Life is Your Story

As we grow older the pool of people we meet and befriend becomes larger and more diversified. Some are just acquaintances while others have been there during the worst crisis of our lives. I have witnessed people truly coming together in support and out of compassion for one another and it is a beautiful thing. I volunteer as a facilitator of support groups for those suffering from mental illness as well as their caregivers. Often the people that attend my groups are living in a psychiatric ward or have just been discharged. Many of the participants were or are admitted at the same time and so they become familiar with one another. This provides them with a common ground and a shared understanding of the pain and daily challenges they all face. They don’t pretend to be someone they are not. They are past the stage of disguises and stories and fake images. They are exhausted but they are fighters and they deal with the very essence of survival in the bleakest of moments. Through t...

What will you remember about your life when all is said and done? Will it be the people who accompanied you on your journey? Will it be the places you explored and traveled to along the way? Will it be a cat or a dog that showed you the meaning of true friendship? Will it be the last word spoken to you by someone you will never get to speak to again? What would you choose to remember if your memory could be wiped clean of just one thing that happened to you in your entire life? Would it be the fist time your parents told you they loved you? Would it be the first time you realized you loved yourself? Would it be the first time you held your child? Would it be the first lips that brushed against yours? Who would you choose to remember? What would you say to them, if you could have them there right in front of you for just a few moments? Isn't it amazing how much detail we are capable of remembering when we shut out all the noise, close our eyes, and feel ...

When someone we love dies, we want them back. Plain and simple. It's like a crime has been committed. They've been taken - sometimes with warning and sometimes without warning - sometimes expected yet always unexpected. There are those we accompany as far as we can toward whatever comes next. We sit by their bed and we wish we could take the suffering and pain away. We are ready to give ourselves in their place. We are aching and frightened. We know what is coming as the butterflies move at warp speed in our stomachs and photos clips turn into horrid collages of the darkest scenes from the obituary in which we can't say what we really want to say and to the funeral that too many strangers attend and the eulogy that will never do them justice and the burial - the shovel to the dirt, the dirt to the coffin, a final curtain call without ample applause to a life well lived and the love they gave. Then there are the ones that just happen the way things just sort ...

So it's the end of a long day and you are finally getting cozy in bed. By the dim light of a lamp, you read a few pages of a book you never seem to finish and the need for sleep overwhelms you. The light goes off and there you are staring at the ceiling. Darkness. It conjures up thoughts and images we manage to avoid or ignore in the light. I find that right there in that very moment, I think of those who have passed on from this life and left me with my heart in my hand missing them always. I wonder where they've gone in the afterlife. I close my eyes and I see their faces. Memories rush through my brain turning the cog wheel at such a constant, powerful pace that my heart starts to beat faster. I force myself to remember the good times when they were healthy,vibrant, laughing the way they laughed and very much a part of life in its entirety and a part of me. I think of my Grandfather who fought in two world wars, traveled the world, a painter, a sculptor and a pharmaci...

Preface: Many years ago my dog and I fell through the ice on a lake in the country. My husband was away patrolling at a ski hill and the house we rented at the time was in an isolated area. The moment I fell through and started to go into deep freeze - I heard my late Grandfather telling me to fight and survive. I equate the depth, darkness and overall tone of this post to the traumatic events we all experience within our lifetimes and the spirit that arrives and takes us by the hand and saves us from everything and everyone including and most importantly ourselves. We all fall - here's to hoping we all get back up again. ---------------------------------------------- What happens when the ground you stand upon falls out from underneath you? Is an ambulance sent to the scene? Is there a trauma team on call waiting for you in an operating room? Are your loved ones contacted and gathered together? Are you able to express what is happening and why? Is there news covera...

Think of your childhood in a flash not at length. Close your eyes. What do you see? I see myself at 7 yrs of age. I am with my grandmother who was in the early stages of a devastating disease - MS. At the time she has a walker but 5 years later she would become paralyzed from the neck down and condemned to a hospital bed. We are on a picnic by a large fountain that shoots up from the mossy base so high that I can see it catch the rays of the sun. My grandmother is smiling and laughing and she affectionately brushes my cheek with her hand and kisses me on the forehead and says "I am very proud of you and I love you." I close my eyes again and I see my dog Buster who passed away last fall just before his fifth birthday from Cancer. This is a constant vision I have of him. He is sitting on the top stair waiting for me to come home. I open the door and there he is just waiting - no matter how long - he waits. He runs down to greet me and pushes me into the wall with...