What To Do When It Hurts – Coping With Grief

For the past 6 months I have been going through a hard time and I want to share some self-care methods I have adopted to help me. I ended a long-term relationship that I deeply wanted to last but that was clearly detrimental to me. Why would I want that to last, you might ask? Well even though it was emotionally abusive, it was a very close and connected union, and I loved him with all my heart. As they say, Love is Blind, and I was always hopeful but one day I knew I had to end it.

Get Help If You Need It

I was shocked that as a month or 2 went by, I didn’t feel like I was getting any better. The depression was overwhelming. That brings me to the most important thing I did to aid in my recovery. I got help and found someone I could talk to. Find a friend or family member you can talk to or find a therapist or group counseling. In counseling I learned that this was grief, a natural response to losing someone or something that is important to you. I always associated grieving with a death but it can be for any kind of loss such as a break-up, selling of a childhood home, loss of a pet, loss of a job, a divorce, or loving someone who is self-destructive. There is no right way or wrong way to go through it, as everyone is different. I also learned that there is no time limit on grieving.

Give Yourself Time

That is very important so let me say it again. There is no time limit on grieving. It will take as long as it takes so don’t pressure yourself on getting past it in a certain amount of time. It is okay to take as long as you need. I felt pressured to “get over it” and not burden my family or friends with my sadness anymore. This made me feel isolated, alone and abnormal until I gave myself a break and allowed myself time to deal with the loss. Sometimes we never get over grief but the important thing is that we are able to move forward in our lives and enjoy them.

Cry and Let It Out

Image from https://en.brilio.net/

You should know it is okay to have negative feelings. At first I was hurt so deeply that I would not allow myself to feel the pain. I was afraid I would not be able to endure it. I tried to deny my feelings. I kept busy with work, went out, did anything I could to not acknowledge them but to heal you have to face your feelings. So I took little pieces of time and let myself feel the pain and cry my eyes out. At first I could only handle little bits at a time and then I would have to numb myself again with TV, alcohol, food or work but as time went on I got better at letting myself feel the feelings and sort through them.

Aromatherapy and Meditation

Aromatherapy is the use of aromatic substances, mainly essential oils, to promote health to mind, body and spirit. It works by stimulating receptors in your nose that send messages to the limbic system. That is the part of your brain that controls emotion. I made a special essential oil blend, Empower, to help me when I was feeling bad, letting myself feel the pain or meditating. I would put a few drops in my bath water, diffuser, in an aromatherapy locket, or just on me. I chose essential oils that could help heal my heart of pain and anger, give me strength and courage to keep going, uplift my spirits, and calm my anxiety and fear. Empower helped me meditate and focus on more positive thoughts and feelings. Meditation is good to practice in everyday life but especially helpful while grieving. It helped me quiet all the rampant thoughts in my mind and get to some of the deeper truths that I needed to deal with. It also lowers blood pressure, stress hormones, helps strengthen your immune system, and enhances the part of your brain that produces positive emotions.

Friends and Family

I know you probably won’t feel like it but spend time with friends and family. I have wonderful friends and family that listened to me when I needed to talk. They invited me places providing an escape from the loneliness. They are there for support when you need it most and being around them, even when I really just wanted to sit at home, helped to keep me from feeling more isolated and alone. So even if you have to force yourself, spend time with those you love because they love you too and you need to feel that.

Take Care Of Yourself

Picture from Everydayhealth.com

I also tried to exercise. I would go for walks, use my treadmill, or do this 7 – minute workout that I downloaded on my phone. Use your body’s natural comfort system by producing some endorphins. I tried to eat right, although I must admit I didn’t always do so great with that. I’m one to self-medicate with hot wings, fried foods, or candy but I really made an effort to allow myself a little and resist the binge. Gaining more weight and not feeling healthy wouldn’t have made me feel good about myself. Exercising and eating right makes you feel healthier and happier. I also gave up coffee, which made it easier to sleep at night. Getting more sleep when you are going through an emotional time is hard but so good for you. It helps you process your emotions but gives you a break from them as well.

Laughter

You know how they say laughter is the best medicine? Well it is good for you because it stimulates your heart, lungs and muscles. It also increases endorphins and can have a positive effect on your immune system. I used it a lot. I watched funny movies and television shows as much as I could to lift my spirits and have some happiness in my life.

