Check out  Something to Think About — If You’re Brave, the most recent post to Living in the Mystery at  www.MelodyBeattie.com/blog.  A guest blogger wrote the important story.

When I clicked the link to the guest blog in an e-mail  at 5:30 this (Sunday) morning, what I read jump-started my heart. I didn’t need coffee. It’s a reminder of something I forget: When fully lived, each moment becomes a miracle and a gift.

“When one door closed, another one opened.  Or at least a window did,” a friend wrote to me yesterday. Her real questions — the subtext –  showed in bold print even though she didn’t type them: When and why did that stop happening?

The big secret? Sometimes we stand, walk, crawl through (or sit in) that dark corridor for longer that we thought possible until the first glimmers of light appear. Then we hope that it’s sunshine and not headlamps from a train we didn’t see coming. It may take ten times longer than we thought is should, but eventually a door will open.

As they say in a group I belong too, “More shall be revealed.”

To get to the post, click the link above or on Blog in the column on the left side of this page. See you there later.

Melody Beattie

January 8, 2012

Holidays can be dicey for people going through grief. While everyone else is eating, moaning, grumbling about required family appearances, or watching football, some people are in their own world — remembering when someone they love was there — skin on, for everyone to see and hear. But this year, the person’s absence is profoundly noticeable. Other holidays go better.

If you’re having a hard time, please feel free to stop by. Someone will be here to read you post, respond to you, and to care. Or, stop by and say nothing. Just stare. It won’t make the pain go away. It won’t bring back the person. But I’m hoping the site can at least symbolize the truth that you aren’t alone no matter what you’re going through.

We’re open especially on holidays. Grief and loss don’t take these days off. They often choose them. We’ll be here too.

I sincerely hope you don’t need us. May Peace and Grace be with you. I hope you have a good day but if it’s challenging, difficult, uncomfortable, or downright horrible, know that’s normal.

Comment. Post. Read. Or get a cup of coffee and hang around for a while. If you’ve registered, maybe find some favorite pictures of other holidays and upload them to your profile. It’s okay to remember when. Do whatever feels right to you, as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else or you. In profound absolute wisdom, our Higher Power as we understand God broke Life down into 24-hour chunks. This day is only one of them. You will get through it.

The Grief Club will be on special duty throughout the entire holiday season. If you want to spend time here responding to others in pain, you’re more than welcome to help us reach out to others.

Melody Beattie

I wasn’t sure where to put this, but I wanted the members in the Grief Club to see it. It’s going to be brief — not my usual “mini-book” blog. But I need to tell you all how proud I am of you. To join a website, to make yourselves vulnerable, to reach out to others and let them reach out to you — it’s more than I could do when I was where you’re at.

I personally think you’re doing great — each one of you. I know some of you (if you’re anything like I was) may not even want to be doing well. (To me, doing good meant getting closer to accepting my son’s death and that was not something I wanted to do.) I don’t know; maybe I thought by not accepting it I could somehow prevent it, or make it not have happened. There’s an old phrase, “insane with grief” and I’m here to say, I was. My thinking wasn’t clear. I couldn’t balance my checkbook. I could look into the face of someone I’d known for years and not recognize who that person was. My short-term memory got blown out. I’ve never been so totally blasted by an event in my life. The biggest difference is that every other time, I accepted a problem as a challenge. I wanted to get back up.

Not this time. Losing my son not only knocked the breath out of me. It made me not want to breathe anymore — for a while.

I feel like a proud mother hen clucking about her ducks (bad metaphor, I know). But I feel so good about how you gals and guys are doing. I just wanted to let you know. I’m not a hugger (unless I know someone). But I’d happily give each of you a warm, genuine hug.

My best,
Melody Beattie

A NOTE TO LET YOU KNOW WHAT’S NEW

Alzheimer’s Disease is Pandemic not only in the United States, but around the world.  What causes it?  We don’t know.  What cures it?  We don’t know that either.  But millions of people are figuring out how they can care for a loved one with Alzheimer’s — or another form of dementia.

“What’s the difference between dementia and Alzheimer’s?” a friend asked the other day.

“Dementia is the category of illness that Alzheimer’s Disease falls into,” I said.  “There are many different forms of dementia.  But Alzheimer’s leads the way.”

With the help of family members, I spent several years taking care of my mother, before her death from the disease.  She didn’t die directly from Alzheimer’s, but indirectly.  A fall caused her to break a leg, necessitating surgery.  The surgery caused immobility, which caused infections to set in, infections she wasn’t strong enough to fight.

Or maybe she was done.

Like many family members, I spent a number of years in denial.  She doesn’t have Alzheimer’s.  She’s just losing her edge, I’d say.  But as years passed and the edge disappeared almost entirely, I couldn’t deny it anymore.  My mother was no longer the woman I’d known.  Unlike many people with Alzheimer’s, Mom didn’t get angry or mean.  She became loving, nurturing, and child-like.  Caring for her, despite the hard work, became a joy.

For those of you who suspect a family member may have Alzheimer’s, or are in denial about a family member having it, you may want to read Chapter Two of “The Grief Club.”  Because I think this subject is particularly important, I’m posting the chapter outside, for the public, and inside, for members.

Feel free to make comments inside the site, if you registered.  Or, if for whatever reasons you haven’t registered, you can still make comments at the blog.  You can get to it by going to http://www.MelodyBeattie.com/blog.  The chapter isn’t posted there, but you can attach the comment to any article you want.

Thanks to all of you for your support of this site.  I hope you’re finding it worthwhile.

Oh, more news.  Simon & Schuster have moved up the release date for the upcoming book, “Make Miracles in Forty Days.”  You can look for it in bookstores this November.  I held a workshop to try out the principles in the book, and even I was astonished at the success rate we enjoyed.

Melody Beattie

I haven’t disappeared. I’m working hard on a screenplay in a class that’s demanding but excellent.  Thought you might like to know that I posted a blog that goes with this site at Living in the Mystery.  You can get to it by going to www.MelodyBeattie.com, Blog, then clicking the link.  The title is the Invisible Majority.  Please be sure to read Elisabeth’s comment, which motivated me to write it.  I hope things are going well and I’ll be back with some new activities, groups, and posts for you soon.  (And I’ve lost 23 pounds and my knees hurt so much less.)  Bye for now.  MB