A Place - #empathyforgrief - Break the Silent Struggle With Grief

Welcome to Mother's Backyard Buzz, this is a podcast where we break the silent struggle with grief. I'll be unpacking my book My Backyard Garden, A Memoir of How Love Conquers Grief. I am the author and your host, Debra Hester.  Chapter by chapter I'll move us deeper into what I included and didn't include in my book that speaks to this journey we all take called "grief".

The death of a loved one is a struggle that many people live their life with day after day.  The cause of death may be illness, violence, an accident, what some may consider too early or after having lived a long life. It may be sudden or expected. Regardless, there can be many heavy emotions associated with the death of a loved one that come and go long after the funeral. Grief is a journey.

We the loved ones have a journey ahead that seems to have no end. I'm not here to define what the journey or the end looks life for you.  I just want to share my journey and encourage you to share yours with someone. During my journey, I wrote the book, My Backyard Garden and published it in 2018 as a way to say to other loved ones...you're not alone and you don't need to struggle in silence. I also wanted to share with you that I realized that there is a way to move with and through grief... a move journey that is uniquely yours and I share mine with you in hopes that you will find your way to a better place.

Starting with the "Introduction" chapter in my book, My Backyard Garden, I used this as an opportunity to express my journey as a greatest love journey. That "greatest" level of love may or may not apply to you; but the grief you feel is still real and will take you down a different road after this person has died and left your life changed. Yes, changed. Different people handle change differently and I really didn't think about the personal change aspect of grief until Started reflecting on what was happening to me. Someway this change creates reflection and that reflection brought forward all types of emotions that I struggled with inside and I knew they needed to come out in a positive way. For me that way was through memories.

Part of the reason my book title became My Backyard Garden was because some of my fondest memories were created there; and in my imagination, I'm there always and plan on being there as my life continues.  I hope you can find a place of memories for your grief journey. It can be a garden or somewhere else. I'm not sure why I didn't pick a beach because I love beaches too. But one of the first things that I suggest you do is really reflect back and think of what I'll call your garden place and use that place to continue your journey.

Why do  you need a place you might ask? I'm not going to support this with statistics or educational findings. All I know is that it helped me and I truly hope it helps you because when I lost my mother, I felt lost and alone. I did see a counselor who asked me with much concern after I broke down with tears in her office: "Are you truly along?" Some of us are truly alone after a death; but I wasn't. I had family and friends; but I let that I was because no one could replace that relations hip that I had with my mother. So I felt alone and it's something about feeling alone also make me feel lost because I didn't know what to do about feeling alone.

Creating a "place" helped me. Creating a backyard garden helped me. You'll learn in future episodes why the backyard became a special place for me and my mother and I hope you can find and share what your special place is.  Send them with your O.K. to post, I'll post them to my website to inspire others at: www.mothersbackyard.com and on social media.

So, thank you loved ones for listening to Mother's Backyard Buzz #empathyforgrief.  This is Debra Hester, break-in the silent struggle with grief.  Remember: move forward from grief with love and more empathy, less sympathy. If you found the podcast helpful, subscribe to me on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts. My book is available online at Amazon, Barnes & Noble and my through my website. Pleas leave me a podcast comment on what you'd like me to address from my book or personal experience. Leave comments on the podcast and let me know how you're doing with your grief journey at Mother's Backyard Buzz.

Join me for my next episode when the buzz will be about why I choose the verse "The Greatest of these is love.  Peace & Blessings.

The special podcast launch code is: LUNCH1MBG.  Use it on my website from November 11 - 18, 2019 to get a discounted price on a special ebook version of my book. You can use the downloaded copy  and follow along with the podcast.