The holidays. Yay.

Here’s the thing; Just as everyone grieves differently, heals differently, we all have our triggers. Things that jump out of everyday life and smack us like a 2 x 4.   There you are, feeling good and making progress and feelin’ all get down with your bad self and then, BAM!.. a song, a scent, a story…it’s a situational minefield. You do what you can, you excuse yourself to the bathroom, change the subject, look away in hopes for a diversion.  There is death and violence and tragedy all around us, and just because I’m hypersensitive to it most certainly does not protect me from it.  And it’s hard, and it sucks.  What makes it so annoying is that I thought I had made such progress.  I was dealing better with the missing, the anger, the “No Fair!” of my mom’s death, and here come the holidays.  My mom LOVED the holidays. She was all about love, and family, and warmth, and heart-felt hugs when you left. I miss that.  I miss it like I would miss air, or food, or… well.  I have spent a lot of time trying to work through the horror of her passing. I have spent, sadly, a lot of time working with friends and strangers alike as they tried to process their own grief. I’m so much better than a year ago.

However, it is now “the holidays”.  My kryptonite.  So, I humbly ask you to be nice to your fellow human this holiday season.  The person who cut you off in traffic, or cut in front of you at Macy’s, or maybe, like me, is laughing a little too loud is, perhaps, trying hard to keep it together while they struggle with something bigger than them. Just sayin’.. we all have a lot to be thankful for.. if you’re not freakin’ out a little on the inside        ~ be thankful for that. Peace to you & yours.. 

Losing a Pet

A good friend of mine is devastated.  He came home to find his beloved Doberman, Red, had died. I understand, and you probably do, too. Researchers have long known that the animal-human bond is strong: A 1988 study in the Journal of Mental Health Counseling asked a group of dog owners to place symbols for their family members and pets in a circle representing each dog owner’s life. (The distance between the subject and the other symbols corresponds to the relative, real-life closeness of those relationships.) The subjects tended to put the dog closer than the average family member, and about as close as the closest family member; in 38 percent of the cases, the dog was closest of all.

Research comparing grief over the death of pets to that over the death of friends and family members has come up with different answers. A 2002 article in the journal Society & Animals that reviewed multiple studies found that the death of a companion animal can be “just as devastating as the loss of a human significant other,” not quite as severe, “far more intense” or, well, just about the same.  

Sandra Barker, the director of the Center for Human-Animal Interaction at Virginia Commonwealth University, who co-authored the 1988 diagram study, counsels grieving pet owners and teaches veterinary students the importance of understanding the process. Studies aside, her own experience has taught her that the intensity and longevity of the grief vary widely. Like me, her clients sometimes begin the process with a sense of surprise and even shame that they’re grieving more for their pet than for a sibling or parent.

“But when they realize that the difference is the pet gave them constant companionship, and there was total dependency, then they start to realize that’s why they’re grieving so intensely,” she said.

Loren's Goodbye, with love..

Eulogies for people I love are difficult.. but here is what I said tonight:

I just hate this place.  Not this place….. but *this* place.  This place of total disbelief, of profound and mind numbing sadness, of  anger and a million questions that we will never get answers to.  When I met Lisa and Loren I knew we’d be great friends, and we were. I fell in love with this whole family.  Lisa, Loren, Travis and Alec, even your crazy dogs.  I loved hanging out at your house because it was such a wonderful, chaotic loving home.  Not perfect, but wonderful nonetheless.    It breaks my heart to be here, and it hurts to know that someone who was so laid back, and fun loving, and awesome as Loren was would do such a thing. And I hate that I know exactly how you feel, because my Mom did the same thing a year ago. It’s a strange journey you have ahead of you, a roller coaster of emotion, and missing, and wondering what you, what any of us, could have done to change his mind. I can’t tell you that, I can’t tell you about his past, his pain, his secrets, his demons, or his fears because that’s not the kind of guy he was. His therapist was his Harley,  he’d just get on it and ride.  What I CAN tell you is that he adored you Lisa, he adored Travis and Alec, and his face would light up when he spoke of you. I hope you realize that he would never do this because of you, he simply lost his way and made a terrible, terrible choice..  And to be honest I hope my Mom in Heaven  punches him square in the throat and tells him so. 

  All of us bear scars from wounds we keep from others, fear and shame that we hide and feed on when we feel less. We’re all faulted, and sometimes people fall under a momentary spell that they don’t matter enough, that they’re not good enough, that they’re not strong enough to deal with the obstacles they face. Depression is a liar, and it tells them that the best way  to improve the situation is to remove themselves from it.  They don’t realize the deep and wide-reaching love that’s all around them.  I hope you never forget how important YOU are, how loved YOU are, how very much you matter.

