The pain of grief is real. The pain of losing someone you love is intense. It can be like losing a part of yourself. Or that self is in pieces so it seems easier, maybe even safer, to build a wall around your heart so you can never, ever hurt again. In a “What’s Your…
Let’s spend our time together this month looking at ways to help yourself in this time of fear, grief and loss. We can call it self-care or showing yourself compassion. I like the phrase self-kindness. It’s something we all need to give ourselves during a difficult, exhausting walk in the shadow of hurt and sorrows.…
At the end of my “Food for Thought” in May, I invited you to stay connected to yourself and others during this pandemic time. I was thinking about how it’s important we give ourselves permission to, “Take good care of yourself. And others.” To find new meaning in sharing losses and being a witness to…
Dear Friends, I, too, am going to chat for a while with you, following in the footsteps of the compassionate and thoughtful Food for Thought from April 2020 written by Judy Hanson. Please don’t let the social distancing from others due to the virus also distance you from yourself and “what’s going on within you…
Dear Friends, I have decided to forgo the usual format and chat with you for a while. Grieving can be lonely, and these can be very lonely times to grieve. With new social distancing our physical closeness – once a source of human solidarity – now comes with a high risk of spreading infection. Many…
Grief has often been related to a harsh winter – freezing our very being – mind, body, and soul. It comes uninvited and unwelcome. We struggle to breathe, to do, to live. Winter compels the earth and the trees, flowers, some animals to rest. It stops growth, for a while, while much lies dormant. Does…
Do you remember the first time you jumped into a chilly swimming pool or a cold lake? (I bet some of us are shivering right now at the thought.) Remember that immediate sense that you really don’t want to be there? This past week I was meeting with a few other therapists who specialize in…
Yes, we have made it through Christmas, or Hanukkah or Kwanzaa, or just celebrating because that is what we do. “The most wonderful time of the year.” Really? I have had so many people tell me that is not true, and it is hurtful to try to encourage everyone to accept that myth. For many…