HUG Corner: Thought for the Week 4/9/18
April 9, 2018
Healing After Loss (Martha Whitmore Hickman)
“Recovery is not a process we can will, but consists of experiencing many small deaths, the passing of significant anniversaries, until our identity is solid and natural in the pronoun ‘I'”.
-Mary Jane Moffat
“Do you remember how it was those first weeks and months after your loved one died? The first time you went to the grocery store? The first time you changed the furnace filter? The first time you went to the movies? Nothing was too insignificant to note. And, of course, the milestones like birthdays and Christmas shouted their warning weeks ahead of time.
And then, perhaps after months, perhaps after years, you feel like a whole person again. The hurt is still there, but it has become part of your inner self. You no longer feel as though part of your own being has been torn away and that everything bumps against that open wound.
I knew a significant change had occurred for me when, upon being asked, “How many children do you have?” I said, “I have three sons,” and didn’t need to add, “I had a daughter who died.” That was still integral to me, but I didn’t need to say it every time.
I will trust this process to unfold in its own time.”