Widows Support, Coaching for Widows

Do you remember the exhaustion you felt when your new baby was about eighteen months?  When she was waking up at 4 AM ready to play, thrilled to be alive and expecting that you were in a similar frame of mind even though you had only gotten four hours of sleep?

We have a new puppy. So I guess that is all there is to say about that.

Her name on Saturday, was Little Bear. So very cuddly.

On Sunday, it was Bear. We were up three times the previous night.

On Monday, it was The Howler. She hates the car. Anneke and I ended up with splitting headaches in the five minutes it took to get home from the vet.

On Tuesday it was, for a moment, Bad Dog. But just for a moment, until I retrieved my Pashmina Scarf from her puppy clutches.

Wednesday, it was Cujo.  She does not like the sound of the shower at all. I got a full view of  her many itty bitty puppy teeth and what I think was her epiglottis, through the shower curtain, as I was washing my hair and blocking my ears at the same time. It was scary.

Thursday, her name was Good Puppy. She stopped howling after an ear-splitting 7 minutes in the car. The point was that she stopped.

Right now, she is again, Little Bear. She is sleeping.  Her head rests on a Beanie Baby Bear, and honestly, she looks angelic. I could eat her up.  I love her.

I don’t remember being so tired with Debs, our faithful poodle of twelve years. It seemed easier. Smoother. Quieter. Easier.

Oh yeah, that’s right. We were two parents back then.

This blog is a warning. Most of you won’t need it.

But for the few of you who are considering a new puppy to sooth yourself after a wicked break up (oh right, that’s what I’m doing) I have a few words for you.

1. I suggest a maternity-leave-type situation. This is WORK.

2. Earplugs. Bose sells Noise Canceling Earphones for a mere $299 and I am seriously considering a pair.

3. Your sixteen-year-old may love the cuddling…but she will be very un-fond of using the pooper-scooper no matter what she commits to ahead of time.  Whatever you do, don’t believe her. Love her, but don’t believe her.

4. And finally, although you probably don’t need reminding, everything is harder with only one parent, absolutely everything.

Please tell me how it is, that after nine years, a boyfriend or two, and now a new puppy, that I am still surprised  that ‘we’ are a ‘me’?

Little Bear, cute and cuddly and funny and full of life, reminds me that she is my responsibility, not our responsibility and that the buck stops with me.

I know I should know this by now, and I do. Most days, I am OK with it.

But I still don’t understand it.

Oh, I know how it happened, the day-to-day decline… But I don’t get THAT it happened. It makes no sense.

Maybe, it will never make sense. I expect that it won’t.

In the meantime, I follow this cuddly ball of fur around, Oxy Solution Carpet Stain Remover in hand, knowing that for a while at least, she occupies some of that space in my brain that tends to think just a little too much.

Mie Elmhirst    Coaching and Support for Widows

Call 508-540-4421 to schedule a free sample session.

“It is so much more that losing your husband.” This description of widowhood was from my first client  this morning.

“What do you mean, MORE than losing your husband?” you may ask. “Isn’t widowhood about losing him? Your husband? How could it be more than that? ”

Well, losing him is the start of widowhood. It is what makes you a widow, it is why the world calls you a widow, and it is what the world believes you are grieving.

And, you are grieving him.

But a widow grieves a great deal more.

She grieves the changed nature of everything around her. She grieves the fact that the adorable 4 year-old trick-or-treaters will not seem funny this year, the loss of her family Christmas’s as they should have been, the loss of shared cups of coffee, dinners for two, arguments and making up, barbecued steaks, home repairs, financial stability….

The losses are too many to count. And just when a widow thinks she has experienced them all, there is a parent-teacher conference, or a visit to the doctor for a suspicious lump that reminds her once again that the losses keep coming.

A few weeks ago I was helping some friends understand what it was like to lose a spouse. I told them ‘years’ when they asked how long it took to recover.  These very bright, well educated women looked at me in shock.

And really, if I had not experienced it myself, I would have agreed with them “Years? Don’t you think that is just a little self-indulgent?”

Well no, it is not.

What I didn’t tell them was that it took me over five years. FIVE years. Oh, I wasn’t crying for five years, but it took me five years to really let go of Mike and embrace a new future.

