth can’t someone be healed by happiness?” Jodi Picoult, Keeping Faith Your moments of joy are to be savored, but they won’t prevent grief from creeping in at times. Once you make peace with that, the moments with grief won’t catch you off guard any more. |
| 12/25/2022 | “Unacquainted with grief, I knew not how to appraise my bereavement; I could not rightly estimate the strength of the stroke.” Ambrose Bierce, The Moonlit Road and Other Ghost and Horror Stories How can you measure grief? It is impossible. You need to deal with it when it flares up and be thankful when it doesn’t. |
| 12/24/2022 | “Love is infinite. Grief can lead to love. Love can lead to grief. Grief is a love story told backward just as love is a grief story told backward.” Bridget Asher Love and grief are intertwined. You know that better than anyone. |
| 12/23/2022 | “But grief is a walk alone. Others can be there, and listen. But you will walk alone down your own path, at your own pace, with your sheared-off pain, your raw wounds, you denial, anger, and bitter loss. You’ll come to your own peace, hopefully, but it will be on your own, in your own time.” Cathy Lamb, The First Day of the Rest of My Life Think of how you grew to care for or even love the person you lost. It was its own beautiful experience. Grieving is as unique as the love you shared with the special person you lost. |
| 12/22/2022 | “Each person’s grief journey is as unique as a fingerprint or a snowflake” Earl Grollman The term ‘journey’ is overused these days, but your experience with grief is a unique journey. Only you know where you are and how you are feeling. Share your pain with those that care about you. |
| 12/21/2022 | I was tired of well-meaning folks, telling me it was time I got over being heartbroke. When somebody tells you that, a little bell ought to ding in your mind. Some people don’t know grief from garlic grits. There’s somethings a body ain’t meant to get over. No I’m not suggesting you wallow in sorrow, or let it drag on; no I am just saying it never really goes away. (A death in the family) is like having a pile of rocks dumped in your front yard. Every day you walk out and see them rocks. They’re sharp and ugly and heavy. You just learn to live around them the best way you can. Some people plant moss or ivy; some leave it be. Some folks take the rocks one by one, and build a wall.” Michael Lee West, American Pie What will you do with your rocks? You may have had a plan a month ago that looks different now. Use that analogy to help you ponder how you want to cope with your grief. |
| 12/20/2022 | “But grief is the ultimate unrequited love. However hard and long we love someone who has died, they can never love us back. At least that is how it feels…” Rosamund Lupton You will always love the person you lost. Grieving can feel lonely because you don’t get to feel their love in return. You may want to write down what you would like to say to your loved one and what you think they would say back to you. |
| 12/19/2022 | “It is grief that develops the powers of the mind.” Marcel Proust Grief is going to pop into your mind. Its arrival is unpredictable but undeniable. What can you do? Know that it is coming, but also know that you can cope with it while it lasts. |
| 12/18/2022 | “Edgar, do you actually think that how long a person grieves is a measure of how much they loved someone? There’s no rulebook that says how to do this.” She laughed, bitterly. “Wouldn’t that be great? No decisions to make. Everything laid right out for us. But there’s no such thing. You want facts, don’t you? Rules. Proof. You’re like your father that way. Just because a thing can’t be logged, charted, and summarized doesn’t mean it isn’t real. Half the time we walk around in love with the idea of a thing instead of the reality of it. But sometimes things don’t turn out that way. You have to pay attention to what’s real, what’s in the world. Not some imaginary alternative, as if it’s a choice we could make.” David Wroblewski from The Story of Edgar Sawtelle There is no formula for grief – no average length for how long it takes someone to recover from a tragic loss. You can’t count down to the last day of your grief. What you can do is continue to celebrate the small victories. You may have smiled and laughed today, or helped someone who needed it. Enjoy the small triumphs as they come, and know that each one leads to healing. |
| 12/17/2022 | “Had any poet adequately described the wretched ugliness of a loved one turned inside out with grief?” Kate Morton Your family and friends may be more worried about you than you realize. Be sure to check in with them and talk about how you are doing periodically. |
| 12/16/2022 | “Hold him in your memory find him in your dreams” Unknown You will see your loved one again in your dreams. It will come when you least expect it and will give you some comfort. |
| 12/15/2022 | “What I have learned lately is that people deal with death in all sorts of ways. Some of us fight against it, doing everything we can to make it not true. Some of us lose our selves to grief. Some of us lose ourselves to anger.” Carrie Jones How are you coping? What does your grief look like? There is not “right” grief and “wrong” grief. There is only your grief. |
| 12/14/2022 | The way I pictured it, all this grief would be like a winter night when you’re standing outside. You’ll warm up once you get used to the cold. Except after you’ve been out there for awhile, you feel the warmth draining out of you and you realize the opposite is happening; you’re getting colder and colder, as the body heat you brought outside with you seeps out of your skin. Instead of getting used to it, you get weaker the longer you endure it.” Rob Sheffield Just about the time when you fear that you are not going to feel better, something will happen to give you hope. You may hear from an old friend, have the opportunity to help someone, or find yourself laughing at a funny tv show. Open yourself up to opportunities that provide positive distractions during this grieving process. You need to feel joy to help your healing process. |
| 12/13/2022 | “It takes a year, nephew… a full turn of the calendar, to get over losing someone.” Annie Proulx It would be comforting to know exactly how long the grieving process takes. Everyone you talk to has his/her own advice, and books on the subject have differing opinions as well. The truth is that it is different for everyone. Don’t feel pressured by the calendar. Your grieving period will take as long as it takes, and you cannot actively control that. Be good to yourself and work through this time with a sense of patience rather than urgency. |
