It’s summertime and everyone is vacationing and posting their happy family photos on social media. Meanwhile for those who are grieving you may not even be able to contemplate vacationing and having fun. That’s perfectly alright. It is your journey. However, vacations and grief can go together.
Getting out into the world and opening yourself up to life and what the world has to offer while traveling can a great advance in your grief journey. Staying at home doing the same thing can be dulling to the senses. So what did Jeni and I experience and learn through vacations and grief? Read our stories below.
Jeni’s story ~
When we met our children in 2006, Bob and I had dreams of building our family and that included family vacations. Little did we expect Bob to leave us in November of 2007 before we had any opportunities to vacation as a family together. From July of 2006 until February of 2007, we were busy with the task of becoming a family and finalizing the adoption process. The summer of 2007, we did venture to Kentucky for a family reunion where our children met my grandparents, cousins (including some visiting from Australia) and other relatives. However, this was our only trip outside of adoption related ventures that we were able to make. November of 2007, we lost Bob. How was I going to be able to travel with the kids and unite us as a family?
When Bob died, I was driving a Malibu and he had a full bed, double cab pick up truck. Soon after his death, the transmission in my Malibu fell out and I had to begin driving the truck. I hated it and made the decision to buy a vehicle more conducive for our family to drive and to vacation. The kids told me that they had been to Tennessee and it was a place where Bob and I had vacationed or stopped at different locations while vacationing. So, I decided to take the kids to Tennessee. I would let them show me what they knew of the state and I would take them to see the places that their dad and I had visited and enjoyed on our journeys.
So, I bought a minivan, packed up the kids and rented a cabin in Tennessee. We visited the aquarium in Chattanooga that their dad and I had enjoyed and then we went to Pigeon Forge where we went to Dollywood and a variety of other locations in the area. We went to museums, Parrot Mountain and just enjoyed ourselves as we shared with each other things we remembered from our past. It was difficult to do without Bob by my side, but it helped to bring my little family together and bond us together by sharing things that we all enjoyed.
My advice–find something that brings you joy now or brought you joy back then and then allow yourself to explore. Jeni
Teresa’s story ~
The first vacation after my first husband, Kris, was killed in a motorcycle accident in October was the following March. My two boys and I planned a mini vacation during spring break. As a family we always did something over spring break. None of us wanted to travel far or do anything much. We decided to head to nearby amusement park and just have some fun away from the house. At this point in our lives I was a newly single mom raising two angry teenage boys. Challenging would be an understatement for what it was like attempting to vacation together as never before. My objective was to bring about a little normalcy and forward movement for us all. We opted to spend one night away and go to the amusement park for the day.
Honestly, the trip was pretty awful for me emotionally at the time. My fun, happy and goofy riding buddy wasn’t there. How was I to have fun? I didn’t want to ride rides alone. The kids swapped off who would ride alone and we rode a few as a family but, in the end the boys wanted to go to do their thing. I’m pretty sure I wasn’t a barrel of fun to be around. I was left adrift while the boys tore off to have fun. I had no idea how to entertain myself while they rode rides. I had never been alone at an amusement park before. I had always been surrounded by friends or Kris I was stunned at how isolated I felt among thousands of happy smiling people. I remember seeing the joyous families and happy couples. I felt very alone, sad, and lonely. I got pretty weepy and took a time out in the bathroom to have a good cry. Afterwards, I sucked it up and determined that I could do this. I got a beer and wandered aimlessly in the shops and to shows we had never been to before. I pretended to have a great time for the boys sake. We had dinner and collapsed in the hotel room. The next day we left for home having checked off the box for first vacation without Kris. On a whim I stopped at the Snake Farm. We had always wanted to stop there but never seemed to have time or it wasn’t open. The boys acted like little kids goofing around. We all laughed and really did have a good time. I was finally happy and it didn’t suck being together as a family on vacation. That first family mini vacation was really hard but I was glad we did it and it was a huge milestone for us. We all moved forward, we laughed as a family again and loved each other. We learned we could do this thing called have fun as a family again.
I’ve written more in my blog on the topic of vacations and grief if you want to see how I’ve progressed with vacations and grief. Teresa
Our hope for you
We hope that our stories on vacations and grief provide you with hope and awareness. Remember grief is a journey and it is your personal journey. We have discovered that travel and vacations can be a great way to heal, move forward, a find some peace along your journey. You can also do something in honor of your loved one on vacation or you can reconnect with old friends and families.
Vacations and grief can to together and can be of great comfort, peace, and healing. Here’s to your courage to travel and may you find peace, comfort, and healing in your journeys.
Have you found travel or vacations helpful in your journey? If so, we’d love to hear from you. Please share your thoughts with us.
If you or someone you know find this useful or thought provoking, please click like, share, comment – help us get the word out.
Love & Blessings,
Jeni & Teresa
P.S. Torn in Half News 
Jeni and I are writing a book from our blog series and would like to invite our readers to offer subjects, topics or items you want us to blog about and/or include in our book. The intention is to produce a useful resource and workbook for widows and widowers.Please send us your book topics and subjects.
