Tag Archives: Grief

It’s Okay to be Okay

13 Thursday Mar 2025

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As time marches on, I am becoming better at being okay. My Mom is gone. I cannot bring her back, and there is little I can do to control any sadness, grief, feelings of emptiness, or the sting of loss. I have recently realized that I have been hiding from a lot of these feelings and experiences, shoving my head in the ground like an ostrich, pretending that the threats don’t exist.

But recently, I have forced myself to yank my head out of the ground and let everything be what it is. The most incredible thing has happened as a result, I have found that there are times that I am okay. More than that, I have come to learn that it’s okay to be okay.

I really struggled at the start when people would say to me, ‘what would your Mom want for you?’ All I could think, or feel was that she would want us to be together; she would want to be alive. Then, I would get angry.

I hid from things, and watched as my world fell apart; my house became a constant disaster zone, my children were becoming more feral each day, nobody was eating proper meals. It was as if I had totally given up on myself, my family, and my life.

Then, I realized one day while talking to Mom (yes, I talk to her…I’m not crazy. It just helps) that she would be so sad to see what I was allowing my life to become, and this upset me. I had to do something – for her sake.

It’s okay to grieve. It’s okay if this takes a long time or happens quickly. It’s okay to fall apart. It’s okay to hide your head in the sand. It’s okay to get angry at yourself for hiding.

And, most importantly, it’s okay to be okay.

As I have sat here this evening, enjoying my newly cleaned house, feeling refreshed by the amount of water I have consumed today, jazz going in the background, and ambient lighting reflecting the peace of my mind, I am okay.

And that’s okay.

Grieving – Let’s Make a Mess

02 Sunday Mar 2025

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When I began with my grief after my mom died I was of the mind that I wanted to really get into it so that I could get out of it. I tried to rush it along, thinking if I gave it all of my focus for a couple of days that it would go away. A few hours into this journey I began to realize that there is no way to hurry grief. You can try to hide from it, but it will find you. You can try to speed it up, but it is going to ignore your efforts and take its time, doing its thing.

Grief is a messy process and it is best if you can allow it room to make its mess without trying to clean it up.

I have been reading multiple books on grief and they have been extremely helpful.

Here are some of my favourites:

https://a.co/d/9c0QLz4 https://a.co/d/hstyQNA https://a.co/d/acJc0wQ

I just started a new one this evening, it’s more of a workbook for grief, and I have already been touched by its approach to grieving. The book is called, “How to Carry What Can’t Be Fixed,” by Megan Devine.

https://a.co/d/9s3zfjI

Grieving and writing have a lot in common; importantly, both grieving and writing need space and the freedom to make a mess. I like how Devine worded it when she stated that “Translating your inner emotional experience into words and pictures is a messy practice” (4)

“It’s hard to speak the truth if you have to make it perfect” (Devine 4)

I feel like it is fitting to share a letter I wrote to my mom on the morning she was cremated, keeping in mind those words of Megan Devine, “It’s hard to speak the truth if you have to make it perfect” (Devine). I am trying to do what feels right inside of me to allow the expression and outworking of my grief, providing it whatever space it needs to make a mess.

So, here goes:

January 29, 2025 (Wed) 5:16am

Mom,

You are being cremated this morning. I now how much you disliked and were afraid of fire; I will be with you. I am so sorry that this is happening. You should be alive. I should be waiting for another couple of hours to text you to let you know how the boys are doing (they are both sick, by the way!).

I realized this morning that I not only lost my mother, but I’ve also lost a best friend. It’s no secret that you weren’t perfect (but who is?), but I really loved you and to me you were still the only mom I would ever want. You loved us all so much; I am so sorry for any ways you feel that we failed you; especially at the end.

I feel the loss of the person who loved my children in a way that nobody else on this planet can/does/did.

I mourn the loss of that profound, special, powerful, relationship. I mourn the loss of the person I would always text little updates on life, anything and everything from the infamous “poop reports” to “SOS! We are falling apart and need our mom/Nana/Mother-in-Law,” knowing that there would always be a reply that would make everything better.

I love how you loved, honoured, respected, protected, and cared for Jono; you taught me how to have more compassion for him and to be more caring, loving, demonstrative and supportive towards him. You honoured me by how much you loved him.