This was how it went.

• Year one was horrible.
• Year two was horrible.
• Year three was sometimes horrible and sometimes fun and sometimes just OK.
• Year four was occasionally horrible and mostly OK and sometimes really fun.
• And year five was horrible about three times and for the rest, filled with hope and just regular life. Ups and downs.

So yes, five years.

Because of this a widow needs to give herself lots of time, love, and compassion for the road is long and arduous. And, she must ask for help.

Mie Elmirst, The Widows Coach

For a sample session email Mie@widowsbreathe.com or click ‘contact’

Today is my wedding anniversary.

It will always be my wedding anniversary. Regardless of what happens in the future, September 2nd, will always be the anniversary of that hope-filled day when Mike and I promised ourselves to each other in front of a small, intimate group of twelve.

Our relationship was not simple, complicated by both of our family histories and by the presence of cancer. But it was solid and never once in our 12 years did I wish for someone or something else.

When Mike died, I logically thought that we would be over, that our relationship had come to an end.

But we were not over and soon I began to talk with him, question him, and sometimes make requests.

Help me, I demanded. Or it was about Anneke. Please be there for her, love her.

Sometimes it was angry. Help me sleep, Damn it!

And sometimes it was softer. Do you know how much I love and miss you?

Always, I felt he was there.

But then, sometime around the second or third year, believing that my close connection to Mike was prolonging my sadness I began to think that I wanted to be free of him. I decided to practice a sort of a trial separation. I spoke to him little, and reached out to him less. I did my best to put space between us. I was determined to be independent. I was a widow, after all and needed to create a life for myself here in Falmouth, rather than with some imaginary ghost of a man.

As it turned out, our separation was only temporary when I saw that it did not buy me the freedom and pain-free experience of widowhood I sought. I was still a widow and I still was sad.

Eventually, I reached out again, (had he been waiting patiently?) and I was glad for our renewed connection.

This time, however, it was a less desperate reaching out and more as a friend. I needed less from him as I began to feel grounded myself. It was more of a Hiya Howya doin’ kind of rapport.

Now, nine years later, we continue to coexist. We have a gentle connection, a sweet connection. It is not passionate, it is not needy and it is not painful. It just is. I appreciate what we have and expect that as the years pass and we both continue to grow, our relationship will continue to grow with us.

Mie Elmhirst    The Widow’s Coach  Help for widows.

www.widowsbreathe.com

For a sample session, email me at mie@widowsbreathe.com.  I will be happy to talk with you.

My husband was sick for ten years, so you would surely think that I was prepared to be a widow. But I was not. That sounds silly even to me, but as all widows learn, widowhood is not something for which one can prepare.

Especially one cannot prepare for the unremitting, all encompassing, physical, emotional and spiritual loneliness.

How I wanted to be touched. Touched in ways that would tell me that I still was still desirable, needed, lovable and above all, not alone.  I wanted someone to brush by me as we made dinner. I wanted someone’s leg to kick me in the middle of the night and I wanted someone’s thigh to touch mine as we sat in the movie theater.

I went for a massage, thinking that touch was touch. The first time I went, I cried. Tears leaked slowly and silently out of my eyes as my lovely massage therapist tried to make up for what I had lost. The second time I went, I just got irritated. Her hands annoyed me and I couldn’t wait for her to stop but I didn’t want to hurt her feelings so I let her finish. I learned that touch, for me, was not just any touch and I never went back.

Isolation compounds isolation. The more alone I felt, the more I remained alone, and so on. I was ashamed that  I was alone (what, doesn’t she even have any friends?)  and I was ashamed that I was lonely. I was ashamed that I watched Oprah every day and Frasier re-runs late at night, and that I watched QVC in the early hours of the morning and sometimes bought things that I invariably returned. Maybe I thought that a really good widow would just buck up and deal, eat well, sleep well and exercise.  I did none of that. Instead, I swam around in my loneliness until it seemed my new-forever way of life.

