Episode Pointers:
When grief first comes to you, you might have a few tools in your toolbox. It may be ways you have used to cope in the past or things you’ve used to get through hard seasons in your life before.
But imagine that you get to build a toolbox of skills that you can pick and choose from to help support you on your grief journey.
If you begin practicing skills and putting tools in your toolbox, you can have options and choices to help you get through a grief wave, and a place of support when things are really hard.
Here’s an idea of what has been in my toolbox, and what is currently in my own toolbox:
1._Thought work:
Learning this skill of noticing my thoughts, and taking captive thoughts that are not serving me in my life and grief has been life changing. I learned this through coaching, and I teach this in my coaching.
2. Learning to feel, experience emotions, and building my container for my emotional capacity:
It is allowing me to practice feeling my emotions instead of reacting to them when they come up. I think of this as having body awareness. Being aware of what’s going on in your body.
3. Movement:
Having a way to move my body in many different ways.
E.g. Yoga, biking, running, walking, stretching, working out at the gym, volleyball
4. Meditation
I use mediation often to notice what’s going on in my body and also to bring a sense of calm to my body and to my brain.
5. E.F.T ( Emotional Freedom Technique - Tapping)
I can totally feel the difference, especially when I am so stressed, anxious, angry, or sad. I do E.F.T. and talk through what's going on, noticing in my body, and I always feel better after I’m done.
6. Therapy
I have been to therapy and I also got the treatment, EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing).I think EMDR has saved my life. It has helped me in being grounded again, and feel that I have a little bit of control over my brain.
7. Coaching:
Getting coaching changed my own life in so many ways, especially learning how much more control I have in my thoughts and feelings in my life. It helped me get perspective on many things in my life and grief, and coaching in some form or another continues to be a part of my experience.
8. Energy work:
Different types of energy work, emotion code, body code, wearing different necklaces of gemstones that support different types of energy. I think energy work is the oddest thing I’ve used to support my grief. I can feel it, even though I can’t see it.
9. Bodywork
- Massages, Craniosacral Therapy, Chiropractic Adjustments, any sort of bodywork that helps support my body physically.
10. Leaning on my Faith
Having my faith helps me put my trust in God and my cares in his hands. It has helped me when I get anxious about the future, or wonder how I will handle another thing happening in my life. I’m able to give it to God and live for this moment.
There are so many ways you can come to support your body and mind through this grief journey. And I believe that if you can build your toolbox, you have more options and ways of supporting yourself.
You don’t need to build your grief toolbox all at once, but as you do something, imagine that you are building the skill and capacity to have more tools in your toolbox.
Join my Relief in Grief on October 27th, 28th, and 29th. This is my 3- day workshop that is so fun and I love getting together with the moms who join, we spend time learning, coaching, and talking. To register, go to www.reliefingriefsupportgroup.com
If you want to dive deeper and have a coach who understands grief, and triggers, and what it’s like to be walking with child loss grief, message me at hello@meganhillukka.com and we can chat about how I can help you on your grief journey.
If you are a grieving mother and looking for others who know the pain of child loss, come join my free Grieving Moms Community Facebook group: www.meganhillukka.com/community
