Happy Birthday, dear Blog!
Today I am celebrating the first anniversary of this blog. I am chuffed. Not just because 100+ of you subscribe and hundreds more now read it, but because – and this matters way more to me – lots of you over the year have written to tell me how helpful, comforting, pertinent, thought provoking, resonant, illuminating and moving you find what I write and that through my words you realise you are not alone.
We care
Some of you I know personally, many of you I don’t and I don’t know how you found me, but I am very happy you are here. Two of you wrote to me this morning with stories of ageing and of the loneliness of grief. I am so touched that many of you write, that you trust me to listen, that you know I care – actually I think we care about each other. It feels like a privileged position to be in and it gives me pause.
Every word of the 27 blogs I have written over this past year, have been true for me at the time. And every time I publish the blog on a Saturday morning I feel vulnerable and a little (or a lot) anxious. It is exposing to write so openly but I realise from your feedback that this is why my words reach you. It’s easy to hide behind ideas and theories, to stay in the realm of the mind; but allowing our emotional world to be on show, our hopes and dreams, sorrows and nightmares, well, to be honest as usual, it takes courage.
Courage
I have just sent the first draft of my first book to a friend who is a journalist and an editor. Oh my, that took some courage! I know she will be kind, but will she say – kindly – it’s rubbish, half rubbish, or that it might have legs? What’s it about? It’s called, “Not Another Day – getting through the 1st, 2nd, 3rd…. year of grief”. It is a little handbook of short thoughts, activities, reflections and understandings,which, a bit like oracle cards, can be picked at random to help get through the day. At the beginning, though, is a section for people who are not grieving – yet – but would like to support someone who is. For example:
“Please don’t say…time’s a healer/you should get out more/call me if you need me/you told me that already…etc”
It could just say,
“Please don’t have expectations of anyone who is grieving or go to them with your agenda to fix them.”
Because that’s the truth, isn’t it, so many expectations placed on us when we are grieving, that within a prescribed period of time we should be over it/better/moving on – in other words not making other people feel uncomfortable or helpless any more. (We might want that ourselves too!) It’s a bit of a soap box I get on. Please, if you’re a friend of someone who is grieving, just be there, alongside them, witnessing, bearing it. They have to bear it constantly, can you manage a few minutes every now and then?
This brings me back to celebrating the blog, for two reasons. Firstly, I believe you listen to me and in the writing I bear witness to myself, discovering and untangling how I feel. (If you have any inclination to write, please follow it. Over the last 5 years I have found writing anything – letters to my beloved, stories, poems, stream of consciousness, this blog – deeply therapeutic.)
And secondly, I listen to you, I hear you, I hold you in my heart. This matters to me, more than you may imagine.
Compost
There is a third thing I’d like to say. This blog is new growth for me. It didn’t arrive after I’d done my grieving or moved on – I haven’t – it emerged through it: through the grief and the loss, the sorrow and panic, despair and loneliness. As grief composts I think it nurtures the soil of ones being – however impossible to believe that may seem at times. We don’t have to try so hard, make enormous effort, strain and stress, but simply be with, attend to, what is.
Your way
If we need counselling or therapy, fine, if not fine; if we need a breather for a little while, to get through the next bit and anti-depressants allow us to do that, fine, if not great; if we need to bend our friends’ ears a hundred times, so be it, if we choose to be quiet, that’s fine too. There is no right way to grieve, there are no rules for getting it right. Just that we have to do it and there are no short cuts. I make a plea here for gentleness – with ourselves always, and with friends in their dark places always too.
A year ago when I began this blog, I wanted it to be a flame of hope when the going gets tough. When you write to me, when you tell this is so and when you tell me you are there for me too, it warms, softens and expands my heart with more gratitude to Life, than I imagined I could ever feel again.
With love to you and huge thanks for your company on this journey. Happy Blog Birthday to us.
Nickie
NEWS
Over this past year, more has grown out of this blog than I ever envisaged. More ‘chuffedness’:
One on one ‘cup of tea’ and support sessions
Wise Women Circle, Year long in-person – ongoing and very beautiful
Walking with Loss, Together, 6 week, course, with Emma Capper for people dealing with loss – “a blueprint for managing grief” – participant. Hopefully another one to come later this year.
Singing for Peace and Hope, day long event with Natasha Hood (also see below)
Hospice in Torquay – my threshold singing group sings their once a month, I volunteer there once a week and co-ran a bereavement group in nature plus ran two creative writing workshops and two more upcoming this year.
I became a CIC- a social enterprise which makes me eligible for grant funding.
I wrote the first draft of my first book – Not Another Day – getting through the 1st, 2nd, 3rd… year of grief.
I moved my blog here to Substack where it has the possibility to grow and touch more people.
And here’s what is coming up:
Dying Matters Week:
There are events all over the country to get people talking about death, dying and grieving. I am involved with these events happening in Totnes:
Creative Writing for Grief – Saturday 11th May at 12.15pm at Birdwood House, Totnes
“Sit on my mourning bench with me” – being a friend to someone who is grieving – Saturday 11th May at 2pm at Birdwood House, Totnes
The afternoon will conclude with a ceremony.
Death Cafe concluding with Threshold singing – Sunday May 12th 4 – 6pm at The Hairy Barista,Totnes.
A Day to Tend to Grief – Saturday June 15th 11am – 4pm in South Brent. A new workshop with me in person, gently exploring ways to be with our grief, through nature, reflection, sharing, creativity and ritual.
I intend that this is not only a stand alone day but also a taster for a longer group starting in the autumn.
More information and booking form here
Song and Silence for Peace – Saturday July 13th, 11am to 4pm in South Brent A second chance to sing for Peace, but also to be contemplative and reflective, to be peace – singing in unison and listening to the sound we create in harmony. There will be blessings and poems, time in nature weather permitting and we will end with a simple ritual.
More information and booking form here
And finally, thank you very much to everyone who has been in touch in whatever way – email, workshop, facebook, messaging – not least the very many of you who have written since the last blog. Thank you for co-creating all of this with me; and please, do keep sharing, liking, writing and subscribing.