Hello Cat...I'm so glad you came back to talk to us and I'm really sorry the support group has been such a disappointment. Talking about what we are feeling is one of the keys to recovering, as is crying.

The holidays must have been so difficult for you to go through without him. All the firsts are wrenching when we are new in our grieving. Burying someone we love, under any circumstances, changes everything.

I'd like to recommend a book by Sally Miller, PhD. It's called Mourning and Dancing A memoir of Grief and Recovery.

"Robert Henry Downham died on Wednesday, August 23, 1967, in Indianapolis, Indiana, of reticulum cell sarcoma. Three weeks before he died, he did not know he was sick. Nine days after dignosis, he died."

I also continue to read Martha Hickman's Healing After Loss, Daily Meditations for Working Through Grief.

Todays "page" Feb. 16th says

"It is an odd feeling to be walking along a busy street, or going in and out of stores, with a grief so central and preoccupying it seems to define our existence, and yet people walk by not noticing at all!

Are we puzzled, and perhaps a little angry, that the world should continue on its merry way? Somehow we feel the earth should stop spinning and acknowledge our grief.

But when we stop and think about it, we don't really want all the rest of the world to go awry, just to keep us company. We need whatever security an otherwise well-ordered world might offer. Just as well, then, that these passerby don't know the turmoil and sorrow within us as we brush past. And who knows what they may be carrying in their own hearts."

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I think it helps us to know that our grief is survivable and one day we will remember all the joy we shared with our loved ones, instead of the crushing pain in our hearts.

Please stay in touch. We care.