skip to main |
skip to sidebar
There were many ways of breaking a heart. But what really broke the heart was taking away its dream -- whatever that dream might be. ~ Pearl Buck
A reader writes: I was recently informed that my mother has died, and I am grieving. My mother left me when I was a little girl. It hurt. I denied it for 40 years. So far I have attended two different bereavement groups. Both are filled with people who are grieving a loved one. I am not. I do not have a string of memories of our times together to talk about: how she taught me how to bake a pie, helped me plan my wedding, helped me through my divorce, paid for college, took care of my kids while I met my second husband, etc. I do not fit into those groups. They are grieving such a beautiful memory that I’m afraid I will poison their precious period of grief if they hear my story of abandonment. I didn’t have a mother to maintain kinship ties with an extended family. I had an evil stepfather who was remote and distant and lied to me about why my mom was gone: “She left you.”
If I think of the real work of grief as doing whatever I can to keep my heart open, to feel and to face every stitch of both pain and love, without somehow abandoning myself in the process, well – that’s “work” I can get behind. That’s work I understand. ~ Megan Devine
A reader writes: It has been a year and 3 months since my best friend died. I think I've moved thru alot of the intensity of my grief and now what I feel left with is something similar to the wreckage after a train wreck. I feel so afraid...so removed from the person I used to be. I am not myself...my old self. I kinda expected that, but I feel so unmoved by life right now. Nothing seems to thrill me...in fact everything seems to be a struggle to do.
Posts
