My Aunt Kathy just celebrated her 30th wedding anniversary. This is a significant event for anyone, but particularly significant for my aunt and “bonus” uncle, Monty, because my aunt had some doubts about the marriage before it even started. You see, my aunt was a 30-something year old widow at the time, raising a small child.Continue reading “Grab Life”
Tag Archives: widowhood
You Can Make it
Christmas week. It’s a tough week for all of us on this widowhood journey, but especially those in the beginning. This will be my 4th Christmas without my husband, and it is still hard. But I’m here to tell you it does get better. I’m here to remind you that your grief will change eventually and one day, you willContinue reading “You Can Make it”
Going West to Find Joy
As she did each evening, Sue Moak sat on the front porch of her home in the rural Texas Hill Country. She and her husband, Rickie, had bought the land and built what they planned as their retirement home. But Rickie died suddenly at age 61, nearly two years before. “I looked down the longContinue reading “Going West to Find Joy”
Ripping Off the Band Aid
It began with a pumpkin cream muffin. I was meeting a friend in a new coffee shop. I hadn’t had lunch and was hoping they had sandwiches. But all they had were baked goods. The tasty treats came from a sandwich shop and bakery in another town, one Dale and I used to frequent aContinue reading “Ripping Off the Band Aid”
The Changes we Embrace and Those we Don’t
“The only constant in life is change”-Heraclitus. In widowhood, there is the change we didn’t choose, obviously. But there is also the changes we do choose to make and even embrace. Early in my widowhood, I either read or was advised in group to make some small changes in “our” home, the idea is to begin the processContinue reading “The Changes we Embrace and Those we Don’t”
Softening the Quiet
It’s the quiet that sometimes bothers me the most. When my mom became a widow, I noticed she had started keeping the television on all the time. Before my dad died, she was alone many hours a day while he worked two jobs, but she never had the television on during the day. I nowContinue reading “Softening the Quiet”