Surprisingly, other widows were quiet about this loneliness. At first I wondered why they weren’t talking, why they didn’t warn me that at ten o’clock at night I would get into bed, always hopeful for sleep and that I would lie there watching the clock until, if I was lucky, unconsciousness would descend between two and three AM. I decided that no one was talking because every night we all (all of us widows) expected that finally this would be the night that our sleeplessness and loneliness would end and we would once again wake up in the morning refreshed.

Or maybe there was just no point in talking about it.

I did not like being out in the world where life went on as usual. In the grocery store I would wonder “did they know?”, the guys stocking the freezer, “did they know that my husband had died?” Did they know that my life had been turned upside down? Did they care?

Of course they didn’t know. No doubt they would have cared, some, if they knew, but they didn’t know. But when the loneliness started to get scary – when I began to fear for my sanity – then I began to really talk  about my dead husband.

In the grocery store, near the tomatoes perhaps, I would strike up a conversation with an unsuspecting stranger. At some point, I would say “You know, my husband died.” I would just stick it in the conversation, whether it fit or not. This always brought a look of horror (which in some sick way gratified me), followed by “Oh I am SO sorry” and then I would say “Thank you, it’s OK” and the conversation would end. (It’s OK???)  I always felt deep embarrassment when I resorted to this behavior, but it didn’t stop me.

The coffee shop, the DMV, my dental hygienist, the LLBean customer service rep… I told anyone and everyone I ran into that Mike had died. It wasn’t like I thought this out, or even that I was choosing to tell. I had to tell. I was driven to tell. I hated watching others go about their business as if my life had not exploded. I was pretty sure that this was not right, what I was doing, but I needed to be in a world that knew that I was hurt. Because maybe then I would not feel so alone. I secretly wondered if I had crossed the line into mental illness.

And God. Where was he? Or she, or it? I thought that God was supposed to help me. Although I was pretty sure that God was not some sort of cruel puppeteer who had snatched my husband from me, I did expect that I would find comfort in my faith and that A Universal Intelligence would sooth my tired soul.

But instead of feeling soothed, I came to the realization that at the age of 47 I still held onto a child-like understanding of God that promised me safety and happiness as long as I was a good mother and a good wife and as long as I did my best to be a decent human being. Well, I had done all that, I thought, but Mike had still died. I grappled with God and what God was and was he even paying attention to me?

Eventually, my Dutch-New England ‘do it yourself’ heritage finally buckled under the weight of my loneliness and I reached out to professionals and friends. I began to talk, tiny bit by tiny bit. I put myself in the hands of people whom I could trust not to try to fix me.

They did not fix me. Instead, they cared for my broken spirit and took me as I was. Sometimes crying, sometimes grumpy, and always self-centered, as if I were the only grief stricken woman on the planet.

Time does heal, along with the love of friends, and my loving coach. I look back and can hardly believe that I was that woman. I wake up these days with a faith once again in A Supreme Intelligence. My reconciliation with God took years but one morning I woke up and realized we were partners again.

I am finally comfortable being alone, and most of the time I am no longer lonely. It was a very long haul and I am grateful for the patience of those who tended to me.

Please contact me for a sample coaching session. Help is a phone call away.

Click on ‘Contact’, or call 508-540-4421.

Mie Elmhirst CPCC, PPC  The Widows Coach

www.widowsbreathe.com

Help for widows

Last night it was cold and damp here on Cape Cod so I lit a fire in the fireplace and invited Anneke, my 15 year-old to join me. She had her laptop and I had mine. She did her homework and I did mine. It was quiet and lovely and I felt gratitude. I have come to a place of deep peace since my husband died. It took years and a lot of help.

But, every once in a while I forget that my daughter is 15, and I assume she grieves as I do. I forget how profoundly different it is to lose a father than it is to lose a husband.

When Mike died we lost our footing. Nothing made sense. I remember feeling as if I were caught up in a vortex and I wondered when we would fall and if we would land on our feet or if we would land, broken into little pieces.

Anneke grieved, because she was 7, in short, deep spurts, bereft one moment and playing happily with her friends the next. She was a child, and because children grieve so differently, she seemed to roll with it better than I did.

Although I could count on regular meltdowns from Anneke, especially after the rare occasion when I needed to resort to discipline, these meltdowns were brief.

