The loss of our husband in our lives is a very difficult thing. Some widows may lose hope in the wake of their husband’s departure from their lives. We did everything together and life was shared in a partnership we cherished. The longer we were together with him, the more entwined our lives became. Our rhythm ran in concert with his. Our lives balanced each other. The scale is now broken. I find it very interesting when I speak to other widows who describe themselves as always very optimistic and energetic before they lost their husband. So many of us see a radical change in nearly every aspe ..read more

Lack of Vision   The bi-products and aftermath of grief are so numerous, that even now, I’m sure there are things that I haven’t even realized yet that will affect us. Grief is like glitter, a song and quote suggest. And it makes perfect sense to me that years from now while I continue to meander through life after loss, a glint of grief will still find me. It’s kind of like when your toddler dumps out the entire glitter container and months later you are still seeing little shiny bits of it in the weirdest unexpected places. Grief’s presence will continue to make itself known in some me ..read more

What is a Glimmer? Glimmers are small moments of joy or peace that arise from appreciating simple things like the colors of a rainbow, the scent of a flower, or the sound of the rain. Glimmers and triggers are opposites in that glimmers spark positive feelings while triggers spark negative ones. – The Newport Institute Although I didn’t know of this word back in the early days of my widowhood, looking back, I can remember many of them quite well. I know it’s beyond difficult to look for the “good” times when your world is falling apart, but if you remain open to it, these little blips of ..read more

Blog written by, Author, Emma Grey Three weeks after my husband died from a heart attack in 2016, my children and I walked in Australia’s “City to Surf” fun run. We’d already entered the race, months before he died, and initially thought of cancelling our tickets. After the funeral, though, we needed a weekend away from all the sympathy cards and the dying bunches of flowers in our hallway. We packed the tissues and took our grief on the road, three hours from home. The walk begins in the centre of Sydney near the Opera House and ends on our famous Bondi Beach. My sister and her children joine ..read more

  Have you heard of the Boulevard of Broken Dreams?   I think that a lot of widows would agree that at least some portion of their grief journey has been spent there, lamenting, listing the losses, and looking toward an uncertain future ahead on the path in which they have no idea what to hope for or hold as life’s dreams and goals anymore. When a loss of this magnitude touches you in the early stages of life, when you feel like you are “just starting out,” then you find there are an awful lot of broken dreams to take inventory of. Like me, you may even feel like you can’t quite mov ..read more

This week I closed another chapter in my widow’s journey.  I have been the lead peer support of a monthly widow’s group that met at a funeral home. The group of women  meets for an hour or so to share stories, to cry together and obtain support.  The beauty of the group is everyone is a widow and knows exactly what each woman has experienced with the loss of their spouse.  And everyone is in a different stage of grief, While I didn’t plan on volunteering to lead the group, someone referred me to the community director of outreach services, who asked me if I’d consider.  ..read more

The Void Life has gone on after the death of my husband. Many days it seems to drag on. New routines established, a new normal forced upon us, yet the void remains. Life without the gift of being in love feels so stagnant in so many ways. A great deal of monotony with no spark, no growing together, no dreams to share, and no one to love on. Life without my sweetheart is a life with a tremendous void. It is large and ever present. It is the void of the lack of a husband and the lack of a father for my two sons. And even after the progression of time and doing all the things that a widow is sup ..read more

Spring is in the air! When we think of Spring, we are usually filled with restored hope in the optimistic promise life is renewed and fresh starts are possible. Tender green leaves and beautiful blossoms adorn the trees and bushes as the landscape before us transforms from the barren and dreary browns and greys to spectacular splashes of color and the air fills with the fragrance of fresh blooms. Spring officially made its debut on March 19. I’ve been longing to bloom again for what seems like such a long time. Every year since my dear husband went home to Heaven, when spring comes, I think of ..read more

The topic of humor is one that I have a lot of experience addressing. Not just in my widowhood circles, but in my everyday life as well. I was kind of a weird little Wednesday Addams sort of kid and if you could make me laugh, you were a-okay in my book. Suffice it to say, though, in those first few moments, or maybe even days – who can remember – after Bret’s death, I felt like I might never laugh again. I know I started to feel a little more like laughing once in a while around the time of his Celebration of Life, and I suppose it just started coming back to me bit by bit, after that. There ..read more

It’s been nearly three years since life as I knew it came to an abrupt halt. It was the 2nd phone call in 4 weeks that no one ever wants to receive … this was the call that told me my husband, the father of my children, the man I thought would be my partner through life’s journey, was gone forever. In the blink of an eye, I found myself navigating a reality I never anticipated—a reality filled with hidden truths, unresolved trauma, and the immense weight of becoming the sole pillar for my five beautiful children. The initial shock gave way to a fierce determination to fight, to rebuild, to pro ..read more