| 12/12/2022 | “I wish everyone would stop crying, Tom. Uncle Joe would be so angry about it.” But she’s crying herself now. “He’d be so angry at us, Tom, for crying so much when all he did was laugh.” Melina Marchetta There may be days when you find yourself crying as much as you did when you first experienced your loss. Seeing something that reminds you of your loved one or running into a mutual friend can bring your loss back to the forefront of your mind. Crying is natural, and many people still have periods when they cry more often as they heal. |
| 12/11/2022 | “If he didn’t love so deeply, he couldn’t grieve so deeply. But he’s drowning in it.” Dee Henderson Think about how someone you know seemed when he or she was grieving. How did you feel being around that person? While it’s tough to see yourself objectively, try to determine how you may be connecting with those around you. Taking the extra effort to make them comfortable will actually help you too. |
| 12/10/2022 | “Grief … gives life a permanently provisional feeling. It doesn’t seem worth starting anything. I can’t settle down. I yawn, I fidget, I smoke too much. Up till this I always had too little time. Now there is nothing but time. Almost pure time, empty successiveness.” C.S. Lewis Begin a project that is meaningful to you. You may want to label old photos or videos, donate clothing to a charity, or reorganize your bedroom. Take on a task that generates a tangible result, so that, upon its completion, you can look at it and see what you have achieved. |
| 12/9/2022 | “I do hope that when the day comes, whether in 1, 10, or 100 years, I don’t want you to think of me and feel sad.” – Esther Earl Do something special – be it lunch with a friend or a walk in the park with a relative – and take a photograph of it. You need to start to build some new memories centered on what you are doing today. |
| 12/8/2022 | “Grief teaches the steadiest minds to waver.” Sophocles Ask someone else who is grieving what he or she needs, and try to do whatever it is for that person. Any concrete things you can do to help someone else will help you with your own grief. |
| 12/7/2022 | “We bereaved are not alone. We belong to the largest company in all the world–the company of those who have known suffering.” Helen Keller There will be times when you mourn the person you were before you experienced the loss of a loved one. |
| 12/6/2022 | “Take any emotion – love for a woman, or grief for a loved one, or what I’m going through, fear and pain from a deadly illness. If you hold back on the emotions – if you don’t allow yourself to go all the way through them – you can never get to being detached, you’re too busy being afraid. You’re afraid of the pain, you’re afraid of the grief. You’re afraid of the vulnerability that loving entails. “But by throwing yourself into these emotions, by allowing yourself to dive in, all the way, over your head even, you experience them fully and completely. You know what pain is. You know what love is. You know what grief is. And only then can you say, ‘All right. I have experienced that emotion. I recognize that emotion. Now I need to detach from that emotion for a moment’.” Mitch Albom As you experience the grief process, try to have an awareness of how you are feeling and how those who share your pain are feeling. It helps to have self awareness so that you can eventually use this time to grow and become a more thoughtful, empathetic person. |
| 12/5/2022 | “Nix still held Benny’s hand, and her grip tightened to an almost crushing force, grinding his hand bones together. It hurt, but Benny would rather have cut that hand off than take it back at that moment. If it would help Nix through this, he’d give her a pair of pliers and a vise so she could do a proper job.” Jonathan Maberry Do a task today that you’ve been putting off for a while. It could be writing a thank you note, cleaning a closet, or some other mundane obligation. Just accomplishing something small can be extremely satisfying. |
| 12/4/2022 | “A shade of sorrow passed over Taliesin’s face. ‘There are those,’ he said gently, ‘who must first learn loss, despair, and grief. Of all paths to wisdom, this is the cruelest and longest. Are you one who must follow such a way? This even I cannot know. If you are, take heart nonetheless. Those who reach the end do more than gain wisdom. As rough wool becomes cloth, and crude clay a vessel, so do they change and fashion wisdom for others, and what they give back is greater than what they won.” Lloyd Alexander Make an extra effort to smile. Doing so can actually make you feel better. |
| 12/3/2022 | “I basked in you; I loved you, helplessly, with a boundless tongue-tied love. And death doesn’t prevent me from loving you. Besides, in my opinion you aren’t dead. (I know dead people, and you are not dead.)” Franz Wright Proactively do something today that makes another person know that you like or value them. It could be as simple as a quick complement or as elaborate as sending a gift. Take a few minutes to make that effort towards making someone else feel special. |
| 12/2/2022 | “Tears have always been easier to shed than explain.” Marty Rubin Sometimes it feels like there are no words to accurately describe what grief feels like. As with any pain, you can’t remember it with precision after the fact, which is a blessing. |
| 12/1/2022 | “When a relationship of love is disrupted, the relationship does not cease. The love continues; therefore, the relationship continues. The work of grief is to reconcile and redeem life to a different love relationship.” W. Scott Lineberry You have lost someone you love. It might have been a romantic love, a familial love or a friendship love. The loss is palpable, leaving a gap in yourself that cannot be ignored. To work through this grief, you need to find a new love to build. It might be the love of a hobby, the love of beauty in art or nature, or the love of a shared goal with others. Call it a passion, a drive, or a purpose, you need to have something that motivates you moving forward. You may already have it in your life, but you have not cultivated it. Take the time to find or develop a new, great love. |
| 11/30/2022 | “Here’s what I know: death abducts the dying, but grief steals from those left behind.” Katherine Owen When you have experienced a loss, you can feel like a victim. Something precious was taken away from you, and there is a definite helplessness to that. You need to make the active decision to not be a victim of your grief. Feel the sadness, but work through the pain proactively each day to take back control of your life. |
| 11/29/2022 | “Grief lasts longer than sympathy, which is one of the tragedies of the grieving.” Elizabeth McCracken You probably haven’t received a sympathy card in quite a while. Most of your friends, family, neighbors and coworkers already know about your loss, and have reached out to you. You may be feeling fairly isolated and forgotten. While you can’t force people to reach out to you again, it can be helpful to reach out to someone else who needs you. Offer to run an errand for a busy parent, pick up groceries for an elderly neighbor, or send a card to someone who could use the pick-me-up that comes from being remembered. The process of acting to help another person will make you feel more alive and connected. |
