Do Not Grieve Alone.com

1. DJ Says:
   October 16th, 2007 at 1:54 pm Before the phoenix goes up in flames and turns to ashes, she has become tired, worn, and ready to start anew, with lessons already learned being embedded in her DNA. As a phoenix arises from the ashes, she becomes renewed, stronger, and more beautiful (inside and out) in the transition. She becomes ready to fly to new adventures. The phoenix can also use her tears to heal the wounds of slef and others. The metaphor of the phoenix is particularly apt.

 DJ, Thank you so much for your comment regarding the mythology of my symbol. Following Rob’s death, I knew I was “forever changed” and the process of rising from the ashes…reconstructing my “so called life” was one of pain and agony as well as joy and transformation.

I knew I could not remain in the ashes, I knew I had to soar and transform, and nothing captured that better than the Phoenix. I am going to include, thanks to your post, some more Phoenix stories under the Phoenix Symbol category. Interestigly, every ancient culture embraces some aspect of this image.

Naturally, I believing “I am the Center of the Universe”thought…what a unique concept the Phoenix was to use with grief, transformation and change. Then I saw Phoenix Images everywhere. One great book DON”T LET DEATH RUIN YOUR LIFE: A Practical Guide to Reclaiming Happiness After the Death of A Loved One, by Jill Brooke describes the work of Dr Joanne Jozefowski’s THE PHOENIX PHENOMENON:

This is a great model, but is “clean” like Joan Didion’s book A Year of Magical Thinking. This Phoenix Phenomenon Model is an example to me of a Clean Grieving Process.  I, Beth, on the other hand believe that grief is messy, snotty and NOT AT ALL CLEAN, so my MESSY GRIEVER COMMENTS will be interjected here with MGC before them.

           1. Impact: The initial state in which we process the reality of the death while sustaing our physiological     needs like food, water and rest. MGC: I went from a size 12 to a size 6 and subsisted on McDonald’s hamburgers purchased while driving thru the drive thru at night when no one could seed me.

        2. Chaos: We develop order from the debris while needing outlets to express our emotions of grief. (MGC: order came later, outlets to express grief…wailing, writing, scouring the internet for resources for widows…cursing Rob for the bad things that happened as well as being grateful for the good.)Outlets…isolation, not a good thing, with the exception of my earth angels.)

3. Adaptation: We learn to adapt to life without the loved one and seek connections to others through support systems, other grievers, work , school or our house of worship, as well as developing new roles for ourselves (MGC this is a great HEALTHY concept, and certainly one to be strived for, however, for this Messy Griever, this was a hit and miss proposition. Certainly after the first year some of these adaptations occured, but for that first year whenever I walked into my church I would sob, my choice of adapted was to ISOLATE with a few compassionate friends. Getting out and about and adapting was later…much later, even though I was “helpfully” counseled by many to do so…easier said than done.

4. Equilibrium: We attain stability and blance in life and are able to consider self potential without our loved one. (MGC: yes, but after much time. I remember the delight I felt at being able to manage a flooded kitchen with the appropriate use of a wet vac without calling my “real life angel Dave and Cher” to rescue me yet again…)

5. Posttraumatic Growth: A resulting metamorphosis as the person emerges reshaped from the loss, developing more self-potential, greater spirituality, altruism, self awareness and appreciation for life. )MGC, I love this and this certainly has been the route I have been on. However, clean it has not been. I have left my traditional private practice to embark on a new avenue of coaching, have stretched myself beyond any limits I thought possible, and above all have not only a new appreciation for life, but a new respect for the preciousness of the present moment.

Although in my early 50′s when I became a widow, I was astonished to read in The Handbook of Bereavement that 50% of all women 65 and older have lost a spouse.

So, there are people all over at various stages of Phoenix Emergence…I still can feel the icy hot flames which engulfed me early on, and my hope and prayer is to companion others as they confront the challenge of loss, grief and transition.

Beth

6 Responses to “Phoenix Rising Coaching: WidowHood”

1. WW Says:
   October 26th, 2007 at 4:42 pm

   I think No. 3 needs more elaboration, for I think it’s the meat and bones of the work to be done. First and foremost, one needs to find safety again in all those relationships and tasks. I remember never feeling safe in venturing outside my home because everyone else was attuned to normal life, and I’d just had the rug pulled out. It was extremely hard to enter the Safeway and deal with the chipper little check-out gal who kept inquiring if I was having an outstanding day. How do you tell such a clueless being that in fact, no, my life has come to an end and I feel like collapsing in the bread aisle?

