This Sunday was a beautiful winter day in Hawaii with the temperature in the 70’s and the sky blue with white, puffy clouds. I facilitated a meeting of the Grief and Happiness Alliance that went so well. The meeting felt good. I felt that each participant had been touched in a way that brought them comfort. That was my goal.
After the meeting I heard a gut-wrenching sound from outside. My dear friend from across the street was yelling at her dog to stop, and the next sound I heard was of her agony. I rushed to her side in the street where she knelt with her precious dog. Neighbors ran out to help, and I snapped into emergency mode like I had done so many times as an EMT on ambulance calls to accidents. We worked together to dispatch the dog and the family to the emergency veterinarian, when just like that, all the people were gone, and I was alone in the street. As the adrenalin wore off, I saw that I had a job to do. I couldn’t have my friends come home to the scene on the road, so I got out my hose and broom.
All too soon they were back home without the one who had been their constant, loving companion. We sat together sharing that tremendous immediate grief, with tears, hugs, and Kleenex. Feeling like my breath had been taken away, I eventually went home. I was shaking and struggling to not fall apart. When this grief hit, my past grief and trauma came flooding back to me. I couldn’t sleep that night with the inflammation that comes with stress causing everything to hurt. Finally, at 4 AM, I gave up trying to sleep, but my thoughts wouldn’t stop. I always start my morning practice with meditation, but this morning I couldn’t get started with that.
I knew I had to do something, so I got out my journal and my words flowed on to the page. I wrote, and wrote, and wrote. As I finished with one thought, another started that needed to be revealed. I don’t know how long I wrote, but the writing gradually slowed till I knew it was time to stop. As the writing slowed, so did my breath and my tension. I felt the physical release of my muscles being able to relax. I did some slow, conscious breathing and felt a lightness and peace enter my being and was so relieved.
When I help others with grief, I suggest different forms of writing because I know how much it helps. With the writing I did with this experience, I discovered profound comfort that I don’t know I could have found any other way. This reinforced for me not only the importance of writing to deal with grief, but also the necessity of it. And writing can be used at any time with grief from anticipatory grief to the grief that pops us years after the initial cause.
What I wrote in my journal was not for anyone else to see, and I doubt that I will go back and read it. The cleansing that came from that writing was so powerful that I was able to allow myself to shift away from the disabling thoughts my monkey mind was screaming, to the quiet of the peace that comes with acceptance. I will always miss that precious dog. He visited me often and was part of my Ohana, the Hawaiian word for family.
The good news here is that we can all move through initial trauma by practicing the best self-care. And writing out your feelings is a great way to get started.
Get your Awaken Your Happiness Journaling Guide at no charge by clicking here: https://www.griefandhappiness.com/pl/2147595767
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You can order Loving and Living Your Way Through Grief by clicking here at Amazon:
https://www.amazon.com/Loving-Living-Your-Though-Grief/dp/1642504823/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1658356016&sr=8-1
You can listen to my podcast, Grief and Happiness, here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/loving-and-living-your-way-through-grief-with/id1509589686?i=1000535381763
You can order the International Best Selling book in 9 countries that I wrote a chapter in, Ignite Forgiveness, here:
