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Health & Fitness

Carry On, Endeavor to Persevere, Tend your Garden

This was written a little over a year after my mother died of Pancreatic Cancer.  The disease devastated her body and mind and I was traumatized by her suffering.  My grief began the moment she was diagnosed and continues to this day.   In the first year I desperately grieved the loss of my mom – she was my best friend, my mentor and my role model.  I thought I knew what there was to know about grief.  I thought I had had my share.  I thought when you are an adult and a parent dies, it is an easy loss.  I was unprepared for all I would be losing when my mom died.  I feel like it changed my DNA.  I thought I wouldn’t be able to speak for a year after she died, that her suffering and mine would have rendered me speechless. 

There were two things that got me through that period in addition to the kindness and caring of my friends.  One was the families I would see at Good Grief where I was working at the time.  They gave me hope.  I thought to myself if they can do it after all they have lost, I can do it too.  If they can get up every day and get dressed and get their kids to school, and go to work, so can I. 

The other thing was my tote bag from Bradley and Son Funeral Home with its four messages of how to cope, passed down through the generations. 

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*      Fake it ‘til You Make it
*      Carry On
*      Endeavor to Persevere
*      Tend your garden. Blossom

I would be driving in my car wondering how I was going to speak at a meeting.  And I would whisper to myself “fake it ‘til you make it.”  Or I would be immobilized with anxiety and I would remind myself to “carry on.”  And always, always, endeavor to persevere. 

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I carried my tote bag with me everywhere and when I wasn’t using it I hung it on the handle of the front hall closet so I could see it every time I passed by.  It was like a gentle but strong friend who kept me going.  And the last message “tend your garden” reminded me to take care of myself and rest and exercise and eat healthy. 

Fast Forward.

 It wasn't until a little over three years after my mom died that I felt like my feet were back on solid ground and that Icould tap into some of the good that came from this particular grief.  This includes a deeper understanding and empathy for the grief of adults who have a parent die.   And the feeling that I want to carry forward the legacy and values of my parents in my own life, that I can’t let it die with them.   And I do things my mom use to do like talk to all the shop keepers whether she knew them or not and I sing to my cat like she sang to hers and it makes me smile.  I’ve learned how to hold my dad and now my mom, in my life on a daily basis.  I talk to them, ask for advice and brag to them when I feel proud of something I did. 

I believe they are there somewhere smiling down on me and supporting the work of Imagine.  It is still hard to wrap my mind around the fact that my bigger than life mom is so completely gone from the planet.  But occasionally I hear her voice calling my name, and she visits in my dreams now too, just like my dad.  

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