coping strategies – Page 28 – thelifeididntchoose

Christmas 2017: What the Bereaved Need From Family and Friends

Christmas is fast approaching so I’m posting this one last time. I hope it helps someone who is struggling to share how hard it can be to “make merry” when a heart is broken. ❤

I know it is hard. I know you don’t truly understand how I feel. You can’t. It wasn’t your child.

I know I may look and act like I’m “better”. I know that you would love for things to be like they were: BEFORE. But they aren’t.

I know my grief interferes with your plans. I know it is uncomfortable to make changes in traditions we have observed for years. But I can’t help it. I didn’t ask for this to be my life.

Read the rest here: Grief and Holidays:What the Bereaved Need From Friends and Family

Here We Go Again: Season of Joy-Blessing the Brokenhearted During the Holidays

I wrote this two years ago, our second without Dominic.

This will be our fourth.

I’m still feeling my way along this path, still trying to figure out how to honor the missing and love the living in ways that are meaningful and helpful. I didn’t get a “how-to” book when my son died. I and other grieving hearts are doing the best we can.

Most parents feel a little stressed during the holidays.

We used to be able to enjoy Thanksgiving before our 24/7 supercharged and super-connected world thrust us into hyper-drive. Now we zoom past the first day of school on a highway toward Christmas at breakneck speed.

For bereaved parents, the rush toward the “Season of Joy” is doubly frightening.

Constant reminders that this is the “most wonderful time of the year” make our broken hearts just that much more out of place. Who cares what you get for Christmas when the one thing your heart desires–your child, alive and whole–is unavailable…

Read the rest here: Season of Joy: Blessing the Brokenhearted During the Holidays

How To Survive December With a Broken Heart

It comes up again and again-and not just for the parents facing their year of “firsts”: How do I survive December with a broken heart?

There’s no single answer or list of things to do that will suit every family.

But there are some general principles that can make even this awful reality a little easier:

Be gentle with yourself. Accept that you will not be able to do all the things you could do before child loss. Understand that tears will fall at the most inconvenient moments and grief waves will take you under when you least expect them to. That’s OK. You do not have to be strong or brave or keep smiling when you are sad. Feel what you feel. Do what you need to do.

Be honest with others. No matter how wonderful it would be if they could truly understand what it feels like to bury a child (without the experience, of course!), it is not the way things ARE. So if you need something from someone, speak up. If you don’t want to go to this or that, say so. If your heart can’t take one more family gathering or meal, send your regrets and stay home. Use “I” statements and say something like, “I’m just not able to participate in gift-giving (or whatever) this year. My heart won’t take it.” They may not like it. But they can’t argue with your experience.

Do not let people cross the boundaries you set up to protect your heart. Once you have figured out where you need to draw the line and have communicated that to others, hold fast. It’s really just fine to not return phone calls or text messages designed to force you to meet others’ expectations. You don’t have to be rude, but you also don’t have to submit your heart to constant trampling.

Be open to change. This is the fourth set of holidays for me without Dominic. Each year I’ve entered the season with certain ideas about how they will go, what will and won’t be helpful, and where I needed to set boundaries. And every year I’ve made adjustments. Some things I thought I COULD do, I couldn’t. Some things I swore I’d NEVER do, I’ve done. Work schedules, plane delays, illness, or even happy surprises alter plans and require adjustment.

Remember that December doesn’t last forever. As hard as this season is, it is only a season. The earth turns, the sun rises and the days pass. If you spend the month in bed with the covers over your head, January will still roll around. If you get up and participate (whatever that looks like for YOU) then January will also show up on schedule.

These days are just like all the rest: in the end we survive them one breath, one moment at a time.

But we do survive.

Pressure Relief Valves and Blowing Off Steam

I use a pressure cooker when canning some things from the garden. It’s the only way to ensure food safety for low-acid, low-sugar foods.

It took me awhile before I could work up the courage to use that contraption-when a pot comes with warning labels about “check to make sure seal is intact before every use” and “always be certain pressure cock is seated properly and working”-well, that’ll make you think twice about how much you want canned beans come winter.

I imagined all kinds of awful scenarios the first time I fired up the stove under that big cooker. But none of them came to pass. Sixty minutes later and all was well.

I’ve thought a lot about my pressure canning days recently and how that pot is uniquely created to allow just enough steam to escape to keep it from exploding. Sure, it gets mighty hot (that’s the point-to kill the bacteria) but not so hot that it bursts into lethal metal shards all over the kitchen.

I feel like so many of us (bereaved parents or not!) are like that pressure cooker-boiling and roiling with heated emotions getting hotter and hotter and threatening to explode.

Some of us do.

It’s messy or even dangerous.

I’ve thought about how critical that relief valve is to the proper function of the pressure cooker and how people need relief valves too.

Some of us find relief through hobbies or exercise or journaling or praying. But many of us can only relieve our sense of building pressure by talking to another person.

We need to be HEARD and SEEN in order to let off steam.