I would go something like this…

Me, (after a minor transgression).  “Honey you need to go to your room for a little while and think about what you did (or said)…”
Anneke. “I waaaaant myyyyyy daaaaaddyyyyyy……”

It wasn’t simply that she was a manipulator and knew how to get me to soften.

We had been a three-person-household, instead of now two, and discipline from one parent always meant that Anneke had the other parent to lend support and balance.  I was the stricter of the two parents and Mike’s laid-back attitude was a wonderful stabilizing force for us. We relied on him for this. His absence was deeply felt by Anneke when she and I did not see eye-to-eye.

Now, eight years have come and gone since Mike died. Anneke and I see eye-to-eye more often than not. She has now known more years without him than she knew with him. Anneke has matured into a gorgeous, articulate, balanced young woman. I have no question that Mike continues to have a strong hand in her up bringing.

I want to put a period on this story. A period that goes something like this.

“I am in a good place, I am dating, I love my life (finally, due to some really good coaching), I am taking voice lessons, I have learned how to dance, I have a good job, I know that I will meet my special someone at some point and I have no big worries. Therefore, Anneke is fine also. Period.”

But that is not how it works. Yes, I am fine.

But last night, I got up from the fire and went to get ready for bed. After an hour or so, I called downstairs to say goodnight. Anneke’s response was a somewhat muffled “goodnight” so I knew something was up and I went downstairs to investigate.

Anneke’s grief continues in a way that mine does not. The man in her life who was supposed to tell her that she is a princess, that she is beautiful, that he is so proud of her musical performances that he might burst, and that she can do anything she wants to do, is gone. The man who was supposed to teach her about boys, to tell her that she is a desirable young woman and who was supposed to interrogate nervous young men as they came to pick her up for a date, is gone.

But her need for him continues. In fact, her need for him is greater now, perhaps, than when she was seven.

For teens, the missing of a parent seems in some ways to get harder. As the years pass, the events in their lives increase in significance and his absence becomes more profound.  But even as this is true, the world around these teens assumes they miss him less, that they are done with their grief.

My daughter, as many teens do, has a smile on her face most of the time. She would be described by anyone as happy, upbeat and positive.

But at night, when alone in front of the fireplace, she grieves. And there is nothing I can do. My job as a parent is NOT to hug those tears away, not to shove tissues in her face, not to make her feel better as I so want to do.

My job is to be with her if she wants me. To cry with her if I have to, but mostly to witness her. To witness and respect her need to grieve, even eight years later. And to let her know that this is just the process, that this will not be the last time she cries, that it will happen again, and that between tears she can and will live a full, remarkable life. My job is to teach her to not fear but rather accept her continued sadness.

I try hard not to be afraid of my daughter’s pain. Like all widowed parents, I don’t want her to have any. None. But he died, and she does have pain. My consolation is in knowing that at her tender age, she is learning a lesson that took me 47 years to learn; that no matter how hard she cries, she will laugh again.

Mie Elmhirst. The widow’s coach. Coaching, Support and Help for Widows.

Please visit www.widowsbreathe.com or click on ‘contact’ for more information about one-on-one coaching or call 508-540-4421.

Last night was the start of 4th Widows Dating Again Teleclass. We had fun, some really good belly laughs, and lots of stimulating conversation. I was struck again by how lucky I am to be able to work with this community of young widows.

Because online dating is so enormous, (it is the easiest way to meet like-minded men) I will share just a few tips on writing a really good, attention grabbing profile. For the full dose, and for more invaluable information on online dating, sign up for the next class scheduled for February 9th and 12th. Attendance is limited so let me know ASAP.)

(Note – If you are a brand new widow, take your time. Healing must be your primary occupation. Filling up the space with a man does not work. Take your time, love yourself, and know that the time will come when you will be ready for new love.)

So, for those of you who are ready, here is a list of some of the dos and don’ts.

