Words that resonated with me April 18, 2011
Don’t forget my blog has moved!
http://connect.legacy.com/profiles/blogs/words-that-resonated-with-me
The blog finds a new home April 8, 2011
Starting this week, my blog has moved to Legacy Connect, a sister site to www.legacy.com. My hope is that this will bring me a much larger readership as I continue to help people find hope after not only suicide loss but also in the broader world of loss and change that we all experience. The new blog coincides with my becoming President of the American Association of Suicidology next week.
http://connect.legacy.com/profiles/blogs/the-road-we-dont-choose
Happy 36th Birthday, Denise April 4, 2011
Today would have been my sister Denise’s 36th birthday. I still believe it’s her birthday since she is still with me so this morning I stopped at a local bakery and bought a cupcake. I have cut back my sugar consumption recently and some days the craving really hits me. This morning I gave in and decided to celebrate Denise’s birthday with a cupcake (I haven’t eaten it yet- it’s on the kitchen counter, where no dog can reach it, waiting for me for later). Even though she always will be just two weeks shy of her eighteenth birthday rather than the 36 she would be now, my perspective now is that’s okay. She’s with me, she sends me messages, I know she’s here. Happy birthday, Denise. 
Artist seeks photos April 3, 2011
The address to send photos to is:
1187 Queen Street Unit #2
Halifax, Nova Scotia
Canada
B3H 2S4
A time of new beginnings April 3, 2011
Today is the new moon and that means it’s a time for new beginnings. Often this can be difficult when we are experiencing a loss because we don’t want to lose anything else out of our comfort zone. That’s the myth around it though. Just because it’s a new beginning though doesn’t mean that we are letting go of the person who was so important to us. Instead, it means we have the opportunity to forget new paths in our lives, new paths that can make us better people. Our loved one is always with us in both memory and in spirit. It’s a time to let go of anything in the past that has held us back. And it’s a time to manifest those dreams we have into reality. Seize today and the energy in it to go forward and be who we are truly supposed to be. This morning I wrote down my goals and dreams, read them out loud, and then burned them. There was a good feeling that I released them to the universe, just as I’ve been attempting (that’s the best word to describe it!) to let go of anything I can’t control for Lent, that I manifested them and now it’s time for materialization.
The root of letting go March 29, 2011
As I’ve been periodically writing about, I’m attempting to let go of things that I can’t control for Lent. It’s been a rough road and one day I will share more, but for now I think I found the root of why letting go has been so difficult for me. In other words, I took the phrase, “If it is to be, it is up to me” to the extreme. This dates back to eighth grade, the night before my dad’s job was eliminated from the company where he had worked his entire career. I remember my parents preparing us (Denise and I were the only two left at home at the time) from some time ahead of the date. He’d had hernia surgery, anticipating this would happen. I will be the first to admit I was never a prayerful child. I followed the rituals because I was supposed to (good Catholic kid that I was) but I can’t say I particularly believed in God or the importance of letting anything go. That night I prayed to God that Dad’s job would still be there. I had a lot of fear at the time about the future of my family. If my dad lost his job, it meant he would be home and it would make us an oddity in the community at the time where most dads got on the train to go downtown Chicago to work. I didn’t quite understand what it meant financially but it couldn’t have been good since Mom wasn’t working full time. The day after he returned to work following the hernia surgery, he came home and promptly retired from the company because his job as project engineer had been eliminated. And I promptly ended my relationship with God (of course that doesn’t mean God ended his relationship with me). As life went on (Mom went to work in the airline industry), I believed that I didn’t need anyone to help me. If I wanted something, I had to go out and get it without anyone’s help, especially God’s help. Quite honestly, this backfired but it only was in the past few days (that’s right, in 2011 rather than in 1986) that I have begun to understand that and connect the dots. Instead of letting go, I held onto everything tight and it kept me from accomplishing many goals early in my life. Through time this would change although it’s only now that can see the entire picture. It’s almost as if I’m standing at the top of the mountain looking over at the view going, “Oh, I get it.” None of us needs to do anything on our own. Letting go is the true way to make something happen because we allow ourselves freedom rather than a grip that keeps us stuck where we are. I think of the Pat Benatar song called “The Art of Letting Go.” It truly is an art but it’s one I intend to master.
The importance of ritual March 27, 2011
I don’t attest to being a church-going person. But what I do appreciate about the Catholic church in which I was raised is the opportunity to go just about anywhere in the world and know the ritual is going to pretty much be the same. I have stumbled on a Cathedral in Sydney Australia and attended Mass with my friend Barry in Northern Ireland. And now looking back on my life, I can see the times when I’ve reached out to the church, mostly for that ritual, when life is challenging me. As I wrote several weeks ago, I started to attend church again to help me let go of things I can’t control and I’ve made it a game with myself each week to remember all the prayers I knew so well at other times in my life. I don’t go to get forgiveness for any sins- I don’t believe in sins, we all do things in life because we need to learn from them- and no one can be harder on me than me. But I do find that going forces me to think for an hour and take time out of my day to reflect about what I want, who I am, where I’m going, and so forth. I believe that when life is difficult, when our routines have changed (or been forced to change because of a loss and/or change in situation), that we can find a lot of hope in rituals, in the familiarity. I may not have been a regular church goer throughout my life but as I look back now, I can see how it has been woven through the fabric of my life experiences and that comes from knowing the ritual is there waiting for me when I need it to serve as a stabilizing force in my life.
Red Chocolate Elephants: A resource for children bereaved by suicide March 23, 2011
Red Chocolate Elephants is an activity book and DVD resource for children bereaved by suicide. In a world where children are often forgotten mourners, this unique combination of text, pictures, and voices – all in the words of bereaved children themselves – will be a treasured safe haven for young people to hear their fears, questions, and difficulties put into words by other children just like them. On the accompanying DVD, these same youngsters speak their words aloud as we see their drawings of their experience. The book and DVD are an excellent resource for parent and child to use together in trying to face the suicide of a loved one. This is also a valuable resource for those supporting children in schools and others therapeutic settings.
Order through Amazon.