We need someone to be the relief valve for our pent up feelings so they don’t spew uncontrollably over everyone and everything.

So when you are thinking about what YOU can do for someone going through a tough time, here’s a thought: Offer to meet them and let them talk. Just let them say whatever they need to say without correcting them or judging them or steering them toward safer topics of conversation.

Just listen.

Offer appropriate comments now and then so they know you are paying attention but let them empty their hearts of the pent up steam of strong emotions.

Then keep all the secrets they shared in your own heart. Don’t spread them around to others and don’t use them later as ammunition or leverage.

Listening is love in action.

Providing a safe space for a heart to let go is one of the best gifts of all. ❤

Holidays and Grief: Some Practical Ideas

It cannot be overstated: holidays are extremely hard after loss. Every family gathering highlights the hole where my son SHOULD be, but ISN’T.

There is no “right way” or “wrong way” to handle the holidays after losing a child.

For many, there is only survival-especially the very first year.

These days also stir great internal conflict: I want to enjoy and celebrate my living children and my family still here while missing my son that isn’t. Emotions run high and are, oh so difficult to manage.

Read the rest here: Practical Ideas for Dealing with the Holidays after Child Loss

Holidays and Grief: What the Bereaved Need From Friends and Family

I know it is hard. I know you don’t truly understand how I feel. You can’t. It wasn’t your child.

I know I may look and act like I’m “better”. I know that you would love for things to be like they were: BEFORE. But they aren’t.

I know that every year I seem to need something different. I know that’s confusing and may be frustrating. But I’m working this out as I go. I didn’t get a “how to” manual when I buried my son. It’s new for me every year too.

So I’m trying to make it easier on all of us.

I’m trying to be brave and think ahead and offer up what I can to help you understand.

Read the rest here: Grief and Holidays:What the Bereaved Need From Friends and Family

Holidays and Grief: Surviving Siblings

I have never wanted to make my life journey with blinders on. I realized young that MY perspective is not the only one. I understand that more clearly now.

So I try hard to think about, acknowledge and accommodate the feelings and needs of others.

But it’s especially challenging since Dominic left us. And doubly so this time of year when every sight, smell and song screams, “It’s the holidays and HE IS NOT HERE!“

I may not be as thoughtful to some in my circle as want to be, but I will expend every ounce of energy and effort I can muster to make space for my living children’s needs during this season.

I promised them the day Dominic ran ahead to heaven our family would not be defined by what we have lost. I committed right then and there we would not sanctify Dominic, wouldn’t whitewash his ornery ways and would not put him on a pedestal against which they would be measured for the rest of their lives.

What I didn’t say, but purposed in my heart, was that I would not allow my own feelings of grief, sorrow, missing and despair to rob them of the mother they deserve. I would not stop being there for THEM-because, let’s face it-Dominic didn’t need me anymore. He is safe in his eternal home.

THEY are here with me in this less-than-perfect, messy and painful world we have to navigate together.

So when I’m working on holiday plans, the first thing I do is ask them what they need from me. I want them to have a safe space to express what’s hard for THEM this year. I welcome ideas, frustrations, hopes and dreams.

I will not shut them down because my heart is hurting.

I know what I think-I have to listen to know what THEY think.

I don’t conduct a sit down interview but over the course of a few days or weeks, I ask probing questions, offer potential scenarios and try to hear the heart behind their words when they answer.

Here are some of the things I ask my kids. Maybe they will be helpful for your family as well:

What’s your work schedule for Thanksgiving/Christmas?
Do you have any other major commitments that we need to work around?
How do you feel about what we did last year? What worked for you, what didn’t work?
Is there something special you really want to do this year?
Is there something you absolutely do NOT want to do this year?
How’s your head going into the holidays? What are you struggling with? What’s easier than this time last year?
Do you need something from me to make the holidays easier?
When would you rather have the main meal? Do you want/need to invite friends or co-workers?
What would the ideal Christmas Eve/Christmas Day look like for you?

There are dozens of corollaries to each of these questions. As my children share, I try to explore the edges of the conversation and probe a little further to get at what is really going on. I am open about my own feelings and fears for the season. I’m honest about where we can compromise and where, because of trying to manage everyone’s needs, we can’t.

I always assure them we will continue to work together, to adjust and to muddle through the best we can.

Humans are flawed and fragile and hearts are unpredictable.

Frustration is inevitable at some point.

Don’t apologize for tears.

We will not have thought of everything.

And that’s OK.

Holidays and Grief: Having the Hard Conversations

You don’t have to bury a child to know that changing long-standing family traditions around holidays is a hard, hard thing.

Just ask a parent trying to work out Thanksgiving and Christmas for the first time after an adult child marries. Suddenly the way things have “always been” are no longer the way things are.

Holidays typically involve so many more people and family members than everyday get-togethers and each person brings expectations, emotions and personal history to the table.

So, that is why I decided to run this series of posts NOW. Because one of the things I have learned over the years is that giving people time to adjust to change is a good thing.

