What has your experience been of loss or grief?

I wrote so much last year about the passing of my parents - first my Father in January 07, and then my Mom in June 07.  My Father's passing was anticipated - he had been growing progressively weaker over the two previous years with the ravages of Parkinson's literally shaking him to death.  My Mom's passing was somewhat anticipated, as we had just learned a few days previous that she had cancer spread through many of her organs, however, neither my brother nor I expected that she would leave so soon after that diagnosis.  Being in hospital though, she ended up with a massive infection, and it ripped through her weakened body in less than two days.  In my last conversation with her when she was relatively lucid (the day the hospital gave her the infection through inserting tubes into her abdomen to drain fluid), we had discussed about her coming home and I would be going to stay with her for a while to, in her words, "get things together".

So a year has now passed since Mom left us.  I have been through every emotion possible to have, I think.  First there was disbelief.  Then there was an emptiness that just would not be filled (still have that one a lot)..  Then there was anger at the hospital for their carelessness and seeming disregard for her comfort during her almost month-long stay there.  Then there was a sense of relief that she had not had to suffer long - because had she stayed on longer, the cancer (and anticipated chemo) would have taken a miserable toll on her comfort, I'm sure.  She was not the type to complain - had she been that way, we certainly would have had her in the hospital much sooner than she finally agreed to go, when she could no longer eat well enough to keep her diabetes stable, and her lungs filled with fluid, choking off her breathe.

I sensed there was something very much wrong, but respected her wishes that I would NOT invade her privacy with my psychic abilities.  She refused all channeled healing as well.  It was extremely frustrating to know that I could have helped at least ease her pain, and even perhaps given her some more time with healing energies.  So on her passing, there initially was a lot of anger surrounding her rejection of me, as an individual who didn't march to her religious tune.

Then, of course, there was grief also that I had never seemed to be close to my Dad.  We may have lived in the same house, but I never felt (at least from the time of about five years old), the kind of love connection to him, as I had with my Mom.  Even so, I know he loved me somehow - and in later years learned that he would often be the one to come and take me from my crib in the middle of the night when I was bouncing around, and sit in the rocker and rock both of us to sleep, until his alarm went off at 5 AM, to go to work.  So a lot of my grief with his passing was that we missed that closeness for most of all the years beyond those first couple when he rocked me to sleep.  And now he was gone.

This year, in February, I found myself at a point of sadness in my life that I just didn't seem to move past on my own.  I sought help through another hypnotist, who turned out also to be psychic and an ordained minister.  She was able to help me move past most of the sadness - enough so that I pushed myself the rest of the way out of it, like a flower pushing itself up through the dirt into sunshine.  That didn't mean that the grief had passed, though.  Just changed it to something I could handle better.  I stopped crying almost entirely (I had spent many days in January and February crying for three or four hours at a time).  I could manage a few tears, acknowledge my feelings, and then move forward toward some goal I had given myself, as an alternative focus to spending the energy in crying.  I still felt and acknowledged the grief, but responded to it differently.

Healing from a loss of loved ones is a long term project.  Tears are now used to wash the wound;  then looking toward what I need to be moving forward with in my own life, to honour the life that they have given me, is the salve on the wound.  I then bind it with thoughts of all the good times we shared.  The bad times have faded to the distant background, and will soon disappear completely.  I honour each of them by keeping them alive in my heart, and carry them forward there with me into a brighter future.

........../~~~^v^~~~\..........

About the pictures:  Although we have a larger granite marker at the head of their gravesites, we also were able to have their names added to the approximate 6,000 others on the granite walls of this memorial.  My brother took the pictures and also forwarded an etching of their names on the wall.  The Memorial Garden is located a few dozen feet from their plot.