Choosing Life

Editor's Note: I recently read an article by my friend Marcia Alig of New Jersey, for a Compassionate Friend newsletter. She is very active in the national organization and does much to help them run the national conference each year. I was struck by her words in this article that are so necessary for those newly bereaved to feel and work through. I reprint this article for you and ask you to choose life, as she and I have.

It will never be the same. Never. As a bereaved parent, you have often heard or said these words to express grief's profound feelings of sorrow and disorientation. Your life has suddenly taken an unexpected course that appears both uncharted and endless. Bewildered, you vainly search for pathways back to your former life, until you confront the reality that there is no way back. Your child is dead forever.

It is then that you may say, ...never the same. This is the aspect of grief that Simon Stephens, founder of Compassionate Friends, calls The Valley of the Shadow. It is that very long time between the death of your child and your reinvestment in life. Between. It is not supposed to be a permanent resting place. Although some people do take up residence in the valley, it is a transition from the death of your child to life with renewed purpose. The key to this transition is yourself. You must choose between life and the valley. You and only you can decide. And you must make that decision again and again, each day.

Giving in to the hopelessness of the valley is tempting. Choosing to move on toward life requires a great deal of work. You must struggle with the pain of grief in order to resolve it. It is a daily struggle full of tears, anger, guilt and self-doubt, but it is the only alternative to surrendering yourself to the valley. Little by little you choose to move on. Little by little you progress toward the other side of the valley. It takes a very long time, far longer than your friends or relatives suspected. Far longer than you had believed--even prayed--that it would be.

When one day you find yourself able to do more than choose merely to live but also how to live, you will know you are leaving the valley of the shadow. There will still be more work to do, more struggle and choosing. The valley, however, stretches behind rather than in front of you.

When you have resolved your grief by reinvesting in life, you will be able to realize that nothing is ever the same. Life is change. We would not have it be otherwise, for that is the valley of the shadow. Change has the promise of beginning and the excitement of discovery. Life is never the same. Life is change. Choose life.

How Animals Grieve, the book

For all my readers emotionally attached to their animals, I'm sure you all realize that animals also have emotions and can feel for us. They can understand when we are happy, and they understand when we are sad. Within the animal kingdom, they share some of these same emotions with each other.

Professor of Anthropology at the College of William and Mary, Barbara King, has written a book called "How Animals Grieve." In her book she discusses how grief emerges from love. She compares it to our own lives and losses. She says that some animals are capable of grief but don't grieve. "It depends on so many factors, some related to the species, others to individual personality and the nature of the survivors relationship with the deceased, as it does with humans also," she added.

King would like us to take away from her book a resonance for animal emotion and inspiration and hope from the animals who freely express their love for others. She hopes that some might even come away from the book with new things to think about in relationship to loving and grieving.

The book also delves into ending all invasive biomedical testing, adding the animal's emotional awareness to a long list of reasons to carry on that fight.

I invite you to read the book and see whether you agree or disagree with her theories, particularly at the comparisons she makes with human grieving.

News: This and That

  

Camp Erin

The COPE foundation, a non-profit grief and healing organization dedicated to helping parents and families living with the loss of a child, has partnered with The Moyer foundation, to sponsor the NY affiliate of Camp Erin. Camp Erin New York City is a free, weekend long grief support camp designed to help children and teenagers afes 6-17 who have experienced the death of a parent, sibling or someone close to them.

Camp Erin will take place this summer at Camp Wayne from August 23-25, 2013 (2.5 hours from NYC in the Pocono Mountains.

If you are aware of any child that might benefit from this camp, have their parent contact Ann Fuchs, director, at 914-939-5338 or afuchs@copefoundation.org .

For more information about Camp Erin please visit: www.moyerfoundation.org/programs/camperin.aspx

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Why Butterflies?

Have you ever wondered why the butterfly is symbolic for Compassionate Friends? Here is the reason:

Since the early centuries of the Christian Church, the butterfly has symbolized the resurrection and life after death. The caterpillar signifies life here on earth; the cocoon, death; and the butterfly, the emergence of the dead into a new, beautiful and more free existence. Frequently, the butterfly is seen with the word, “Nika”, which means victory.

