(blog) Are you experiencing death, divorce and/or grief?

Loss is loss, whether you are giving up a food addiction,
a way of being that has been comfortable like wearing a pair
of old shoes, a marriage, or a dear loved one.

I’m not minimizing the obviously more intense losses like when
we lose someone we deeply love and who’s been part of our
lives a long time. And grief is grief at the end of the day.

We long for things to be the way they used to be. I long for
my daughter, Maddie, who left this earthly plane 10/26/18 after
giving up the fight with cystic fibrosis at 22 years old. I will
always long for her and think of her every single day.

feel compatible with. We don’t start out getting married
and thinking that our relationship is going to end some day, at
least by choosing it through divorce.

Hopefully our marriage begins when we are deeply in love with
another. I was in love with my ex-husband, with his intelligence,
his tender heart, his charm. I understood even back then that he
was looking for a mother figure to love and nurture him, just as I
was looking for a father figure to do the same for me.

We also brought to the relationship our dysfunctional, hurt little
ones, who desperately wanted love, understanding and compassion.
Problem was that we couldn’t give empathy to each other because we
couldn’t give it to ourselves.

So we made mistakes. We hurt each other. With our words that
would sometimes cut like a knife because we knew each other’s
vulnerable places. We were selfish, self-centered and self-absorbed.

Both of us were guilty. He acted out more with hurtful words and
controlling behavior, and because I was also a control freak and
wanted things to look a certain way, I retaliated by withdrawing,
isolating, and over time, resenting him.

I didn’t honestly communicate my anger to resolve it, and I
began to lose trust in him and in us. So then I wanted out. It
felt like our time had come to an end. My love, my energy that
once pulled towards him, was waning.

And though it was ME who wanted out of the marriage, I was
confused by why. Why did I feel like my heart was so closed off
to this man I’d been with for 12 years… this man I’d shared so
much with, a beautiful daughter, learning of her chronic illness,
and working through that with hope as best we could.

Was I just so shallow, I wondered? Leaving behind our life together,
giving him custody of Maddie who wasn’t quite 2 years of age,
leaving our beautiful home in the country, this was all a HUGE loss.
Yet I chose it.

And currently I am asking to be open to giving up the control
I mistakenly believe food offers me, the comfort of dessert, of
salty snacks, etc. I’m open to seeing who I’d be without this
dependence on food.

I’m open to seeing who I’d be without the reliance on busy-ness,
on excessive learning that keeps me up in my head and not in
my heart and body, where I need to be in order to truly live and
have meaningful intimacy and connection with others.

I’m open to seeing who I’d be without the need to take over-
responsibility for those I love and care about, whether my mom,
husband, client or friend.

So yes loss is loss, and some hurt worse than others, but at
the end of the day, it helps if we recognize that we are always
letting go of something to make way for another experience.

What are you currently losing? Just like the photo on this blog
says, though we think grief shrinks over time, what is really
happening is that we grow and expand around the grief…if we
so choose.

This is the empowered way to handle grief in my opinion. We
can learn how to nurture ourselves through the pain, and not
hate ourselves for our mistakes.

Grief can just as easily swallow us up and make us bitter, where
we actually shrink from life due to self-protection.

What do you choose? WHO do you want to be as a result of life’s
death, divorce and/or other griefs? We can be a victim to life’s
difficult transitions, and that is absolutely part of the journey. And
then we can move through them, unscathed and even stronger.

“You must understand the whole of life, not just one
little part of it. That is why you must read, that is why
you must look at the skies, that is why you must sing
and dance, and write poems, and understand, for all
that is life.” J. Krishnamurti

I’m here to support you through these difficult transitions.
If you want to book a Become A Loving Self-Advocate
Discovery Session with me, I’d be happy to share this journey
with you.

You know if you vibe with me. You know if you trust me.
Watcha waiting for? Schedule now as I’m only taking on 4
more private clients, and we have space in our women’s
empowerment group too.

Much Love,

Angie Monko