Open to Hope Articles

Articles Home

Five Tips For Grievers During the Holidays

Posted on December 26, 2009 - by Jane Galbraith

The first Christmas without my mother was agony. Actually, the month before was probably worse than the day itself. Because my mother had been sick between December 6 and January 11, I relived the whole month, which included Christmas and New Year’s Day. I tried to do things that I had done with my mother in hopes of making everything “all right”. But of course, it would never be the same. Grief causes physical and emotional pain. Baby Boomers have come to expect instant pain relief in this fast paced society. Unfortunately, Baby Boomers will be facing this chapter in […]

Dear Widow: When Mistletoe and Holly Make You Feel All Blue

Posted on December 25, 2009 - by Linda Della-Donna

Oh, by gosh, by golly, whaddayaknow, it’s Happy Holiday time, again! And that red-suited man standing on your street corner’s extolling, “Ho! Ho! Ho!” making, you, dear widow, want to scream, “No! No! No!” instead, because your husband is dead. Just like teeny snowflakes falling from the sky, you’re feeling sad and a tiny bit silly. You don’t understand. Because it’s *hand over mouth* years since you buried that man. Not to worry. Because I’m a widow, too. And I got three tips for you to get you through. Tip #1 – Cry. Go ahead. Give yourself permission. Pick a […]

Poem: New Widow Speaks to God

Posted on December 24, 2009 - by Rosalie Siciliano

My husband is dead! My husband isn’t here anymore! I don’t have a partner anymore! I reach over to his side of the bed and it’s cold and empty. Look around…..I’m looking….the coffee cup is still sitting on the shelf. I look some more and the newspaper is still on the lawn… It’s awful quiet in here! Something is seriously wrong. Death has invaded the entire space of my existence…. Now just one minute! No, I’m in the middle of a dream… “still foggy from sleep?” I touch my pink cotton robe and I’m here…I’m awake. I’m still here. But, […]

Holiday Grief as a Gift

Posted on December 23, 2009 - by Pamela Prime

Grief is a profound gift. It is one we never request, but one we learn to respect. When grief comes, we are given a way through our pain and suffering to a new way of being… to becoming more real and more open to love than ever before. I say this as a way to encourage each of us, me included, to feel fully the pain we are experiencing, especially as we enter the Holiday Season. The memories of “how it used to be” and all the seasonal traditions, now celebrated without our loved one(s), weigh heavily upon us and […]

Choose Positive Memories During this Season of Hope

Posted on December 22, 2009 - by Patrick T. Malone

Patrick Malone’s remarks at The Compassionate Friends Atlanta Chapter 2009 Candle Light Remembrance. We would have traded places with our child without a second thought, but we weren’t given that choice. When that enormous pain of grief rolled into and totally disrupted our nice, neat, little life, we didn’t have a choice. Even now, months or years later, when a residual wave of grief chooses to crash along our shoreline, we aren’t given a choice. It just shows up. None of us aspired to be part of The Compassionate Friends. In fact, it ranks last in organizations that parents and […]

Grief Takes No Holidays

Posted on December 21, 2009 - by Sandra Pesmen

“Grief is the price you pay for love,” said therapist Carol Nevin at the December meeting of the Widows List Group at the Northbrook, Ill., Senior Center. Carol was there to discuss “Grieving During the Holidays,” and her visit was perfectly timed for Marilyn, one member who lost her husband six months ago and still feels “disoriented.” Marilyn said that confusion frustrates her more than anything else, because she always felt in control of her life. “And that’s perfectly normal, ” Carol assured us. “We all like control and predictability and we don’t like change, but death shows us that we have little control over life.” Carol also touched on another common part of grief that […]

Give Your Gift to the World

Posted on December 20, 2009 - by Gloria Arenson

Have you ever been complimented on something you have done and wondered why, since it was an ability you took for granted? Have you ever complimented someone else about what they do that impresses you because you couldn’t do it no matter how hard you tried, and they do it so well? Many years ago, when I was teaching classes at a City College adult-education division, Joan, who programmed the classes said, “How can you do what you do? I would be terrified standing up in front of a group and talking.” I was surprised by her words since teaching […]

Don’t Say You’re ‘Fine’ When You’re Not

Posted on December 19, 2009 - by Sandy Fox

When we are on a grief journey and someone asks us, “How are you feeling?” the tendency is to say, “I’m fine.” But we’re not fine, and one of my friends pointed that out to me a few months after my daughter died. She said in a rather exasperated voice, “You’re not fine and don’t say you are!” I was briefly taken aback and then realized she was right. Why say you’re “fine” when you’re not? From that point on, I told the truth. My answer became, “I’m doing the best I can. Each day is a challenge and I […]

What is the Role of Anger in Grief?

Posted on December 18, 2009 - by Norman Fried

What can be said about the meaning of anger; and what role does anger play in our eventual recovery from grief? We know that, as humans, we are capable of experiencing a full range of feelings, and that each of our emotions is inexorably connected to its opposite. We know that an honest life insists upon the wholeness, as well as the integrity, of our emotions, thus an attachment to one feeling at the expense of others can have damaging effects on our growth. We understand that sorrow, pain and intolerance have a place in our lives, and we expect […]

There’s No Grief in Santa

Posted on December 17, 2009 - by Connie Vasquez

Last year was the first year my mother didn’t recognize me at all . . . not even a glimmer. I’d been expecting Alzheimer’s to take away her ability to recognize my face, but wasn’t really prepared. That was the first Christmas it seemed to make no difference whether or not I called my mom for the holidays since she didn’t know whether it was Christmas or St. Swithens Day, whether it was me or the Easter Bunny. She’d long since forgotten what the telephone was and what those noises coming into her ear were. Christmas was always a big […]