• In writing a profile you are engaging the reader in a relationship. This is the first glimpse of you your future date will have. He will learn specifics tidbits about you from your profile.
• He will also learn about you from the energy of your profile. Be aware of how your energy comes through. If you are sad when you write – it will show.
• Make the headline interesting.
• In this era of online dating, you have only seconds to grab his eye – attention spans are short and the hand is quick to click on the next profile.
• Pay attention to the tone of the profile. (Serious, upbeat, witty.) Have the tone of the profile reflect the real you. If you are a serious type, let the profile reflect that. A chatty profile would misrepresent you and he would expect to meet a very different person.
• Tell the truth. But you don’t have to tell everything in a profile.
• Write and re-write. Ask your friends to critique. Remember – it is your introduction and you want it to reflect the best in you.
• Use spell check!
• Make your profile positive. Most Internet dating sites will say, at the beginning of your profile that you are widowed. Therefore you don’t need to talk about your late husband or the fact that you are a widow or the fact that you have been through a lot. That goes without saying. When we talk about loss in a profile it brings the profile down. A sad profile will attract a sad person… and who wants that? You want new relationships to stand on their own rather than to be about your experience of widowhood or his late (or ex) wife.
• Say what you like, not what you don’t like. Or, if you must say what you don’t like, make it work. I.e. classical rather than rock, the Ritz rather than camping! Jane Austin rather than Updike, white wine rather than bud. You get the picture. This way he gets to hear what you don’t like without you sounding negative.
• Or, if you still want to say what you don’t want, simply look for the opposite of what you don’t want (what you do want) and make it positive. I.e. I like a self-motivated man sounds better than I don’t want a beer drinking couch potato!
• Make sure there is some fun in your profile. Dating needs to be fun in order to be successful. Make a little joke that might put a smile on someone’s face.
• Stay away from the ordinary. “I love walks on the beach”, or “I love a glass of wine in front of the fireplace” are rather boring statements. Everyone likes those things. What is a little different about you?  What makes you stand out? So, rather than “I love to XXX,” tell the reader what it is about XXX that you love. I.e. Instead of  “I love hiking” let the reader know what it is about hiking that you love. “Being at the top of a mountain and hearing the wind howl reminds me of how much I treasure the planet”. OK, so maybe that is a little too touchy-feely…but you get the point.
• A sloppy profile will attract someone who doesn’t care about sloppy – and therefore may also be sloppy. If that doesn’t matter to you – fine. But most of us want a man who respects himself enough to be able to clean up with not too much effort.
• Be specific so that by the end of the profile he really knows a few things about you.

When you are done writing and your friends have done a thorough once-over for you, let it rest for a few days. When you go back to it, read it again and make sure that the real you and the best in you shines through. If it does, and you are happy with your profile…go ahead and sign up!

Remember, a profile is just the beginning. There is much to know about what to do when a gentleman, or a not so gentle-man writes you. Dating on the Internet requires a whole new skill set.

Please visit www.widowsbreathe.com or click on ‘contact’ for more information about one-on-one coaching or if you are interested in learning more about profile writing.
Mie Elmhirst,   The Widow’s Coach  Coaching for Widows,

I had a lovely holiday this year. Nothing really big happened. Anneke and I baked bread, we told each other silly stories about what presents the other was getting, we made soup, went to a movie, hugged a lot and we celebrated our family. Our very small family. We were enough. I had enormous gratitude as I remembered where we were eight and nine years ago, when we were trying to keep our heads above water as we watched our husband/father die, and then as we struggled to learn how to live without him.

But of course, in the midst of all this peace and gratitude, I found myself thinking some disquieting and uninvited thoughts. Similar thoughts have come and gone during the past eight years and to be honest they have finally begun to irritate me.

These unwelcome thoughts are similar to what a 6-year old might think when, after her mother has said ‘no’ to more cookies, she sneaks back to the cookie tin to get yet another and then worries, “Does Mom know?  Does she see me? What does she think?”

As smart and as worldly as I would like to believe I am, when I step out of my self-made box and do something out of character, or spontaneous, or maybe a bit daring, my thinking becomes that of a six year old. But instead of worrying about my mother, my thoughts are about Mike.

“Does he see me? Does he know about ______? What does he think about _____? Or, I hope he is not mad about _____.”

