Today I had another one of my weekly cookouts - luckily the weather was nice.  Lots of Michael's friends came over and we chatted and talked.  I teared up a few times but for the most part I stayed upbeat and content. 

I remember seeing one of Michael's good friend at a restaurant a week ago on Saturday.  When he caught my eye he came right over and gave me a big hug and said, "I miss him so much".  I began to cry and he tried to comfort me.  I asked him to come to the cook out at…

Today as I read from "Healing After Loss" I was struck by how familiar the words were to me.  It talked about the emotional roller coaster of grief and how one minute your fine, the next, a flood of tears.  I am very much in that place of teetering between being strong in mind to falling apart.  It's not fun for my loved ones to watch this part of the grief journey yet I can't change it.

According to "Healing After Loss", we're not suppose to change it; this is what happens.  I just…

I read today's meditation from "Healing after Loss" about dreams and how we often wish to dream about our loved ones as a way of staying near and in touch.  Martha Whitmore Hickman shares a dream she had about her daughter, who died from injuries due to a fall.  In the dream her daughter was on a stretcher being carried by two men who brought her up to where Martha was waiting.  Told she was told her daughter was going to be okay.  Below Martha was her family looking up and waiting for her…

"Healing After Loss" gives an interesting perspective on the unknown. It is far better to accept that our understanding of beyond life is limited.  Relish in the stories told of faith and intuition and most importantly.......wait and see for yourself!! Why try to have all the answers.  Don't stand so close for you will only learn a very small piece about life and what God has in store for us.  Step back and accept that though our questions are unanswerable, the real question is one of…

For those who are struck with the loss of a loved one, our suffering can be immensely difficult.  "Healing After Loss" states that in order to get to a new beginning, we must walk through the center of our suffering.

Oh how easy it would be to go around it, avoid it altogether or numb ourselves from it.  The truth is we need to feel and experience the pressure of grief.  No one is expected to stay in it 24 hours a day - take time out to breathe.  Our situation becomes a balancing act…

What a surprise - this change from living in the valley of despair to a land of potential opportunity.  Yes it's true and according the "Healing After Loss" the shift is subtle yet noticeable.  For instead of looking toward the day with sorrow and heart ache, we notice our mind is awakened to a new way thinking.  We are actually feeling happy and content more often than not. 

Without knowing the exact time it happened, we are just realizing that something is good is going on.  For…

Today I went to the beach with three of my long time friends (over 40 years).  I started out crying but as the day went on, I listened to their stories of various struggles.  I began to see that they all turned to God for assistance.  One had a brain tumor, one had breast cancer and the other had problems with her only son.  Each one said that they turned their woes and worries over to God, but not before thanking him for all the wonderful things they had going right in their life.  Each one…

Healing After Loss explains to us how hikers who have lost the exhilaration of starting their hike and can't see the end of the path, often call this the "middle-miles."  Grief's journey, though different than the hikers climb, does have stages.  For example in the early days/weeks of our grieving we have others to help get us through those early, shocking moments.  However once the initial "I'm here for you", fades, we realize that we are on our own.  It's about that same time that we doubt…

Sounds crazy to think that our refuge exists in our capacity to love.......death.  Only then will we begin to see change.

"Healing After Loss" offers us this:  If we learn to love death, the truth, or all that is, we can slowly unlock the chains that have kept us in denial and anger.  We can stop insisting on having something back that is never coming back.  Instead we can accept what has happened and rejoice in the life we have.

"I will try to open my hands - and my heart - to…

One month ago today My Michael went away.

The pain will just not go, and the tears continue to flow.

No words I write could ever say,

How sad and empty I feel today. 

You always said "I love you mom" right up until that day,

My broken heart just wants to know why you went away — For Michael Colby.

As we go to the places that our loved one spent with us, there's going to be that moment of reality that our loss is real.

Martha Whitmore Hickman talks about she would measure the level of courage based on far open she would keep her deceased daughter's bedroom door.  On bad days the door stayed mostly closed, on good days, perhaps a quarter of the way; but most definitely a difficult vision to see her daughter's possessions.

After months of open and close door games, she…

"Healing after Loss" explains to us that for many, there is the guilt of the survivor.  The one who can't understand why they were spared and then given the dynamic task of dealing with the horrendous grief.  In this meditation we are asked to turn and look through another lens - certainly not in a triumphant or over confident kind of way, but a simple nod that indicates we have come through the storm of grief and anguish.  And instead of emptiness and hopelessness, we can transform our…

When we truly look within ourselves, we may be surprised to find a glimmer of joy circling the peripheral of our center.  Heck we might even find a sliver of peace.  

From thinking about the meaning of death, remembering our loved ones beautiful faces, reminiscing about times together, it's no wonder most of our thoughts are wrapped up in the person who is gone.  "Healing After Loss" challenges us to; take a moment, return back to our skin, breathe, and try to return to our center.…

Grief - such an interesting process.  The question is, according to "Healing After Loss" are there benefits to us in grieving?  We do get attention and sympathy from those around us. Perhaps we're able to avoid responsibilities that were never on our list of favorite things to do anyway?  How about the fact that grief can actually make us feel even closer to our lost loved one? 

Here's the punch line - of course we want to stay close to our loved one, BUT it's the person we…

Often times rituals can be a source of comfort and direction as they carry us through the most difficult of times.  Rituals that have been shared with our lost loved one can instill a sense of power that actually brings us closer to them; recalling the sounds and words of what was said during our time together.

Take the saying of prayers or a holiday family feast, we can still surround ourselves with those who continue to participate in these rituals, and carry us through the…

It's often difficult to savor the daily beauty of the world when we are so lost in our grief.  Why should we enjoy something so blessed when our loved one is no longer here to share in the gift of life. 

It is a true miracle for us when at last we can appreciate and accept that our loved one is in better hands than ours, and that they are seeing the beauty.  The beauty that only those who have passed, are privileged to walk and live amongst the land of eternal love and…

everyone knows how to manage grief - except those who have no grief.  Everyone wants to tell us how to manage it, when to be over it, we're being too weak, or we're  hanging on for nothing.  The truth is we might need help from others; perhaps a trusting friend, a counselor, support group., etc.

But what most matters is that we stick to our own timetable.  Some say it takes seven years to adjust to the loss of someone close.  Whatever it takes, please know that you have every right to…

No words can describe the pain I feel for the loss of my only son Michael.  I only hope that, as the book of "Healing After Loss" tells me, I will learn to bear the pain and give thanks to God for all that my son gave to me during his 31 years of life. 

The hardest grief to bear is losing a child and assuming that the physical being is no longer in our reach.  Yet if we allow faith to remind us that this separation is only temporary, we can slowly begin to squeeze in some happy…

According to the book "Healing after Loss", there is often a quietness around the rituals of dying, as though creation itself has stopped in mid flow while the moment of truth is unveiled.  Many of us take on the roles of the bereaved, and though the rituals may be old in time, our experience to it is new and painful and raw.

Perhaps these rituals and roles help guide us through the process in order to help signify what has happened.  Even having some context of faith in which to…

It seems that my life is clouded with dark swirls of gray and black.  How could it be that my world went from light to dark?  "Healing After Loss" speaks to me and says that we will have lots of "first times"; for example Michael's first birthday, first Thanksgiving, Xmas, etc. At first these "events" will be small ones (first get together, first snow storm, etc.) and eventually build to greater milestones.  Each one will cast a dark shadow over our world and we'll wonder where we will get…