Your husband can be very tough to read at times, but you knew him well. I miss knowing that you two had each other, no matter what, you had each other’s backs.

And now, anger. My anger. I miss you and I am so angry that you are no longer here. I am not mad at you; I am mad at the universe for letting this happen to you. You should be here. You should be here with your bright light of love, joy, peace, and comfort.

I miss you.

Love,

Your Daughter xo

The feelings surrounding my loss are wild and varied, spanning anywhere from missing her sending me pictures of her Minecraft creations, to ugly sobbing about the fact that the “ping” indicating an incoming text is, once again, not from her.

The book, “Coping with Grief,” encourages the reader to ‘tell their story: Who died, who they were to you, what changed with their death, etc. In the discussion about how this process is a messy one, my answer to the following question seems appropriate: “What thoughts or feelings are worrying you?”

Here’s what I wrote:

What if I never get over it? What if I feel crazy, and lonely, and broken, and not myself forever?

Who will support and protect me now?

What if I can’t grieve properly and I’m ruined/messed up for the rest of my life?

My life is going to have a huge chunk of emptiness in it now. What if I can’t get over it or move on from the loss?

What if I don’t want to?

“Into the darkness they go,
the wise and the lovely.”
 – Edna St. Vincent Millay –

It’s a mess. I’m a mess. Mourning is a mess. But, into this mess I must go; this is my home now, at least for awhile. I’m sure that the mess will get less, well, messy with time. But, for now it is where I am and must continue to exist. I will allow the grief to have its space, to change my world, and to change me, just as you have.

Into the darkness I go.

My Mom Died – I’m Seeking Life Now

24 Monday Feb 2025

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My mom died recently.

I have been waiting to write about it; waiting for the pain to not be so strong and the ability to breathe not be so weak.

It all happened so fast. I still can’t believe that she’s gone.

I keep thinking that she’s going to show-up and say, “surprise! I’m here! It was all just a joke! You’ve been pranked!”

But this is not going to happen. I will never hear her voice in real time ever again. I will never experience the feeling of one of her hugs again or watch her giggle while playing with my children.

 There will be no more “just because” gifts.

I’ve lost the person I could text at any time about anything and always get a response, and almost always get support and encouragement.

Who is going to encourage me now?

She was my biggest cheerleader; I knew that I could handle life, that I could manage, that I was special because of her. What am I now without her?

Life goes on. It’s true. I still do life things; it’s not just everyone else who continues living while she is dead. It’s me too, and this makes me feel guilty. I make dinner, eat toast, buy toilet paper, watch tv…but I do it all while thinking about her, missing her, and hoping that she will come around any corner at any moment and give me a hug and kiss and tell me how much she loves me.

My Mom called me her “Joy.” But I never got to tell her that she was my joy and that the only reason I was ever able to be a joy to her was because of all the joy that she had given to me. I am me because I am her daughter.

So now, my joy is gone, and I don’t know what to do about that.

I miss her.

I want to tear the world apart out of anguish and anger for the fact that this world took her from me.

I don’t want platitudes or to hear “it will get better with time.” These things do not help with the pain that I am feeling right now.

I want you to be angry with me. Be angry that a great mother, wife, friend, Auntie, Nana, and friend has been taken from this world. She died so quickly I didn’t get a chance to say everything I wanted, for us to do the things we talked about doing together.

There will never be another birthday card, or Christmas gift; I will never have to help her change a password again or help her return a mistaken purchase from Amazon.

We were going to watch “Wicked: Part 1” together…

She was hoping that a house on our street would come up for sale so that we could live close – we’ll never live together again.

She wanted me to wait to show Brian my convocation video when she was feeling better and could watch it with us.

We were going to watch “Grumpy Old Men” in late January and do a turkey dinner for Easter, since we did a fish dinner for Christmas.

We won’t be doing any of this now. I will do it all alone. Without my sidekick. Without my friend. Without my best friend. Without my mom.

There will always be a piece of me that is broken, a piece that is missing now.

Always.

I am learning to live with this new version of myself. This version that I have never, ever, known before. There has never been a version of me that has not had my mom – until now.

What is this life?

I thought it was a struggle before to figure out this life; seeking life now has taken on a monumentally deeper and intense meaning than any other thing I’ve experienced.