“______” could be anything. It could be about how I discipline our daughter, how I rearrange furniture, how much money I spend on a pair lowish rise jeans, or about the fact that I finally threw away that stupid, stupid can of sausages labeled Porcupine Peckers. (I kid you not, my dear sweet brilliant husband thought it was funny! Had to be a boy thing…)

Of course, if I were to be honest, what I really want to know is what he thinks about how I have ‘done’ widow, and especially my love life.

• What does he think about the fact that I joined match.com?
• What does he think about the various men (especially that motorcycle dude) who asked me out and the fact that I said ‘yes’ to a few of them?
• That I had love again and gave it up?
• And what does he think about the fact that I have a bigger libido now than when we were married? Does he feel gypped?

WHAT DOES HE THINK?????

Why oh why do I still care about his opinion?  (As if he has one…) He is not even here any more, right? Am I afraid at any moment he will yell down at me “Hey! What the hell do you think you’re doing, woman???”

Sometimes I think I care because I have this tiny but powerful belief tucked way back in my brain that says that we, Mike and I, were in it together, and now that he is gone it is my responsibility to carry on for the BOTH of us. Most of the time I don’t believe this, but sometimes I do. Most of the time I know that it is my job to live my life rather than the life he did not get to have.

The question “what does Mike think” is tiring because there is no answer that could satisfy. There are only guesses. I can only guess and hope that he is happy with me and with the life I have created. If he is in fact there…

But there is another question. A much more important question. It is this.

If Mike could want something for me, if Mike does want something for me, what is it?

I know the answer to this because I knew my husband’s heart.

Mike would want me to be joyously happy.
He would want me to understand and forgive the mistakes I made before and after he died. And the mistakes I keep on making. My growing pains mistakes.
He would want me to give myself credit for trying to do the right thing. Rather than want credit from him.
Mike would want me, if I had to pay too much money for low-rise jeans, to have fun with them.
He would want me, if I had to date a biker, to have a heck of a time.
Mike would want me to stop worrying about what he thinks.

Above all, Mike would want for me what I want. Mike would want me to deal with my grief, to honor my burning need to grow, to experience and to love. He would want me to celebrate myself every time I get on the stage to speak, and to celebrate every article I write. He might be proud; but more than that, he would want me to be proud. Proud not only of how our daughter has grown up, but of how I have grown up. For I have grown up.

We have a second chance, those of us who are widowed.  A second chance to grow and develop those parts of ourselves that did not grow and develop in our marriages. It will be scary, and we may wonder what he thinks. But in the end, what really matters is what we think.

Please visit www.widowsbreathe.com or click on ‘contact’ for more information about one-on-one coaching or call 508-540-4421.

Mie Elmhirst, Help for Widows

The Widow’s Coach, The Grief Coach

What was really wonderful about your husband?  What were those qualities that brought out the best in you? What was it about him that attracted you in the first place? What was it about your union that really worked? What was it that made you say, way back when, “This is the man for me”?

It took me a while to remember what it had been like in the early stages of my relationship with my husband. This is because cancer showed up two months before we were married and most of the 10 years of our marriage were snatched up by surgeries, chemotherapies, and other treatments so bizarre and painful that the fact that he agreed to them speaks to his great love of life.

(Interestingly, his buoyant personality did not change as he navigated these various treatments. He remained always positive and hopeful.  My personality, however, was not so lovely. I became ultra-serious, and mildly-to-not-so-mildly, neurotic. I was scared to death and compensated by trying to make life perfect. But, this is a topic for later.)

With the help of photos and my daughter’s elephant-like memory I have been able to recall those early years. I was surprised to remember that he actually had hair! And I remember when we climbed mountains we could go for hours not speaking, enjoying the smells of the damp earth and wet leaves, the sound of the wind whistling in the trees, and the breathtaking views. I remember how we loved the fact that the two of us were together, alone in the woods, in the quiet, doing what we loved the most.

I remember, 8  years later, how he smelled. I remember the way that he put those little stays that I thought were so weird in the collars of his dress shirts, and how he got on his knees every night to thank  God for the day. And I remember waving him off to work in the morning thinking what a handsome man he really was.

Yes, I can remember some really good stuff.

Spend some time remembering for yourself. It is important to do this.

Here are the next questions. Not so much fun, but equally important to answer.

