The Singing Widow
1,717 FOLLOWERS
Jessica Ayers is a widow, mother, and musician who writes about her daily struggles after losing her husband in 2014 to a stray bullet, only 3 days after the birth of her infant son.
The Singing Widow
1y ago
As I sit in my living room on the eve of Justin’s ninth death anniversary, I find myself wondering: has it gotten any easier?
The short answer is HELL NO! But because I feel like I owe it to my followers and supporters to be transparent about my grief journey, I cannot give a short answer today.
And that’s because, in some ways, it is easier. I would think that to anyone who’s recently lost a spouse or child or sibling or best friend or parent, that might give you hope.
Why should that give you hope?
Doesn’t the anniversary getting easier signify that my love for Justin ..read more
The Singing Widow
1y ago
It's finally here!
I cannot begin to explain how many hours, years, and months I dreamed of this moment — author status.
Even though I truly only started writing this particular book about a year ago, it's been a constant ache in my heart for quite a while. This book was my first book idea, even if I knew I would not be ready to write it for quite some time.
I grew a lot during widowed years one, two, three, four, and beyond, but I don't think I was truly ready to write this book until I reached a turning point in my life.
This book is truly everything I wanted t ..read more
The Singing Widow
3y ago
The retrieval
Until my October transfer, I was what the IVF community calls —a poor responder. The average number of eggs retrieved in IVF is 8 to 14, and I got 5.
But I was excited for the chance of 5 embryos. If all of them made it to blastocyst, we would freeze them and be able to have 5 chances of conceiving without having to do another egg retrieval. But when we got the call, only 1 made it to blastocyst.
The transfer
This one embryo meant that I had one chance of becoming pregnant, and if it failed, we’d have to spend the same amount of money (15k) and go through the same emotiona ..read more
The Singing Widow
3y ago
The day after Justin died, I felt like the past ten years of my life were for all for nothing. I was angry that I’d invested so much energy into my marriage, and just like that, it disappeared.
Everything was a waste: every kiss we shared, every gift we exchanged, every vacation we went on, every song we wrote, and every single memory we created was all for nothing.
I didn’t understand why God would give me ten years to build a marriage, prepare for motherhood, grant me a child, and then take away my husband. It was like I’d been given the worst backhanded compliment in history.
For a very ..read more
The Singing Widow
3y ago
After Justin died, I went to grief counseling, where I was taught the five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.
My counselor told me that it might take some time, but the ultimate goal was to make it to the acceptance stage. He said once I got there, I could create a living memorial for Justin. He told me that while the goal is to make it to acceptance, it’s possible to get stuck in one of the other phases forever. He said that if I didn’t do the work, that could happen to me.
Stage two: Anger
I remember sitting on his poofy leather sofa while he tried t ..read more
The Singing Widow
3y ago
Hey everybody, in case you did not know, my last name is Ayers.
No, it’s not my maiden name; it’s Justin’s last name. When I married him at 20-years-old, keeping my maiden name didn’t even seem like an option. I’m not sure why. Maybe because I was so young and I was told, “it’s tradition.”
But even without that added pressure, taking Justin’s last name was never an issue for me. I was down for it and excited to become Mrs. Ayers. Looking back, I would not change a thing. Mainly because it felt right, and Justin had a cooler last name than me. Taking Ayers felt like an upgrade.
I did not t ..read more
The Singing Widow
3y ago
Breastfeeding — it’s how we feed our infants when their bodies are still shifting from the womb to the world. It’s often debated about, gawked at, and frowned upon when done in public. But, it’s nature and motherhood in their most natural state.
My breastfeeding story is different than most.
I didn’t struggle to produce milk, and my infant latched on just fine (with a nipple shield for the first month). I wasn’t forced to pump and go back to a job. I was able to stay home with my son and nurse him on demand.
Instead of dealing with these struggles, I mourned my husband. I cri ..read more
The Singing Widow
3y ago
The Flight Attendant is a typical pop-culture portrayal of PTSD (or Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder). Cassie Bowden, played by Kaley Cuoco in the HBO Max series, is deeply disturbed, haunted by daily flashbacks, and self-medicating with alcohol. Without giving away any spoilers, let’s just say that Cassie is not handling her past trauma very well. Instead, she’s drowning in it.
While this is often how the media portrays PTSD, it isn’t the most accurate depiction. Not everyone who suffers from the disorder struggles with rage, substance abuse, or even debilitating flashbacks. Sure, some do ..read more
The Singing Widow
3y ago
It’s no secret that my journey to motherhood has NOT been easy. Ten minutes after Jax was born, I encountered a significant complication that required the entire medical staff at Bay Med. to come to my aid. Then, three days later, a convicted felon shot and killed my husband. So in addition to joining the lovely young widows club, I lost my home, career, stability, security, and the father of my child.
Infertility feels a bit familiar.
As Don and I struggle to give Jax a sibling, it brings me back to how I felt seven years ago when sadness consumed me; when motherhood coincided with deat ..read more
The Singing Widow
4y ago
When you can’t have a baby, it’s full of "so many nots"
So many friends have conceived.
So many 'baby on board' and 'promoted to big brother' announcements. While scrolling on social, you see another birth announcement. It doesn't matter what social platform you choose, it's going to be on all of them: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok. The couple should expect a lot of likes and comments, maybe close to 300. The post will gain a lot of steam, a lot more steam than your sad, infertility, miscarriage post. New life is exciting. Babies are exciting; infertility is not..........So h ..read more