Tag: #goodmourning (Page 2 of 3)

Our Part In The Overdose Crisis

August 28, 2022 / Mama Fish

One of the many events that the grief community participate in is International Overdose Awareness Day, held August 31^st. This day remembers, with love, those who have died and acknowledges the pain felt by family and friends left behind. It is a day that reminds us that drug overdose is the world’s worst public health crisis. And what are we doing about it?

I had a colleague say if you want to solve the problem, don’t stand on the shore, and wonder why the fish are dying. Travel up the river and see where the problem begins.

What would we find up the river of a drug overdose? Would we see a health care system that has failed? Would we see a community that is judgemental and non-accepting of diversity? Would we see fear and loneliness of those seeking refuge?

No child says, “when I grow up, I want to have a drug overdose”. And yet the Centre for Disease Control & Prevention reports in 2020 over 93,000 people lost their life to overdose. How can we, as a society, continue to sit quietly?

I don’t know of one person whose life has not been touched by drug overdose. A neighbor, a school chum, a co-worker, a family member. And God help us when it is your child. The stories all have a common thread; there was a physical or mental incident, once or many times, the person sought relief in a drug. It does not matter if that drug was alcohol, or pain killers, or heroin. When an overdose occurs, it could be a moment of grace and salvation, but often, it is a permanent injury or sudden death.

The stigma a parent has with the death of a child by overdose is one of shame. Society whispers ‘oh that is the one whose child was a drug addict’ as if somehow their life could not be touched by such tragedy. And not all drug overdoses are by addicts. Not the point. The point is we have a crisis that affects us all.

My belief is this is the first step. We must agree that we are all a part of this crisis, and we need to work together to fix it. There is no shame or blame around the loss of a child by overdose. A loss is a loss. Every death is a tragedy.

We must pull our head out from the sand and acknowledge we are all vulnerable to this crisis. We must open our heart to others and embrace our differences.

We must hold our health care system accountable for what is dispensed and how. We must demand a stronger focus on the resources needed for alternative treatments, pre-assessments, and support.

Most importantly we must hold tight to each other. Keep talking, listen to one another, be there for one another. We must remember that we are all connected. Only then will the needed attention to this crisis be delivered.

“On Life After Death”

August 21, 2022 / Mama Fish

Our beloved Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, through her books, has supported our mourning by talking about death, identifying the stages of grief, and offering us strategies to cope. My recent read, “On Life After Death” she deepens possible healing by reassuring us there is no death.

Her book reads like a conversation. I can imagine myself in her living room. A cup of tea is poured. There are cookies set on a plate. She sits down and in a soothing voice she begins to talk, “…the death of the human body is identical to what happens when the butterfly emerges from its cocoon.”

This book is about the three stages of what happens to us when we die. It is based on the vast experience and the commonalities across the globe, she has had with patients who have had near-death experiences. Her examples cannot be explained by science. A little girl tells her father she liked when she ‘had died’ because the place was so full of light and the feeling of love and that her brother was there. She says to her dad, “the problem is I don’t have a brother.” And her dad confesses that she indeed had a brother who passed months before she was born, and they had not told her. A female patient, blinded in an explosion, when out of her physical body, could see the whole accident and describe the people who dashed in to save her, but when brought back to life, she was totally blind. Example after example the good doctor discovers at the time of death, each patient was acutely aware of what was happening as they watched from above in perfect physical condition. And each patient then saw a path, a bright light and felt a love that was pure bliss.

Her words are comforting. She insists that our loved ones do not die alone. Those we love that have gone before are waiting to greet us. There is no pain as they transition from cocoon to butterfly. She tells us, “…it is no longer a matter of belief, but rather a matter of knowing.”

I relished in this suggestion. There is no death. There is this life, in this cocoon, that we must make the most of. At the end of this stage, the next life we maintain our identity and our personal energy pattern, taking up no space and able to be many places. Our loved ones are here, connecting with us, guiding us. They are the butterfly.

Celebrating You for 31 Years

August 14, 2022 / Mama Fish

Yesterday we gathered in our daughter’s back yard with family and friends to celebrate Zane’s 31^st birthday. I found it hard to smile and celebrate a ‘happy’ birthday to a situation that is anything but happy. Then I read somewhere that birthdays are a way to celebrate the number of years that this person has been. Period. Their birth brought their soul here in a physical form. Death removes only the body. Their soul is still alive and well. It is the soul we celebrate. I liked this advice. Zane was killed at 26 but his soul has been with us now for 31 years.

So, every year I create something that celebrates Zane, a simple activity that his friends can do to help honor his spirit. The first year we handed out pay-it-forward cards, asking his friends to buy a stranger a drink and give the card to the recipient so they knew why they had received a free drink. The second year we wrote wishes on ribbons and tied them to the tree that Zane had planted when he was in grade three. The third year was Zane’s 30^th birthday and we had a bingo game made, each square listing an activity that Zane enjoyed, challenging his friends to complete the 30 squares over the year for Zane. This year with many of his friends now traveling for a holiday or a destination wedding, we bought luggage tags with a picture of Zane, asking them to take “Zane along on their adventures” and send us back a picture, postcard, or sticker. I plan to make a collage of all the places Zane travels in spirit with his family and friends.

In the grief community, honoring is essential to good mourning. It is the way we continue a relationship with our loved ones. It is how we pay respect to their life here on earth. It is how we remember. Sharing these celebratory acts with friends, asking them to be a part of how you honor your loved one, enables us all to feel linked together.

Birthdays are supposed to be personal. We are celebrating a specific person on that day, thus finding ways to honor them that reflects their personality, their hobbies, or desires before they departed is an important way to commemorate them.

Birthdays are difficult, but every day is difficult, so I encourage you to take your loved one’s birthday as a day to smile through the tears and bring what they enjoyed in this life into your life. And to share it. Celebrate who they were, are, and will always be.

To Zane, on the Fourth Anniversary

August 7, 2022 / Mama Fish

Dear Zane,

It has been four years today,

an indescribable hell

trying to live in this realm

knowing you live in the other

It has been four years of ugly rituals

like crying every morning

and screaming every day in the car

It has been four years of not believing, believing

And then not believing again

It has been four years of mockery

watching my friends’ kids do, be, experience

what was to be for you

It has been four years of anger

Not able to comfort your sister

Or any of us from this pain…

It has also been four years of honoring you,

asserting you are still here,

friends and family include you

in our daily lives

which brings some peace

as a mother’s greatest fear is

there will come a time

when life goes on without you.

It has been four years learning

that the diminutive conciliation

of holding your hand

are unexpected symbols,

enigmatic Instagram posts

feathers on our path

dragonfly on the window

bubbles and balloons

signs that I cling to

as oxygen, for my own survival

There is also the Universe’s gift,

the subconscious reality through nighttime slumber

where I can feel your hug, hear your laugh

our moonlight conversations,

when morning arrives,

my broken heart holds tight to

giving the energy I need to walk another day

It has been four years today, my sweet boy

and if I have understood only one thing

It is that my love for you is endless

as are the tears I cry.

The Physical Damage of Grief

July 31, 2022 / Mama Fish

At my annual doctor’s appointment, I was expecting the usual battery of tests and probes to be told I am ok. Living with chronic physical pain, I am used to “everything looks great” even though I don’t feel that way. But this year was different. When your doctor pulls up the stool, closer to you, and starts the conversation with “we have to count on diagnostic tests and when they fail us, we are all in pain…” What the hell?

According to this year’s blood and x-ray parade, it is confirmed I can add lupus, severe osteoarthritis and a cancer scare to my list of health ailments. Dear God. It is almost laughable. How do I go from ‘perfectly healthy’ to ‘this is worrisome’ in one year? I call my trusted herbalist to chat with her about these new findings and part of her advice is to review what am I doing to address the anger of my grief. Wow.

I came home stunned. I randomly opened my journal to a page in December 2020 that read:

You have no idea

How much energy it takes

To keep the screams inside me

From escaping

My soul is in constant pain.

Can grief cause a major illness? We know it effects our memory, our heart hurts, we are emotionally stripped but major physical ailments. Isn’t this just about growing old? It sent me down a web search rabbit hole and here we have it.

Research says that the emotions of anger, resentment, hostility, and grief unexpressed can harbor and change our health at a cellular level. There is a definite connection between life-threatening health conditions and trauma experienced two years or more prior.

When we are grieving, our health practitioners, family and friends say we must take care of ourselves. How many of us listen, truly listen to this advice? How many have a daily regime in place to address the anger and resentment of our grief so that it does not fester inside our bodies to create more issues? For 3 years, I have been dealing well with grief. Or so I thought. I had not taken seriously enough the fact that anger is a part of grief that necessitates attention.

If this year’s check up has illuminated one thing, it is this. We need to be very cognizant of the length of time that grief has accompanied us. The longer the emotions related to grief are with us, and ignored, the more dangerous they become. The internal screams need to be released. For the sake of our physical health.

The Promise for Red Roses

July 24, 2022 / Mama Fish

My brother-in-law and I took advantage of time before he departed. We talked about many things including his love for my sister. A request he asked of me was to surprise her for their, what should be, 32^nd anniversary. I agreed. I was told to buy red roses from Costco. Those two factors were not to be compromised. They had to be red roses. They had to come from Costco. When someone who is actively dying asks you for a favor, you do not ask why. You say, “I promise”. And I did promise.

When the anniversary came around, life was busy. It would be easier to pick up roses at Safeway while I was getting groceries. I heard Dan’s voice, “has to be Costco”. So off I went to battle the line up and traffic to pick up roses. They had so many beautiful rose colors, and so many types of flowers. There was one bouquet that was stunning, and I thought to myself how my sister would enjoy these. Again, I heard Dan’s voice, “has to be red roses”. I chuckled to myself. A promise is a promise.

When we arrived at my sister’s home for the anniversary dinner, I handed her the roses and said, “You must not have heard the doorbell, I found these on your porch.” “The doorbell is broken,” she said, looking for the card. I kept walking into the kitchen. She followed and I watched as she opened the envelope. The card was signed, Love Dan. She gasped. Her eyes filled with tears. “Did someone forge this?” she asked. I hugged her and said they were from her sweetie.

As she put the flowers into a vase, she asked me, “did Dan tell you red roses?”. “Yes,” I said, “and they had to come from Costco”. She started to laugh through her tears and told us of how he brought her red roses from Costco for a long time, and she doesn’t like roses! “He brought me a bouquet of them every week”, she said, “and finally I just had to tell him, I don’t like roses!”

We laughed. What a wonderful memory to recall. What a double whammy that Dan promised to play tricks on me and did so in recruiting me to spoil my sister with something he knew she did not like. It was so him to remind us of a funny ‘do you remember when’ moment. He did this for us, through his request and it brought us joy. We sat around the dinner table sharing stories and laughing and each of us knowing, that Dan was right there. At the table, laughing with us.

We know too well that life does not always tell us when we will depart. When we are given an estimated death date it does give us an opportunity to hold conversations, to make promises. We can prepare for their departure. And, during a very sad time, together, we can plan future events that will become memories our loved ones will share with us across the bridge of life and death.

Stampede Lesson

July 17, 2022 / Mama Fish

In our home, Stampede is a holiday. It is met with anticipation and excitement. I have a tradition of sharing one of the ten days with my kids: games, shopping, mini-donuts and trying the latest weird foods before sending them off to Nashville North. This year was no different. And yet it was.

We couldn’t find skeet ball. We didn’t play the water gun game. I didn’t see any bubbles like last year. The connections to Zane being with us seemed non-existent. So, although I enjoyed my day, I came home, and grief flooded over me like the tsunami it can be.

