A Heavy Heart

The holidays are hitting me harder than usual this year.  I know it is the recent decision to put my sweet fur baby Kiki to sleep a month or so ago.  I miss her terribly and feel so much guilt since I had to sign that damn paper.  It has compounded the loss of two husbands.  The good memories both help and hurt me.

I have found many groups and pages on Facebook that have helped me cope.  The following is a poem from one of them.  The source is also listed.  I could have written this myself . . .

You think she's angry, but you don't see,

The weight she carries silently.

It’s not the rage that fills her eyes,

But tiredness in a thin disguise.

She's not furious, but worn and torn,

From dreams abandoned, hopes forlorn.

She’s tired, she’s weary, she’s feeling lost,

Paying life’s relentless cost.

She’s sinking deep in a sea of doubt,

Crying softly, without a shout.

Frustration builds, but not from hate

It’s the closed doors, the heavy weight.

She promised much, her dreams were bright,

But now she battles every night.

She wants to give, to rise, to shine,

But life’s harsh currents pull the line.

So when you see her weary stare,

Know it’s not anger, but despair.

She’s fighting hard to find her way,

Hoping tomorrow’s a kinder day.

- Christina Stewart

Source for photo and poem

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When your dog is your soulmate

 

As I have grieved my fur baby Kiki, I have sought out social media forums and communities dedicated to help grievers cope with that terrible phase in their life.  It is important to surround yourself with those who have and are walking the same journey, just wanting to find peace.  Below you will find a post that said everything I have been thinking about my little girl. 

It has been over a month since she's been gone and I am still so heartbroken.  Starting to take her kennel down, her "house," has proven to be one of the most difficult endeavors ever for me.  I feel like I am betraying her and trying to erase her existence, which is so far from reality.  It is tearing me up big time.

If you are walking in my shoes, feeling the loss of a pet and grieving in a profound way, the following group on Facebook is for you.  The article below will help you understand why you are having such a difficult time when others who don't understand just think you are being ridiculous and just need to get over it.  It is that magical connection that is still so strong and always will be.

Source for article and graphics: Serendipity Corner

"When your dog is your soulmate, it feels like they’ve seen the depths of who you are and decided to love you anyway, flaws and all. There’s no pretense with them. They don’t care if you’ve had a bad day, if you’re broken, or if you’re lost. They just stay. Not because they have to, but because, for some reason, their soul fits with yours in a way that makes everything feel a little lighter.

It’s not about them reading your mind or sensing your moods like it’s some magical connection. It’s more raw than that. It’s in the moments where you feel like you’ve got nothing left to give, and yet, somehow, they bring out the part of you that still cares. It’s in their eyes, how they look at you like you’re the only thing that matters. There’s no pretending with them—no need to put up walls or hold back emotions. With them, you’re exactly who you are, and that’s enough.

And it’s more than just love—it’s the way they make you see yourself differently, the way they pull you out of places you didn’t even know you were stuck in. The bond is stronger than anything life throws at you because it’s rooted in something so simple and pure. They don’t just support you—they remind you, in the most basic, honest way, that you’re worth being loved. And when the world feels cold or distant, they’re the one soul you can count on, no matter what.

R.M. Drake 

Artist Credit: Lisa Aisato"

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Grief is a strange journey

 

I've been going through another grief journey that has knocked me down pretty hard. Losing a pet is an indescribable grief.

In order to make a real attempt of going through this loss better than the losses of two husbands, I have discovered and remember how different the feelings are when it is an innocent little creature who can't tell you they are sick. Our pets want to make us happy. Some of them take it so seriously that they can be so sick and close to death, but don't want to bother you with it. Or so it seems.

Groups I have joined to cope with pet grief have opened my eyes to this. The majority of members say that they had no idea their pet was so gravely ill and it was too late to help them survive. Their described heartache matches mine. Total devastation at the loss of their precious best friend who was always so loyal and loving.

Although I am trying to stay busy and keep my mind occupied, my little Kiki is always on my mind. I've gone through so much guilt for not picking up that she was so sick. Those groups have helped me through that guilt. There is something to be said about surrounding yourself with those who understand what you are going through since they have experienced the same journey. The journey that never ends.

"Grief is a strange journey.

Each time we embark upon it, it is as though we have never taken its roads before.

No, I have that wrong: each grief brings us through a familiar landscape carved into unrecognizable contours.

For we do not only lose another person; we lose the person we were with the one we lost."

Patricia Monaghan

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The difficulty of grieving

Someone in a group I belong to told me that I'm in the "deep of grief" and I know that the way grief manifests itself changes with time.  But it never ever goes away.