   The other adaptation is to losses beyond the immediate loss of loved one. When a spouse dies, so many people evaporate and disappear besides our beloved ones; best friends don’t call, family disown us, it’s like we have bubonic plague when we show up to an event, and our mere presence causes horrible pain to be visible upon the faces of friends who see us and then they want to run from the pain they assume we represent. The losses keep mounting, and to re-orient to THAT seems to take a very long time. I think in grieving a life partner you end up psychically alone, at the north pole, in a very cold snowstorm, with no visible means of heat or shelter. You must determine how to find home again from here and be willing to start back with no map.

2. Beth Waddel Says:
   October 26th, 2007 at 11:52 pm

   Oh, yes, my friend, WW to me is wonder woman,
   As a widow-in-kind- your words are so true…the people that evaporate…the people who “go on” and want “us” to snap to it…Often it seems that our pain is a pain they might “catch”, so to stay away is safer.
   I wonder how it is to forgive and move on? I know there are folks I have been hurt by in incredible ways, yet, I understand their own insecurities and pain. But, the petty part of me wants to respond, just wait…just wait until you are here because inevitably they will be…I too, will do or not do what you have done to me…that’s no way to live, but the response is surely human…
   Safety for me now is with a new world of folks…with a few steady people who have been consistently there. I agree we do grieve the loss of a life partner and end up psychically alone…but I would much rather be me than be the people who have abandoned those of us who experienced the pain first…because one must remember, what goes around comes around…today, I trust the few who have held true and strong, and those who have traveled these roads…soul sisters indeed.
   That first year is “dramatic” and interesting…it’s the second year that reveals the character of those who are “close”. It’s the second year when we need the support, and it’s the second year when folks disappear, but thankfully, new folks emerge.
   It’s all good, WW, and I am so thankful for having you on this journey. You are a blessing.
   Beth

3. ww Says:
   October 27th, 2007 at 12:57 pm

   And one more thought on the phoenix. How perfect, this symbol of renewal after total destruction. Before your website, this poem wrote itself during my grief journey, so I share it here.

   Unwilling to Enter

   Keening
   in a voice far away that later I
   realized was my own,
   a scream leapt from my chest like a fugitive
   wanting to run anywhere but here.

   Sentenced to lose my beloved’s life in 2 weeks
   it was time I didn’t think I could do.

   Shackled by grief and duty and love
   these three became my sisters
   who carried me on a plank to my own suttee

   The flames that would destroy me
   instead became the wings of the phoenix
   O Holy Fire
   what you ask seems impossible
   until dancing with flames becomes my daily practice
   I am singed, flinty, ashen, yet transformed.

4. LS Says:
   October 27th, 2007 at 4:27 pm

   While I do not have the experience of being a widow (Thank God) reading these posts has both made me think about the last 9 agonizing months of my daughter’s life when I had no choice but to watch her suffer 24/7. Those 9 months I was virtually on my own, partially because I wanted it that way, but more so because nobody, not even her father could stand to see her or me. She reminded them they would have to face her death soon, and they couldn’t stand to be with me because they had to see a pain they didn’t want to and couldn’t even begin to understand. When it was finally over her name was a forbidden word, never to be spoken. When it was over they made bets as to how long it would be before I ‘lost it’. They challenged me with that bet and I vowed to never let them see me fall apart.
   I hear people talk about the first year and then the second year after the loss of someone, but for me that grief did not happen until 13 years after the fact. What struck me the most with reading is that I may have avoided the pain and grief for a good many years, but it was all waiting there for me when I finally allowed it to happen. Maybe it was more that for some reason I waited until I could survive the crushing pain. It never went away because I avoided it, but waited patiently. My time to grieve was way past as far as friends and family were concerned and I had to get over it and on with my life. I have a new circle of friends now that encourage the healthy growth that has happened since I started feeling, and I started feeling again when I started grieving.
   I look at my twins on a daily basis and am reminded of their sister Vicky (it isn’t a name I avoid saying anymore) It is however a challenge for me in some way each and everyday. I constantly see her in them, but I also think and wonder about how she would have done things. Would she have wrecked our cars like the twins did? Would she have graduated from high school as they will this spring? Would she have given me the trouble that her sister has? What would she have become, what would she be doing right now? Bla bla bla

5. Beth Waddel Says:
   October 27th, 2007 at 5:19 pm

   Yes, LS, we are certainly onto something…and that
   “something” as WW also addressed is finding people in our life who promote health, happiness, genuiness and growth.
   Certainly supports ALL the literature on happiness and well-being. The people who are really there for us will help us grow and flourish.
   It’s a shame that often it’s a crisis which creates the new circle of support, but now, each of us can value those who are truely supportive and concerned with our well-being. Those people who tolerate and manage our tears as well as our laughter.
   Character certainly is revealed during times like this…

6. Rodger Blackwell Says:
   January 9th, 2009 at 1:56 am

   hi
   tnwa7r40kjjl873o
   good luck

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