Nancy Jensen shares her story with anticipatory grief with her daughter. For 22 years Nancy lived in a state of anxiety not knowing if her daughter was going to die. At any moment, and many times she almost did. Nancy shares her journey with a daughter who was very sick, and all the emotions that come with raising a daughter who was very sick.
So it can actually be more painful as you begin honestly taking a look at what’s going on, if you try to do this by yourself. Because our normal human reaction is to start judging and beating ourselves up. Instead of leading with curiosity, and taking things out gently from underneath the rug, and having a serious honest conversation about what you are thinking, feeling, and going through. It’s the easier thing, to just shove it under the rug and pretend those things don’t exist, like the anger you have inside of you, or that you just really want to break down and cry and crawl into a dark hole, but you keep pushing through.
When you can process and sit with the day that you are dreading, you get to release those emotions that are underneath instead of waiting on pins and needles for that day to come so you can finally know if you are going to feel those emotions. This helps to let the steam out of a pressure cooker. Don’t keep it all bottled ino. By practicing this it allows you to know that you can do anything. You can handle any emotion that comes up. Even though it’s not always fun and pretty painful sometimes, you can do this. You can experience and allow emotions to flow through you.
Michele Benyo is a Certified Grief Recovery Specialist®, early childhood educator and parent coach, and
the founder of Good Grief Parenting. After her 6-year-old son died of cancer, her 3-year-old daughter
said, “Mommy, half of me is gone.” This heartbreaking statement defined Michele’s life purpose. Her
mission is twofold: to help parents through the unimaginable challenges of parenting while grieving the
death of a child, and to equip parents to meet the unique needs of a child who has lost a sibling in the
early childhood years. The desire of Michele’s heart is to see families live forward after loss toward a
future bright with possibilities and even joy.
I recently heard this description that goes something like this. There are 3 lanes, or business. There’s God’s business, there’s your business, and there’s other people's business.
Suffering happens in your life when you are in God’s business, or other people’s business.
So often we want to change things that are not our business. No matter how hard we try, we cannot change them. We cannot change our spouse, our kids, what happened in our life, what’s happening to someone we love.
These are the questions we discussed in today’s episode! I’m so happy to introduce you to my good friend Brett, who is a Marriage and Family Therapist, and also a Life Coach.
-Can you introduce yourself, and share with my audience how you came to do the work you are doing?
-Conflict with your spouse after your child dies is a huge stressor for many grieving mothers. Can you share a little bit about the conflict cycle that you teach about, and how couples can use it to connect.
-We also think that there’s something wrong with our marriage when we have conflict. Is this true?
-What happens if only one person is wanting to change or work on their marriage?
-How would a couple know if they need help in their marriage or not?
If you want to connect with Brett and learn more from him, or schedule a appointment with him you can find him through these links!
Facebook- www.facebook.com/pivotalapproachmn
Instagram- www.instagram.com/pivotalapproachmn
If you like this podcast, and found it helpful, I want to invite you come check out Grieving Moms Haven, my monthly community for Grieving moms, where you can learn positive coping mechanisms, find a safe space with others who understand, and learn life long skills that support you as you learn how to carry this weight of grief in your life.
There are group coaching calls where we do guided meditations, tapping meditations, breathwork, and just talk, knowing that everyone in the group is also walking the path of child loss
You can come check out Grieving Moms Haven at www.grievingmomshaven.com
I can promise you, that if you come inside of Grieving Moms Haven, and do the work, go through the program with us, you can’t help but change. There is just no way you can do this work and not see a bit differently than you did before.
Thiswork inside of Grieving Moms Haven is both physical, emotional, and mental. We dive into your thoughts, and help get clear on what you want to think on purpose, but also how your emotions feel, help you experience and connect with your body and all of the emotions of grief so that you can experience life to it’s fullest.
A question I ask often is why would you not try to make your life better? Why would you not try something when it feels like your life is just a struggle every day, a slog. Maybe you’re in the point of your grief kinda just waiting for your life to end so you can be done with this suffering.
Why would you want to live that way the rest of your life? You don’t have to. There are things that can help you, and yet, maybe you haven’t taken any actual steps to getting help, doing the work, learning the skills, investing in the coaching or practices that can help you.
