6 Months of Grief Project: Day 29

Olive & I enjoy a rainy evening.

This is Day 29 of my #6MonthsOfGrief Project. To learn more about this practice, feel free to visit Day One, where I explain this project in more detail.

Today I spent the day in Sausalito with a friend I have known since we were 15-years-old. I have noticed that after my husband died, I started to need to be with people who knew me before I met him. I need to re-connect with the person I was before I became a wife. I need to remember that I once lived on my own and was completely independent. I need to remember that my life is not over, because my husband is dead.

Being with my friend of almost 3 decades (and her precious dog, Olive) was so soothing to my soul. It's a blustery, rainy day, so we stayed in and watched the wild waves of the Bay outside her window and ate good BBQ and laughed and watched one of the best movies ever made, 9 to 5. I like that I am smiling in today's picture. Laughter and rest can be part of grief.

What are ways you can get out of your day-to-day routine and find a bit of unexpected joy in your grief process?

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I am very aware that this project can bring up a lot around yours or other's grief and loss, I will always follow every post with some online grief support resources that have helped me. Please feel free to let me know of online support that you have found healing in your grief, as well:

Art with Grief:

• Photographer [Sarah Treanor] Takes Moving Self-Portraits to Cope with Her Fiance's Death by Jillian Wong

• Self-Portraits: Expressing Emotion Through Art on What's Your Grief?

• The Hard Romance of Grief by Mark Liebenow

• The poetry of John O’Donohue

Resources for Widows:

• Camp Widow

• Soaring Spirits International

Living with Grief Resources:

• Grief Bibliography on Grief Healing

• Teresa “TL” Bruce's What to Say When Someone Dies
• They Brought Cookies: For A New Widow, Empathy Eases Death's Pain by Ann Finkbeiner on NPR
• A Field Guide to Getting Lost by Rebecca Solnit

• Megan Devine’s Refuge in Grief

• The Geography of Sorrow: Francis Weller on Navigating Our Loses, interviewed by Tim McKee in Sun Magazine

• How to Be a Friend in Deed by Bruce Feiler in the New York Times

• 12 Things to Know About the First Year of Grieving Someone You Can’t Live Without by Laurie Costanza in Elephant Magazine

And remember, I am sharing this project on a variety of platforms, including my Instagram, Twitter, & Facebook feeds, as well as my Pinterest page on Grief. I use the hashtag #6MonthsOfGrief, so it can easily be found on any platform. Please share this project with anyone you think might need it.

Thank you, and see you tomorrow.