I have been AWOL 3 of the last 5 weeks. Putting the finishing touches on getting mom's house cleaned out was a bigger challenge than I thought it would be... and more emotional as well. I'm exhausted... I'm drained. I can take solace in the fact that Christmas is around the corner and I can visit homes where some of mom's things now reside. I am grateful for this. I didn't think that the house would mean so much to me. I'd only "lived" there for 2 years before I went off to discover and challeng...
Dec 18, 2019•23 min•Ep. 188
I realize I have been away from a few weeks... I'll talk about that in next week's episode. I spent the week before Thanksgiving 2019 finishing up cleaning out my mom's home for it's new tenants. It was an emotional experience to say the least. You can complete your holiday shopping on Amazon here: https://amzn.to/2OOJOCy Subscribe to this podcast by using one of the following: Click here to subscribe via Apple Podcasts Click here to subscribe on Android Click here to subscribe via RSS Click her...
Dec 04, 2019•7 min•Ep. 187
A few weeks ago, the Washington Nationals celebrated their first World Series Championship by having a parade. While the entire city was happy and festive and celebrating with the team, I was not. In order to get to the World Series, the Nationals had to beat my home town team, the St. Louis Cardinals... and they beat them in convincing fashion, winning the best of seven series four games to none. They then went on to beat the Houston Astros for the championship. Suddenly, I thought of one perso...
Nov 13, 2019•14 min•Ep. 186
As the calendar tuns to November, I am reminded that this is National Children's Grief Awareness Month. As such I wanted to call attention to an organization that is helping children deal with grief. This is extremely important to me as I lost my father when I was 10. Rays of Hope Children’s Grief Centre is one of the only of its kind in the nation. It is a safe, neutral place for adolescents to do the work of grief. Children who have experienced loss due to death, separation, divorce, incarcera...
Nov 06, 2019•52 min•Ep. 185
As I prepare for an annual photography gig I have in the next few weeks I am reminded of just how similar putting the pieces back together after losing someone is just like putting together a photo shoot. The event I'm photographing is an annual event I've done for 4 or 5 years now and even though it's different each year, there are certain elements that stay the same. The program is the same, put the speakers as well as the attendees are different. In grief there is sadness whenever someone die...
Oct 30, 2019•23 min•Ep. 184
I have been asked how I try to move forward as quickly after a loss. I have learned ho to compartmentalize things in my life. to put things into categories and not let them interact with other. But in theis episode of the podcast I come face to face with the fact that doesn't always work. Announcement: I have a new podcast coming out with the hosts of the Grief Dreams podcast call Grief Cafe where we will discuss grief related topics. You can find it here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/g...
Oct 23, 2019•23 min•Ep. 183
Sometimes when we lose a friend we are driven to write a song about them. Rachel Leycroft began piano lessons at seven years old and found her voice through songwriting at thirteen. Her lyrics became her diary for expression and healing, rarely shared with anyone outside of her notebook pages & piano keys. Sixteen years later, upon the sudden death of a dear friend, she felt the undeniable need to bring a song to life in the recording studio for the first time. “Warrior” was written the day ...
Oct 16, 2019•44 min•Ep. 182
I have mentioned that I am also a photographer who mostly takes pictures of jazz musicians. One of the questions I am often asked is whether or not I play and instrument mysels. I simply say no. This is not entirely true... When I as in 5th grade, about 7 months before my dad died, he bought me a guitar and would take lessons after school. I continued to take lessons after he died until I entered hight school. Girls and cars were my new obsession. A few years ago I came across my old guitar at m...
Oct 09, 2019•17 min•Ep. 181
“I don’t think of all the misery, but of all the beauty that remains.” –Anne Frank This week marks the one year anniversary of my mothers death and as I have tried to figure out what I'm going to do on October 2 I am reminded of a question that comes up often in grief forums I belong to: How do you mark the time since your loved one's passing? For me, I don't... I can't - not if making the time means counting the days or the months since the day of their passing. That to me means that I have to ...
Oct 02, 2019•20 min•Ep. 180
What happens when a widow establishes a relationship with the hospice social worker responsible for making her husband as comfortable as during his final days? They create a game designed to allow people to have tough conversations around death and dying, course! LORI LoCICERO Lori LoCicero is a freelance writer and the co-creator of The Death Deck. A creative storyteller and eternal optimist, Lori combines her personal stories of loss with her innate sense of humor to write about life and talk ...
