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Dear Reader A book reviewToday I’d like to devote this newsletter to reviewing a book that I think we all will have need of sometime in our lives. It’s Grief is Love, a book by Michelle Blythen which tells of her ongoing journey after the tragic loss of her only child, her son Zane whose life was taken violently.
Michelle’s book is filled with her own illustrations and poems as well as quotes appropriately drawn from books and authors she’s read. Each inclusion speaks to a part of the grieving process and gives comfort and strength to the reader. It’s hard to conceive of anyone else being able to explain exactly how I’ve felt throughout my life when faced with the “shock, confusion, and agony” of the unexpected death of a loved one. Michelle writes of the total disruption and changes within the survivor’s life going forward. She writes of the things that helped her put herself into this new situation in a way that she found healing and acceptance. People’s love and care were important. As were counselling and books. And caring for herself, finding joy again in little things in life, also brought healing. Grief is not linear, nor, as she puts it, does it have an endpoint, like coming out of a tunnel. And grief is experienced differently by us all. The way she expresses her journey resonates with me. At this stage in life I’ve ‘lost’ a lot of people I’ve loved. I fear the loss of others that might come before I myself leave this realm. I found myself nodding in agreement, shedding tears, sighing in gratitude at the way she’s expressed my own journey. And I want to say, “Thank you Michelle for your courage and love in sharing your journey with us so we too can find peace.” I can best describe how her book resonates with me by quoting a paragraph and describing how this scenario she describes manifested in my own life. There is a real risk for some people to throw themselves into work, or a project, so completely that it shuts out their thoughts, emotions and interrupts their grieving process. Grief will not go away. One day that suppressed grief will flood to the surface as though the loss had only just occurred. It is possible that might happen when another loss occurs… the stifled earlier grief will rise to the surface and completely overwhelm with grief on grief. I was nineteen years, one month and one day old when the semitrailer driven by my husband John, the father of my two daughters, collided with another in Grafton, NSW, Australia. The date was the 8th October 1966. I organised childcare for the girls, then aged three and thirteen months, and took a bus from Beenleigh in Queensland to Grafton. I was met by a kind woman who took me to the hospital where I was told John had just passed away. I couldn’t believe it. He had a compound fracture on one of his legs. A broken leg. That’s what killed him. Bone marrow got into his bloodstream. I was given a bed for the night at the hospital but I didn’t sleep. Although I was in shock, I was most aware of the sole responsibility I now had for my two girls. I looked at our future from every angle I could and plotted out a plan for ‘carrying on’ so their lives would be disrupted the least. I stuffed my own grief down, put a lid on it, and put on a brave face. Like most of us do in life. Just got on with doing what needed to be done. I became aware over the years that I hadn’t fully (or even partially, truth be known) moved through my grief. I was mostly stuck in anger that he had left his little girls, and me, to struggle on without him. I honestly felt like he had exercised a choice in leaving us. And then, forty years to the day later, my brother Digby, a young man of sixty, died. I was bereft. So hurt, so shocked, so sure that John had taken Digby to be with him. They were best mates and that seemed a reasonable assumption. Now my grief at losing my brother was compounded by that original grief, as Michelle said in the excerpt above. And the shock, hurt and grief from the original event came flooding in and merged with my grief over losing my brother. I was a mess. Thankfully, I was living with a friend in California at the time. Mimi gave me the space, love and support to deal with what was flooding my emotions. What I did is not a prescription or advice that others should do the same. And this was the first and last time I’ve ever dealt with my emotions this way. I bought two bottles of Jameson’s whisky. Alcohol was the time honoured way my family dealt with grief so it was probably natural that alcohol was what I turned to. Over the course of the next few hours I drank almost the whole two bottles. And I cried in despair and agony. Then I threw the whisky up. Spewing the grief out from deep within me in the process. It was finally the beginning of letting my first husband and my brother go – and living a life without the shadow of the guilt and pain that also comes with the tragic loss. There are a lot of other parts of Michelle’s book that resonate with me. If you read it, I’m sure you will find some as well. If you’d like to get a copy of Michelle Blythen’s book, Grief is Love, let me know and I’ll give you her contact details. Till next time, An Event Reminder
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This is an amazing event that I’m thrilled to participate in this year. I’ll be sharing a table with Pat Backley, who’s books I adore.
The event is billed as: a book event where readers can meet over 70 authors, buy books, and have them signed in person. Multiple genres, from NZ and Australian authors. All ages welcome. Free entry.
Facebook page for the event is: https://www.facebook.com/groups/agesofpagesfans
My thoughts for Living Life in 2024 and beyond:
“Write it on my heart that every day is
the best day of the year”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Remember that sometimes not getting
what you want is a wonderful stroke of luck”
Dalai Lama
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