Focus On Others

picture from http://www.quotefancy.com

When you are grieving so much of your attention is on how you are feeling. If you move some of that attention to helping others the rewards are great. Firstly you forget your troubles for a while and then there is the added benefit of feeling good about yourself and being part of something positive. Helping others can be something as small as letting another driver in when you’re in a traffic jam or holding a door open for someone. While meditating one day the idea came to me to create Empower soap and essential oil blend to help others who may be going through a difficult time in their lives and help raise money for the Community Crisis Center in Elgin, IL. They helped me with counseling and serve individuals & families affected by domestic violence, emotional abuse, sexual assault, and homelessness. Their services include a 24-hour hotline, a shelter for 40 women and children, individual and group counseling, financial assistance to prevent homelessness, partner abuse intervention, and advocacy through the legal, medical and social welfare systems. I will be donating $2 from every Empower item sold to the Center. You can read more about it here.

Gratitude

Being grateful creates positive emotions and leads to a happier, healthier life. I purchased a gratitude journal to help me be mindful of things to be grateful for. When you are grieving it may be hard to think of these things and write them down everyday. That is why I purchased a journal that has prompts and inspirational sayings to get me thinking more positively. The more positive emotions you feel, the more you send out into the world thereby attracting more to you. That’s an awesome benefit for just a couple of minutes a day.

Getting through painful life experiences is not easy but it is possible. Know that you will have good days and bad days. Even when you think you are healed and done grieving moments can arise that take you right back into it. Things such as holidays, birthdays, a song, or seeing the person you separated from can bring up feelings again so acknowledge them and then let them go. Just remember to be kind to yourself because you are the greatest comfort and most powerful healing you can have.

Please share this post so that it can reach others who may be struggling right now and can use some help. You might not even know that someone is struggling because women are good at hiding it.

Frauds Exposed!

Do you use essential oils? Do you ever wonder if what you are buying is really a pure oil taken from the actual plant itself?

Did you know that there are a lot of crooks in the industry that adulterate essential oils with synthetic fragrance chemicals or even sell synthetics as real essential oils?

I have been aware of this because I use pure essential oils in my soaps.

 

I make sure that I purchase them from trusted sources. I wouldn’t want to make an all natural soap and then poison it with harmful synthetic fragrances.

I realize though, that you may not be aware of these things so I wanted to bring them to your attention. I hate when people are cheated. So I wanted to tell you about this new foundation that was created to expose the frauds and I thought you would like to know about it.

It is called Essential Oil Analysis Foundation, a non-profit organization that will do GC/MS testing to bring accountability to the industry. The results will be made public so you can beware of the frauds out there.

You can learn more about them and view the companies they have already tested here.

You can also purchase my soaps here.

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Turmeric – My New Soap

You may have heard of all the health benefits of turmeric lately. It is getting a lot of publicity and attention in numerous studies.

Turmeric is the root of the Curcuma longa plant.

Image from suburbantomato.com

It is a common spice in Indian food and the main ingredient in curry. It is also widely used in Ayurvedic and Chinese medicine.

It has strong anti-inflammatory. anti-bacterial, and anti-oxidant properties. It is being studied for cancer prevention & treatment, as well as other health concerns, and proving to be very promising.

Because of turmeric’s anti-inflammatory and anti-bacterial properties it is also used to treat skin problems such as acne, rashes and eczema. It is said that the anti-oxidant properties make it good for stretch marks, wrinkles, and balancing skin tone.  There are numerous recipes on the internet for face masks made with it that claim to reduce the signs of aging and leave your skin with a healthy glow. I have not tried any because turmeric is also used as a dye and I didn’t want to walk around with a yellow face until it wore off.

It can easily stain your skin or anything yellow. I grated some fresh turmeric root once and my fingers were orange-yellow. Thankfully I know that although turmeric is not soluble in water,  it is in oil so I just used some olive oil on my hands and it came right off.

However I wanted to take advantage of all the skin care benefits this spice has to offer without risking yellow skin so I put it in a soap. I also added some moisturizing coconut milk and a light scent blend reminiscent of sandalwood and roses.

I then tested it out on my human guinea pigs (aka family & friends) and it got a big thumbs up. No one turned yellow and everyone said it made their skin amazing. So I am now offering this special soap to you. Try it out and let me know how you like it.

Use the code “Be Well” in the voucher box of the shopping cart and get 20% off your order.

Mother Earth Day

As May approaches the focus is on Mother’s Day. Most businesses are advertising gifts for you to buy your mother. Although I am a mother, my mom has been gone for 20 years so I’m putting my focus on Mother Earth.

