Tag: Faith
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Why God?
Why God? That question has been weighing heavy on my mind as my eyes were fixated on the news of the flooding in Texas over the holiday weekend. So many lives lost, whole families, those beautiful Camp Mystic souls. All gone forever. Too many losses we will never be able to accept. It’s natural to…
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I Am Not Alone
Last night I sat in a stranger’s living room, gathered with a group of women who had one thing in common. We have all lost our spouses. It was the monthly meeting of our widow’s group. A time to gather, enjoy food, share stories, and lift each other up. Sometimes I’m angry on the drive…
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Storm warning
It was March 2001 when I moved in with my husband Joe. Just a few months later we were in the middle of tornado season in Oklahoma. Our closet was the hidey hole when the spring weather got crazy. One year, for my birthday, we set out to buy a sauna and came home with…
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In loving memory
Words are pouring out of me this week. It’s kind of a momentous week. My mom’s birthday was today, and the anniversary of my dad’s death is tomorrow. Two years my dad has been gone. He went on hospice the day before her birthday, but he waited until the day after to leave us. I…
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Against the wind
Sometimes this grief is like a strong wind blowing me back against my own steps. Some days I feel as if I am making progress. Other days I feel like I am standing still. It’s exhausting walking into the wind. It steals all of your energy and sometimes steers you in the wrong direction, until…
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It’s okay to be okay
Throughout my grief journey many people have told me “It’s okay to not be okay”, and they were right. There are no rules when it comes to grief. Someone came up with the stages of grief a very long time ago (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance). And all those things do happen, but they don’t…
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Blessings in the storm
This week I have been reminded that, while life doesn’t always go the way we plan, there is always something to be grateful for. I was also reminded that grief can magnify the small problems and make them feel much larger than they are. My “storm” this week was superficial at best. I wrecked my…
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Can you say published?
I’m so excited to announce that most of this blog and all of the handwritten letters to my Joe have been published and are now available in paperback for all the book lovers out there. I honestly can’t wait to get my own copy. I’m a book lover myself! Order from Amazon here https://a.co/d/590LM6K, and…
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You are not alone
I’ve learned so much about myself in the last seven months. So much about grief, life, acceptance, and hope. Yes, hope. Death is the only thing in this life that is guaranteed. We will all die. But when it happens to someone in the prime of their life it’s so much harder to accept. Watching…
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Bloom
Easter is upon us. A time for rebirth, new life. Not just Christ’s rebirth, but everything around us as well. The flowers and the trees are coming alive again after lying dormant for so many months. I can’t help but think God planned it so his Son would rise again just as His Creation would…
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Learning to walk again
I wish I wasn’t someone who was tied to dates and calendars the way I am. It’s the nature of my job as an executive assistant. And the nature of my personality as an organizer, the scheduler of all things. An attribute that is also one of my biggest faults. It’s been six months since…
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Sending me angels
I spent my morning hanging out at home, doing nothing in particular. I had plans later with our friends Jeff & Lisa for an afternoon of Scrabble. As I was getting ready, an overwhelming sense of grief came over me and my tears would not stop. I knew I needed to move, to get out…
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Babe
My dear friend Jennifer came over on Monday. She brought us dinner, and we talked for hours about love and life, grief and survival. She understands exactly where I am because she walked this very path eight years ago after losing her husband Roger. Roger & Joe’s circumstances surrounding their deaths were very similar. She…
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Music heals the soul
One of the greatest things Joe & I leaned on during his cancer battle was worship music. Music spoke to us in ways that scripture couldn’t, in ways that preachers didn’t. Cancer initially reignited our faith out of fear, but as the journey continued that fear was replaced with hope and our faith grew stronger…
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Dear God . . .
