Taos News

Loss is a lifetime process

Ted Wiard Golden Willow Retreat is a nonprofit organization focused on emotional healing and recovery from any type of loss. Direct any questions to Dr. Ted Wiard, EdD, LPCC, CGC, Founder of Golden Willow Retreat GWR@newmex.com.

The Taos News has committed to implement a weekly column to help educate our community about emotional healing through grief. People may write questions to Golden Willow Retreat and they will be answered privately to you and possibly as a future article for others. Please list a first name that grants permission for printing.

Dear Dr. Ted:

I appreciate your articles and know you have a story of your own that includes loss. I have recently had a loss that just seems so overwhelming and as time goes on, I’m seeing this is lifetime work. How did you move into the place that you are now in your life after your many losses?

Thanks, Simon

Dear Simon,

For some reason it is not surprising to me that you have asked this question right as I sat down to write today’s column. I choose to hold off on the other article I was going to previously write and focus on your question, due to today, back in 1996, my journey was upended, and grief and emotional healing became my personal and professional work for the remainder of my life.

July 29, 1996, there was a horrendous car crash here in Taos, where my mother-in-law (Rachel) and my daughter (Amy) died immediately, followed by my other daughter (Keri) the following day. This was the culmination of multiple losses in a very short time.

I lost my brother in 1989 in a commercial fishing accident, and my first wife, Leslie, in 1993 from cancer. There were other losses as well and cumulative losses, with little time for grief, now followed by the death of my daughters and mother-in-law, shattered me to an unknown place of a metaphorical death, and the reality I did not want to live.

Gratefully, with the support of family, loved ones, community and professionals, I began a journey of healing. It was not an easy journey and the journey continues each and every day as grief is a lifetime process. Grief does not take away the yearning, pain and missing, but what it does allow, is for me to not be confined and defined by loss, as well as navigate and live with those immense empty places within my psyche in order to fully enjoy, love and live in my present world.

I remember going to the Grand Canyon after all of these losses and looking out over the vast landscape of enormous open spaces, beauty, and intricate colors with awe. In actuality that beauty had come from volcanic eruptions, erosion, landslides, and other turbulent moments of loss and within that loss, the deep and intricate layers of time were exposed and allowed to be truly demonstrated. To have that beauty, the vast and open spaces of loss had to be there.

This is how I see grief, as the paint brush that allows us to see deep into our soul due to the shattering of loss. It gives the opportunity for someone to truly appreciate what they have, what they had, and what they can be in this moment. In honor of my losses, I try so hard to truly live with my authentic heart while honoring the vast caverns and canyons that make up my soul from loss.

My life drastically changed on this day back in 1996 and I will never be who I was before that day. What I can do is live my life as fully today in order to honor my losses and allow those experiences to live on through me.

Simon, I don’t know if that answers your question, but you got me to share a bit of my story. I wish you well on your healing journey and please know loving and healthy support is what allows us to move forward one step at a time as an individual, family and community. Until next week, I wish you health, healing and continuous growth.

HEALTH

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2021-07-29T07:00:00.0000000Z

2021-07-29T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://taosnews.pressreader.com/article/281831466769250

Santa Fe New Mexican