A week or so ago, April 22, was Earth Day. Although I work at protecting the environment every day with better business practices and by producing environmentally safe soap, I wanted to do something more for the earth. After all without it where would we be? Without the tremendous abundance it gives us in food, beauty, and joy we wouldn’t have much of an existence.  So I joined my local environmental committee in a clean-up project.

That is how I learned about Buckthorn. It is one of the most troublesome invasive species that grows just about everywhere.

Photo from University of Wisconsin GB https://www.uwgb.edu/biodiversity/herbarium/invasive_species/rhacat01.htm

It’s a shrub native to Europe and has no natural controls here. It is the first to green in the spring and one of the last to lose its leaves in the fall allowing it to out-compete native plants for nutrients, light and water.

It also produces a chemical that is toxic to other plants so nothing can grow under or around it. It produces berries with many seeds that the birds love which is how it spreads so fast. It degrades wildlife habitat and threatens our forests, wetlands and prairies.

I’m told most people have it in their yards and it is important that we destroy it before it destroys our native plants and habitats. So I was put on “buckthorn killer” duty and had lots of fun doing it.

It is terribly hard to get rid of. Even cutting it down isn’t enough. The stumps have to be treated with an herbicide otherwise it will just sprout new branches. In our forest preserves they also do controlled burns to try and get rid of it.

Working at removing it all day I got to be kind of good at identifying it, although I’m still not an expert. I have found some in my yard though and am working on getting rid of it.

I also did some trash removal from Salt Creek that runs through my town.

All in all it was a very productive day. I felt good (and very tired) after tending to Mother Earth. So this Mother’s Day as you buy gifts and honor your mothers please give a thought to the first mother of all life, the earth.

Please think about the products you buy, the packaging you throw out, what you wash down the drain, etc. Please recycle, compost, reduce and reuse. Be careful of the plants you choose to put in your yard and look for buckthorn and destroy it. Know that caring for Mother Earth can only benefit you in the long run.

To help you help the earth I am offering you 25% off at Scenter of the Mind. Just put the word “green” in the voucher section of the online shopping cart. It’s that simple.

How Do You Heal?

I am going through the most painful days of my life. It feels like there is never going to be an end to it. This feels like a culmination of all the pain I have ever experienced in my entire life and there has been a lot.

Can anyone understand?

It all seemed so normal. Being 6th in a line of 7 children. A nice home in a nice neighborhood. A sainted mother that did everything while raising 7 children. An alcoholic father that never wanted to come home after work. He wasn’t mean. He didn’t beat us. He worked and supported us. He just would rather go drinking than come home to us. No horrible words to us. Silence, the silence that let’s you put your own words and meaning to it all in your head. The words, “I don’t love you” and “you aren’t deserving of me” or “I don’t want you.”

A childhood of drinking and drugs to cope. Strings of boyfriends to try to feel loved. Boys who cheated on me, almost every single one.

Still I had dreams I hung onto. There was hope. Keep believing and you will find someone to share your life with. Someone to share your love with and that will love you.

Then I started growing up and trying to become a responsible, acceptable adult. I got a job, a husband, some children. Life held promise except that my husband was an alcoholic. All perfectly normal. He went to work every day and supported us. He came home. He wasn’t mean he just would rather sit in the garage and drink until he was numb enough. He didn’t say mean things to me or even fight with me when I got angry about it. There was just silence. The kind of silence that lets you fill in the meaning & words yourself. The words, “you aren’t even worth fighting with,” “I don’t want you,” “I need to be drunk before I can stand you.” I thought this was the most painful time of my life.

But still there was hope and 4 children I needed to save from repeating my childhood. There is hope I can become better, prettier, thinner, worthy of love. Then he will want to share life with me. He will want my love and love me.

One of my children was born with spina bifida. You can read that story here. I thought that was the most painful time of my life.

After 25 years of marriage I started realizing that dream life was never coming. Love was never coming to me and I had to try to find it inside myself. I started working on myself. I started finding friends and things to do that I enjoyed. It also meant slowly starting to separate myself from trying to be someone my husband could love. I wanted to be someone I could love. After 27 years of marriage my husband dumped me for another woman.

I thought going through the divorce and being replaced was the most painful time in my life. I felt so betrayed, worthless, alone and like someone no one could love.

Still there was hope. Maybe I needed to go through everything I have so that I could become someone I could love and finally find love. Maybe all my life was just the “cost” and that I finally paid enough for the prize. Keep believing and my dreams will come true.