Seeking life now; when life doesn’t turn out as you had hoped it would.

Unraveling Religious Trauma and Spiritual Abuse

04 Wednesday Dec 2024

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I have spent the last 14 years trying to “come to grips” with my past. I have made some progress recently. But, the work is tough. Especially when you are doing it on your own. This article is everything: https://www.sandstonecare.com/blog/religious-trauma/

My religious trauma began at an early age, but was kicked into hyperdrive at the same time I began to experience spiritual abuse.

The trauma and abuse went on for years, by multiple people in various locations. But, all with the same messages: You are sinful. There’s something wrong with you. You need us and you need God to be made whole. You won’t receive God’s blessing if you don’t give us 10% of any money you get, but, really you should give 20%…10% is just the baseline. You give as much as you can, even if it means you have to sell your possessions to pay rent, and eat nothing but saltines all day…You will do these things, or else you won’t be welcomed into our inner-sanctum. You should always be a servant – now go clean that person’s apartment because I need you to help me protect myself from their threats. I’m your spiritual leader, and doubting me is sinful, God doesn’t like that, and you want to please God, right? You feel tired and sick? Too bad – go and do the thing I told you to do, or you’ll be letting not just me down, but God as well. You haven’t been trained for it? Do you doubt God? Are you too weak, too selfish, that you won’t stay up all night and pray? You don’t matter. We matter. What you sacrifice for us and the community matters. Not you. You are not allowed to watch tv for a year. No dating. No drinking. Wear only these clothes. Here are the “approved” people you can be around…

and on and on it goes.

No wonder I feel so lost most of the time. It’s good to know that there are people out there who understand, even more than I do, how what I’ve gone through affects me every day; and that there are ways to heal from it.

I don’t write this to be offensive to anyone, or to hurt anyone’s feelings. But, maybe you’re someone out there who has experienced similar things and are struggling now that you’re “out,” or you want to “get out” and don’t know how. Maybe this will help you.

I don’t want to start a fight.

If you want to reach out to me, you can private message me. I’m here.

https://www.sandstonecare.com/blog/religious-trauma/

The Storm

14 Friday Jun 2024

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Sometimes I go to sleep wondering if I will wake up the next morning and discover that it was all a bad dream.

But as the hot tears burn my cheeks and another stress migraine settles in, I know that no matter how much I try to wish it away, this is real.

I cannot comprehend why, or how, a child can hold so much pain and fear.

I try to suppress the day’s memories of being called horrible names, of being used as a human punching bag by the life I brought into this world.

I absorb his pain. I take his suffering. I can only hope that it provides him some relief. I would do anything to help ease the torment for him – even take the blows without flinching in an effort to prove to him that my love for him is unconditional; that there is absolutely nothing he could do, nothing he could be or become that would make me not love him.

As I hold him tightly, assuring him that I love him, that I’m not going anywhere, and that it doesn’t matter what he does to me, I will never give up on him, the punches become lighter, the swearing decreases, and I can feel the pain and anger being replaced by shame and sorrow.

He finally collapses in my arms, sobbing, apologizing. I can hear the agony in his voice; the fear of self, the hopelessness of feeling like you are a monster that is sick and will never get better.

I have been there.

I know what that feels like.

My heart shatters in a million pieces once again, but I have to be strong for him. He needs me.

This whole situation is so messy, so painful, and so completely undeserved.

While I may be strong for him when he is near, I crumble multiple times a day.

I fight back thoughts that maybe he is right, maybe it would be better if we didn’t exist anymore – maybe that is the only way out.

Then, through all this pain and suffering, while I am struggling just to breathe, to function – when it takes every ounce of effort to get up to face it all again and to keep getting up every time I’m knocked down – my integrity is questioned.

I have no words.

I barely have breath in me, but they manage to squeeze out plumes of vapours, forcing me to prove that I am unwell.

What they don’t understand is that I have to keep going every day; I am not free to live out my own pain because I have a child who needs me.

They do not see that every day is a struggle to live, that I have to give more than I have to get up each day.

They cannot comprehend this love, nor understand the toll it takes to lose myself every day in the hopes that we will find him; to sacrifice myself so that he might be saved.

He is my heart, and my heart is sick.

I would go to the ends of the earth to help him. I will never apologize for that.

