Paula -OMG I have missed you!! Thank you for coming back on. Remember we are always here for you - that has not changed.

Happy to hear that you have been able to take some steps such as work and this new club. Bloody right 50 is young!! I am told it is the new 35 and 58 to (my age) is the new 39 forever. We'll go with that anyway .

Hugs

Donna

Deb, Sue and Paula....Hello, have missed you all so much, and have so much to catch up on...my biggest news? I will become a grandmother this month!!! New Friends, so nice to meet you

Aimlee,
I think this is the most wonderful idea, so glad that Brian is always on top of things, and so very receptive to others ideas and needs...wonderful leader! I wish I had found a way to come back sooner, truth is, it hurts like crazy. Forgive me, my head is all over the place and my thoughts scramble when I am anxious, when not anxious, I am just distracted. Before I forget, I just wanted to respond to your question early on regarding the anniversary of death....I was very close to my mom, best friends, was CG to her, which was my honor....her death nearly flattened me. I had such an awful time for months on end, and slowly I started to find myself again...life was moving along at a nice pace, was as near as normal as it could be and then her anniversary came....it totally knocked me down! The shock of how hard it hit me was unbelievable and I was a wreck for a few days, almost a week. My best, heartfelt advice to you and anyone else, is to give yourself the day off...meaning, just let your feelings be as they are. My mom and I always spent time at the beach, I went down to be near her and God, as I feel that the ocean is the closet place to heaven for me. It was overwhelming and I tried to run away from my pain, didn't get far. Finally, as I sat there on the beach the next day, it was as if my mom said to me (something she always told us), "Donna, Feelings are neither right, nor wrong, they just are." I still have bad days, moments when I suddenly feel so overwhelmed by missing her....and now especially as I look forward to becoming a grandmother, we would have had so much fun planning on being great grandmother and grandmother together....and who knows maybe my Nana would still be here(lost her on Aug 18th, still broken-hearted, she and i were very close also)...we could have been three generations of grandmothers together.... Life throws fast, hard, curve balls--I used to try to catch them, now I have learned that for me, it"s best to lean out of the line of fire...
Just want to tell you all, I am so proud of you...I don't know some of you, but then again....maybe I do....your selfless hearts are gifts, they are where they are supposed to be, and react how they are supposed to, because that is how they feel... Life goes on, we just try to hang up our Super CG uniforms, and leave them behind...I kept going back, putting on my uniform and sitting down and reviewing everything we did, and what we didn't do...and maybe what we should have done...I'd like to say don't go there, but "there" was the only way I let myself off the hook. You give it your all and sometimes you feel like it wasn't enough...it is/was... As for me, I'm so hung up on the day that I told my mom, "Mom, if you ever wanted to check out, now would be the time, this is no way of living...I love you so much, and I want to tell you now, as your greatest cheerleader, that I am ok if you want to leave and go on to your next journey..." her eyes widened, and i said I loved her enough to let her go....my mom beat the cancer, was 4+ yrs out, had been cancer free since 9/07....she had a massive stroke and heart attacks, she would be bed ridden, and the part that made me more mad than anything else was the stroke was on the side that took away her voice!! That crushed me. I pray each day that she forgives me for telling her that I was ok with her leaving, what a hurtful thing to say....in truth I said it out of love...but love doesn't make it sound any prettier.

wow!!! apparently i am still a train wreck....sitting here at my desk, tears in my eyes and overwhelmed...my mom died on May 4, 2011....I do so well and BAM!! I'm in tears,,,,ok Donna, take your own advice above.

Love and Peace to you all....

Hey Donna! I jumped as usual...not sure who else I may have missed....still, whenever I see your name I think of the yellow rose, and pandora

50 isn't so bad...yet...

Welcome back and glad to hear you are a Grandmother, as a Grandfather I can tell you it is Great being a garndparent!! Keep in touch and best wishes!! Semper-Fi Bob

Still waiting on the "it gets better" part. Approaching fall/winter.. the holidays... a season full of firsts without my love. I have had periods of happiness, but when the sadness comes back it seems to have such force.
I do glean strength from the journey that we faced together.
I dropped in on the caregivers forum and was completely floored at the nearly 26000 views to the thread covering the last few months of the battle.
Knowing that somehow sharing all of it has helped others feels very good.
All of it wasn't for nothing.
Not sure what to do with that journey.
I do know that this place is one of few where I feel at home, even if I am not as active as I once was.

I can so relate with all of you...it's coming up on 4 months since I lost Ron and this Thursday would have been his birthday. I'm getting together with a small group of close friends and some of his family to celebrate the day of his birth. It's going to be bittersweet. And I don't know about all of you but I'm dreading the holidays...Christmas was Ron's favorite and I don't know how to handle that one. Here's wishing all of us peace and strength to continue on our new journey in life. Everyone keeps telling me it does get easier with time. I pray they are right.

Love,

Shelley

Oh Donna � The beautiful words you spoke to your Mom before she passed on, so moved me, were so filled with love � it breaks my heart to think that you could for even a second feel guilty about saying them. Yes, they were spoken with love but more than that it took tremendous courage and the kind of love it takes to unselfishly let someone go rather than hold on for your own comfort and need to be with her just a little longer. I hope that when my own time comes to move to the next level in my relationship with God, that my children will have the same strength and courage that you have shown. As a Mom I�ve always worried from the earliest of moments when I had to be away from my children, whether they would be ok without me, even when it was for just a very short time. I am so sure your Mom felt that way about you, too � and wondered if you would be ok without her physical presence. I�m sure it comforted her to hear you say that it was ok for her to leave. And now � although she is not physically close to you, she is still with you in spirit and it must hurt to see you in such pain. There will always certain times when the tears will come and that�s ok. Tears can be very cleansing and it does help to have a little compassion for yourself when remembering a loss. But it helps too, to be able to think about all the good things that you shared together. I hope, in time � whenever you are ready � that the sadness you feel will soften a little and that you will know that your Mom is close by and you will feel her love and comforting embrace.

What encouraging words, Donna! The pain that we suffer is incredible and the "first" holidays, birthdays and events are so sad....I don't like the "seconds" either. Thanksgiving, will be 2 years and sometimes it seems like he never existed and then days like today I had to play mind games with myself and convince myself that Jim was just away....that's how I got through my moment today....I'll see him again, so for now, he is away and I'll just keep going! I hope that he won't hold it against me for moving onward and upward....but then again, he is likely in a better place than I am so hopefully he is smiling down on all of us saying "you guys need to get a grip" LOL. Hugs to this entire board!
Paula

great post Donna, Ole sista

Right now I have no beautiful words to express myself...I am just so sad. It was so hard caring for mom and supporting her and each other (my siblings). Nothing we did for her helped, that I could see...but we loved her and tried like crazy. I pray for all of us here that use this website. Jane