My two recent losses, The Captain and my precious little Kiki were my immediate family that I lived with and loved day after day.  I am now completely lost with both of them gone.  My home is totally silent and feels so empty without them.  

When The Captain passed away, Kiki and I grew closer and we grieved together.  Dogs do grieve just like people, but in their own little way.  I have always taught my dogs to "talk" and Kiki took talking very seriously.  In our grieving together, she knew when I was going through a rough time and she would come to me and talk, hitting my leg with her paw, like to say "listen to me, I'm talking to you and want you to feel better."  The comforting look in her eyes was indescribable.  She comforted me like no human could and that made her so much more special than she already was.  

Now I am in the "deep of grief" over losing her company and comforting, resenting the fact that I can freely walk around and not worry about her tripping me since she was a Velcro dog.  I'm finding it so difficult to move past this and learn to live without her at my side every minute of every day.

I found this poem on the internet and it perfectly relates how I have been feeling since The Captain passed away and now Kiki. 

The harder we love

Means the harder we grieve

The harder it is

To go on when they leave

The harder to sleep

And the harder to wake

To know they’re not here

With each breath that we take

It’s hard to look forward

And hard to look back

Stuck in the middle,

Imprisoned and trapped

Where the harder the darkness

The harsher the light,

The harsher this world

That keeps spinning with life

But when that world’s feeling

So painful and hard

And you can’t imagine

Escaping the dark

It might help a little

To know it’s because

The harder we grieve

Means the harder we loved

******

Becky Hemsley 2023

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Run free little girl

 

As Kiki got older, I tried to protect myself from this time I am going through.

No matter what the vet told me, I was not convinced that she was as sick as he said.  She still did her cute little dance when it was time to eat like she always did, like a healthy dog at almost 16 years old.

My little partner, my little girl is gone and I am beyond heartbroken.  When I walk around the house, I still look down to make sure I am not stepping on her since she was always at my feet.  What a weird feeling it is for her not to be there.

Betsy and Buster were waiting for her at Rainbow Bridge.

Run free little girl.

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Sit with the pain

 

This is what grief is.

A hole ripped through the very fabric of your being.

The hole eventually heals along the jagged edges that remain. It may even shrink in size.

But that hole will always be there.

A piece of you always missing.

For where there is deep grief, there was great love.

Don’t be ashamed of your grief.

Don’t judge it.

Don’t suppress it.

Don’t rush it.

Rather, acknowledge it.

Lean into it.

Listen to it.

Feel it.

Sit with it.

Sit with the pain. And remember the love.

This is where the healing will begin.

Author unknown

I'm feeling a little better, but it has been a bad few weeks. It is what I expect, but sometimes I can handle it better. This year is different since I'm experiencing The Captain's passing too. Maybe I'm trying too hard to be normal.

In the meantime, I deal with it as best as I can and sit with the pain with my awesome memories.

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Lessening Grief

 

In the course of dealing with grief phases, I have found myself relying on memories as a comfort for the painful feelings of grief.  I'm always grateful for having had my loved ones share their life with me.  Even remembering not so great memories leads to being grateful.  Life is more than good times and anger has a place in there too.

Time changes the way we perceive memories.  I didn't realize that until The Captain passed away.  Memories of my life with JR have changed through the years without me realizing that it was happening.

Time lessens grief, but it never takes it away.  I have learned to be grateful for everything I have been blessed with, especially another day.

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Lacking Peace

 

My latest grief stage has brought me far away from perfect peace.  It is getting better, but faith and trust have been difficult to attain.  The birthdays of two husbands who have passed away have been awful trigger days with Easter around the corner.

This definition of peace is what I have been lacking . . . "freedom from disquieting or oppressive thoughts or emotions".  

As I prepared our traditional Easter ham and potato salad, the overwhelming empty feeling of not sharing the cooking and enjoying the meal and the holiday itself with both of them consumed me.  

These are typical trigger days that have doubled for me.  The Captain helped me through those days in the past.  Now I try to relive the memories of days past to get through the present trigger days.

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Loud Silence

 

It has been a weird time.  Yes, the silence is loud.  Sometimes it is hard to breathe.  I need to write and let this out, but I really don't know what to say.  I'm enjoying being alone in my silence, but it would be great if he was here with me.  Only him.  God knows how much I miss him.

It was so good to finally see my family again after all these months, I missed them so much.  However, words have been difficult to find and conversation is so difficult right now.  The Captain and I were rarely without words.  He is the only one I want to talk to, but I never will again.

Yes, it is a difficult time, but this too shall pass.