Read the rest here: Grief, Holidays and Hard Conversations

Holidays and Grief: Thanksgiving Plan

Thanksgiving is hard on my heart.

My birthday is usually close to, and sometimes on, Thanksgiving. So we often celebrate them together. What makes that especially painful for me since Dominic ran ahead to heaven is that the last birthday before he left was a surprise party at his apartment.

It was wonderful and loud and fun and filled with laughter and love.

So all those good but achingly hard memories are wrapped up with the turkey and dressing.

Thanksgiving has also been our family’s favorite holiday for opening our home to people. No gift-giving expectations and abundant food made adding another chair to the table easy and fun. Internationals, singles, widowers, and other families often joined us cramming the house as full as our stomachs.

So now when the gathering is intimate and one chair left unfilled, it echoes loudly to my heart that things are oh, so different!

The first year after Dominic ran ahead, we went out of town. Our eldest son had married that summer and we visited him and his wife in West Virginia. A power outage that lasted through Thanksgiving Day evening was a welcome, if slightly annoying, diversion from the heaviness of the first real holiday without Dominic. Traveling used up some of what would have been long, empty days. So, for us, it was the best thing to do that year.

The second year we kind of muddled through with a facsimile of years past. it was a struggle and not at all comfortable for my heart. I don’t really know what I was thinking or not thinking that year-the second year found me more anxious, less able to deal with my sadness and overwhelmed by unexpected grief waves that swept me under before I knew it.

The third year some very special friends invited us to join them for Thanksgiving. They fixed all the food and we crowded together in their daughter’s apartment, packed in but jolly and very well loved. Getting there involved an unpleasant and emotional discussion with extended family. But the day was redeemed and it was exactly what I needed last year.

This year-well-I’m not entirely sure just yet.

There are a number of factors keeping us from making definitive plans. My mother is still unwell and not able to travel. One son will most likely be absent. Some friends may need a place to land and a table around which to gather.

So my plan is to have a plan by early next week.

I’ve done a few things so far: purchased pretty paper plates, baked some goodies and put them in the freezer, got my Thanksgiving cards out (remember-I’m sending them instead of Christmas cards this year!), washed the big windows in the kitchen and living room, and begun putting out feelers to the lonely and abandoned in our circle to see if they are interested in coming for a meal.

The meal is the easy part. Because in the end, as long as it ends with pie and chocolate, who really cares what you eat beforehand? 🙂

The hard part is the conversations.

The way I have to remind even those closest to me that this year will be just. as. hard. as every other year since Dominic left us. The way I have to breathe deep and swallow words so I don’t burst out crying at the mention of who’s coming and who’s not-because Dominic will never come again. The way I have to be very, very careful to balance all the emotional needs of family members and try to respect various requests for what’s important to their hearts.

I remind myself that I am not the focus of every event or holiday. I am not the only one carrying emotional or physical burdens that require accommodation. I am not given a pass to act ugly or pitch a fit or crawl in a hole and hide just because I buried a child.

So I try to think ahead, ask ahead, make my needs known ahead and then I participate as fully as I can-with a smile and an open heart to the ones that still gather.

I refuse to turn every holiday into a battle and every meal into uncomfortable silence where people are afraid to say anything for fear of hurting my feelings.

I honor Dominic by honoring those I have left.

My heart may be broken, but it is also blessed.

I won’t let one overshadow the other.

Holidays and Grief: You Need a Plan

When faced with the upcoming holidays and already rapid heartbeat and fading strength, the last thing a bereaved parent wants to hear is , “Make a plan”.

But the truth is, if you don’t it will be so. much. worse.

No one can tell YOU what the plan should be. Each family is unique. Each year brings different challenges-declining health, moves, children or grandchildren born and a dozen other variables that must be accounted for THIS year versus years past.

This will be our fourth set of holidays without Dominic and the one thing that has been, and continues to be, important is communication. I need to communicate early enough and plainly enough to extended family what I and my immediate family can bear for this year. If I don’t, there will be misunderstandings and hurt feelings all around.

This year will be different than last year.

That’s something surprising to me this side of child loss, nothing seems “fixed”. No new tradition can take the place of the traditions we embraced before Dominic ran ahead to heaven. So every year I find myself feeling my way in the dark.

Another important note: Even though my loss is great I am not the only one whose heart should be honored this time of year. I may not be able to participate in everything others want to do, but I can decline gracefully and encourage them to celebrate well without fear I’m upset about it.

If this is your very first holiday season after loss, I highly recommend keeping things low-key, whatever that looks like for you.

Some families find that keeping tradition is helpful. Some find it unbearably painful. Some want to run away from familiar places and others want to wrap their hearts in shared memories.

Over the next few days I will be reposting past articles about how to survive the holidays after loss. I hope they cast a little light on this hard topic. Take what helps and leave the rest.

It’s your call.

Your life.

Your heart.

No one else gets to judge how you choose to do (or not do) the holidays.

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: