In May of 2011, my beloved mom died and my world turned upside down. I thought I was prepared. I'd had three years to accept the reality of her diagnosis: a recurrence of breast cancer, now metastatic, meaning incurable. I was a mother of two with a supportive husband, a close family, and a strong network of friends. Despite these resources, I was overwhelmed by the intensity of my grief. While losing a parent at the age of forty isn't particularly noteworthy, it was a big deal to me. I was a grief rookie. Experiencing loss for the first time, I felt adrift, confused and isolated. Without expectations from previous experience, I allowed myself to be open to what was happening, and I learned a lot in the process.
My hope for this site is it will be a resource for those that are grieving, whether in the earliest stages of shock and disbelief or farther along when it becomes even more painful. Hang in there. It will get easier. It might get harder first though. I wish there was one piece of advice, one magical solution, a silver bullet. But unfortunately, grief is a process, an evolution. You'll move through it, at whatever pace is right for you.
A few years after my mom died, I wrote in my journal, "When I next experience the death of a loved one and grief re-enters my life, I want to be able to say, 'Hello, old friend." I've come to see grief as a necessary path, an inevitable part of life that comes with potential silver linings and opportunities for transformation. It reminds me of the Rumi poem The Guest House which tells us to welcome our sorrows as they are here to teach us. Grief is a teacher, and our biggest heartbreaks can be our biggest lessons. But grieving takes courage, and we know peeling back those layers of hurt and sadness will expose us, and temporarily expose us to deeper suffering. Courage allows us to continue on that path, through the wilderness of grief and the dark nights, and then come out on the other side. We won't be the same person that entered the woods; our grief will have shaped us and changed us. The many gifts of that process - perspective, wisdom, greater compassion and empathy for ourselves and others - those are the silver linings. In hindsight, I see this as my mom's final gift to me.