Anniversary Dates and Memories

May 28, 2024 Mark

May 15th is my wedding anniversary. Donna and I were married May 15, 1983. This would be or is our 40th anniversary. Interesting that writing that exemplifies the struggle for me to use past tense or current tense. We're still married even if the line about till death do us part exists. Her death did not part us. In a way it brought us closer. The wound of grief allowed light in to me. I discovered more about me, us, and her as I slow walked my grief path.

Redemption Tour

November 27, 2023 Mark

Since Donna died I measured myself, her death, her love for me, and what it all means. I held the tape measure up to it all. I found solace in what was analysis. Not the raw emotions. It became exposition on my grief. Negligence to not till the soil of my loss to make what grows from that trauma grow. I thought I grew, changed, as I struggled.

4,384 Days: A Journey of Loss & Love Part II

August 26, 2023 Mark

So 4,384 days after Donna died and what I learned from her death and her being in my life. Donna is dead. Donna is not coming back. Donna I hope is waiting for me. I can join her at my will. She carried me here. I carried her here. My grief is there but so is all I've become and knowing what I've not become. That is what we had/have the difference between something that makes sense or something that makes you fall in love.

4,384 Days: A Journey of Loss & Love Part I

August 26, 2023 Mark

On August 7, 2011 Donna died in hospice. She entered hospice exactly 21 days prior. She was diagnosed with Stage IV cancer 938 days before her death. Or 22,512 hours.

August 7, 2011 was 10,311 days after we were married on May 15, 1983. We had 247,464 hours of marriage, love, and more.

This anniversary will be 4,384 days since her death. That is 105,216 hours of grief, memories, hurt, and learning.

Look Honey I Shrunk My Venn

July 10, 2022 Mark

If this was a Venn it's a Venn of two circles overlapping greatly. One circle was a widowed man of a certain age alone without meaning and purpose. The other circle was the grief community, my grief journey/work, and my desire to bring meaning to my loss and others loss.

Bounty and Famine My Bookends of Grief & Isolation

February 11, 2022 Mark

Quote is from an Ezra Klein Podcast with Ruth Ozeki and help craft this post

When Donna died I flayed at finding meaning and purpose. I never gave up trying. At this moment it seems that I've lost agency too. Agency over myself and all that I am doing with regard to my work/journey. A journey of musings without witnesses.

Discovery and Reflection

January 4, 2022 Mark

The shells and stones were whole at one time. Complete in their beauty and shape. They had purpose a reason to be where they were in the ocean. They held agency and gave agency. They existed as a whole in and of themselves without need to be connected nor engaged. They were complete and self actualized.

Blog Retrospective #2

November 11, 2021 Mark

Revisiting previous posts that remain valid, important, and meaningful today for those of us on a grief journey.

Blog Retrospective #1

November 5, 2021 Mark

I’ve been writing about my loss and my emotional response to among a bunch of other pieces and posts. I am taking a look back because perspective is everything.

The Fork In Road For My Grief Journey

June 21, 2021 Mark

As the world began to slowly opened up from the devastation of our collective pandemic life it became crystal clear the crushing effect of my isolation and grief for 16 months. I could not help to think this is similar to being boiled like a frog on a low simmer. Finally, I was done. Skin as raw as my emotions. My drive to create, build, and do was simply floating lifeless in the pot. Simmering.

Random acts of discovery or perhaps a divine intervention. A podcast that I am very fond of To The Best of Our Knowledge appeared in my peripheral life .

Grief Sucks & Sucks the Life Out of Us

April 22, 2021 Mark

Grief sucks. Just sucks. There’s data. Excellent clinical data that not only sucks the emotional life out of us. It sucks the actual life out of us in very biological ways. This post is my reading of an article by Ann Finkbeiner in the New York Times “What Happens in the Body During Grief”.

Discovering My Grief Voice

March 18, 2021 Mark

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It was joining HYWC that some profound changes/discoveries began.

I discovered I was not alone in my grief. Though writing and reading about the grief I knew I learned we all grieve and grieve differently. We are all in pain. We all want to share our story. Being among these HYWC wids I discovered. A brilliance of our shared grief. The Venn of our pain and hurt. How we all can learn, grow, and support others grieving.

My Grief: Devoured From Within Devoured From Without

January 12, 2021 Mark

This grief, my grief, occupies a vault within me. A compartment connected to all the other compartments in my mind and heart. This compartment leaks like a thatched roof in a monsoon memories to all parts of me. Around me the world at large. The world outside of the within me is my life as I know it. It's the outside compartments with less grief. More life sans meaning & purpose for me. This outside world devours me as well and has an equal effect on me as the grief within me.

A Love Song for Nora & Moe

December 21, 2020 Mark

The fiercest grief warriors you’ll meet Moe & Nora

Nora and Moe created a space a place where grief and loss and pain can thrive. Grief can have a life beyond the crushing sense of loss where it pulls relentless at you and breaks your every moment. Nora and Moe have taken grief out of the darkness and allowed it to be shared in a way that I and others have learned to live with it.

This is Interesting #27

December 18, 2020 Mark

Three quick references on grief. How to navigate being stuck, broken, and unmotivated after a loss. The death of a colleague can be devastating for all some great tips to help everyone. Amazing list of online support groups when you’re grieving.

Staying In My Grief Lane (aka Serenity Prayer)

November 16, 2020 Mark

There is that specter of hubris that chases me with relentless inquiries “Will you dance with me?” I won’t. Not because I’m smarter and more self actualized about all the psycho shit in my head. I just know I’m not worthy of hubris or self-actualized feels that says I am good either in my head or out loud.

Grief is A Möbius Strip

October 19, 2020 Mark

Loving myself has always been the bur under the saddle of self-worth. It was there poking at me and making my ride forward problematic. It was largely kept in check though sheer will and that I didn’t have to look at myself in relation to others. That damn do I measure up syndrome. Thank you the pandemic and isolation.

Animating My Grief Like a Pixar Film

October 7, 2020 Mark

There exists a ‘grief illiteracy’ in our collective lives. I would say with 20/20 hindsight the grief has animated my sense of loss which is new, a deeper understanding of Donna and what love is, the sincere wish I could share what I am learning and doing with others in the same state of shit.

This is Interesting #25

September 23, 2020 Mark

Three great reads on grief 1. Surge Capacity our ability to survive stresses faced in Covid times. This works for grief 2. A review of yogi Shabkar work in loss and grief. Important. 3 Pandemic & Isolation so much written but this is is clear applicable to our grief.

My Grief ABC's: Part I

September 13, 2020 Mark

Following Donna’s death I examined my loss and my grief relentlessly. Closure was never an option. Closure is indifference. Closure is denial said pretty. Closure ignores who Donna was and who she is within me. In my grief journey/work I’ve discovered three domains. We all grieve differently and each of our grief journeys are entirely unique. I attacked my grief hard and discovered its purpose and meaning for me. My wound of grief allowed light to enter.