6 Months of Grief Project: Day 155

Deflated (photo by Tracy Cunningham)

This is Day 155 of my #6MonthsOfGrief Project. To learn more about this practice, feel free to visit Day One, where I explain this project in more detail.

Summer is here. I used to love summer, because there are more opportunities to be in water, which is my absolute favorite place to be. But now summer is a reminder of the tragedy that has befallen my life. Facebook likes to remind me of past events, and it's starting to show me pictures of this time last year, which was the last month my husband was alive. There are pictures of us in Calistoga, celebrating my birthday. There are pictures of the new bikini that my husband excitedly picked out for me. I am so happy in all the photos, because it is summer and I am in water and I am with my love.

Now it is summer again. My birthday is looming. The one-year anniversary of his death is also looming. I tread carefully out into the bright sun, holding back the tears. Friends invite me to swim in their pools and I am so grateful that they are willing to have me in their space, even though I may burst into tears at any moment. 

Do you remember Moxie the Unicorn? Don't worry, she's okay. She just partied too hard and needed a rest. This is me putting her to bed after a fun day of frolicking in water. It's good to play. It's good to rest.

__________________________

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:

• Filmmaker Gemma Green Hope made a short animation in memory of her grandmother 
• Photographer Sarah Treanor Takes Moving Self-Portraits to Cope with Her Fiance's Death
• 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:

• Open to Hope: Finding Hope After Loss
• Widowed Village
• Camp Widow

• Soaring Spirits International

Living with Grief Resources:

• What Joe Biden Has Said About Dealing With Personal Tragedy And Grief
• Death, Grief & Shattered Assumptions
• Stifled Grief: How the West Has It Wrong
• How Grief Can Make You Sick
• What's Your Grief?
• The Grief Geek
• Modern Loss's excellent resource list
• The writings of Tim Lawrence
• The Rules of Grief are for Other People by Shawn Doyle on The Good Men Project
• 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 Losses, 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.