If you don’t know me, then let me say I am obsessed with Christmas. For me Christmas is a time of warmth, light, coziness. I love to cultivate those things within my home. To cover the walls with greenery, to string lights all around the house, to put childhood mementos in places of honor. For me Christmas is full of slow cozy mornings with low lighting and hot coffee, quiet nights with drinks by tree lights, weeks of cooking and creating and giving to others. Over our past few Christmases together, I’ve also been working to develop traditions with my husband making our holidays all the more magical.
And then in October, my grandma died.
Loss. Fear. Darkness.
Hers is the only death I have experienced in my adult life. However it is the third death in my
family that has occurred in October. What a mess of a month.
Before I was born, my parents lost my old sister after just 8 days. Generational sadness
permeated my life without my ever realizing it.
When I was 13, my grandpa died. I had grown up near most of my family, but we had moved to
Arizona 4 months before his passing. I was already depressed, disconnected, lost. His loss was
never fully processed.
Nearly two months ago my grandma passed.
My sister’s birth and death, my grandma’s death, my grandpa’s death.The dates of these losses
span just 14 days in October.
In the past seven weeks I have felt overcome with layers and layers of sadness, years of grief, all
compounding with this most recent loss. And I find myself in the midst of my absolute favorite time
of year, completely unmerry and joyful. For a while I wasn’t sure I would even decorate for
Christmas but it does so much for my mood that I eventually knew I couldn’t weather the holidays
without doing so, but it's simply different. I put up a tree that I never finished decorating. I dried
oranges that I never strung into a garland. I have watched exactly one Christmas movie, done
zero Christmas bakes, seen zero lights, had no mulled wine, missed every single night of advent
thus far.
I have no answers, this story is not over nor will it end. I will journey through these losses for years,
carrying them with me. For now I am simply working to sort through them, to learn how to carry the
pain. All I wanted to do today is pass along some of my most favorite resources so far. This list is by
no means exhaustive, it’s simply my current lifeline as I prepare to weather to holidays with a heavy
heart.
My favorite resource (currently) is the podcast “Grief Cast” by Cariad Lloyd. I stumbled it upon it
ages ago through a comedian I followed. After my grandma passed, I checked it out again and have
begun listening daily to previous episodes. Cariad hosts comedians who talk about their life losses.
They go deep and simultaneously remain light. Feeling understood and connected, hearing my grief
through the words of others, they make me feel less alone when I don’t or can’t talk to those around
me.
Instragram:
Podcasts:
Grief Cast
What’s Your Grief
Coming Back
Books:
Permission to Grieve by Shelby Forsythe
Website:
Resources I’ve been given (but cannot vouch for yet):
Modern Loss by Rebecca Soffer and Gabrielle Birkner
Grief Out Loud (podcast)
The Airing of Grief (podcast)
Grief Unveiled (podcast)
**Please note that while I use Amazon affiliate links in other places on this site, these are straight
links. I have no desire to profit off your grief and I wanted that to be clear.
