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Posts tagged with “loss”

When a Wrong Can’t Be Righted: How to Deal With Regret

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“Regret can be your worst enemy or your best friend. You get to decide which.” ~Martha Beck

I was lucky enough to grow up with a pretty great mom.

She put herself through nursing school as a single parent, still made it to every field trip and dance recital, and somehow always made my brother and me feel like the best thing since sliced bread (even when we were acting like moldy and ungrateful fruitcakes).

She knew our deepest secrets, our friends, and who we were capable of being—even when we didn’t know ourselves. As I grew older my mom …

He Left, But I Will Not Give Up On Myself

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“I now see how owning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing that we will ever do. “ ~Brené Brown

He just left our home.

After eighteen years together, fifteen of them being married, he left as we had planned, as we had gently and lovingly discussed.

We are on a break, a trial separation. What you hear about separation and divorce is all so achingly true. It feels like a death, a chasm where all the worst feelings imaginable pile in on you, where you can’t quite breathe right.

The pain is visceral—like someone …

The Most Powerful Way to Help Someone Through Emotional Pain

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“When you can’t look on the bright side, I will sit with you in the dark.” ~Unknown

I walked in for my monthly massage and immediately sensed something was off.

A layer of desolation hung in the air like an invisible mist, ominous and untouchable, yet so thick I felt as though I could reach out and grab a handful in my fist, like wet cement, oozing out between my fingers.

I’d been seeing the same masseuse once a month for three years, repeating the same routine each time. I wait in the hallway just outside her rented studio, a …

The Betrayal of Expectations: Coping When Life Doesn’t Go to Plan

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“What will mess you up most in life is the picture in your head of how it is supposed to be.” ~Unknown

I expected to get into college. I expected to have a career after a lot of hard work, and that one day I’d meet a nice man and we would get married. We would buy our first house together and start a family, picking out a crib and the baby’s “going home” outfit and organizing a drawer full of diapers. We’d have more babies and go on vacations and grow old together.

I expected that one day I’d …

A First Aid Kit for When Life Falls Apart

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“What if pain—like love—is just a place brave people visit?” ~Glennon Doyle

It’s one of life’s greatest paradoxes: When life is easy, everything seems easy. When life is hard, everything seems hard.

This one keeps coming back to me and I keep trying to figure it out. Why do we end up in these spirals of “all good” or “all bad”? How can we get out of the “all bad” faster next time we get trapped? How can we help ourselves get out of there?

I’ve had periods in my life when all seemed lost. When I haven’t been able …

What to Say (and Not to Say) to Someone Who’s Grieving

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“Remember that there is no magic wand that can take away the pain and grief. The best any of us can do is to be there and be supportive.” ~Marilyn Mendoza

My mother, an articulate and highly accomplished writer, began to lose much of what she valued a few years ago. Her eyesight was compromised by macular degeneration, her hallmark youthful vigor was replaced with exhaustion, and many of her friends began to die. Finally, and cruelest of all, her memory began to go, slowly at first, and then with increasing speed.

Her struggle and her suffering in the last …

How to Enjoy the Holidays When Grieving the Loss of a Loved One

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This post contains an excerpt from GETTING GRIEF RIGHT: Finding Your Story of Love in the Sorrow of Loss, by Patrick O’Malley, PhD with Tim Madigan.

It was spring 1980 when my wife, Nancy, and I received some of the best news of our lives—she was pregnant with our first child.

On a Tuesday morning that September, we found ourselves sitting in her obstetrician’s office. Nancy, not due to deliver for three months, had been awakened the night before by a strange physical sensation.

She had wanted to get checked out, just to be safe. But after the examination …

Seeing Rejection As Redirection: What We Gain When We Lose

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“Every time I thought I was being rejected from something good, I was actually being re-directed to something better.” ~Steve Maraboli

Rejection hurts. Whether it is from family, friends, co-workers, or a new company, when we experience rejection it hits us right in the heart—the control center to our emotions.

We may wonder, what is wrong with me? We might begin pulling ourselves apart with self-criticism. However, rejection also has a way of teaching us, redirecting us, and ultimately making our lives better.

I have learned to look at rejection differently these past couple of years. Actually, many of …

6 Things My Heroes Taught Me About Overcoming Hard Times

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“A hero is an ordinary individual who finds the strength to persevere and endure in spite of overwhelming obstacles.” ~Christopher Reeve

It all happened so suddenly that it felt just like a flash flood. One minute the road was clear and drivable, and the next it was a raging river. Before I knew what happened, my life went from being only slightly a mess to being a complete mess, my car teetering on the edge of the water, ready to go for a swim at any minute.

I had left a job I liked and found a job I thought …

How a 10-Day Silent Retreat Helped Heal My Grieving Heart

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“In a retreat situation, you are forced to come face to face with yourself, to see yourself in depth, to meet yourself.” ~Lama Zopa Rinpoche

When I was at university, doing a ten-day silent Vipassana meditation retreat was considered a hardcore rite of passage only the toughest among us attempted. Those who lasted the distance referred to it as a “mind-blowing” and “life-changing” experience.

“Think of how you feel after an orgasm,” a friend said when I considered finally doing a Vipassana meditation retreat to reconnect with myself after a decade in full time employment. “Imagine feeling for two months …

To Be AND Not to Be: Honoring a Life Lost to Suicide

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“To be, or not to be—that is the question.” ~William Shakespeare

This Sunday marks one year since my friend took his own life. It both is and isn’t a big deal. It is in the sense that we like to commemorate things: one-year-old, one year at a new job, one year since 9-11, one year sober.