Sep 25, 2019•57 min•Ep. 179
When I'm not working my day job, I usually have a camera in my hand taking pics of allkind, either jazz musicians or anything I find interesting on the street. Facebook reminded me that I took a picture of a homeless man 3 years ago. While the photography industry seems to look down on taking pictures of the homeless I look at them in the same light as children on the sindes of milk cartons. See, when I was 10, no one asked me then or even since then "Why haven't I gotten over my fathers death?"...
Sep 18, 2019•21 min•Ep. 278
I went through what I went through because God told me to go through it. - Allen Iverson Two weeks ago, I questioned why people do the some of the things that they do... like go to church. I theorized that this was done because someone (our parents, probably) took you church at an early age and you got baptized (or went through whatever right of initiation your church has). At some point you received the doctrine of your religion and that you were told that if you followed these teachings or thi...
Sep 11, 2019•24 min•Ep. 177
Today I have a follow up conversation... a sort of health and welfare check with my good friend Shelby Forsythia. Shelby Forsythia is the author of Permission to Grieve and podcast host of Coming Back: Conversations on Life After Loss . After the unexpected death of her mother in 2013, she became a “student of grief” and set out on a lifetime mission to explore the oft-misunderstood human experience of loss. Through her book, weekly podcasts, and one-on-one grief guidance, she helps grieving peo...
Sep 04, 2019•1 hr 9 min•Ep. 176
With the deaths of several people in early August 2019 in the events that took place in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio, I reexamine my view on gun gun control and what different wys in which I think we as a society can make a difference when it comes to mass shootings. Are guns really the problem? Let me know your thoughts Subscribe to this podcast by using one of the following: Click here to subscribe via Apple Podcasts Click here to subscribe on Android Click here to subscribe via RSS Click h...
Aug 28, 2019•41 min•Ep. 175
With children returning to school, how can we prepare schools to deal with children who've experienced loss over the summer? I've received some listener feedback from a lady whose husband has died over the summer and their child is returning to school in a few weeks. she'd like to know how best to prepare her child. In my opinion it's best to prepare the environment first. Here are just a few things that I would do: Contact the school an let them know the situation. You have experienced a loss i...
Aug 21, 2019•23 min•Ep. 174
Today I welcome Alyssa Budinock to the podcast. Alyssa is a Kripalu yoga instructor, podcast host, and end-of-life doula in training. She lives in Rochester, New York with her fiance and their beloved dog Blue. Between 2017-2018 she experienced 5 significant losses in her family that ignited her deep curiosity in how people grieve, how they die, and how they live. She's a sucker for beautiful things like little streams, wildflowers, and garbage plates (it's a Rochester thing...). Today she feels...
Aug 14, 2019•1 hr•Ep. 173
One of the things I don't say enough is that I don't have any formal training in grief. I am not a therapist, psychologist, or grief counselor. All I have is my many experiences of dealing with loss in my life, beginning with the death of my father. As I have so often stated, grief gives you an opportunity to learn more about yourself than you ever wanted to know. One must simply put aside their own biased opinion of what life "should" be like and confront the life they currently have. Examine o...
Aug 05, 2019•18 min•Ep. 172
This past week I lost a little faith in humanity. Let me explain. Early in July 2019 a person I served in the army with lost his son suddenly. Unfortunately, after spending so much money trying to keep his son alive, he need money for whatever final arrangements the decided upon for his son. So the reached out to family and friend on Facebook and started a fundraiser. Well, someone decided that they would set up a fake page and solicit funds from those people who had already donated. A few peopl...
Jul 31, 2019•12 min•Ep. 171
This week, I have a conversation with Melissa Lynne. Melissa’s mother died in March 2014 and everything changed in that instant...her priorities, her career, her purpose and passion, her outlook on life and death. She crumbled into a heap under the blankets and shut out the world, where she stayed for almost a year. The thing that brought her back and kept her going was returning to the page, returning to the written word, returning to something that felt like life. The words came through her bo...
Jul 24, 2019•58 min•Ep. 170
The internet makes finding answers to answers to any question you could possibly have very easy to find... just type your question, hit enter and in milliseconds you have more answers than you might ever imagined. When it comes to grief. looking for answers to questions such as how long will it hurt this much or what can I do to make the pain go away will give you various results that all worked for the people who wrote them. They may not work for you because even though there are similarities i...
