Happy Girl Winter: How to Overcome Seasonal Depressive Disorder
‘I Didn’t Have My Anchor Anymore’: Navigating Parental Loss in your Twenties and the Power of the Present Moment in Processing Grief
Losing my mother in the period of life often referred to as ‘emerging adulthood’ left me feeling like I had to grow up suddenly. I wasn't what I would class as a young adult by any means. I was 27, a few months away from my 28th birthday in fact, but this rudderless feeling that had been sprung upon me left me thinking that I needed to release myself from ‘emerging adulthood’ and become an actual, fully emerged adult…
Did My Peace Lie in Spirituality, Religion or Science? Trying to Cope with the Death of a Friend
Death is an unexpected visitor, and grief is the house guest that just won't leave. Sometimes loss hits you like a train to the gut at 8 am on a sunny Tuesday morning, the recipient and the messenger of the heartbreaking news blubbering on the phone for five minutes in disbelief and pain. My friend was dead. What was I meant to do now?
‘To Experience New Motherhood is to Experience a Type of Grief’: How The Birth of My Daughter Made Me Think About Death
The first time my daughter grew out of an item of clothing the grief I felt was an aching, bodily grief. The only situation in which I had ever touched time in this way before was in the company of a dying loved one. Nobody can deny a failing body; neither can we deny bags of tiny clothes that no longer fit piling up week after week…
‘Grief is Like Being in Pitch Darkness’: Navigating the Sudden Death of My Mum
In the days and weeks that followed, I noticed that a fundamental part of me had left with her. I felt a permanent shift at the core of who I was. Like countries that were once together that are now forever set apart. A seismic shift. If I only exist because of her, how can I exist without her? Everything I knew about death seemed so confusing…
Unwanted Advice, Assumptions and Grief: Surviving an Early Loss Miscarriage
It was an early loss. I was out doing the day job of taming everybody else’s brain weasels (I’m a therapist). I doctored my language around my loss, terrified to appear less pro-life, of triggering my sisters who’d made difficult decisions or offending those who’d been empowered in accessing a stigmatised form of healthcare. I felt as though it was my duty to take on the complexities of issues that weren’t comparable, like I was responsible for making everything ok. In my professional life, I’d call that a maladaptive coping mechanism…
Chosen Sisters: How Friendship Helped Me Through Grief
There is often a cliché (but nonetheless true) statement regarding the bond within female friendships – it’s often called a sisterhood. A sisterhood is women who will support you through your darkest times…