Today, guest blogger Dorothy Skarles shares a note she received from her brother-in-law that relates to all memoir writers. To this, she adds another installment in Dash Off a Memory, Create a Memoir, by revisiting a subject she knows well–Bereavement. Welcome Dorothy.
Are You A Couch Potato?
This morning, my brother-in-law sent me this little note, and since I feel the sentiment goes well with all memoir writers, I want to share it with you.
Be who you are and say what you feel. Because those who matter, don’t mind, and those who mind, don’t matter.
So remember, if you have lost a loved one, you will feel better after writing about the loss and what troubles you.
To jumpstart your memoir, I present you with two questions:
Are you a couch potato?
It’s the sitting that puts on the pounds?
Have you let exercise go by the wayside?
Activity avoids the pounds.
Following are the reactions most commonly reported by surviving spouses in bereavement groups.
- It takes all your energy to just cope with your new status in life–widowhood.
- Many things you knew you should do, you don’t.
- You have a difficult time reaching out for help.
- Even thoughts of staying healthy fall along the wayside.
- During the beginning of those first few months, walking for exercise slides to zero, and sitting or lying in bed continues off and on for weeks.
- You are in withdrawal, and your house becomes a mess.
One man in the bereavement group said that his daughter, who had come to take care of him, dropped one of his socks in the hallway, and neither of them picked it up. It got to the point where he wanted to see how long it stayed there before either of them put it back where it belonged.
The trouble with that man’s story is that I understand it. As I look around my living room, I see a week of rolled up newspapers, still unread and held together with rubber bands, stashed on my rocking chair. A telephone book lies on the floor, and several mysteries are strewn on the end table. My beautiful glass-top dining room table holds my lap top and piles of printed paper, along with three dictionaries.
I have to take charge and get off that couch!
And it would probably help if I thought of housecleaning as exercise to get rid of a couple of pounds.
Housework just might be my salvation in accepting my new life and giving me the motivation to stay healthy.
After all, housework is never done, is it?
daskarles 2010
Thanks, Dorothy,
After my mom died, I'd go to my dad's and the house would be sort of clean, but the dust would be so thick, it make me sneeze. So I'd dust. I just couldn't get him to dust! I suppose he's new lady friend does for him, or I hope she does.
I know sorting through things can be difficult.
Recently, my dad gave me a boxes of pictures and scrapbooks. Going through them is both happy memories and sad ones. I can only do it occasional, as I organize the boxes. It will be a slow process, but I hope a healing one.
It's funny about pictures LA, even the sort-of sad ones will bring good memories of your loved one.
Dorothy,
Your brother-in-law's words "Be who you are and say what you feel.Because those who matter, don't mind,and those who mind, don't matter." are so true. Sometimes we need to learn how to just be ourselves and what others think about us doesn't matter. Those who love you will love you like you are and not try to change you into something you feel uncomfortable or resentful wih.
Also, it is important to get up, move and clean up your living space. It is a good feeling of accomplishment and makes you want to face the next day with more opporutnities to progress.
Hey Bernadle, I sorted out books this morning. Some to keep and some to give away. I have a small pile gone. Today isn't a wasted day.
I make a list everyday of things I need to do, this helps me to stay somewhat focused. Some days I only get one thing on the list done, but it is one more than yesterday. That is headway.
Hey, my friend.. Saw what you left on my Tingtasy.. and your words bring my grin wider, knowing you could relate to my last write, 'Christmas Songs'… 🙂 Yep, I agreed, both are positive songs and it is great for either one to keep ringing in our heads.. hahahha
Wow, what your brother-in-law shared was indeed inspiration.. Something which can be so easily forgotten and often proved to be a struggle..
Okay, you got me here.. My living room is kind of in a mess too.. ever since my injury, I feel it is kind of 'un-needed' to clear or clean but I know that is just something which didn't make me feel better.. I just cleared my desk but I arent sure how long this neatness will stay though.. hahahahha.. 😉
2003 I lost a young friend – he choked on his own vomit at 19. I then lost my granddad. But he was old and we expected that. I then lost my dear brother in 2004. He took his own life at 33yrs (like me, a bipolar sufferer). 2005 I lost my father which left me numbed in shock, though I don't understand why. He was a chronic drug addict for over thirty years and it was practically a medical miracle that he'd lasted so long. Then, I lost my nan. She'd been ill with emphysema for twenty or so years and her death was a blessing in the end.
I still grieve for them all in different ways. But mostly, I miss my brother. When he died I wished for over 12 months that he'd taken me with him. He'd visit me in dreams, trying to say something which has alluded me to this day. And although I'd dearly loved to follow him, I couldn't add to the devastation of my family. Their pain made me live on.
I spent that whole time walking in a ghost-like existence. Confined within a bubble which no one could penetrate. It made me very ill and I was hospitalised several times. Eventually I received a bipolar diagnosis too and a year after that I became stable with the help of my now hubbie, and meds.
I got through the worse time of my life and entered the best. But it never truly leaves – the acute pain which resides just beneath the surface, ready to twist the knife at a specific tune, or smell, or any other reminder. You just kind of get used to it. If that's the correct phrase. And you become more aware of the pain other's felt in similar situations – like on T.V: I still cry for my own loss when a character feels bereaved.
Of all that loss, it is my brother who still haunts my consciousness. I have somewhat laid the others to to rest, in as much as one can. But not him. Not yet. X
Judy, I also do lists of things I need to do or get. Yesterday, I went to the store and couldn't find my list. The one thing that helps me to remember. Now isn't that the pits. Now I have to remember what purse I put my list. I must have also forgotten my B 12 pill that a friend told me would help me with my memory. Oh, I want you to know that the B12 does help.
Hello Neo, nice to hear from you. I guess when I said I was cleaning up I forgot my furniture for my TV. Suddenly, I see nothing but dust. Do you think another song to do better would help me? Keep writing.
Dear Shah, the pain never leaves, but I do know that it does come less as time goes on. But you truly never forget your loved one. This morning, I have been writing a future blog with a quotation from a very old book that I have had for many years and would like to share with you and readers that know death.
He who for love hath undergone
The worst that can befall
Is happier thousandfold than one
Who never loved at all.–RM Milnes