Posts tagged with “grief”
How Iāve Been Shaking Out My Pain Since Losing My Daughter
āMovement has incredible healing power.ā ~Alexandra Heather Foss
My ten-year-old daughter, who had been ill for all her life, was dying. She was hooked up to tubes and monitors, and they were always going off. Her numbers were off the charts, and the doctors kept saying, āYour daughterās numbers aren’t normal, and we would normally have a team coming in here to check on her breathing and to rouse her.ā
After the last operation, one doctor said she was surprised that she was still alive when she came into work. We all were. She kept fighting. She would just be …
How Trauma Affects the Brain and How Iām Healing from PTSD
āOwning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing that weāll ever do.ā ~BrenĆ© BrownĀ
Several months ago, I was stoked about writing a piece on the living legacy of trauma, sharing how much we think we know about these so-called injuries of the mind, body, and spirit when, in reality, we know diddly squat.
I thought that a piece on this topic would inform and help folks like me. Iād suffered long and hard from PTSD, triggered initially by the sudden death of my brother and, simultaneously, the unfortunate finding of an email that confirmed
5 Things to Remember When Heartbreak Feels Too Heavy to Bear
āIf you feel like youāre losing everything, remember that trees lose their leaves every year and they still stand tall and wait for better days to come.ā ~Unknown
For a big lover like me, heartbreak has always gotten the best of me. I have felt heavy pain from the ending of a relationship, the ghosting of a situationship, and the loss of what could have been with someone I never dated. And Iāve experienced the sting of friendships leaving my life.
Itās all heartbreaking.
It starts with a crippling, piercing full-body agony. And eventually it grows into a dull ache …
Accepting Fear and Sadness as Normal Parts of a Good Life
āBefore you know kindness as the deepest thing inside, you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.ā ~Naomi Shihab Nye
I knew it was around that time. When I opened my eyes, it was pitch black outside and I couldnāt yet hear the chickens in the distance waking up. It was 4 a.m. again.
In the past few days, I have loved this gift of jet lag; transitioning to a thirteen-hour time change has afforded me this dark, mysterious quiet that has woken up inside of me the place from which I writeāa place that spontaneously arises when the
4 Types of Regret and How to Leverage Them for a More Fulfilling Life
āRegret is not dangerous or abnormal, a deviation from the steady path to happiness. It is healthy and universal, an integral part of being human. Regret is also valuable. It clarifies. It instructs. Done right, it needn’t drag us down; it can lift us up.ā ~Daniel H. Pink
It happened when I reached midlife.
I’d experienced regret before, but this was different.
In my forties, I struggled with several deep-seated regrets all at the same time.
And I didn’t handle it well.
If only I hadn’t chosen to fall into unhealthy habits that were hard to break, like smoking cigarettes …
Why I Donāt Regret That I Didnāt Walk Away from My Relationship Sooner
āThe butterfly does not look back at the caterpillar in shame, just as you should not look back at your past in shame. Your past was part of your own transformation.ā ~Anthony GucciardiĀ
Before I finally grew the courage to walk away from my boyfriend, I contemplated walking away many times.
There was the time that he had ghosted me for a week without communicating that he needed space. Then after promising me a timeline for telling his mom about me and our relationship, when the time came to do it, he made up another excuse. And there were …
How I Forgave Myself for Cheating and Hurting Someone I Once Loved
“The best apology is simply admitting your mistake. The worst apology is dressing up your mistake with rationalizations to make it look like you were not really wrong, but just misunderstood.” ~Dodinsky
It was January 2016 and Baltimore was in the midst of a blizzard. Outside, the city was covered in a three-foot blanket of snow.Ā Inside, we were having a blizzard party. My boyfriend, five friends, and me.
Weād been coloring, listening to music, dancing, and playing games.Ā Already, I knew it was one of the most cozy and fun nights of my life. Everyone was happy. The energy …
How Iāve Navigated My Grief and Guilt Since Losing My Narcissistic Father
“One of the greatest awakenings comes when you realize that not everybody changes.Ā Some people never change.Ā And thatās their journey.Ā Itās not yours to try and fix it for them.ā ~Unknown
In 2021 my father died. Cancer ofā¦ so many things.
Most of the events during that time are a blur, but the emotions that came with them are vivid and unrelenting.
I was the first in my family to find out.
My mother and sister had gone on an off-grid week-long getaway up the West Coast of South Africa, where thereās nothing …
One Missing Ingredient in My Recovery and Why I Relapsed
āThe Phoenix must burn to emerge.ā ~Janet Fitch
Many people were shocked when I relapsed after twenty-three years of recovery. After all, I was the model of doing it right. I did everything I was told: went to treatment, followed instructions, prayed for help, and completed the assignments.
After returning home from treatment, I joined a recovery program and went to therapy. Once again, I followed all the suggestions, which worked when it came to staying sober. I had no desire to drink or do drugsāwell, at least for a long while.
When I went to treatment, I was …
How I Found Forgiveness and Compassion When I Felt Hurt and Betrayed
“I can bear any pain as long as it has meaning.” ~Haruki Murakami
Iāve always felt like someone on the outside. Despite having these feelings Iāve been relatively successful at playing the game of life, and have survived through school, university, and the workplaceāalthough, at times, working so hard to āsurviveā has impacted my emotional well-being.
I have been lucky enough to have healthy and supportive relationships with a few loved ones who have accepted me as I am (quirks and all). To anyone else Iāve come across, I suspect Iāve been perceived as inexplicably normal and inoffensive.
Like many …
How I Feel the Best I Can Despite My Struggles with Depression and Anxiety
āThere is hope, even when your brain tells you thereĀ isnāt.ā ~John Green
I remember being fifteen. I was a high school freshman who loved drawing, books, Harry Potter, and Taylor Swift. I hated math class with a passion. I had a loving family and a small white dog named Maddie. I wanted to be a writer, and to have a boyfriend. I also wanted to die.
It started in seventh grade, when my best friend, Meghan, dumped me. You hear about romantic breakups all the time, but no one seems to talk about friendship breakups. They hurt a …
Finding Home After Divorce: What Brought Me Peace and Healing
āWe need to learn how to navigate our minds, both the good and the bad, the light and the dark, so that ultimately, we can create acceptance and open our arms and come home to ourselves.āĀ ~Candy Leigh
Divorce is so common that my son, at a young age, asked if my husband and I could divorce so he could have āa momās and dadās house too!ā And my daughter agreed because then āwe could get double presents on holidays!ā Given my experience as a child with divorced parents, I assured them, āGuys, divorce is not really that much fun.ā…
How I Found Hope in my Fatherās Terminal Cancer
āWithout realizing it, the individual composes his life according to the laws of beauty, even in times of greatest distress.ā ~Milan Kundera
When my father received a terminal cancer diagnosis, I went through a wave of different emotions. Fear, anger, sadness. It opened a completely new dictionary that I had not had access to before. A realm of experiences, thoughts, and emotions that lie at the very bedrock of human life was suddenly revealed to me.
After the initial horror and dread at hearing the news had subsided, I was surprised to find a new sense of meaning and …
How Grieving My Parentsā Divorce (20 Years Later) Changed Me for the Better
āThere are years that ask questions and years that answer.ā ~Zora Neale Hurston
At the age of thirteen, my childhood as I knew it came to an end. My parents sat my brother and me down at the kitchen table and told us they were getting a divorce. In that moment, I could acutely feel the pain of losing the only family unit I knew.
Although my teenage self was devastated by this news, it would take another twenty years for me to realize the full extent of what I had lost. And to acknowledge that I had never …
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