He hugged me so tightly  when I was broken, he cared about the people in his life. He was kind, and genuine, and I miss him more than these words, as I know you do. Please don’t let what he did become more powerful in your memory than who he was.   This desperate horrible choice was not his legacy. YOU are. He loved you, and love is always louder. Always. 

The Fog That Follows

I remember in excruciating, vivid detail the day I was told my Mom had taken her own life. It began a strange and scary journey, of trying to make sense of something that simply never would make sense.   The weeks, that followed, however, I don't remember so much.  Actually, for a full year I felt like I was on auto pilot, laughing maniacally one minute, sobbing the next.  Some days I simply did not have the will, the energy, to leave my bed.  The one year anniversary of her death was a turning point for me, and I made a conscious decision that I did not want to live that way for one more minute, that I had to get out of "that place".  I didn't want how she died to be bigger than who she was, didn't want to injure myself with her memory. 

Maneuvering through difficult times is a lot like driving through dense fog. You can’t always see where you’re going, you feel a little lost, you want to turn back, and every mile feels like forever. Yet, scared or fatigued as you might be, there’s nothing you can do but breathe, focus on the road ahead, keep moving forward, and trust that a force with keener vision than yours is out there functioning as your guide. You learn to look for ways to help yourself, and for me that meant learning about depression, raising awareness, and reaching out to others who find themselves in that horrible place as they begin their journey. There are resources out there, there are others who are also trying to find their way.  I'll never give up, and I'll never give in, and I'll never stop trying to prevent it from happening to you, my friends.  Peace.

My life has two parts. The part before my Mom's suicide, and the "vortex of suck" that has followed since. I was struggling to get my life back together when she decided to take her own, and to say it launched me into a year of "grieving" simply doesn't begin to cover it.  It has been a strange, and scary, journey but I continue to put one foot in front of the other in hopes that each day will bring new strength, and new peace.

 Friday night my best friend's husband killed himself in the same violent manner,  and I feel shattered all over again.  I'm  struggling to help her through it while trying with all my might not to backslide into the deepest pools of grief that she's just been thrown into.  I do not want her in this club with me, I hate that I know the different pains she will experience, and there's nothing I can do but hold her hand, listen, and give comfort and resources as she is ready.  We are such fragile creatures, really... faulted and trying to find our way. Please be gentle with each other... Love to you and yours.

A wonderful sentiment, I won't even attempt to improve upon it, or add to it. The simple truth is rarely simple, but truthful just the same.  Peace..

Suicide sucks.  Really, and truly. Since my Mom died I've been doing some research, and recently I learned about something called The Suicidal Trance. There are some major components that come into play as the descent of depression causes someone to become suicidal. The first is that pain and suffering remain unaddressed, the person  withdraws behind a façade designed to protect him/ herself from further hurt and to cloak the suffering underneath.  However, the façade only intensifies the slide toward a suicidal trance.  Ultimately the trance narrows the person’s perspective until the only inner voices that they can hear are those that  convince him/her that ending their life is the best decision, ultimately, the only decision they can make.  Changes in brain chemistry, PTSD,  mental issues, and the constant availability and societal suggestion to medicate often work in a frightening waltz, becoming a violent vortex when the underlying issues of that pain and suffering are not dealt with effectively.  As the person distances themselves from the outside world they may make a pretty strong argument that their solution is the most viable as their strength to fight it, to hide it, becomes diminished.  The  world they perceive, the one devoid of hope and choice and joy,  is a dark and frightening-but vivid reality, and all the "cheer up!"s and messages of motivation & empowerment in the world will not change their thinking. They are already carrying the stigma and shame of their depression, and need to be reminded, perhaps constantly, that participation and conversation, and working towards a solution is the only one the rest of will accept.  This trance becomes a state of mind and body that receives only the kind of thinking that reinforces their pain and reinforces the person’s conviction that the only escape is through death.  The suicidal and the deeply depressed can be sneaky, and manipulative, and as they become more comfortable with their decision may exhibit indicators that may not mean much to the rest of us, but they are there. They may become resigned, not seeming to care much about their life at all. This can be pretty scary to family and friends who can't comprehend why they no longer take an active role in their own lives.  Their decision may be beckoning them with a pretty strong voice, and its important that other voices, of love and caring and possibility, pump up the volume as well.  Since the end result that they envision looks pretty good; no more pain, no more suffering, no more despair, they may try to convince you their solution is the easiest one, the right one, its important that you remind them, over and over if need be, that this is NOT the end result at all for all the people that love them. The pain, suffering, and despair are magnified ten-fold, and completely and without question farther reaching.  So, please, pay attention to each other.    Keep asking, keep questioning, keep listening, keep reminding anyone who needs to hear it that you are refusing to give up engaging with them. And if you can't, you have resources. Please find someone who can.  Peace...