| 11/28/2022 | “Tears are a river that takes you somewhere…Tears lift your boat off the rocks, off dry ground, carrying it downriver to someplace better.” Clarissa Pinkola Estés It hasn’t been too long to cry. Cry when you need to cry and dry your tears when you are ready. |
| 11/27/2022 | “Heart weeps. Head tries to help heart. Head tells heart how it is, again: You will lose the ones you love. They will all go. But even the earth will go, someday. Heart feels better, then. But the words of head do not remain long in the ears of heart. Heart is so new to this. I want them back, says heart. Head is all heart has. Help, head. Help heart.” Lydia Davis Your head seems to be healing faster than your heart. You understand your loss intellectually. Why then do you awake with the hope in your heart that it was all just a bad dream? As with all matters of love, the heart has a bigger role to play than the head would want! |
| 11/26/2022 | “Nothing that grieves us can be called little: by the eternal laws of proportion a child’s loss of a doll and a king’s loss of a crown are events of the same size.” Mark Twain When you turn on the news or read a magazine article that focuses on someone else’s tragedy, you may feel guilty because their losses may seem more “important” than yours. How can I be so upset about my situation when others have much more serious ones? You never need to feel that way. You are as justified as anyone else to have the feelings that you do about your loss. It is as personal as a fingerprint, and another person’s situation cannot diminish yours. |
| 11/25/2022 | ” I think of the chimp, the one with the talking hands. In the course of the experiment, that chimp had a baby. Imagine how her trainers must have thrilled when the mother, without prompting, began to sign her newborn. Baby, drink milk. Baby, play ball. And when the baby died, the mother stood over the body, her wrinkled hands moving with animal grace, forming again and again the words: Baby, come hug, Baby come hug, fluent now in the language of grief.” Amy Hempel Is it comforting that so many other people are grieving too? For someone, the grief process started today. For someone else, the first glimpse of hope that things would get better happened. One of the tough parts of grieving can be that it seems isolating. Wherever you are in your process, though, always know that you are not alone in your feelings. |
| 11/24/2022 | “Life Lesson 3: You can’t rush grief. It has its own timetable. All you can do is make sure there are lots of soft places around — beds, pillows, arms, laps.” Patti Davis Show yourself the same patience that you show to everyone else in your life. The key is to believe that you will heal from this. You will be changed, but you will heal nonetheless. |
| 11/23/2022 | “The depth of the feeling continued to surprise and threaten me, but each time it hit again and I bore it…I would discover that it hadn’t washed me away.” Anne Lamott Just about the time you think you are doing better, something happens that brings memories flooding back. Try not to feel discouraged. Think of grief like a toddler learning to walk. The child has to hold on at first (and cries a lot!). Over time, the steps become more steady. While the child falls as he gains his footing, his strength grows with time and the help of people who care. While the toddler will surely fall again, those falls will become less and less frequent. You too will learn to “walk”. |
| 11/22/2022 | “Sometimes she’d go a whole day without thinking of him or missing him. Why not? She had quite a full life, and really, he’d often been hard to deal with and hard to live with. A project, the Yankee old timers like her very own Dad might have said. And then sometimes a day would come, a gray one (or a sunny one) when she missed him so fiercely she felt empty, not a woman at all anymore but just a dead tree filled with cold November blow. She felt like that now, felt like hollering his name and hollering him home, and her heart turned sick with the thought of the years ahead and she wondered what good love was if it came to this, to even ten seconds of feeling like this.” Stephen King Take time to work on your other relationships today. It could be with your children, your siblings, your parents, or your friends. Make sure you stay connected to the people who matter to you. As you heal, those bonds will grow stronger and help you to return to life. |
| 11/21/2022 | “Sometimes, there was no getting over it. Sometimes, you lived with the empty place inside of you until you imploded on it, loss as singularity, or until the empty place expanded and hollowed out the rest of you so thoroughly you became the walking dead, a ghost in your own life.” Caitlin Kittredge There will still be days when you feel like you are a shell. You have to go through the motions and get through it. As you know by now, it won’t be easy. The good news is that it won’t last forever, and you will get through it. Try to find a spark of hope. You just need to weather this storm, because tomorrow will probably be a little easier. |
| 11/20/2022 | “What happens when you let go, when your strength leaves you and you sink into darkness, when there’s nothing that you or anyone else can do, no matter how desperate you are, no matter how you try? Perhaps it’s then, when you have neither pride nor power, that you are saved, brought to an unimaginably great reward.” Mark Halperin Can you let go of your grief for one day? You may not be ready quite yet. Try to involve yourself in a project or hobby today that frees your mind, even if it’s only for a short time. |
| 11/19/2022 | “I waited for dawn, but only because I had forgotten how hard mornings were. For a second I’d be normal. Then came the dim awareness of something off, out of place. Then the truth came crashing down and that was it for the rest of the day. Sunlight was reproof. Shouldn’t I feel better than I had in the dead of night.” Francine Prose When you least expect it, there will be a morning when you wake up and forget about your loss. Try not to feel guilty, for it is a sign of progress. While it may not happen again for a long time, waking up without sadness will eventually be the norm. |
| 11/18/2022 | “The weird, weird thing about devastating loss is that life actually goes on. When you’re faced with a tragedy, a loss so huge that you have no idea how you can live through it, somehow, the world keeps turning, the seconds keep ticking.” James Patterson When you walk down the street, you probably pass several people who are grieving. Can you pick them out of the crowd? No – nor can you be identified as grieving by those who don’t know you. Life goes on, but you are not alone in your grieving process. Be sure to stay connected to others so you don’t feel isolated in your process. |
