6 Months of Grief Project: Day 54

Exhausted

This is Day 54 of my #6MonthsOfGrief Project. To learn more about this practice, feel free to visit Day One, where I explain this project in more detail.

I'm gearing up for a big change in my life, so I'm trying to get all my big projects and last dregs of widow paperwork completed. This frenzy of activity combined with the anxiety and insomnia that comes with grief has made me completely exhausted. I think at this point, I may have some form of adrenal fatigue, and I have been trying to care for my body and get things back on track so I can be strong and awake and healthy as this next chapter of my life begins. 

My good friend has also been going through a series of surgeries for his cancer, and my worry for his health has taken its toll on my body and mind as well. He's got two surgeries completed, with just one more left to do and he's been recovering beautifully. He also surprised the doctors with having extra muscles in his neck that have not been seen in any anatomy book! I feel relieved that he's doing okay and I'm also realizing the toll that my worry about him has taken on me. 

I'm trying to be very gentle with myself, but that takes a level of self-love and self-care that has always been difficult for me at the best of times, let alone when I am in deep grief. So for now, I try to get extra rest and take care of my body, while still knocking things off my to-do list. It's a difficult balance and I'm doing my best.

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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
• When the Fall Comes, a film about Grief by Adriana Marchione
• 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:

• Modern Loss's excellent resource list
• 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.