Why You Shouldn’t Tell a Widow to Move On

One thing I have learned in my 20+ months of widowhood is that a lot of people feel the need to tell a widow to “move on” with her life. I haven’t come across this personally, but I know an alarming amount of widows and widowers who do experience this. So I’m taking the opportunity […]

Cleaning Out the Closet

I consider going to therapy a lot like cleaning out a closet. When you start therapy, more often than not you’re going in to a big mess of emotions and emotional problems. Just like having a messy closet. The first step is just pulling everything out and looking at what you’re up against. This is […]

A Look at Growth

I have reached a point in my journey where the amount of effort and work that I put into my healing is starting to show and it is starting to pay off. My growth has become glaringly obvious since I have started my new job. I want to take the time to show exactly where […]

Trying to Embrace the New

The theme of major transition continues for me. This time, I am being dealt a positive transition. I have landed a new job. It’s exactly what I was looking for. This is also my first full time, permanent position since graduating college. I haven’t had a ton of work experience since finishing school back in […]

Why is year two so hard?

For those of you who don’t know, year two of widowhood is brutal. And I want to explore this concept, I have spent more time thinking about this than I would like to admit. When I first joined the online group Hot Young Widows Club (which I have mentioned before), I noticed that a lot […]

Old Cove Road Podcast

I am so thrilled to announce that I participated in the podcast Old Cove Road! You can give it a listen here (my episode that I am a participant in is Write For Your Life, but I urge you to listen to all of the episodes, Chris and his guests do a great job). Please […]

What Emotional Rebuilding Looks Like From the Inside

Today I have felt so many different emotions, it’s all over the map and extremely rapid. I am a weird combination of clear/lucid along with feeling like it’s hard to pin my thoughts down. I’m physically and emotionally exhausted. Excited and defeated. Feeling hopelessly trapped but also feeling like I’m running down the path to […]

Fighting for Normalcy

I feel like the process of rebuilding my life seems to happen in waves, or cycles. I don’t like using the term steps, steps indicates that it’s all a forward motion and that isn’t the case. Remember, healing and rebuilding is not a linear process. That last sentence was more for myself than anyone. I […]

It’s a Battle

Mental illness can be so frustrating. It has its own schedule. It has its own rules. It doesn’t care if you’re doing well. It doesn’t care about anything. It just eats at you. I have been doing really well lately (which is a factor in my lack of posts lately, I’ve been trying to just […]

Healing Is Not Linear

If you’re going through a major loss or trauma (or both, in my case), the healing process unfortunately is not a linear one. I’m going to go with a “nerdy” analogy here and compare it to The Lord of the Rings movies. Parts of their journey include safe, cheerful moments. Other parts are intense and […]