What was difficult about your relationship? What were the challenges? What drove you crazy?  What was not so wonderful about your marriage? What was it that made you look at other marriages and wonder if they had the same issue(s)?

My biggest challenge was myself. When Mike got sick, I took on the role of emotional caregiver. He did not ask me to do this. How I had been raised, our societal values, my lack of self-esteem and my fear of losing him conspired  together to thrust me into this role. As emotional caregiver I put his needs above mine for the whole of our marriage. I did this so successfully that it seemed at times, that he forgot I had any needs at all. I am not blaming, I am simply stating what was.

So, just in case you think that I have sanctified my late husband – think again.  Mike was no angel. For one thing, he had a way of poking fun that made me crazy. And he could not understand my sensitivity. This was a frequent topic of heated conversation. Yes, we had our challenges, both because of who he was, and because of who I was.

Why is it necessary for a widow to look back, especially if it is painful to do so? Am I suggesting this simply for the sake of airing dirty laundry? Why must we who are left behind acknowledge anything that wasn’t positive?

There are many reasons – but the most important are the following:

We must understand our challenges, our tendencies, so that when we are again in relationship we will be ready respond to our new situations rather than react to them because of old unhealed wounds. If we don’t acknowledge the truth about the past we will be owned by it. And therefore, bound to repeat it.

And, if there is pain that we don’t acknowledge, it affect us. Just because it is not addressed doesn’t mean it isn’t there, festering.

I am pretty sure that I have found my new special someone. As I type those words I feel excited, and scared and happy. But most of all I feel very secure in the fact that I have done the work. This new relationship is not just a fix it. I am not in it in order to chase away loneliness. It is not a Band-Aid for pain. It is healthy and it the product of a good amount of self-exploration and acknowledgment of what I had and did that worked and what I had and did that did not work.

I have had to learn to ask for help. I have had to learn to speak up. I now can say things like “no, that won’t work for me”, or “when you said such-and-such I felt badly”. Or,  “will you take Anneke and I out for dinner Friday? It has been a really hard week.”

To move forward we need to stay in reality. To look at the whole picture, rather than just the convenient, easy, fun part. If we are grounded in the whole truth, we are then available to share our lives with a special someone, if that is what we want.

Closure happens when we are at peace with our memories, the good memories and the not-so-good memories. Closure is when we are willing to acknowledge the whole picture; that he was a very real human being, a mixed bag, and that he was capable of making us happier than we thought we had a right to be, and he was also capable of disappointing and hurting us. Just as we were capable of disappointing and hurting him. Closure happens after we have done the work, and usually when we are not looking. It is that very quiet moment when we are finally at peace with what was and are capable of looking ahead with a sense of anticipation.

We are then free to love once again.

Please visit www.widowsbreathe.com or click on ‘contact’ for more information about one-on-one coaching.

Mie Elmhirst, The Widow’s Coach

This morning a friend of mine, who is also a widow, told me no matter what happened in her life, even if she got married to her new boyfriend, she would always be a widow. “I have a pretty good life, I love my boyfriend, but Frank (late husband) will always be my first love, my true love, my best love, my soul mate. I will love him forever.”

At first glimpse this sounds romantic and loyal, right??? After all, she is probably correct. Once a widow, always a widow.

Technically speaking I am sure that this very definitive statement, for her, is true. However, these claims uttered in love, respect and yearning for our lost husbands conspire to keep us alone and lonely. The more earnestly we insist that what we had was irreplaceable and un-top-able, the deeper we dig ourselves into a hole of loneliness and aloneness. The more stringently we hold on to the belief that we could never again be as happy as we were, the less of a chance at happiness we have.
I have yet to meet even one widow who would not like to love and be loved. Who doesn’t want to be held, to laugh with someone, to cry with someone, or to build a life with a new love? Yes, you might be scared, and yes, it may be too early, or yes, if you are very, very old it might be too late, but we ALL want love.

And when we (widows) use words such as always and never, we decrease our chances of finding new love. We close the door on possibility.
If it is true that my husband Mike was “one of a kind”, meaning he was the best that there was/is, then is it true that I will now have to settle for second best? Who wants that? Not me, that is for sure.