| 11/17/2022 | “It (nostalgia) reassures us of past happiness and accomplishment; and, since these still remain on deposit, as it were, in the bank of our memory, it simultaneously bestows upon us a certain worth, irrespective of how present circumstances may seem to question or obscure this. And current worth, as our friendly bank loan officer assures us, is entitled to at least some claim on the future as well.” Fred Davis Memories may have been making you feel sad lately. Perhaps a special birthday or anniversary is near, and it’s been difficult to manage your emotions. However, nostalgia is a great reminder that you were and are important. You bring joy to others, and can continue to do so. As time progresses, try to see your memories as a source of empowerment rather than a source of sadness. |
| 11/16/2022 | “When you arise in the morning, think of what precious privilege it is to be alive – to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.” Marcus Aurelius Find one thing today that reminds you how beautiful life is. Photograph it and print it out. Then, use it as a visual reminder when you need it. |
| 11/15/2022 | “Start before you’re ready.” Steven Pressfield You may never feel like you are ready to reconnect with people and pursue things that interest you. Take the leap anyway…you’ll be glad you did. |
| 11/14/2022 | “In any given moment we have two options: to step forward into growth or to step back into safety.” Abraham Maslow Find the courage today to do something you would not ordinarily do. What that looks like is different for everyone, but the act of taking a risk will empower you. |
| 11/13/2022 | “There’s a loneliness that only exists in one’s mind. The loneliest moment in someone’s life is when they are watching their whole world fall apart, and all they can do is stare blankly.” F. Scott Fitzgerald When was the last time you spoke to a stranger? Hold the door for someone with a baby carriage; help someone who is struggling to carry bags to ease his/her burden; compliment someone on his/her outfit. You must make the effort to connect with others even in small ways throughout the day. |
| 11/12/2022 | “We hold on so tightly, because we’re terrified of loss. We hold on till our hands bleed. And in that self-shattering persistence, we fail to see the answer: Just let go.” Yasmin Mogahed Let yourself feel some happiness today. Allow yourself to smile. You need to feel some joy to help you balance the pain you are working through right now. |
| 11/11/2022 | “Happiness isn’t about getting what you want all the time. It’s about loving what you have and being grateful for it.” Asher Roth You are working through your grief, and that is an overwhelming process. Look for one thing today that makes you smile. You may have to search online for a comedic video or timely cartoon you find amusing. Try to reawaken that part of your emotions. |
| 11/10/2022 | “The whole world can become the enemy when you lose what you love.” Kristina McMorris There may be times when you look at those people who have not lost someone with envy. They seem like they don’t have any real problems as they live in the blissful ignorance of what it feels like before you experience great loss. Your grief changes you, but it also brings wisdom. You can now empathize and connect with others in ways that you could not truly do so before your loss. Your loss brings to you a greater understanding of life and all of its stages. |
| 11/9/2022 | “A ship is safe in harbor, but that’s not what ships are for.” William G.T. Shedd Sometimes grief makes us want to stay home alone and not engage with our friends and family. Try to go out and connect with others. Go shopping with a friend; have coffee with a relative; attend a club meeting. It’s hard to go out and be part of life, but if you try to do so it will help you to heal. |
| 11/8/2022 | “And in the end it is not the years in your life that count, it’s the life in your years.” Abraham Lincoln What have you done lately that makes you feel alive and connected to nature? Go for a bike ride, take a walk, go for a swim…there are so many ways to feel part of the greater world around you. |
| 11/7/2022 | “If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.” Mother Teresa Write an email to someone who is also impacted by loss. Talk about how you are feeling in an honest,open fashion. These are the times when we need each other. |
| 11/6/2022 | “Happiness is not the absence of problems, it’s the ability to deal with them.” Steve Maraboli You don’t need to aspire to be happy or even to “not” be sad. Just take a moment and actively reflect on how you’re feeling today. Be good to yourself, but be honest. You can recognize that you feel lonely or sad. That is a step towards feeling better. |
| 11/5/2022 | “The greatest gift you can give someone is your time, your attention, your love, your concern.” Joel Osteen Reach out to a neighbor today. Walk their dog, take in their mail…find something you can do for them to make their day a little easier. Being proactive is a critical part of your healing process. |
| 11/4/2022 | “For myself I am an optimist – it does not seem to be much use to be anything else.” Winston Churchill How can you feel optimistic when you still feel sad? It is so difficult to believe that things are going to improve when the burden of grief is so heavy to bear. You may not be ready to feel optimistic about a lot of things today. Try to feel optimistic about one….you will heal and be able to enjoy life again. Once you start having that belief, your life will slowly change. |
| 11/3/2022 | “Change the way you look at things and the things you look at change.” Wayne W. Dyer Take out a concrete object today that reminds you of your loved one. It could be a photograph, a letter, or something that belonged to that person. Even if the object initially makes you feel sad, think of at least two things about it that make you feel happy. It is not an easy assignment, and you may not be able to do it yet. Keep trying, though, as it will help you to move past your grief into a place of greater contentment. |
| 11/2/2022 | “We all make mistakes, have struggles, and even regret things in our past. But you are not your mistakes, you are not your struggles, and you are here NOW with the power to shape your day and future.” Steve Maraboli, What are you going to do today? Will you be at home or are you going out? You decide today who you are going to be and what you are going to do. The control you have over yourself and your actions is actually an important part of your healing. Your loved one being gone makes you feel like you have no control. However, you do control a lot of the pieces of your life. Having an awareness of that will help you feel less like a victim of your loss. |