It has been 4 years since the divorce. I have struggled but always held the thought that now is my time. I will find someone to share my life with. Someone who wants my love and loves me. I have endured much loneliness and doubt all while tightly gripping the dream. Just keep believing and it is mine.

I put aside my fear of relationships, rejection, opening up my heart. I met someone. I was cautious but went for it. He treated me better than I have ever been treated. We were so good together. He allowed me to share my life with him. We did things together. Everything was better than it’s ever been and there was hope for a future. It was perfectly normal. He just wanted to drink with his buddies one night instead of be with me. Red flag but I didn’t want to jump to conclusions. After all everyone needs time with their friends. That’s normal.

7 months later, after several break-ups and getting back together I was finally realizing that he would keep rejecting me in favor of drinking but I was still clutching the dream. I went to his house to talk to him. That’s when I met his girlfriend that he broke up with when we started dating. Except according to her, as she sat outside his house in her car, she had been seeing him the whole time and was supposed to be going out with him that evening.

She texted him she was talking to me. He came out. I asked him if he had plans with her. He said yes. Then silence. Silence as I walked away and headed home. Silence after I texted him my distress. The kind of silence that lets you put your own words & meaning to the situation.

There is no more hope. I have no more strength. I will never find someone to share my life with. Someone who wants my love and will love me. I can’t even love me. I can’t heal. I don’t know how to heal. This is the most painful time of my life.

How do you heal?

 

 

 

I Got the First Look

Last Friday night I had the opportunity to attend one of the best fundraising events. It is called First Look for Charity. This is a black-tie event where the guests are the first to gaze upon the new automobiles being unveiled at the Chicago Auto Show, the largest in the country.

The best part about it though, is that it generates more than 2 million dollars for 18 Chicagoland charities, one of them being the Illinois Spina Bifida Assoc. Since it started in 1992 it has raised 42 million dollars.

I got to go as part of my job. Many of you just know me as the owner of Scenter of the Mind but I also work a part-time job as the Administrative Assistant to the Executive Director of the Illinois Spina Bifida Assoc.

I got involved with the ISBA about 20 years ago. My son Jeffrey, now 25, was born with spina bifida, one of the most common, permanently disabling birth defects. It is the failure of the spine to close during the first month of pregnancy. It is a very complicated condition requiring constant and super expensive medical attention. So my first contact with the ISBA was for financial help, which they so generously gave me twice. I cannot tell you how much that meant to me and the survival of my family.

In later years I used many of their services like Camp Ability and attended their events to connect with other families going through the same things as mine. They were such a blessing to me that I ended up volunteering as the Holiday Party Chairperson for 8 years. Unfortunately I had to leave that post but now just a couple of years later and I am back working with them.

So I put on my best dress and headed to the McCormick Place to set up and decorate the tables in our room where we greeted our most wonderful supporters. The majority of them are from the Windy City Corvette Club,  Bill Kay Chevrolet, and Brandenburg Industrial Service Co.

Even though I had to work part of the evening I still got to go up to the auto show and enjoy live music, champagne, hors d’oeuvres, desserts and all the newest cars & trucks.

I particularly loved this BMW so buy lots of soap. Ha ha ha!

 

This Mercedes wasn’t bad either.

My shoes clearly were not meant for all that walking so I was thrilled to run into a nice man handing out slippers.

 

Even with the blister on my toe I still had a wonderful time. So next year if we are still benefactors of this awesome event contact the ISBA for tickets and go. You get to have a classy evening and provide much needed services for many deserving children and families. It’s a win win!

Floss My What?

We all know by now that flossing between our teeth helps to clean away bacteria, protect our teeth and prevent gum disease.

 

 

However there is another part of your body that you can floss.

 

Photo from http://calmag-c.com/

 

It is your nerves.

I learned of this technique while searching for a reason that my arms fall asleep at night while I’m sleeping. It is very annoying and has been waking me up several times a night.

As expected most medical web sites were not any help with this problem. They listed very few possible causes for this condition and  then, of course, suggest you see your doctor and have all kinds of expensive tests.

Since that is not an option for me I kept looking and found some muscle-building forum posts from people experiencing the same thing as me. Since I work out and lift weights this seemed like a closer fit to my problem.

In reading some of the suggestions I saw the term “nerve flossing” which prompted me to do another search. That led me to a web site called Kinetic Health (www.kinetichealth.ca).

Well I never would have guessed it but apparently there is a nerve in your arm called the ulnar nerve and it can get compressed by the tissues surrounding it. This can cause pain or numbness in the neck, shoulder, elbow or arm. It can also cause “cyclist palsy” which is numbness in the ring & pinky fingers when holding on to the handlebars.