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Don't give up now

 

But really, do I have a choice?

I guess it was his birthday, a trigger day that started me on the roller coaster again.  Just when I was starting to feel better.

I'm so tired of feeling better only to slip back into this funky phase of grief.  The good thing is I have writing about it to help me get through the awful moments.

If it seems like I am ready to give up going on with my life and having a normal life again, the answer is hell no, I will never give up.  I got through losing JR and I will get through losing The Captain.  He taught me that life does go on . . . he made it possible for me to do so.  It isn't easy, but life isn't easy.

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Love With No Place To Go

All that talk about positivity has gone out the window.  I find myself overthinking everything.  My happy, carefree attitude of taking one moment at a time has disappeared.  It is what grief is all about.  One must be ready for it to get through it quickly.  I'm trying!

The trick is to figure out how to pull yourself back to a comfortable place that is sometimes so difficult to find.  

Love with no place to go is rough and heartbreaking.

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Trigger Days

 

Trigger days . . . holidays, birthdays, anniversaries of all kinds, etc. always add an extra sense of grief.  You never know how they are going to affect you until it does . . . they are sneaky like that.  They can also change from year to year.  

Just like any other grief phase, it is not a good idea to try to ignore the trigger day or the affects of it.  One must go through and feel the grief stages in order to get through the healing process.  The difficulty is not knowing where the next grief hit is going to come from . . . a song, a place, a passing thought, a smell, food . . . anything really.  One thing is for sure, there are times that everything is a reminder and know that it may throw you into survival mode, even if it is an old loss as well as a fresh one.

There is one thing I do to cope with trigger days . . . write your loved one a letter.  Just as with journaling, the spontaneity of the writing will conjure up thoughts and feelings you never addressed.  Those thoughts and feelings get me through trigger days, as well as good memories that I make an attempt to dwell on instead of how awful I am feeling at the moment.  The great memories on trigger days for me are treasured gifts and I look at it as a pleasant way to honor the loved one.  That is so important.

It is not easy, but I have learned coping mechanisms through over 20 years of grief phases from losing my first husband.  It never goes away, but as time goes on it becomes easier to manage and tolerate the emotions.

Today I am experiencing The Captain's birthday, the first since he passed away.  This trigger day is fresh and so very painful, but I'm making the attempt to use the coping mechanisms I have learned to get through this awful day.

The clock continues to tick and the trigger days hit with regularity, bringing with them the emotional minefield.  What is important is to know that you control how you react to the thoughts associated with the day.  

The trigger days and grief itself became my new normal when my first husband died.  Now my new normal is double the trigger days, grief associated with it and learning to emotionally deal with more positivity as time goes on.  I'm learning how to celebrate the loved one's life and be grateful they were in my life at all.

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Joyful Melody of Life

 

I've started listening to music regularly as I did in "normal times."  Music has been a part of life since I was a little girl enjoying the radio being on day and night by my family.  Songs have meaning to me as far as lyrics and bringing back memories.  It is strange how a song can be associated with a person, a place in time, an event, etc.  For me, music is so special for all of those reasons, as well as the love of a song or musician.

In the past couple of days, I have been drawn to songs that remind me of the beginning of my relationship with The Captain.  They brought up so many awesome memories that took me back to the time like it was yesterday.  That is what I love so much about music, it takes you there.

In this phase of grief, I can say that I have found the joyful melody of life with The Captain, remembering the great times with a smile on my face.  And just as fast as the smile appeared, so do the tears of a time in my life that is gone forever.  

The next grief phase will hopefully focus on the great times and the memories with only smiles and less sorrow.  I will listen to your song forever in my heart and the song will play softly, soothing my soul.

Cherish the music!

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Grief is schizophrenic

 

When grief gets a grip on you, it will take on a life of its own that no matter how hard you try, is so difficult to get through.  One of the problems is that it is ever changing and when you think you have it figured out and under control . . . BOOM . . . it will grab your attention and let you know otherwise.

Grief is schizophrenic!

Many of you know that my first husband passed away over 20 years ago.  As a reader of my blog you know that I am still grieving his loss to this day and having a difficult time with it.  And even though I have been through the grief all these years, I have determined that it is totally different for me this time.  So my notion of grief has changed.  Now the two are mingled and sometimes throws me for a loopy time.

Today is one of those loopy times.  I'm semi-paralyzed and have not done anything all day except sit here and try to think on how to get moving.  It is approaching early evening and I have not had a thing to eat or have not had a cup of coffee.  No energy, no motivation whatsoever!  There are days I don't eat at all, I don't want it and I am passionate about food.  Sometimes I can trick myself into gathering up some motivation and times like this there is no way.  Today my definition of self is that I am out of control and can't stop the roller coaster!