Elizabeth Kubler-Ross movingly tells of seeing butterflies drawn all over the walls of the children’s dormitories in the World War II concentration camps. Since children are intuitive, she concludes that these children knew their fate and were leaving us a message. The Compassionate Friends has adopted the butterfly as one of its symbols—a sign of hope to us that our children are living in another dimension with greater beauty and freedom—a comforting feeling for us.

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Apology

I would like to apologize to Wendy, a bereaved mother I met at the TCF conference in Boston. She asked to speak to me after a conference dinner and candle-lighting we were having on Saturday night. Due to circumstances beyond my control, I was not able to meet her and did not know her last name or how to contact her to tell her I couldn’t meet with her. I sincerely apologize and hope that if you, Wendy, read this, you will contact me so we can talk.

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Safe Place

Safe Place is a retreat for bereaved parents where they will find others at different stages of grief, some moving forward, some stuck, some caught back up with the "normal" time. It will be held this year Nov. 8-10 at the Presbyterian Mo-Ranch Assembly in Hunt, Texas. The facilitators are there to meet you at whatever level you are on.

The retreat is led by other bereaved parents and supported by professional counselors and includes time spent in listening groups and/or individual conversations.

The main goal is to provide a safe, spiritual environment where participants feel free to talk about their bereavement, share what has helped them cope and discuss how to move again, even if it is just putting one foot in front of the other for now.

Registration pays for sleeping quarters for two nights, 5  meals, the programming and all materials for the weekend. Scholarship assistance is available.

For more information, call Sue Endsley at 830-238-4455 ext. 226.

Bears, Quilts and Projects In Memory of Children

The final workshop I want to tell you about that I thoroughly enjoyed was the one on making Bears, Quilts and Memory Projects, given by Kathy Rambo and Gail Lafferty.

If you are at all creative, this is a great way to do things in memory of your child while keeping busy. Kathy and Gail do these projects (or at least start them) at their special Compassionate Friends gatherings, so they can all work together and have the companionship and be able to talk about their child as they show their finished projects.

They have made and showed the audience craft projects such as jewelry, angel suncatcher, T-shirt quilt, teddy bears, explosion photo boxes, origami photo books, photo transfers on canvas, photo pillows and more. They had at least 100 examples of both simple projects and more complicated ones.

The T-shirt quilt is one of my favorites they showed using their child’s T-shirts and explaining how to put it all together. Granted, you need certain supplies to do all these projects and this one was no exception: iron-on interfacing, thread, rotary cutter, border material and 15-20 T-shirts, depending on the size of the quilt you want.

Another favorite they showed but way more difficult was the teddy bear. For this you would need a Simplicity or McCalls 15 inch bear pattern, cotton material, 4 covered buttons of ¾ inches (brand name Dritz), 2 eyes size 18 inch (brand name Darice), 1 nose size 21 (brank name Darice), doll needle (5 inch brand name Dritz), dental floss and poly-fill stuffing. All these items can be found at a fabric store or can be ordered online. From there you need to follow the pattern. It is possible to use your child’s clothing to cover the bear or just part of the bear. You can also put a photo of your child on the stomach of the bear.

One of the simplier projects was decorating an Altoid memory tin. After cleaning the inside and out, decide what theme you want to do. If you have a small trinket of your child’s, you could build you theme around that. Some other ideas are: spell your child’s name with letter beads or something related to what  your child enjoyed doing like a sport or hobby or even a holiday they liked. Choose either scrapbook paper, wrapping paper, a magazine picture or any colored paper to decorate the box. You would need to make a pattern to cut out and trim it to fit. Glue to box. Add the embellishments with either tacky glue or a glue gun. You can also add ribbon around the outside or anything else you’d like. Since you are making this tin with love in memory of your child, enjoy the time you spend remembering your beautiful child and create a keepsake to take with you in your purse, keep by your bed or place on a special shelf.

I have personally done a computer photo transfer to a T-shirt of my two books. (Some parents do a photo transfer to a T-shirt of their child’s photo.) I was surprised at how easy it was to do and how nice it came out. For this you need have a copy of the photo on your computer. Then make a laser print copy (printed in reverse or mirror image) of your photo with special photo paper used to transfer the image on to material. Print the picture on the special photo paper, let it dry completely before placing it on the T-shirt and iron it on with a very hot iron. When it cools, remove the photo paper gently and slowly from the T-shirt and it should look great! Let it dry completely. It will not come off when washing, but do wash inside out.

