Today is my angel babies birthday and I am reflecting on what has helped with the healing process for me.
Do you ever truly heal? I am not sure. However, accepting the grief, honouring your grief and learning to live with the grief, as a part of your new reality may ease the pain.
Having spoken to many bereaved people, I feel that everyone has a personal medicine that helps them through the tough times. The things they go to when the emotions resurface as they do. These items were my personal medicine during my time of grief. If you are experiencing grief right now, I hope you find your personal medicine .
1) My family and friends. Their love, support and compassion.
2) Not allowing anyone to pretend they understood when they didn't.
3) Having his name mentioned not avoided like something taboo.
4) His memory honoured and remembered. Even 7 years on, friends and family will send me beautiful messages honouring and remembering him on his birthday.
5) Having something tangible that represented his spirit. For me that came in the form of a blue wren. This blue little bird signifies my son and his freedom in the sprit world. Occasional I will see this beautiful bird and he seems to appear at times when I need it the most. I have received so much comfort. Also his little spot at the cemetery was that tangible place I could go visit the first few years.
6) Being able to write. I loved being able to channel my thoughts and emotions in to a blog or poetry when the grief was raw. This was so therapeutic and helped me to process the intensity of the emotions.
7) Poetry - I love poetry and reading other poems especially the one that I share below, gave me so much comfort in the early days.
8) Having a place for Michael in our home. We have a little spot in our home where his photo and other items that remind us of him live. We light his candle often.
9) Music- I have several songs that remind me of him. I have placed them onto a CD which I played and played and played in the early days. This too I found extremely healing.
10) My little boys persistence in getting messages to me when I was not paying attention. I cannot tell you how many times my boy has via other beautiful people delivered me gifts and messages that where so random and the synchronicity of the events that lead to me receiving the messages could have not been anything short of a miracle. Pay attention. They do try and get in touch with you.
11) Meditation - The ability to visualise him, connect with him and mother him through my visualisations has been so powerful for me.
12) Channelling this energy into a purpose and knowing that his story touched so many people on so many levels.
If you are supporting a bereaved loved one, do not pretend to know what they are going through when you really don't. All people really need at this time is someone to listen to them. Someone to allow them to process at this difficult time. They are not really looking for answers cause really there are no answers.
Don't be afraid to ask 'HOW ARE YOU?' and genuinely wait and listen to the answer. These three words can be the most powerful. Knowing that someone genuinely cares is so important.
Don't be afraid to mention their loved one. You are not reminding them of their loss. They a living it every moment of their day and will do so for many years. You will find that they love talking about their loved ones.
Another don't is the phrase 'At Least'. I really disliked (maybe hated) this phrase. Well meaning people say ' At least you have other children', 'At least you know you can fall pregnant' ...one does not replace the other and I found this phrase to be the most diminishing/undermining of all phrases. This, mind you does not only apply to bereaved parents and I have heard this phrase used in many contexts. Please do not use it when someone is grieving or to diminish anyone else's pain.
I hope this helps those that are grieving and those that a supporting somebody who is grieving. I am sure I have not covered everything so if anyone has anything to add here please feel free to do so or if you would like to share your personal medicine that would be great.