I can tell you that writing about it helps tremendously.  At times it gives me the opportunity to see a different perspective after I have written about it.  Try it if you are having grief incidents that are sometimes unbearable.

This too shall pass and tomorrow is another day with another grief phase - hope it is a good one!

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I was never ready for you to leave

 

My normal grief feels like all of the above at the same time.

It happened so fast.

On that morning, I woke up and was startled to see the far away look in his eyes.  It seemed to me so strange that he was normal the night before, although I felt something was off for a few days.  One of my first thoughts was "I'm not ready for him to leave me."  He was already gone, but it was months before he passed away.  

Since that day, unbearable sadness has consumed me to the point of paralysis, not being able to do a thing at times.  Being alone is what I have craved and I can sometimes only make it from one minute to the next without breaking out in uncontrollable tears.  I thought I would never get through the phase of acceptance since I was not ready to lose him to begin with.  Even though he was not healthy, I never thought he would die so young.

I had already experienced the tremendous grief from losing my first husband and I knew what agony I was about to face again.

Are we ever ready to lose someone we love?

My grief has thankfully entered a new phase and I am happy to say that I am actually experiencing "normal" days.  It has taken me almost a year to accept that he had to leave, God was calling him.  But I now find myself moving past acceptance and through all the other phases that change from one day to the next.  But at least some days are good.  I know as time moves on the good days will appear with regularity.  It just takes time and lots of prayer.

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The Lunacy of Grief Stages

 

The changes can be horrific from one day to the next, leaving the feeling of being on a roller coaster.  They can also make you feel like you are actually losing your mind while knowing you are sane.

What really makes me feel crazy is the shift from surviving the grief to overwhelming sadness that rips you apart.  Nobody said it is an easy process.  The process itself can go back and forth, repeating itself over and over again.  It ends up breaking my heart over and over again.

For me it is still so fresh, only 8 months of the torture and a couple more months if you count the hospital time.  But I believe the greatest progress is making it through the first phase of acceptance.  You don't have to like it, but the loss must be accepted in order to get past it and start healing.  I've finally reached acceptance and feel the process of healing, no matter how much it fluctuates.

Regardless of the phase, the reality is memories are all that is left.  And I cherish them.

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Hope

Every night we go to bed,

without any assurance of being alive the next morning

but still we set the alarms to wake up.

That's HOPE

It is also faith.  As a person who has a broken spirit, I know that without hope and faith, the possibility of becoming whole again is bleek.  I have lived it.

I have also become whole again after brokenness, never losing faith that everything was going to be OK again.

It is human nature to succumb to disappointing life changes.  You can't beat yourself up over it.  Attitude determines the degree of healing and how long it takes to get there.

At this place in time, grief has once again gotten a grip on me, but I know I will get through it.  There is no grief without love and love is worth the effort to fulfillment in life.

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Solitude and Being A Hermit

 

I choose to be what so many people describe as being a "hermit."  For now, it is what is a comfortable lifestyle for me as I contemplate the rest of my life . . . again. 

It is important for me and necessary for my healing to write honestly about these past months without going into major details.  I also hope it will help just one person out there going through something.  That is what my blog is about. 

My heart has been broken.  I am grieving the loss of another husband and I've been judged by people who can neither understand nor validate my deepest thoughts, feelings, and concerns during one of the worse times of my life.  My body and soul has been numb and lost.

Lacking compassion for my feelings, they could not be gentle enough when I finally developed trust and honestly open up about everything, breaking something in me over and over again.  

My heart is tired and craves my alone time, the solitude that is my comfort zone from those who deem themselves "normal" and feel so compelled to judge me unfairly, not even trying to understand where I am in life and where I have come from emotionally, what I have been through.  I'm left with the uncomfortable feeling of being accused of having a "victim mentality" when they have no idea of who I am.  

All this has been life changing.

Yes, I now love my solitude and being a hermit.  There are a few people I allow myself to be close with.  These months have given me the time to contemplate what The Captain went through, where I have been and where I am going for the rest of my life.   I'm slowly healing, I can talk about it now and am confronting everything head on, getting stronger every day.  One day at a time, one second at a time.

Believe it or not, the solitude is beginning to make it possible to heal without the judging opinions of insensitive people.  The toxicity is no longer a part of my life, they are not a part of my life, and that makes me happy.  

It will affect the way I perceive those I think about letting into my life in the future.  This is the world we live in.  Insensitivity is no longer a rare thing.

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