Grief Has No Time Limits

 I received a digitized thumb drive of my old 8 mm films and watched them yesterday.  They were fun to watch. Most of these were of Shelley’s baby, toddler, and childhood days.

Yes, they made me smile and shed a tear or two. In these films, she displayed kindness and a willingness to help someone. I found myself saying, “Shelley, look how cute you were.” And then I remembered she would never see these films.

I dreamed of her last night. I suppose the films caused the dream. 

In my nighttime vision, I drove through cities and towns as I searched for her. When I finally found Shelley, she appeared as an adult. Now, get this. She was looking for a man to date! This frustrated me in my dream, and I have no idea why. She was a widow when she died. If she had lived, perhaps she would have been looking for a companion.

Shelley met her husband online. He was a good man, and they had ten years of a happy marriage before he passed.

 They both became sick at about the same time. Don, her husband, was diagnosed with esophageal cancer, and Shelley was diagnosed with early onset dementia.

Don took treatments at M.D. Anderson in Houston, but he reached the point where the physicians couldn’t do more. He knew he was dying and asked us to take charge of Shelley. Of course, we did. We spent over ten years caring for our adult child.

I do not regret it.

God took her to heaven on October 26, 2024. That’s been enough time for grief to lessen for me. Right? However, grief doesn’t work on a schedule. There are times when I swallow tears so others cannot see them.

Her earthly birthday is coming up. Her dad’s birthday is March 4, and hers was March 6. We celebrated them together in the past. Perhaps the anniversary of her birth is another reason the grief grows stronger, as well as my dream about her.

I know it is normal to dream of Shelley. I understand I may become sad when I see pictures of her.  And when special anniversaries or birthdays come around, I know it is natural for sadness to creep into my being.

She is entombed in Austin, Texas, next to her husband. I live in Houston. I took flowers last year on her birthday. I went again and took more bouquets on the anniversary date she left this earth. I won’t go to her burial site this year on her birthday, but I’ll be thinking of her.

And I’ll be grieving.

Tips for Caregivers

1.    Don’t punish yourself because you grieve. Remember this. Grief has no time limits.

2.    Never beat yourself up. Everyone is different. Other family members are on their own timetable of sorrow.

3.    Remove pictures that make you sad and replace them with happier photos of your loved one. I recently removed a photo from my fridge. It is a sweet picture of the two of us, but it makes me feek forlorn. Other pictures of her on my fridge don’t.  Isn’t that weird? The one I removed was a selfie I took of us while we waited for a doctor. We laughed so much that day. We went to lunch after the appointment and thoroughly enjoyed the time together.

4.    It’s okay to cry. "Tears are words the heart can't express" ~ Gerard Way

5.    Think of tears this way. "Tears are God's gift to us.  Our holy water.  They heal us as they flow." ~ Rita Schiano

I Went Back

 

Yesterday, November 20, 2025, I returned to Shelley’s residence, the last one she stayed in before the Lord moved her spirit to heaven.  She transcended to her eternal home on October 26, 2024.

How did I feel as I entered the familiar place?

I didn't become as melancholy as I expected. You see, I always thought if I could make it through the first year's anniversary, I’d survive. 

I pulled into a parking place I had used many times before and felt okay. Sure, I said a quick prayer, but I didn’t feel the urge to cry.

I was there to play the piano. I had offered to play many times in the past while Shelley was a resident, but my husband never wanted me to do so. Why, you ask? I have no idea. I’m no expert pianist, but I can play hymns in an adequate fashion, and we had donated hymn books to the facility.

Anyway, without telling him, I decided to go back and play for the residents. I can’t do much, but I can do that.

They had rearranged furnishings, but otherwise, it appeared the same. At least with furniture. The personnel changed many times over. I often wonder why that is.  Working with dementia patients is a difficult job. Perhaps that’s one reason why.

The activity director had positioned the patients in a gathering behind the piano. I like to see the audience, but with the piano placed that way, I couldn’t, but I heard some of them sing!

One lady sat in a wheelchair right behind me. I played old, familiar hymns, and she sang the words, and she hit all the high notes. She impressed me big time. She had a gorgeous voice. A choir master would have been overjoyed to have her in the choir.

Others sang too.  I’ve always said music is the last to leave the mind.

Before Shelley moved to memory care, she lived in an assisted living facility. Retired guys brought karaoke machines. They sang, and they danced with the residents. The ladies loved the attention.

I will play there again. I received more blessings than I gave.

Where Shelley was

Gay's Author Page

Tips for Caregivers

1.    Take music with you.

2.    Sing with them, even if you can’t carry a tune.

3.    If you play, do so for the residents.

4.    Even if you don’t know anyone in a facility, you can offer music to them.

5.    Offer to dance with them.

 

 

Months Vanish into Yesteryear

 

 

The Months Vanish into Yesteryear

 

A few people recover from grief quickly, even if they loved the deceased person deeply. They move on to the next phase of life as if the sorrow was a mere blimp in the road.

Others mourn for years. The sadness is heartbreaking, and they carry it forever.

Where are you in the process of grief?  We all experience it with different emotions and sometimes, the emotions repeat themselves. One day, we are okay with our loss, and the next, we are angry. Then a week later, we are sad. The repetition continues.

Grief recovery is different for each of us. We are snowflakes, unique with our perspectives and upbringing.

If we have surgery, a scar remains as a reminder of the incident. It takes days to recover from a medical procedure. After the healing, we experience health again, but a scar remains, and it jogs our memories. We’ve been through something important.

While living in the survival mode, there is no right or wrong way to feel. No magical genie in a bottle to blow grief away. We live with it. Period.

Helpful people may say to you, “Just move on.” Perhaps they can do that, but it may not work for you. I recently had a family member tell me, “Oh, I forgot about her death.” This person finds it easier to adjust that I do.

It has been a year since my daughter left this earth. During these past months, I’ve carried on with the necessary things, but I’ve also cocooned myself. I don’t answer the phone. My hubby knows I won’t answer, so he does it. I don’t go somewhere unless it is a must. I don’t dress unless I’m going somewhere. I play games on the computer. They rest my mind.

However, I’ve given suggestions below, and these suggestions continue to help me. My support group consists of two women who have gone through grief. I took medication for a brief time, and my Bible study is a godsend. 

God grant us mercy as we live with our grief.

 

Help for Caregivers

1.     Find a support group. Don’t try to go through this process alone. You want to be healthy, and a support group can help with that.

2.     See a doctor for your extreme sadness. Temporary medication can help.

3.     Join a Bible Study. Exploring how Bible characters went through grief can be enlightening. Take the story of Joseph in Genesis. His brothers sold him into slavery, and he also spent years in prison. He was totally innocent. How did he handle it?