I was floored because I get that too when I ride my bike, although to me it feels like my whole hand.

So what do you do about it? Medicines? Surgery?

Nope, you floss the nerve. The Kinetic Health web site has videos on how to floss the ulnar nerve and other nerves as well like your sciatic. It turns out that flossing the nerve is just doing certain easy movements that gently free up the nerve and strengthen it.

Well I tried it and it worked. I didn’t get “sleepy” arms at all last night.

There is a bonus to all this as well. I also suffer from nerve pains in my left foot as a remnant of herniated disks and back surgery. It usually also strikes at night and nothing makes it go away but some hard-core pain meds like vicodin. I hate taking them because they cause me all sorts of other problems and are harmful to my body. Sometimes though I don’t have a choice because the pain is too great.

I watched the video on sciatic nerve flossing, since I know that nerve goes all the way into the leg and foot. I tried flossing it and it seemed to help the nerve pain in my foot a little bit. I’m not sure if it will make it go away completely but I’m going to keep doing it. I am hopeful it will.

So if you have back, neck, shoulder, elbow or headache pain maybe some nerve flossing is all you need. Hop on over to Kinetic Health and watch their videos. The exercises are pretty simple and free. Just more proof that our bodies can actually heal themselves.

I’m so happy with my new healing powers that I just had to share. I hope it helps someone else suffering needlessly.

Thinking Spring

Today the snow is melting. The seed catalogs are arriving and I am thinking about spring. I know we have at least 6 more weeks of winter but flowers are in my head.

With the snow being so wet it really does hold together well and is just right for making a snowman, however, I have flowers in mind.

 

So I decided to make snowflowers. It wasn’t as easy as I thought it would be and I was tired out after just two but maybe tomorrow I will feel like doing more.

 

 

Merry Days

I have been hearing complaints about people wishing people “Happy Holidays.” I find it sad that one can find something negative about someone wishing them well.

Then my daughter didn’t like me saying “Merry Christmas” to the man at the bank. Maybe he was Jewish and celebrated Hanukkah and would be offended.

To me,  I don’t care what you celebrate, the fact that you took the time & thought to wish me well is all that matters. If someone said, “Happy Kwanzaa” to me I would say, “Thank you. You too.”

So I don’t understand these Facebook posts challenging people to have the guts to say “Merry Christmas.”

It doesn’t take courage to wish someone well. It takes an open heart, thoughtfulness, kindness and love.

With that said, and in the hope that you take this wish in the spirit that it is given, I would like to wish you

Merry Days!

May all your days be filled with light, love and kindness.

Make a Wish and Watch it Grow!

A while back my sister had the opportunity to go through an old barn and take any items she wanted. She collected a few things and offered some to me. Of the items I took was an old rusted iron trough. I have no idea what it was supposed to be but I thought it was interesting and wanted it.

My usual plan would have been to use it as a planter but that was boring to me so I hung on to it for several years until I had just the right use for it.

This past summer I decided to expand my flower garden and turn it into a special place. A sanctuary where I could meditate or just sit and be grateful for all the beauty that nature provides. A natural place for the bees, butterflies and birds to eat and drink. A space where I could connect to nature and feel its power and abundance.

As I began to add more features to the garden I looked at the iron thing again and started pondering what I could use it for. At first I was thinking maybe I could incorporate it into the water feature I was adding but it didn’t fit in that plan.

As I was building the fountain though, I was going through all my rocks and that gave me the perfect idea for the iron thing.

I made it into a wishing rock container. What is a wishing rock, you ask? Well it is something I made up.

It is a rock that has a wish painted on it. I took a bunch of stones and rocks that I had collected over the years and put them in a basket. I bought some paint pens and invited everyone who came over to visit me to paint their wish on a rock and toss it into the iron thing.

I put the wishing rock container in my flower garden so that everyone’s wishes and beautiful thoughts would grow and spread.

It was a great way to incorporate my family and friends and their hopes and dreams into my sanctuary. The perfect way to turn an old, rusted iron thing, which was pretty cool looking, into something more beautiful.

So if you ever come to my house you will find the basket and paint pens and can make a wishing rock of your own to add. I think it would be awesome if the wishing trough started to overflow with beautiful pictures, thoughts and desires. I hope also that all the wishes come true and the energy of all the collective ideas feeds the garden making this space a true sanctuary for all who enter it.