It isn’t in the sense that my to-do list that day includes “thaw and marinate chicken.”

When a person takes his own life, it creates a cosmic shift in the universe.

It also doesn’t.

The first few days after a person takes his own …

The Miscarriage: Why My Heart Feels Full In Spite of My Loss

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“Suddenly you’re ripped into being alive. And life is pain, and life is suffering, and life is horror, but my god you’re alive and it’s spectacular.” ~Joseph Campbell

They say all feelings have a beginning, a middle, and an end.

The truth is that I’m still in the middle part, but I felt like it was time to share this story with you—not just for me, but for all women who have faced this and for all women who have made a plan and then surrendered as the plan changed.

Two months ago, I had a miscarriage.

The pregnancy …

Lost Everything? 8 Tips to Help You Get Back on Your Feet

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“Tough times never last, but tough people do.” ~Robert H. Schuller

About two years ago, I was working in a professional career that I had been building for nearly twenty years.

I had been at my company for thirteen years, and had been generally commended and given positive reviews and regular bonuses and raises for most of that time.

I had just left a terrible and traumatic relationship, and due to two years of criticism, gaslighting, and conflict, was experiencing severe depression. I was on medication that made it hard for me to focus and which gave me anxiety …

How I Forgave What I Couldn’t Forget

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“Forgiving someone doesn’t mean that their behavior was ‘OK.’ What it does mean is that we’re ready to move on. To release the heavy weight. To shape our own life, on our terms, without any unnecessary burdens. Forgiveness is pure freedom—and forgiveness is a choice.” ~Dr. Suzanne Gelb

I remember the feeling of blood rushing through my veins, my head pounding, and my heart beating faster. Every time I remembered what happened, I either cried or felt a wave of depression. This guy was someone who’d hurt me in a way that I never thought would happen. His deeds …

Love Hurts: Buddhist Advice for the Heartbroken – Interview and Book Giveaway

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Note – The winners for this giveaway have been chosen. They are:

  • Jennifer Moore Hardesty
  • Margie Lynn
  • Dr. Mac
  • Ryan
  • RB
  • Justme
  • Rogério Cardoso
  • Fernanda Garza
  • Benjamin E. Nichols
  • Terri Cross

When you’re dealing with heartbreak, it can feel like the pain will never go away.

You may know, intellectually, that everything heals with time, but in that moment, when you’re suffering, it’s hard to hold onto hope.

Like all humans, I’ve experienced my fair share of loss, and I’ve felt scared, depressed, alone, betrayed, rejected, regretful, and angry—with other people, with myself, and with the world.

Losing someone or …

How Losing My Father Helped Me Become A Happier (and Better) Person

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“In every loss there is a gain, as in every gain there is a loss, and with each ending comes a new beginning.” ~Buddhist Proverb

Four years ago, on a typically cold and overcast day in upstate NY, I found myself scurrying around preparing for a two-week trip to Kenya and Tanzania, which left the next day.

My father, a strong and soft-spoken sixty-two year old, had aspired to experience the great plains and animals of east Africa since childhood, and was deeply proud that he was able to pay for me to accompany him on his bucket-list adventure.

Though …

When Life Feels Hard and Unfair: 4 Lessons That Helped Me Cope

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“Acceptance of what has happened is the first step to overcoming the consequences of any misfortune.” ~William James

Two years ago, I gave birth to my second daughter via a planned C-section at thirty-seven weeks.

My first daughter had been born via emergency C-section after seventeen hours of unmedicated labor. I had very much wanted a natural, intervention-free birth. Due to a number of issues, the surgery was so complicated that I was told it would be dangerous to ever go into labor, much less have a natural birth ever again.

Of course, this was devastating for me.

Still, I …

Surviving Loss: You Always Have Choice

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“I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions.” ~Stephen Covey

One ordinary night after an ordinary day of work and family, I went to bed a mother, wife, teacher, writer-person.

I remember falling asleep between sentences exchanged with my husband after an evening spent with just the two of us on our patio, something we rarely seemed to find the time to do in our busy lives. We promised each other that we’d make a concerted effort to have more of these “dates.”

The next morning, on what was supposed to be another …

To Fully Heal Your Broken Heart, Make Sure You Do This

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“Grief is healthy and it is healing.” ~Richard Moss

When I was a little girl there was this belief floating around in my head that there was only one person. One person who was my soulmate. One person who could love me. I think the belief was formed by some concoction of Disney movies, religion, and American culture.

What’s worse than this belief is that I somehow found myself afraid that I wouldn’t even have one person. I was afraid I would be alone. Forever.

I don’t know when I adopted the belief that I wasn’t enough, that I …

Coping with Suicide Loss: 9 Lessons for Hope and Healing

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“It takes courage to endure the sharp pains of self-discovery rather than choose to take the dull pain of unconsciousness that would last the rest of our lives.” ~Marianne Williamson

“That boy is one in a million, Jill. He’s one in a million.”

These were my grandfather’s words to my mum about my brother, Mitch, when he was just a kid. He really was one in a million—a light that shone so bright as a child and early teen, only to then fade into shadows of desperation and defeat as he grew into adulthood.

No one really knows what’s going …