Mourning

05 Monday Jun 2023

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I’m mourning the loss of life.

Mourning the end of my story.

Reliving the pain it brought and letting it go.

With an abuser – when he died it brought everything right back up like it had happened yesterday.

I had to go through it all again – processing every bit that had happened – while mourning the loss of life, I was now also mourning the loss of a part of my life – my story.

“River Street” – has died. I mourn for it, for the loss of a significant part of my life, while also processing all that it meant to me, good & bad.

I need to put those things in their rightful places, say my final goodbyes and move on.

Mourning.

Anger.

Angry for what he had done to me. Now he was gone and was free of it, but I still had to live with it.

“Act like” it never happened – but, it did, and it was wrong, and while you are “free” of it, I have had to suffer for years. Now you are becoming dead to me, I need you to die/to be dead to me, I am angry because you take a piece of my story with you- an ugly piece that is your fault and you should have no right to take with you and act like it’s all okay, and move on – you should suffer too.

But, you can’t now/you won’t.

That’s not fair.

Look at what you’ve done to me. How can you get away with this? This is why I resent your sick, smiling, successful faces. You make me want to puke.

But, I miss you.

I wish I still had the intimacy I had with you – the excitement – the heart racing, swooning feelings – the sense of importance – the sense of doing something, being someone, that matters – making a difference. The heat of the moment – the fire/heat of life/living.

Mourning.

Anger.

Loss.

Resentment.

Letting go.

Trying to Feel

29 Saturday Apr 2017

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Sitting in the back seat of my Mom’s vehicle, on our way to what will be our new home. In the past couple of weeks I have been asked, what seems like, hundreds of times how I am feeling about moving. 

I’ve always said “exhausted”, but today my husband found a much better word to express how we are feeling: numb.

I have only just started to allow myself to consider how massive this move really is. We are leaving Canada’s largest city, our bustling, noisy, gritty, downtown home to live in a small town. In fact, we are not even in the town, we are outside of it.

And, although, I grew-up in the area, I’ve been away for 18 years. I’m looking forward to the slower pace and being able to do more outdoor activities with my boys. But, I have become a ‘city person’ in many ways, and I will miss the excitement, the diversity, the fact that there is always so much to do, and watching the sunset glistening on the high rises. I will miss the street meat and array of buskers. 

I’ve tried to picture, to imagine, what life may look like for us now, to try to already begin replacing some of these moments and memories with the great things to come, but it is not possible. You cannot reminisce on what has not happened.

And so, what is left to do but to allow myself just to embrace the grief that comes with such life-altering changes? It’s not always easy to embrace grief. We don’t like to feel pain. We avoid it if we can. But, pain is an important part of grief because it allows you to really reflect on how much something has meant to you.

We became a family in Toronto. 

Therefore, here I sit in the back of my mom’s car, embracing the grief. Trying to wrap my ahead around the enormity of what is happening and allow myself to push through the numbness and feel.

High School Almost Killed Me

28 Sunday Feb 2016

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*

When I was 18, I over-dosed on Gravol and a few other things that I found in the cabinet.
I remember the morning as clearly as though it was yesterday.

I was tired. So, very tired.

I had just managed to scrape-through some of the roughest 3 weeks of my life. These 3 weeks were full of disappointments, let-downs, heartaches, hurtful practical jokes and endings. It was my last year of school and I was already feeling the grief of all that was being lost.

I didn’t set-out to kill myself in particular. I just wanted a break. I just wanted to be able to get-away from all the pain for a day.
To just sleep-through it all.

As the meds started to set-in I began to worry ‘what if I don’t wake-up?’ I took-out my journal and jotted-down some notes to my loved ones (just in case), and I called my Music Teacher to let him know I wouldn’t be at school or band practice that night.

And then…it all went black…

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As a, so-called, “Highly Sensitive Person”, I am amazed at how I’ve managed to make it through the turbulent waters of life.

Though, it’s certainly true that I haven’t come-through it unscathed. I have the scars to prove that I have embraced life in all its guts and glory.

This article is a good place to start on my journey because it sets the scene for who I am and how I experience the world.

Once again, for fellow HSP’s out there, or anyone who lives with an HSP, check-out the Huffington Post article:

16 Habits of Highly Sensitive People