| 11/1/2022 | “To live in hearts we leave behind is not to die.” Thomas Campbell Write down one thing today that you learned from the person you lost. Put it in your pocket and take it out whenever you feel you need to to get through the day. Perhaps tomorrow you will not need the concrete reminder of the legacy left by such a special person in your heart. |
| 10/31/2022 | “There is no passion to be found playing small – in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living.” Nelson Mandela Your grief is a setback. It is unquestionably devastating and even frightening as you piece together what feels like the shattered pieces of your life. But this is your life, and your chance to live it is today. Take a step, no matter how small, towards finding your purpose. |
| 10/30/2022 | “I suppose that since most of our hurts come through relationships so will our healing, and I know that grace rarely makes sense for those looking in from the outside.” Wm. Paul Young Are you afraid to tighten the bonds with your family and friends? Do you think that if you become closer with them that you are running the risk of losing them too? It is normal to worry about losing once you have suffered a loss. Despite your hesitancy, it is important to have bonds with others to help you rebuild after your great loss. Death is a hard but inevitable part of life. You cannot stop living, growing, and bonding with others. You need to choose to live. |
| 10/29/2022 | “Grief can’t be shared. Everyone carries it alone, his own burden, his own way.” Anne Morrow Lindbergh It can be surprising, even shocking, that others who had a relationship with the person you lost are grieving so differently. The fact that they are crying more than you, talking less, seem so contented, or any other difference is hard to understand. |
| 10/28/2022 | “Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the little voice at the end of the day that says I’ll try again tomorrow.” Mary Anne Radmacher You may have had several days, even weeks, where you felt like you were doing a little better…not great, but a little better. Then, it hit again like a ton of bricks. Grief sometimes plays cruel tricks where you think you’re handling it, and then you have a setback. This process is long and grueling. Be patient with yourself, and remember that tomorrow is another day. |
| 10/27/2022 | “If you suppress grief too much, it can well redouble.” Moliere You do not have to pretend to be the strong person that your family, friends, or even society assumes that you are. You may not want to cry, but you need to find an outlet for the intense emotions that come with grief. If the tears won’t come, you should do something physical to release some of that pressure. Taking a walk, running, or riding a bike can be helpful ways to handle the daunting feelings of grief. |
| 10/26/2022 | “Thinking and talking about death need not be morbid; they may be quite the opposite. Ignorance and fear of death overshadow life, while knowing and accepting death erases this shadow.” Lily Pincus It is important that you find someone in your life who has also lost someone close to them. It may be a family member, but it could also be someone that you connect with online or as part of a support group. You may not need to talk about your loss every day, but there will be days that you need to have someone to whom you can just say, “Today is tough,” knowing that the person on the other end of the phone or who reads your email understands. Having that moment where you feel safe and understood is important. If you haven’t found someone to fill that role, you should begin trying to do so. It will help those flashes of pain much easier to bear. |
| 10/25/2022 | “Death ends a life, not a relationship.” Jack Lemmon What defines a relationship? Many would argue that a relationship is the bond you have with another person. That bond, of course, varies a lot depending upon the person with whom you share it. However, the connection that you have is one that is everlasting, and most certainly transcends death. When your partner passes on, the relationship still remains. You don’t have to use the past tense when you think about your loved one. Say to yourself, “I love this person,” rather than, “I loved this person.” It is a small change, but one that will help your heart know that you don’t have to abandon that relationship, but to see it as an important part of your life today. |
| 10/24/2022 | “Grief is a curious thing, when it happens unexpectedly. It is a Band-aid being ripped away, taking the top layer off a family. And the underbelly of a household is never pretty, ours no exception.” Jodi Picoult Everyone responds to grief differently. Some people talk about their feelings at length, some seem angry with the world, and others withdraw. Within your own family, people may be grieving differently. Know that even if each family member is responding differently, that you all have the same shared experience. Try to reach out to one another with love and understanding. Be good to each other as you try to work through this challenge together. |
| 10/23/2022 | “Shock is a merciful condition. It allows you to get through disaster with a necessary distance between you and your feelings.” Lisa Kleypas Do you wish you still felt the way you did a month ago? You were numb and going through the motions of your life to just “get through” the obligations that come with the death of a loved one. Now, you’re not shocked anymore, and the slow realization of the truth has moved into your psyche. This stage is tough, because it feels so final. Hang on and don’t feel discouraged. It takes a lot of patience to work through the first few months after such a tragedy. |
| 10/22/2022 | “There’s a fine edge to new grief, it severs nerves, disconnects reality–there’s mercy in a sharp blade. Only with time, as the edge wears, does the real ache begin.” Christopher Moore You probably need to hear it again today. You are feeling sad, and you think that feeling is never going to end. The grief becomes almost frustrating with its endless presence. It is still a new loss, even if the calendar tells you otherwise. Know that the grief will be there, and know that it will be a painfully slow in easing its grasp on your heart. |
| 10/21/2022 | “Grieving doesn’t make you imperfect. It makes you human.” Sarah Dessen When you go out and see all the people busily leading their lives, it feels like you are the only one grieving. Everyone seems purposeful and fully occupied with the events of their day. At times like that you may feel truly alone in your grief. However, people from the outside looking at you might not realize your struggle. They don’t ask you how you are because they assume you are healing, and that you are doing ok. Most people who are grieving are hiding their pain from the outside world. You are not alone…you are simply unaware of the millions of others who feel like you do. |