Do you struggle with your faith? I feel like my faith is as strong as it’s ever been. I have no doubts about my salvation, no doubt that Joe and my parents are in heaven, and we will be reunited again someday. God’s unfailing love is a comfort to me. But my emotions, my feelings…
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Better days
I am just over the four-month mark since losing my Joe. My brain seems to be working better now. I didn’t even realize the fog I’d been in. Grieving clouds everything. Imagine if you will a veil over your head. One that allows a small amount of light in, but nothing is clearly visible. Sounds…
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Somewhere in the sunshine
I firmly believe those who have gone before us having the ability to send us signs. Joe has sent me more than a few since he passed away last September. I love receiving messages from him in the form of a seashell in an unusual place, glitter from 20 years ago, or an extra snuggle…
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Day full of gratefulness
The last few weeks have been such a challenge for me. Between illness and the lack of sunshine, my spirits were truly at the bottom of the barrel. This morning I got up and drove over to my mother-in-law’s house to pick her up for church. The fog was thick most of the way there.…
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This ain’t nothin’
Boy, the pity party has been raging around here for days! It started when what I thought was a cold jumped into high gear two nights ago. I tried to sleep in the living room, sitting upright because I couldn’t breathe or stop coughing when I laid down. Instead, I was up all-night. It wasn’t…
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Have I told you lately?
Over the past four months I’ve had a lot of people ask me what happened to my Joe. I can clinically explain the details. He went into sudden cardiac death at home. We got him back thanks to CPR. In ICU he was put into a medically induced coma on a respirator. They attempted to…
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In dreams
I finally dreamt about Joe last night! This is the first time I’ve seen him in my dreams at night. He visited me once during a nap one afternoon when I fell asleep in the living room chair. That one was brief, and sweet, and almost like a flashback from the beginning of our relationship.…
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This side of heaven
A friend sent me this song the other day. If there was ever a song that explains exactly how I feel every single day, this is it. How will this side of heaven ever feel right without my Joe? My friend and I had a long conversation about loss. She is no stranger to it.…
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Grief in a group
Well, I did it. I joined a new grief group, and my first meeting was tonight. It was held in a church across town. I was apprehensive because the last time I attempted this the meeting was at my parent’s old church and it was practically empty. Two of the three participants were in their…
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I’ll rise up, just not today.
Anyone that knows me knows I’m not the kind of person to give up. It’s not in my nature. I even have this song as my alarm on my phone. Every morning I wake up to these words: Rise Up And some mornings I throw my phone across the room and bury my head under…
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Don’t give up on me yet
I woke up this morning in a new year. A year Joe will never know. I’ve mentioned before how hard all of this is for me because I don’t know how to do nothing. I’ve always been a doer. I’ve always been a fixer. When Joe was sick with cancer, I did so much research.…
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Easy come, hard go
As the year comes to a close, all I can do is keep moving forward. This grief still knocks me to my knees and makes it so hard to breathe. I’ll try to exhale all the stress and sadness 2023 ushered in and pray for the coming year to be filled with a peace that…
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Wasted time
Today pretty much just sucks. I’m working from home (thank goodness) because the tears can’t seem to stop. The sadness is heavy today. I can’t stop questioning why. Why were we able to spend so many years being so happy, going through unbelievably hard struggles together (cancer and the death of parents) and surviving them,…
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Last thing I needed first thing this morning.
It’s been exactly three months since my Joe left this world. September 22nd at 1:07am. Twelve weeks missing half of my heart. Ninety days without my soulmate. 2,160 hours lost in grief. 129,600 minutes of loneliness. Sometimes it feels like moments ago, and sometimes it feels like a lifetime ago. It was over seven million…
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The weight of my world
Ever since Joe was diagnosed with cancer back in 2017, I wrestled with the thought of “giving it to God”. I’m kind of a control freak. And I never could completely hand my struggles over to Him. I always hung on to just enough to make me think I was still in control, when clearly…
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I Believe
Have you ever wondered if God controls all the things that happen to us? Does He create the bad things, like cancer and catastrophic events? Or does He just use those events to shape and guide us, to bring us closer to Him? I ask this question because sometimes I struggle with the why of…
WidowSpeak - Random thoughts after losing my husband 