Jul 17, 2019•20 min•Ep. 169
As I post this, I am in St. Louis... at my mom's house... finally going through her things. As I spent 13 hours in a car driving here, I had a lot of time to think about this process; how hard it might be and the emotions i would face as I tried to determine what I would keep for myself, what I might offer to others and what I woulkd just get red of entirely. It was difficult when I first got started but I decided it would be easier if I could establish a closer connection to mom while I was her...
Jul 10, 2019•11 min•Ep. 168
Latasha James is the founder of James + Park, a digital marketing company based in Detroit. She is also a YouTube content creator and host of The Freelance Friday Podcast. Latasha talks candidly about the love she has for her father who became homeless after her parents separated. She explains how forgiving him is helping her move forward in her grief. While he suffered with addiction to alcohol, she did as much as she could for him while he as alive and possibly even more after his passing. Vis...
Jul 03, 2019•57 min•Ep. 167
This week, I've been listening to a new podcast, 'Grieving Overdose Death' by Susan Claire. Susan is a listener to the podcast who decided it was time to tell her own lost story and to give a voice to others who like herself have lost a loved one to a drug overdose. I have often said that if you have something to say, say it. You may not find support from the people you expected, but you will find support from the least likely of places... and your story with resonate with or even inspire others...
Jun 26, 2019•9 min•Ep. 166
Dr. Sarah Neustadter is a licensed psychologist based in Los Angeles, specializing in suicide prevention, loss, and grief, including those grieving the suicide of a loved one. She has over a decade of professional experience identifying and treating those at risk of suicide, especially teenagers. Sarah is passionate about helping others understand grief as an entryway into a deeper process of spiritual growth. She holds a bachelors degree from New York University’s Gallatin School for Individual...
Jun 19, 2019•51 min•Ep. 165
This weekend I binge watched season 3 of the TV show Master Chef. The show is a competition for amateur cooks hosted by Gordon Ramsay (and other celebrity chefs) to determine who the best home cook for that season happens to be. The aspect of this particular season that had me glued to my TV was the fact that one of the contestants was blind. How could someone without sight cook fancy meals in a short period of time? She had to rely on the senses she had: taste, smell, hearing and touch. And not...
Jun 12, 2019•16 min•Ep. 164
As the St. Louis Blues make a run at the Stanley Cup, the National Hockey League's (NHL) biggest prize, I took a moiment to look back at my time growing up in the city of St. Louis and my relationship - or lack thereof with hockey. Even though I am not the world's biggest hockey fan, I really want the Blues to win it all. Growing up I was (and still am) a huge St. Louis Cardinals baseball fan. Hockey on the other hand was something I only watched if there was nothing else on t watch. I might hav...
Jun 05, 2019•21 min•Ep. 163
This past week - Memorial Day weekend here in the United States, I had a chance to finally meet Dr. Joshua Black of the Grief Dreams podcast ( griefdreams.ca ). I took him to Arlington National Cemetery and we watched the changing of the guard at the tomb of the Unknown Soldier. It was a very powerful experience. He happened to be in town to speak at a conference given by the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors (TAPS). Our discussion focuses on the cemetery visit and how his fathere's death...
May 31, 2019•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 162
As I think about things that I have to do to settle mom's estate, I realize that once I go through the rest of her personal effects, I will go through another huge wave of emotions. I'm not exactly sure what that looks like. That's part of the future of my grief journey. When I look back at where I started with the death of my father, I realize how far I've come. I know I can handle it. I know that grief will come and go. Some days will be fun and easy, and some days will be hard. I have learned...
May 22, 2019•19 min•Ep. 161
As I was drinking a glass of wine (that turned into the whole bottle) on Mother's Day, I starting thinking about things that she would say to me in the form of unsolicited advice - specifically about people would would call themselves my friends but were only hanging out with me because I had a car. I didn't want to believe this to be true... after all I was simply becoming more popular as I got older. As it turned out, I got in trouble and lost access to the car for 30 days. With it my NEW so c...
May 15, 2019•18 min•Ep. 160
This week I had the honor of chatting with Dr. Joshua Black of the Grief Dreams podcast ( griefdreams.ca ) and Shelby Forsythia of the Coming Back podcast ( shelbyforsythia.com/comingback ) about the importance of Mother's Day and how those of us who have lost our mothers will cope in the absence of Mom.
May 12, 2019