| 10/20/2022 | “Before you can live a part of you has to die. You have to let go of what could have been, how you should have acted and what you wish you would have said differently. You have to accept that you can’t change the past experiences, opinions of others at that moment in time or outcomes from their choices or yours. When you finally recognize that truth then you will understand the true meaning of forgiveness of yourself and others. From this point you will finally be free.” Shannon L. Alder You have to forgive yourself for all of the things you wish you’d done differently in your relationship with your loved one. If you had died first, he/she would have been facing this struggle instead. Would you want that? Forgive yourself so you can heal. Living your life is a gift to be treasured. Don’t allow yourself to wallow in regret. Be the best person you can today to show you have learned from your past mistakes. |
| 10/19/2022 | “You attend the funeral, you bid the dead farewell. You grieve. Then you continue with your life. And at times the fact of her absence will hit you like a blow to the chest, and you will weep. But this will happen less and less as time goes on. She is dead. You are alive. So live.” Neil Gaiman After a while, people stop asking you how you are doing. After a while, people assume that you must have gotten used to your loss. It may take longer than people who have not been through grief realize how long it takes to return to some kind of normalcy again. Yet, you must eventually do so. There is nothing to be gained by trapping yourself in your grief forever. So…grieve, cry, and then live. |
| 10/18/2022 | “…acceptance is yet another of life’s ‘here’s a side of hurt’ lessons and it is never truly acceptance unless it has cost us something to arrive there.” Libba Bray When your anger has cooled, and your tears have dried, you will eventually find yourself in a place of reluctant acceptance. You never have to like what has happened, but you will learn to accept that, for whatever reason, it did. |
| 10/17/2022 | “See, as much as you want to hold on to the bitter sore memory that someone has left this world, you are still in it. And the very act of living is a tide: at first it seems to make no difference at all, and then one day you look down and see how much pain has eroded.” Jodi Picoult You will not feel like you have made any progress in healing from your loss for so long that the idea of feeling better seems implausible. Then, out of nowhere, you will suddenly realize that you are doing a little better. Celebrate that moment. It is a long journey to get there, and worthy of your pride. |
| 10/16/2022 | “People think they know you. They think they know how you’re handling a situation. But the truth is no one knows. No one knows what happens after you leave them, when you’re lying in bed or sitting over your breakfast alone and all you want to do is cry or scream. They don’t know what’s going on inside your head–the mind-numbing cocktail of anger and sadness and guilt. This isn’t their fault. They just don’t know. And so they pretend and they say you’re doing great when you’re really not. And this makes everyone feel better. Everybody but you.” William H. Woodwell Jr. You may not be an athlete, but you have a game face. When you go out into the world, you hide that piece of you that is broken…that piece that is grieving. It is good to have a life outside of the grief. It helps to have parts of your day that distract you from how you are feeling inside. In time, those parts will grow and grow until they begin to crowd out the sadness in your heart. |
| 10/15/2022 | “You cannot die of grief, though it feels as if you can. A heart does not actually break, though sometimes your chest aches as if it is breaking. Grief dims with time. It is the way of things. There comes a day when you smile again, and you feel like a traitor. How dare I feel happy. How dare I be glad in a world where my father is no more. And then you cry fresh tears, because you do not miss him as much as you once did, and giving up your grief is another kind of death.” Laurell K. Hamilton Guilt is grief’s unfortunate partner. We feel guilty because our grief is keeping us from connecting to the living. We feel guilty because we are not grieving as much as we once did. Let go of the guilt. The grief process is a natural part of losing someone we care about. As you come out of the grieving period, be happy, not guilty, that you can return to being the person your loved one knew. |
| 10/14/2022 | “Whoever said that loss gets easier with time was a liar. Here’s what really happens: The spaces between the times you miss them grow longer. Then, when you do remember to miss them again, it’s still with a stabbing pain to the heart. And you have guilt. Guilt because it’s been too long since you missed them last.” Kristin O’Donnell Tubb You may be desperate to feel better, yet almost afraid to let go of the pain. You do not need to feel guilty for trying to live a normal life again. The person you lost does not want you to stop living. As you heal, know that it is normal to feel wary about your return to normalcy. It is part of your healing. Coming out of mourning does not mean you no longer feel love for the person you lost. It means that it is time to reestablish yourself as a vital, living person again. |
| 10/13/2022 | “No matter how bad your heart is broken, the world doesn’t stop for your grief.” Faraaz Kazi You may find yourself questioning why no one else around you appears to be sad. How can there be laughter and dancing? How can you be upset because your soup is cold when my heart is broken forever? The world may seem very frivolous right now. Try to not let that make you feel angry or isolated. You are not the only person grieving. Reach out to others who are experiencing the same struggle. It will help the world feel more like a place of healing and less chaotic. |
| 10/12/2022 | “When one person is missing the whole world seems empty.” Pat Schweibert We never think about how our life is a careful balance. Everyone with whom we interact regularly plays a part in creating our world, a web of people who make us feel comfortable, safe, and loved. When we lose an integral part of that web, we feel lost. The balance is upset, and we feel like we will topple over from the grief and the uncertainty of this terrible change. You may feel like things are “out of whack” for a long time. That is normal. Over the next months and years, you will be able to methodically reset the balance, so that you return to a feeling of normalcy. Know that you are resilient and that you can make it through this unbalanced period of your life. |