I pulled out my journal, calmed my breathing and began practicing my automatic writing I have recently learned to do. Why were you not there Zane? I am so afraid that the day will come where you will not show me signs. Was today a glimpse of what is to be? I can’t bear this…

And suddenly my writing answered me. What are you talking about? Did you not hold and admire the beautiful feather created by Marney Delver? You always complain that the wine is not good and suddenly your favorite chardonnay is there for you to enjoy, is that coincidence? What about the art piece; the bear holding the crystal ball, and the caption read, “the energy continues”. You had so many signs and you felt them. Your soul knew.

Sitting in my room, the tears splashing on the paper as I wrote without thinking, my grief settled down. I closed my journal and reflected. It was true. There were so many signs. Different. But as real as ever.

We know that our loved ones send us signs. What I experienced this Stampede was that our loved ones can change how they remind us they are here. The signs we see that bring us comfort when they first depart might change. Or they might stay (I still see bubbles and feathers and know it is Zane) but new signs can begin to show up. We all grow, experience new things in life. Perhaps this is also true of the other realm. Perhaps our loved ones wish to ‘shake it up’ for us, experience new things with us and let us know they are with us in new and cool ways. If we are stuck on needing the signs we first receive, and close our mind, and our eyes, to other signs, we might miss their visit.

Stampede brought another great year of bonding, laughter and this year, a lesson. Our loved ones are always letting us know they are with us, in different ways that we can experience if we open our broken hearts. “Didn’t we have a great day?” I hear Zane ask me. “Feel the joy. I am here.”

Heavenly Pen Pals

July 10, 2022 / Mama Fish

Most of us have tried journaling or writing to a loved one who no longer lives on earth. It is therapeutic. It helps us remember things that were and shares on paper what we wish had been. Recently, I signed up for a course to move journaling to a new level. It is called automatic writing.

Automatic writing is about connecting to your higher power, whatever you wish to call that. It is designed to open your subconscious mind to receive messages. It is a mindful practice done either early morning or late at night, after a deep meditation. It begins with a gratitude prayer, thanking your higher power for surrounding you with love, light, and protection. There are questions to ask, and, in your relaxed state, you begin writing the answers. You do not think of the answers, there is no pondering, you just write.

Sometimes, nothing comes to mind, and you write, “I don’t know what to write” and you write it over and over. With practice, you begin to write deep insights of who you are, what you need and what is your current purpose. The mystery of this type of writing is that your answers may be influenced by ‘angels’ whose energy comes through pen to paper. Because you are writing, without thinking, it isn’t until you finish and read what was written that you start to see messages that may sound like a loved one holding a conversation with you. This is a tricky concept to grasp; the dead coming to talk to us through writing? It is profound.

The course is a 21-day course, which I have another week to finish. When I reflect on my writings, from first day to now, I see a change. How I describe myself is different. What I write has a theme running through it. In this course, I have discovered or maybe it has just confirmed what I already knew. I feel stuck, I feel anxious, I lack direction. All things very typical with grief. Through automatic writing I have been able to focus on this, asking and writing about why I feel this way, how do I move forward. My writing brings ideas I had not thought of and insights that give me hope. Some of my writings seem to be advice from my loved ones, including Zane.

“Mama, you must take care of what is your role. You want, need this. You know-you need to bring you new ways to be you. You don’t get it but trust it. You know in your soul, this is right… You da best.”

I am not sure how the magic works, if it is wishful writing or a spiritual conduit, and I don’t care. What I have discovered with this course is a new way to explore both sides of the realm and to uncover who I might be as I face my grief. Automatic writing gives us one more way to become mindful, and to feel connected to those we can no longer hold. It is like being a pen pal with the angels.

Just Ask

July 3, 2022 / Mama Fish

We are told that if we wish for a sign from our loved ones, to just ask. Call out to them and suggest you need to know they are near. Some say you can even specify the type of sign you wish to see. I shy away from this practice because I don’t want to be disappointed. But this weekend, I tried it. And it works.