If it is true that “I could never have what I had with him” then am I saying that any relationship I might have in the future will never measure up?
If the “really good men are all taken”, well, why bother trying? Why even date for fun?

When I make such proclamations I limit God. (Spirit of the Universe, Higher power, etc). With such statements, I decide what is and isn’t possible, instead of leaving it to a greater power than I. With such statements, I am letting you know that I believe that what I had was as good as it gets and I should expect only less than that in the future.
I am not suggesting that you and I did not have a gem of a man. We did. We all did. Seriously, when I was first married I was surprised that hordes of women were not banging down my door, trying to get my man. (Ah yes, young and naive.) During our marriage I cultivated appreciation for this very good man. I loved, admired and respected him.

But do you mean to tell me that God (Spirit of the Universe, Higher Power) only makes a finite number of good men? And once you have had one chance at happiness you don’t get to have a 2nd chance? Does this really make sense?
What kind of a God is that? I would have a very hard time praying to a God that parceled out happiness that way.

The Universe is generous to those who are willing to receive. Getting ourselves to that place where although we may still be a widow in name, we are also open to courageous and abundant living, willing to receive; that is the challenge for all of us. It is not as easy as it sounds. How about you? Are you ready?

Please visit www.widowsbreathe.com or click on ‘contact’ for more information about one-on-one coaching.

Mie Elmhirst, The Widow’s Coach

Early widowhood was really the first time in my life that I gave myself permission to just let it all hang out, to stop worrying about what everyone else thought.

I gave myself permission for two reasons; the first was that even if I hadn’t given myself permission I would have blubbered all over the place anyway, so why not just make it OK.

The second reason was that I knew deep inside, if I tried to hold in my tears to prevent either others or myself from feeling bad, the opposite would happen. I would feel worse. Healing cannot be sped up but it most assuredly can be slowed. And this was one experience I did not want to slow.

So, I cried and I cried and I cried. I thought I would never stop. I cried at the grocery store, the lumber store, and the dog groomer, with my neighbors, my daughters principal, and the dishwasher fix-it man. I cried everywhere and with anyone. There were many days when I applied and re-applied my make up at least five times before lunch. Eventually, I just gave up and looked bad.
Who cared?

My coach assured me that every tear I shed was one less tear I would need to shed in the future so I welcomed them all.  My tears gave my daughter Anneke permission to do the same. She was seven years old, so her grieving was done in short, 2-3 minute segments, but grieve she did. The second reason was that I knew deep inside, if I tried to hold in my tears to prevent either others or myself from feeling bad, the opposite would happen. I would feel worse. Healing cannot be sped up but it most assuredly can be slowed. And this was one experience I did not want to slow.

One day, her best friend Timmy followed her into the house right after I had had my 10:00 AM melt down. He looked at me, horrified, as I lay flopped on the couch, in my nightgown, eyes read and swollen, copious amounts of snot coming out of my nose; at least 20 used Kleenex at my feet. Yes, grief is messy. Messy in every way.

Anneke, having seen much worse from me, said to her young friend, “Oh, don’t worry, that’s just my mom crying about my Dad. Wanna make a tent under the table?”

I mean really. What’s not to love? Anneke did her grieving in the early evenings, in my arms, when she was secure in the fact that I could be present to her tears, not lost in mine.

I was sure, in the very beginning, that someone/something must have invented the 10:00 PM – 2:00 AM hours as a special torture for new widows. I was my most hopeless late at night and I prayed for early mornings and a coffee machine that worked. Caffeine, (only one cup but I drank it in minutes like a full-blown addict) helped me forget the terrors of the night before and look on the new day with less fear, forgetting momentarily that 10:00 PM would come again, as it did every night. The daytime hours were not easy either but Anneke, my work, meditation (and Oprah!) gave me enough structure to make it through one day at a time until eventually I could see the light at the end of the proverbial tunnel and realize that joy was again going to be a daily companion.

If you are a new widow, keep in mind that it ALL PASSES. Eventually you will feel better.

Please visit www.widowsbreathe.com or click on ‘contact’ for more information about one-on-one coaching.

Mie Elmhirst, The Widow’s Coach