After the death of my husband, Kris, I remember hearing that with the words new normal. I railed at that idea. New Normal – there wasn’t such a thing.
I denied this thing called new normal and “moving on”. There was never going to be a new normal ever going to happen in my life. I ran from accepting the fact I was a widow and single mother.
NOPE. I flat out refused to accept. I stayed firmly put in the other stages swirling around in denial anger and bargaining for a long while.
In looking back it was about a year. The raw facts of grief moved me into a sneaky depression that I didn’t know was depression at the time. I was raised by the queen of denial so that is a familiar comfortable place to hang out. I eventually had to move forward to survive. If you want to know the entire story, check out Soul Love: How A Dog Taught Me to Breathe Again – my memoir of the grief journey I took to breathe and live again.
Sure, there were moments of raw acknowledgement of this loss, I’m all alone and this sucks, where’s the boy’s dad, where’s my best friend. Accepting this fact was far from where I was.
We are at the end of our Let’s Talk About the Grief Journey and Stages topics — Acceptance and our last story. Remember this is a journey with many hills and valleys. The stages are NOT linear and we don’t stop grieving when we begin to feel acceptance. Click here for a review of the stages . This complicated journey you may feel all or none of the stages in 5 minutes or 5 months. It’s all in your own time.
How did I get to acceptance?
The quick answer is through support, a grief group and counseling. Plus time to process my grief and all of the feelings that went with it.
There were some epiphany moments of “I’ve got to get help and I’ve got to figure out how to live” that moved me forward into the beginning stages of acceptance. The other stages of grief are important and take the time you need in them processing your grief. There’s no right or wrong way. Accepting is NOT forgetting or pushing the grief away. It’s accepting this fact and allowing yourself to live fully again.
I help support people in grief and work with them to find acceptance. Here’s how we know your starting to accept this awful reality of being a widow and single again. Acceptance starts out fleeting minute by minute until you finally are there for more time than not.
- The start: When you can write down “I’m a widow/widower. Or maybe if someone asks, you can squeak out a yes. That’s the start of acceptance.
- When you can look at yourself in the mirror and say out loud, “I’m a widow/widower.” or “_____ is dead” and for a few seconds not cry or dry heave. Keep doing this until you can say it and not have a visceral reaction.
- When you can talk about being a widow/widower openly.
- When you pick your head up out of the miasma of grief and say, OK, what’s next or I’m ready to live again.
- You are willing to look at the next steps and accept the fact there IS indeed a new normal and life has forever changed. Here’s a link to my story on new normal.
- Keep a journal – especially a gratitude journal.
- Daily thank God/Universe for what you are grateful for. There is something to be thankful and grateful for each day, even the hard stuff. That’s what makes you resilient.
When to seek help is an article we wrote. Sooner vs. later. Support, grief groups, counseling, coaching, spiritual guides are a great way to get support and help work through the stages of grief. Notice I said work, it is work and won’t happen unless you apply yourself to this.
If you are still having a challenge finding acceptance and it’s been over a year, it may be time to get additional support and seek a professional.
If you have Thoughts of suicide – Get help immediately – call 911 or the US. National suicide hotline 1-800-273-8255
Suicide Online Chat: https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/chat/
http://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/
Looking for more information about grief, stages, support? Check out our Resources page or send us an email.
May you find Peace as you journey through this path.
Teresa Bitner
P.S. Please help spread the word, about the Torn in Half GoFundMe we created in order to increase the reach and effectiveness of this blog. Please help us help others by either contributing or by sharing this request with others. No amount is too small!
Thank you in advance! Jeni & Teresa
