Moving on After Death of Spouse
Moving on after the death of a spouse presents a challenge for both men and women. We have lost our partner, confidant, lover, traveling and social companion.
How we move forward or on with life often is dependent on our age, the length of time we were married and the support we have of family and friends. I recently met JoAnn Deveny, author of the new book “I am Widow, Hear Me Roar: Confessions of a Surviving Spouse.” Below are some of JoAnn’s… Continue reading
Grieving Child Loss
Grief is like the ocean; It comes on like waves ebbing and flowing
By Tracy Sheppard
As I sit on my back deck on this warm and humid May day, the wind is blowing in a warm muggy breeze. The trees are dancing and swaying. The sturdy white oak tree is like a mother to the leaves. Most appear to be securely attached to her core. Then a big gust blows by, and one lonely leaf has blown away, never to be held by its mother again. I am grieving the loss of a child.
I am like that tree.… Continue reading
When Anger Shows Up in Grief-How to Get Through It
Often we are angry following a death, it’s possible we don’t know how to handle these feelings or how to get through it
By Jackie Trottmann
After my mother’s death, the last emotion I thought I would feel is anger. Well, really… rage. It welled up from deep inside of me like I was possessed.
I wasn’t angry because of her passing. She had lived to be 96 with her wits about her until the end. Even with congestive heart failure and complications with diabetes, she didn’t suffer. What more of a blessing could you ask for?
Anger Shows Up… Continue reading
Has Death Been Your Teacher?

Picture from Pixabay
When someone we loved and shared a close relationship with dies, we grieve their physical presence. But have you experienced lessons you may have learned from them more profoundly after they died and has death been your teacher?
When I talk with people who are or have grieved the death of a spouse as I have, it is fascinating to hear stories about what that person death has taught them about life and the living. When we are deep in grief we can’t see any lesson, we only feel the pain of our loss and that is… Continue reading
Letting Go After Loss
Letting Go Following a Mother’s Death
By the age of twelve, I knew what the word cancer meant. My mother had been diagnosed with stage-four pancreatic cancer shortly after Mother’s Day in 1988. Her physicality had slowly deteriorated, and she returned home from the hospital a fragment of the woman she had once been. Chemotherapy thinned her hair, and her swollen legs prevented mobility. I did my best to keep out of sight because I didn’t want to be present when my mother drew her last breath and slipped from this world into the next.
I saw my mother for… Continue reading