Coping with Loss

    Moving away from my friends has been especially hard. I miss them all like crazy. One of my dearest friends, Kristina, moved away the week after we did. They moved to South Korea for three years. Honestly, it is killing me. I miss their whole family. We used to get together a couple times a week. They were kind of our family away from our family.

 

 

Liam, me, Kristina, & Eun Chai

    My children are missing them something fierce, too. I am coming to realize that loss is a part of life, though. I think it is even an important part of life.

I was thinking about that as I was driving to school yesterday. I was feeling the weight of this loss of friendship as I was driving and pondering on the idea of loss in general. A family that used to be in our ward lost their baby to a fire and the dad was mentioning how they would have been celebrating their child's first birthday this week. Another friend shared how they just lost their sister to cancer this week. Each and every one of us experiences loss many times throughout our lives, whether it be big or small. I know it is natural, but I also feel there is some greater purpose behind it. I believe it is important for our development. 

    I am not good at loss. Not at all. So, though often people blog about things they know a lot about, I am blogging today about something I know nothing about. My coping techniques are awful when it comes to loss. It is a such a deep pain that I often ignore it, but I know this is terribly unhealthy. 

    I am sure there are other people out there who struggle with knowing how to deal with loss, so I thought I would pose a question out to my readers in search of a way for us to all help each other. I love to learn from other people. Each person has a unique way of dealing with the experiences that come their way, and we all have so much to gain from each other. Though my losses that I am dealing with right now are comparatively small, they are still mine. They still hurt. And I know there are others out there with even bigger losses that are looking for ways to cope, as well, so I figured it would be helpful to ask how people cope with loss on here so others can benefit from it, too.

I would love if you would be willing to leave comments on one or both of these questions.

1) How do you cope with loss?

2) Have you or anyone you know ever had an situation with loss where you have gained or grown from the experience?

If you want to share in private instead, here is my email: jillflythe@gmail.com

Thank you in advance for your courage in sharing!

Assateague Revisited

Crikey! Life is crazy sometimes, isn't it? I don't know if I should play catch up since I haven't blogged in awhile, or just move forward. Hmm... maybe quick recap and move forward. I like that.

We camped yet more in July. Assateagued two weekends in a row with two different families that we love.

We went with the Maglebys the first weekend. I was out swimming and saw a dorsel fin go by. My first thought was - shark. But it felt friendly for some reason and was swimming by so I just stayed out there. Then Will came out by me and we saw that they were dolphins! There was a pod of about 15 or so swimming right by us. It was incredible. Like some enchanted feeling. The kids saw jellyfish and we saw many sting rays. It was wildlife weekend. We boogey boarded. We went bike riding and laughed around the campfire at night when the kids went to bed. Our friends just moved to Korea for the next three years so it was nice to have this last hurrah with them.

The following weekend we went with the Gordons. My friend, Karen, had never been boogey boarding, so that was a fun new venture. We walked on the beach collecting shells. This year we didn't get attacked by wild horses, so that was a plus. We went into Ocean City and saw some sand art and some kind of kite flying thinger jigger. Good times. It is now officially a yearly tradition for us to go to Assateague with them.

Ocean City. I dug the Jesus sand art.

We realized that this summer we camped six weekends in a row!! It was so crazy, but seriously one of the best summers I have ever had. Unfortunately, though, we were completely exhausted by the following week when we had to pack up and move. Because of our constant camping, we didn't have much of a chance to pack before the moving week. We packed our whole house in three days! Thank goodness for friends who helped with kids or feeding us or loading the truck. We moved on a Thursday. We finished moving Kari and Doug into their place (along with many Goodwill and dump runs). The next day we moved Amanda and Brenna into their apartment. My dad and stepmom came in to visit that night. Saturday Valarie (my stepmom) and I cooked all day long for Tommy's missionary farewell luncheon the next day. The following week we cleaned out and painted our house. Then we cleaned out Kari and Doug's old house. Tommy left that week on his mission. Then we tried unpacking, too. It was the most exhausting two weeks ever!! I am sooo glad to be through that time. We are adjusting to our new life now. It is still a big transition, but I feel so good about it, and it is going better than I even pictured.