We were in Canmore. The magic of the mountains that Zane and I both love, poured over me as I stood alone on the balcony. The crisp morning air, the view of the wooden path to town below me. I looked up and said, “I’m here, are you?” Suddenly, out of nowhere walked a man along the path. He wore a royal blue suit jacket and tan dress pants and beige shoes. He had a Herschel backpack on. He looked just like Zane, who had the same attire. I ducked to try to get a closer, longer look but he faded away into the trees that shade the path. I smiled. I imagined Zane off to work and I laughed that my motherly advice of the kids not being able to move past Canmore when they grew up, Zane had honored. There he was off to work.

The night before we left, I was meditating in bed. My window open to feel the night breeze, I lay with my eyes closed and let the wave of gratitude for being there flood over me. I whispered to Zane, “I am thankful for the signs, I know you are here, I just miss your laugh”. A few minutes later a laugh, a belly laugh from outside my window broke the silence. I opened my eyes just as another laugh filled the air. The reality was there was group of young men walking back to the hotel, laughing, and talking. The one laugh was so like Zane’s. I started to giggle. “Thanks, Zane, I needed that” I said.

I believe there is no harm that I imagined the young man that morning, looking so much like my son, was my son. Nor was there any harm that I imagined Zane was part of the group coming home from a party, laughing at the antics of the night they had. We dream of what our children might be doing if they were still living on earth. We dream of who our children might have become, where they would be living. When another human who behaves or appears in some manner like our loved one comes along, I think it is fair that we may dream, ever so briefly, that this might have been them. If life was different. This does not make us delusional. We know better but the comfort of pretending, for just a moment so to feel good but not so long that we become depressed, makes these types of signs playful.

When we ask for a sign that they are present, they provide. Whether it is a feather or a dime or a look-a-like or a laugh, it is a reminder that they are very much present. They are near. They are with us. I encourage you to just ask.

When Our Loved Ones Are Actively Dying

June 26, 2022 / Mama Fish

My friend told me she was off to visit her mother. The nursing home called to say she was ‘actively dying’. “What a strange term that is”, my girlfriend said. Her comment got me thinking about all the wonderful possibilities around having this opportunity to be with a loved one, actively dying.

We all know that death is inevitable, although we ignore it, when it comes to the time where it is the unremovable elephant in the room, we are given a chance to say goodbye. This is a period where we can say what the person meant to us; how much we love them. It is a moment to ask what they would want us to do after they depart. It is a time to reassure them we will remember them, and how. It is also an opportunity, if need be, to mend differences giving both parties peace at the end of the day.

I had the blessing of being able to hold such conversations with both my parents prior to their death. And yet, years later, a memory will come back, and I will think how I wish I could tell dad that or did mom know I felt that way. Even after our loved ones depart, you still want to hold conversations.

Recently I was reminded that it is never too late to converse with our loved ones. True, there is no verbal feedback we can hear if the conversation happens after death. What is important is the action of speaking out loud or in a letter what we wish or need to say. This is good mourning; it offers a prayer-to-the-heaven feeling that some how your loved one hears you and knows. And that is comforting.

When your loved one dies of sudden death, the beautiful experience of sharing discussions before they leave does not happen which adds to grief. It creates a lot of the ‘what if’ questions and ‘if only’ and ‘did they know’ questions that haunt many of us. Therefore, post-earth conversations are even more important.

Choose a quiet spot where you are uninterrupted and take a few deep breaths to relax. Ask your higher power for a moment to feel the spirit of your loved one and then open your heart. Whether you choose to write a letter or just talk, envision your loved one next to you. Picture how they looked, the softness of their skin, the smell of their cologne. Start with an affirmation. (Mine is always, thank you for being here). Begin chatting, as if they were present, next to you, listening to you. Be slow in this process and hold no expectations. End by telling them you love them. I enjoy this practice. Tears are usually a part of it, but I have also experienced laughter through these conversations I have with the ghosts of my loved ones!

Another good practice is to tell those who are not actively dying how much you love them. One never knows the plan life has for each of us. My friend says she is grateful for the time she has, knowing her mother will be departing soon. It is a gift my friend will be able to keep in her heart, forever. And may she find comfort in the idea that her last conversation with her mother here, is not necessarily her last conversation.