If you need help on any of these projects or have questions, contact Kathy at KatjRambo@wowway.com or Gail at angel4gail@tds.net .

Estate Planning Workshop

The 3^rd workshop at the TCF conference I want to mention for this Sunday dealt with the Now Childless bereaved parents. This workshop broke up into 6 smaller group to discuss the following topics: step-children, widowed or single, seasoned grievers, newly bereaved, the child’s possessions and scholarships and estate planning. After each leader discussed their topic within their group, an informational report was given to the entire group.

I did the “scholarships and estate planning.” Because childless parents have no one to leave anything to, that presents problems for the bereaved. What will happen to all your money and your possessions? I don’t claim to know all the details, but I will give you a brief overview of what I said and what was discussed by the group.

Most bereaved parents want to honor and remember their child in some way. By doing some of the following, you will find that you will be able to accomplish this.

We talked about setting up scholarships in your child’s name for financially strapped students and many parents do that, but the main part of this discussion was dedicated to trusts and setting up an endowment fund.

Everyone should at least have a will. If you don’t, your estate will go to the state and no relatives can claim anything. If you have a substantial amount of money, meaning over $500,000, you should set up a trust and be able to leave whatever you want to relatives, friends and organizations. By having a lawyer help you do this, your estate will not go through probate, if you have less than $6 million (this can change, but I think that is what it is now) and you won’t have to pay any taxes. Paying taxes is the biggest reason trusts are done. Of course, if you are extremely wealthy, anything over the government limit of $6 million, you will get slammed!

You can also designate who will get what from your estate in a written trust prepared by your lawyer. The best way to set this up is to specify “percentages” for each person rather than a set amount of money. You don’t know when you are going to die and therefore, may not have the same amount you thought you might at the time you set up your trust. By doing percentage, it will be based on the total amount of the estate at your death. Your trust can also set up funds for grandchildren and designate an executor to take care of that money, if the child is not old enough, until, say age 25, or any age you want.

I did all types of memorials to honor my daughter, but until I set up an endowment fund for my daughter in her memory, I was not satisfied. Now I am. The fund is run by a foundation (every state has them) and each year from my fund, two or three scholarships for a designated amount (there is a limit of using only 5% of the fund) is given to deserving students who fill out forms and write an essay. I get to read the essays written and comment on which one I like the most. In some cases I even get to meet the recipients, giving me great pleasure. All recipients are given information about Marcy so they are aware of where the money comes from. When the monies grow and are available, I will eventually give to something like a touring summer drama camp, something Marcy was involved in and loved. This is all written in the fund papers I filled out and will be carried out in perpetuity.

The money in the fund is invested, and by doing so, will always be there for others to benefit. I do pay a very small amount of money per quarter for that service. I also get a quarterly statement telling me how the funds are doing in the market. I have designated in my trust that half of what I have will go to Marcy’s endowment fund to help others when I am gone. It is a great feeling knowing everything will be taken care of.

For any additional information, see your lawyer. They will also probably know how to get in touch with the people who run these endowment funds in the state you live.

Loss of an Adopted Child

A new workshop never given before at Compassionate Friends National Conference but always requested was “Loss of an Adopted Child.” Peggi Johnson gave this for the first time. Parents who adopt a child have often typically experienced loss of biologic children or the dream for a biologic child, as well as infertility treatments. They have endured the often difficult and expensive adoption process. They are fervently invested in raising their children. When such a child dies, the grief experienced is complicated, cumulative and intensified.

Peggi had an ectopic pregnancy two years after she married. It was a life-threatening experience, but she pulled through. She and her husband then went through infertility treatment which was complicated, expensive and took a long time. Some of those treatments included temperature charts, hormone treatments, sonograms, injections, surgeries, biopsies, blood tests and loss of dignity and privacy.

Nothing worked. They grieved the loss of a biological child because they knew they were never going to have one.

At this point they went through the adoption process of which there are three kinds: open adoption, closed adoption, and partially opened. Peggi said that there was a tremendous investment with money, financial disclosure, and complicated legal procedures. “You have to be flexible,” she said. They hired an adoption attorney.