| 10/11/2022 | “Friendship doubles our joy and divides our grief.” Swedish Proverb Many times when people grieve, their first instinct is to isolate themselves from others. You may need to cry, or to just sit in silent reflection as you continue to try to process what has happened. However, in conjunction with your personal grieving, it is often beneficial to take the time to talk about your sadness with people you trust. Having a friend, support group, or counselor can make a tremendous difference as you try to re-assimilate to the life you led before this tragedy. Being able to talk and to listen to the advice and stories of others helps you to reconnect. Isolating yourself is easy, but it shows great courage and fortitude to share these vulnerabilities with others. Take a chance and talk about what you are going through…you’ll be glad you did. |
| 10/10/2022 | “Love is stronger than death even though it can’t stop death from happening, but no matter how hard death tries it can’t separate people from love. It can’t take away our memories either. In the end, life is stronger than death.” Anonymous People talk about the importance of memories when you have had a loss. It is true that they are often referred to as treasured, and that is an accurate description. Yet, our memories can also evoke the most pain when the loss is still fresh in our minds. Trying to find the balance between the happiness and sadness of our memories is one of the hardest parts of grieving as time passes. You want to look at photographs, watch home videos, or read letters to keep your connection to your loved one fresh. At the same time, these items can also be difficult reminders of the acute pain you are feeling as you adjust to the loss. |
| 10/9/2022 | “Everyone grieves in different ways. For some, it could take longer or shorter. I do know it never disappears. An ember still smolders inside me. Most days, I don’t notice it, but, out of the blue, it’ll flare to life.” Maria V. Snyder When grief is your every day, it’s hard to imagine not having that weight on your shoulders. It’s hard to fathom that there is even the possibility of a life without it. However, as it fades and your hope builds of a life free of that constant sorrow, know that there will be flare-ups. There will be a little reminder that brings it all flooding back. The good news is that the reminders are not permanent. They will startle you, but then fade away. These bonds do not break, but the level of intensity softens over time, allowing you to slowly move forward. |
| 10/8/2022 | “Youth offers the promise of happiness, but life offers the realities of grief.” Nicholas Sparks No matter your age or your background, the process of grief is the last step in truly growing up. Your life before loss was one of a kind of childlike innocence compared to the life you have now. However, it is not without hope or value. The love and understanding you can bring to others has a depth and intensity unlike any other. Your appreciation for life and its joys makes you a richer, stronger person. This does not happen overnight. This depth of character builds in conjunction with your grief process. It is the phoenix rising from the pain of loss. Use this gift to enhance the lives of those around you. |
| 10/7/2022 | “Grief is a most peculiar thing; we’re so helpless in the face of it. It’s like a window that will simply open of its own accord. The room grows cold, and we can do nothing but shiver. But it opens a little less each time, and a little less; and one day we wonder what has become of it.” Arthur Golden Your grief may fade away completely one day, or it may always play a role in your consciousness. No matter its intensity, it will evolve into something you can become accustomed to over time. |
| 10/6/2022 | “So it’s true, when all is said and done, grief is the price we pay for love.” E.A. Bucchianeri Take a minute today to remember three times when your loved one made you laugh and smile. Relive those beautiful memories in your head. Those sweet moments are why you feel such sadness. Know that they were worth it. |
| 10/5/2022 | “There should be a statute of limitation on grief. A rulebook that says it is all right to wake up crying, but only for a month. That after 42 days you will no longer turn with your heart racing, certain you have heard her call out your name. That there will be no fine imposed if you feel the need to clean out her desk; take down her artwork from the refrigerator; turn over a school portrait as you pass – if only because it cuts you fresh again to see it. That it’s okay to measure the time she has been gone, the way we once measured her birthdays.” Jodi Picoult Your process of grief is not following anyone else’s timetable. It may take you two years to feel like someone else does in two months. Think of when you learned to walk or learned to read or learned to drive. Everyone’s timetable is different for every part of life. Grieving is no different. Be patient with your heart. You will grieve as you need to for as long as you need to do so. |
| 10/4/2022 | “They say time heals all wounds, but that presumes the source of the grief is finite” Cassandra Clare There is something so special about learning something new about the person you have lost. Hearing a new story or finding a letter you forgot about is an unexpected joy. While these moments are undeniably special, they can also rekindle the sadness of your loss. Try to treasure these artifacts as gifts, rather than focus on the feeling of emptiness they may evoke. Your loved one will always be with you, and these new connections only strengthen the bond you will always have. |
| 10/3/2022 | “And grief still feels like fear. Perhaps, more strictly, like suspense. Or like waiting; just hanging about waiting for something to happen. It gives life a permanently provisional feeling. It doesn’t seem worth starting anything. I can’t settle down. I yawn, fidget, I smoke too much. Up till this I always had too little time. Now there is nothing but time. Almost pure time, empty successiveness.” C.S. Lewis When you are grieving, it feels like your time is monopolized by nothing but waves of emotion. Reflecting on how you are doing, you may be feeling worried that your life seems to have changed so much in such a short amount of time. Do not panic. As all-encompassing as your grief is now, this intensity will not last much longer. You may already be feeling better than you did just a couple of weeks ago. Take a moment or two and celebrate the healing you’ve already done. |
| 10/2/2022 | “Someone experiencing the stages of grief is rarely aware of how his behavior might appear to others. Grief often produces a “zoom lens effect,” in which the focus is entirely on oneself, to the exclusion of external considerations.” Sol Luckman Grief sends us into survival mode: we do the bare minimum to exist because the majority of our energy is directed towards grieving. Do not spend time worrying about the details of your life that you may have neglected during the early days of your grief. Instead, choose one thing today that helps you feel more connected to your old life and do it. |
