Warning…deep post but in a thinking not depressed sense

At the funeral today of the wonderful Lucy, I sat in the pew pondering what really is the point of life?

We are born, wishing our time away until we can be a grown up and do grown up things

We leave home and have to work to pay for basic needs

We then have families which need our time

We then start losing the people around us

We then stop working and look forward to retirement…and so often we die!

We seem to spend all our lives believing that enjoyment is just round the corner ?

So it begs the question when do we truly live! I can think of moments, I can think of days but I am not sure that I have ever put the enjoyment of life at the centre of my world or the world of those around me.

How sad is that…..how can we ensure that the only celebration of life is NOT at our funeral. Maybe it is just because I feel that sense of loss today, maybe I am fighting for that meaning to my world, maybe it is because I never truly feel anything but an outsider, maybe it is a combination….

Maybe I just need to start living….

I still wish that somebody would find a remedy for the aching heart, when I spoke to my Auntie she gave me a wonderful piece of relationship advice. She said “To help overcome the pain of a lost relationship, you must forgive yourself”

At first, I didn’t understand forgive myself, his death was not something I could control? Then I thought a little harder and realised that I did need to forgive myself. My mind was saying many sentences that started “If only…..” If only I hadn’t complained about moving, if only I had taken a days holiday, if only I had been there, I am sure you know what it is like!

The fact is I didn’t know that he would not come home, we had shared a wonderful life - yes, there were things that I regretted or petty arguments that were silly….but I had no way of knowing that he would die. We cannot change the past we can only use those experiences to change the future. I had nothing to forgive myself for, I could not have known. I could not have done anything more. Would he want me to hurt, no. Would he want me to my thoughts from If only, to thanks for the wonderful memories…of course.

I found a wonderful Web site today for the woman who is looking for the motivation to “get going,” again.  And of course, for a young widow who is in the process of reinventing her life and starting over, getting going is what it’s all about.  I know - it isn’t easy, but it can be done and I know you can do it.

I first thought that Girls Get Going was just for women in their 20s or maybe 30s.  It has a youthful look.  But as I looked around, I realized this was part of the atmosphere of the Web site.  It is positive, uplifting, and very motivational, without being preachy.  It felt homey, feminine, and safe.

There are several features this site has to offer that would appeal to a woman who has been widowed and is beginning to start thinking about making some new friends and exploring life outside of her living room.  If you sign up and become a site member (which is free of charge), you will have access to an array of tools and site content.  And for widows it feels comfortable because this is a “no guys allowed” Web site; having the ability to talk to other women while you are working on your own life experience, without feeling self-concious around men (a common reaction for a widow) is important.  There are just some things we don’t want to talk to men about!

Girls Get Going describes their features as:

Create your own blog, participate in discussions, read about other’s experiences with goal setting and be encouraged on your own journey of change for your health, career, finances, home, relationships, hobbies, spirituality and personal appearance. Articles and resources, links and discussions will spur you onward.

They have a nice guide to take you through the steps of joining and what will be available to you as a member.  I particularly liked the various challenges; they are enough to keep the motivation going but not so much as to be intimidating when everyday seems like an impossible and insurmountable challenge, in and of itself. 

I hope you will visit, and join, Girls Get Going.  When you are ready to reach out and begin to find your life again, you will need a resource like this.  If you aren’t ready yet, bookmark the site.  You will be ready someday; you may not believe that today, but trust me, you will want to find yourself again.

I think GGG is a great site to do just exactly that:  Find yourself, reinvent yourself, and step back into living your life.

Girls Get Going

Welcome Tutorial for Girls Get Going

Site Description: Girls Get Going website is created to be women’s online support community for goal setting and life management.

grief grieving widow widows loss+of+a+husband death rebuilding reinventing+your+life motivation motivational+content weight+loss stop+smoking make+friends get+a+blog reading+groups

Right after I was widowed, I bought every book on grief I could find.  I had this idea - if I bought all of the books and learned everything I could learn about grief, it wouldn’t hurt so much.  Bad idea - it cost me a lot of money and it still hurt. 

Oh, how desperately we seek to maintain control.

I still buy books on grief but now I have a rule - I don’t buy them very often, maybe two or three a year, and I don’t look for them to be anything more than a map to help guide the journey.  Even with a big library of books that should help, I still noticed that yesterday was the fourth anniversary of my husband’s funeral.  We need to be realistic about what we can expect from a book.

With that in mind, this month I bought a book called, “I Remember You.”  Although this is a grief journal, it is also a book about healing, rebuilding, redefining, and learning to let your past coexist with your present and future.  Laynee Gilbert, the author, says, “In this book, you can note your reflections of life and death, on faith and hope; you can dwell with whatever is on your mind and in your heart.”

Gilbert emphasizes a very important thing for anyone grieving, but for a young widow it is imperative to hear.  People do die - we can’t change that.  But relationships do not die.  Love crosses all boundaries, even those that exist between the veil of life and death.  Taking that as a starting point, the author has created a journal that not only guides the widow, in the here and now, but strengthens the relationship she had, and lost.  That isn’t to say, other relationships will not happen, but each person we love occupies a unique place within our life; this book honors the relationship recently lost and allows a person to move forward.  “Your loved one may be gone but the relationship lives on,” says Gilbert.

The vast majority of the pages in this book are for what I would call “interactive writing.”  There is space for letters, poems, song lyrics, and other writings that would be meaningful for the owner of this book.  The author suggests putting photos in as it seems appropriate.  Gilbert’s writing only covers a very few pages, leaving the rest of the book to the reader to finish writing.

“This journal can be a home for your experiences.  As you tell your story, your words will lead you on your own unique, personal passage through the healing process of grief.  As you give life to these pages, you will also be breathing life into your relationship with the one who has passed on.”

Four years after the death of my husband, I think the right book came into my life.  I think it is an excellent book for the widow who is ready not only to cope with her grief, but to work on redefining her life and remembering her husband in a very special way.