On Feb. 27, 1990, their son was born to a teenager. There were health complications and Peggi wasn’t able to bring him home until sometime in March. The birth mother insisted that there be no spanking of the child and the birth father wouldn’t sign the final papers until six months later, so not everything went smoothly

When son Jordan was a year old, they looked into and second adoption and 20 months later brought home their daughter, Claire. Peggi became a full-time mother and couldn’t have been happier. She was always there for them, she helped out at school with field trips and parties. They were healthy, smart, happy children. However, Jordan’s sister, as she grew up didn’t fare well. She was emotionally challenged and was in and out of treatment centers.

Peggi and her husband, Jeff, found that adopted children have more emotional problems as they grow up. Where they were concerned about their daughter, it was Jordan who was having problems and they had no idea. Jordan committed suicide at 19. Both parents and Claire were shattered.

Peggi has come to believe that the loss of an adopted child produces grief that is cumulative, complicated and intensified. “It is definitely a hard journey,” she said.

They do everything they can to honor Jordan: donate to animal shelters, speak to groups and Peggi has served as TCF newsletter editor for her chapter.

She says that what helps the pain management of their loss is to

1. Be with other bereaved parents
2. Read about parents who have lost a child
3. Going to counseling and support groups
4. Actively seek out distractions (travel, or anything that takes your mind off the death like playing the piano, knitting, gardening)
5. Take care of your health
6. Get a dog or cat
7. Solace of service- Peggi is at peace helping others like Alzheimer patients. "I need tough challenges like this so I volunteer at hospice," Her husband continues to be supportive of whatever she decides to do.

A Time for Weeping, A Time for Laughter

This past weekend was the 36^th annual conference of the Compassionate Friends. This year it was held in Boston, Massachusetts July 5-7. Many keynote speakers and over 100 workshops were held to help all bereaved parents, grandparents and siblings, one of which I did on Dealing With Difficult Situations As a Bereaved Parent. In between all that was going on, I was determined to get to some of the newer workshops that I had never been to before. In the following month each Sunday I will detail some of them for you if you could not attend.

This first one was called “…A Time for Weeping and a Time for Laughter.” Doug and BJ Jensen firmly believe that laughter can be a healer and that you can find joy again after losing a child. It was designed for those further down the grief journey road who are ready to smile and laugh again. They demonstrated this belief through song, sketches, videos and words of wisdom, they conveyed how they got through the death of their 30 year old son, whose depression subsequently led to suicide.

The couple started the now internationally renowned Love In Motion, a 100 hand sign language choir who travel to inspire audiences with their presentations.

With good memories of fun times and extraordinary love they had for their son, they told funny stories of Jay and the family’s life together. The audience roared with laughter at some of Jay’s antics as a young boy, and BJ invited the audience to think of funny stories about their child and share. It was amazing how many stood up and without hesitation told beautiful stories of children who never got to do many of the things they wanted to. One of BJ's stories I enjoyed was the one about Jay at a baseball game wanted a players autograph. The player was signing and Jay stood in line; the signing was cut off right at Jay. His parents were furious. Jay, in his young innocence said to his mom, "What is an autograph?" When BJ told him, he said, "Oh, that's okay. I already know his name."

The couple also did a sketch about being joyful in spite of the circumstances of the death of Jay, who jumped off a bridge to his death. They emphasized that, of course, there were always sad moments but they said, “We choose to remember our loved one’s legacy with laughter.”

Members of the Love In Motion choir then sang the song “Before the Morning” in sign language, expressing that there can be a brighter tomorrow after grief. The couple learned to focus on what they had and what they could do for others.

In addition to all this, they wrote a book, “Finding Hope…After the Devastating loss of Beloved Children.”

In another sketch they showed the difference between how men and women grieve and that they couldn’t agree on anything during much of their grief journey. For example, BJ would camp anywhere there was a condo, while Doug loved camping outdoors. There were also differences in parenting issues. And BJ wanted to talk about Jay after his death, but Doug did not.

In a video BJ went through exercises as Jay silently looked on, hands folded on his chest as his mother did the exercises all wrong; a cute funny video.

BJ also told a story that one night she woke up and heard her son's voice saying he hoped she was happy and wanted her to buy some earings she saw the day before. "The money is in the closet in an old briefcase," Jay said to her. Sure enough, the money was in the old briefcase; the exact amount she needed.

The last song done in sign language expressed the optimism that the Jensens feel. “As long as we have music in our life, our spirit will set us free, ending with their mantra—less weeping, more laughter in your life.”