| 10/1/2022 | “Tears aren’t for the people we’ve lost. They’re for us. So we can remember, and celebrate, and miss them, and feel human.” C.J. Redwine We are filled with such emotions about the person we lost and the relationship we lost. The feelings are so strong that we have to let them go by crying. Never feel shame in that. |
| 9/30/2022 | “Somehow the thought she might be next wasn’t nearly as terrifying as the realization he was gone.” Marcha A. Fox There is an inherent fear in facing a life without your loved one. You can’t change what has happened, and you can’t make everything “ok”. What you can do today is to take a look at that fear and share your emotions with someone you trust. Just saying out loud, “I’m really scared to go on living without this person” can help ease your fear and pain. |
| 9/29/2022 | “What was I going to do? The choices seemed basic and slim: Die. Exist. Live. I wanted to die, but with two young children to care for and a husband, that wasn’t an option. Exist. I could do that. I was doing that now. but how flat and lifeless. How dreary and endless the long march would be until I met Charlotte again. The only option that resonated with me was to live. But how? I wanted to want to live. That was the best I could do in that moment.” Sukey Forbes The obligations of your life may be the only driving forces propelling you forward right now. Rely on those routines to keep you going until you are ready to face your feelings. |
| 9/28/2022 | “Sorry doesn’t make anything better. It’s just a word to fill the space of a loss of words.” Shari J. Ryan Be grateful today for the people in your life who have reached out to you to try to lift your spirits. Take the time to thank them. |
| 9/27/2022 | “Grief is one illness that defies all remedies; it must ever run its course.” Brandy Purdy You can pretend that your grief is not there or hide it, but it will stay with you until it has run its course. The feeling of grief may make you impatient or angry. Instead, try to find a place of acceptance. Because you cannot force the process to be over, you need to just acknowledge that that is where your heart is right now. Time will be the best healer. |
| 9/26/2022 | “To better handle grief, become the passenger, not the driver.” Todd Stocker Letting people help you is as therapeutic for them as it is for you. Just remember that a time will surely come when you can repay the favor. |
| 9/25/2022 | “It’s easy to be forgetful when you’re grieving, even forget those things that you believe most people wouldn’t.” Liz Fichera Don’t hesitate to ask for help, even though some time has passed since your loss. Those who have lost someone know the truth – that the grief process is overwhelming for a period of time far longer than one would imagine. |
| 9/24/2022 | “Someone dies, there oughta be something. It oughta shake the world! You’re not supposed to walk away!” Lisa Henry Some days you may wish that the rest of the world could match the way you are feeling inside. It almost seems wrong that life goes on all around you when your world still seems to be upside-down. It’s hard to believe today, but there will come a time when you are grateful that the world is ready and waiting to take you back. |
| 9/23/2022 | “I watch and listen, helpless to help. There is no point in saying “This, too, shall pass,” For a time we do not even want it to pass. We hold on to grief, fearing that its lifting will be the final betrayal.” Ahdaf Soueif You need to take the time you need to grieve. While some might see it as almost a luxury, it is actually a necessity for your physical and emotional health. |
| 9/22/2022 | “I, though, was still sometimes ruled by stark pain, lost to everything else. Grief slipped away, only to attack from behind. It changed shape endlessly. It lacerated me, numbed me, stalked me, startled me, caught me by the throat. It deceived my eye with glimpses of you, my ear with the sound of your voice. I would turn and turn, expecting you, and find you gone. Again. Each time I escaped my sorrow, forgetful amid other things, I lost you anew the instant I remembered you were gone.” Kate Maloy Have you thought you heard your loved one’s voice? When that happens, you will feel a mixture of hope and sorrow all in an instant. Recognize that voice was hard, but that eventually, it will actually make you feel more nostalgia than sorrow. |
| 9/21/2022 | “You who have never been there in the throes of grief, have no idea what is going on inside the head of the grieving spouse: the scattered thoughts, the constant worry that we will forget something or someone in our fog-induced state, that strange feeling of not quite being all there when out in social situations, the pall that covers everything, like a cloak of sadness that never lifts.” Mary Potter Kenyon It seems that most of your energy is directed at grieving. Mundane tasks may not get done and obligations may be forgotten. Make a list of what has to be done and forgive yourself for what doesn’t. In a few months, you will be able to handle your responsibilities without it, but for now it will help to keep you on track. |
| 9/20/2022 | “Grief is always sudden as winter, no matter how long the autumn.” J. Aleksandr Wootton Even if you thought you’d be ready for a death, you probably found that you weren’t. You may have a sense of relief for the person if he or she was in pain or a sense of gratitude if the death was fast or painless. No matter the circumstances, death is final; the mourning phase is no easier under any circumstance. The stark winter-like feeling of a loss is universal. There is no way to soften that blow. |
| 9/19/2022 | “The tough times start,” he said, “the day the last casserole dish is returned.” Michael Perry There is a palpable silence when the rituals surrounding a death are over. It feels like this is the new normal, but it is just a transitional phase. You can fill your home again with sounds and life and love when you are ready to do so. Until then, don’t let the silence frighten you. It will not last forever. |
| 9/18/2022 | “It didn’t help when you told me that my mother would always be with me, even if I couldn’t see her. An unseen mother couldn’t go for long walks with me on summer evenings, drawing the names of trees and flowers from her seemingly infinite knowledge of nature; or help me with my homework, the familiar scent of her in my nostrils as she leaned in to correct a misspelling or puzzle over the meaning of an unfamiliar poem; or read with me on cold Sunday afternoons near the fire” John Connolly Try to be patient when people say the “wrong” thing to you about your loss. In general, people have good intentions. Focus on the spirit of their comments vs. the content of them. |
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