Grief Transformation Archives

Category Archives: Grief Transformation

A Memory: Merry Christmas Darling

Posted on December 8, 2015 by Andrea Hylen Leave a comment

Day 69 of 100 days of Blogging

In New York, my oldest daughter and I were planning a small Christmas cookie baking activity to share with her 2 year old daughter (my granddaughter.) I was searching on Spotify for a Christmas playlist to add to the Christmas Spirit. Choosing the Classic Channel the first songs were White Christmas, Jingle Bells, and Santa Baby. We were mixing the sugar cookie dough and singing to the songs.

When the next song began to play, a wave of memories brought a lump to my throat.

Greeting cards have all been sent
The Christmas rush is through
But I still have one wish to make
A special one for you

I could feel my heart skip a beat. The song transported me back to 1977. Temple University. Third year of college. A boyfriend I met that fall who I deeply loved. This would be our first Christmas since we started dating. The unfortunate part was I was going to be in California and he would be in Pennsylvania. Both of us had holiday plans that had been scheduled before we met. I wanted to give him something with heart felt meaning. So, I sang and recorded a cover song for him to open on Christmas.

With a sweet, tender voice of love I sang:

Merry Christmas Darling
We’re apart that’s true
But I can dream and in my dreams
I’m Christmasing with you.

(One of his sisters told me later, that the moment he opened the present and saw an audio, he left the family celebration and ran up to his room to listen to the song in private.)

As the song continued to play, tears burned my eyes. There was this mixture of love, sadness, and loss. The end of our marriage was the end of hopes and dreams. It ended with a crazy divorce with anger and hurt and meanness. It took several years to go through the court system and finalize the divorce. It took 15 more years to finish raising our daughters with many variations of co-parenting. We did raise our two little girls and they are now all grown up and sharing their hearts and inspiration with the world. One of them is married and a mother living in NYC and co-leading a non-profit organization with her husband. The other daughter lives in Baltimore. She is teaching special education in Baltimore City and has an equally amazing man in her life.

Even though I left the marriage in 1987 with a broken heart and even though the 28 years since then have been filled with challenges, when I heard the song today, all I wanted to focus on was the love. I played it over and over until that is all I felt. The desire I had to share my heart and soul with him. Our two daughters were two of the gifts from our ten years together. I am grateful.

Merry Christmas Darling…

Merry Christmas Darling

Greeting cards have all been sent
The Christmas rush is through
But I still have one wish to make
A special one for you

Merry Christmas Darling
We’re apart that’s true
But I can dream and in my dreams
I’m Christmasing with you

Holidays are joyful
There’s always something new
But ev’ryday’s a holiday
When I’m near to you

The lights on my tree
I wish you could see
I wish it ev’ry day
Logs on the fire
Fill me with desire
To see you and to say

That I wish you Merry Christmas
Happy New Year too
I’ve just one wish on this Christmas eve
I wish I were with you

The logs on the fire
Fill me with desire
To see you and to say

That I wish you Merry Christmas
Happy New Year too
I’ve just one wish on this Christmas eve
I wish I were with you
I wish I were with you

**********

Andrea Hylen believes in the power of our voices to usher in a new world. She is the founder of Heal My Voice, an organization that inspires women and men to heal a story, reclaim personal power and step into greater leadership. Andrea discovered her unique gifts while parenting three daughters and learning to live life fully after the deaths of her brother, son and husband. In addition to serving as Heal My Voice’s Executive Director, Andrea is an Orgasmic Meditation Teacher and Sexuality Coach.

She is following her intuition as she collaborates with women and men in organizations and travels around the world speaking, teaching and leading workshops. Her passion is authentically living life and supporting others in doing the same. To connect with Andrea and learn about current projects go to: www.andreahylen.com and www.healmyvoice.org.

Posted in Grief Transformation, Music Inspiration

Anniversaries: Feeling a Wave of Grief

Posted on November 29, 2015 by Andrea Hylen Leave a comment

Day 60 of 100 days of Blogging

It is amazing how unexpected a wave of grief can appear. Right there. Feeling it in the gut. It doesn’t matter how much time has passed, how much I have processed and transformed the grief, or how I have moved through layers of feelings to create a wonderful, new life. Grief comes back in unexpected waves. It is part of a cycle that continues to expand me.

If my husband was still alive, we would have celebrated our 25th Wedding Anniversary this week. Although he died 10 years ago, there is something that just touched me with sadness when the day appeared on my calendar. I sat by the fire and gave myself some space to feel it.

My reflective question: Why did this hit me so hard with waves of grief surfacing throughout the day?

I come from a lineage of people who have been married for 50, 60, 70 years. My first marriage ended in divorce after we had been together for 10 years. My second husband and I navigated huge challenges during our fifteen years together with the final challenge, his cancer, that ended his life. I have every confidence that if we had beaten that challenge, we would have celebrated this silver wedding anniversary together. So, this was another marker of time, another dream that was lost, another reminder of his absence.

Still I explored the feelings even more. I felt the loss of not having the opportunity to…what?…accomplish this goal? Something is tangled up in here. Value? Worth? Love? Challenge? Accomplishment?

What if I never have a relationship where I celebrate 25 years together? Do I still have value as a person? Can I love myself without marking a wedding anniversary with a man?

In the exploration, I noticed once again how complex loss and grief is and how the timing of feelings arrive as a clue to something that is deeper.

I noticed as the day went on that other memories began to dissipate the feelings of sadness. After my first marriage ended in divorce, I didn’t want to get married again. I was interested in partnership and I wanted to have another child, but I was disillusioned by the ceremony and vows that flew out the window when things got tough in my first marriage. I only married my second husband for the practicality of health insurance for our baby. I loved him. I was committed to our relationship and I wanted this union. I agreed to marry him with the condition that we would write our own vows and continue to use them as a tool to stay connected and grow together. He agreed and we did use them for fifteen years.

Every year when our anniversary rolled around, one of us would remember days later. We debated the actual date because we were married the day after Thanksgiving. So, of course, the date was always changing! Neither of us were really “anniversary type” people. Celebrating moments of connection throughout the year was more important to us and we had daily rituals to remind each other.

This week I continued to feel the feelings and to remember.

*****

After a lifetime of processing and studying grief transformation, there is one piece of advice I would give to everyone. When you feel a wave of grief, no matter how many years have passed, give yourself some space to feel the feelings and explore.

By the end of the day, I was clear that partnership with a man is a part of my growth on the planet. Part of the sadness around the anniversary was reminding me of a desire to be in some kind of partnership. I miss having a man in my bed. Pillow talk, sex, cuddling. I can feel that it is time for deeper exploration around that and to turn up my desire by taking more action.

A course I have been teaching called Carving the Next Path is opening me to what I truly desire to create. Walking side by side with the women in the course one of my desires is to co-create a new type of relationship with a man. Changing patterns. Embracing new ideas. Getting to the core of what I really want. Creating new pathways of possibilities.

Feelings, including grief and loss are clues that point us in the direction of our desires. I am stoking this fire.

What are you noticing in your life?

Feelings, desires. infinite possibilities. Surrender.

Share with us in the comments!

**********

Posted in Grief Transformation

Grief Transformation With Music

Posted on October 24, 2011 by Andrea Hylen Leave a comment

Grief Transformation With Music:

The Gift of a Tape Player That Led to a Health Recovery

Music has always been a powerful healer for me. Songs are linked and woven into the memories of joy, sadness, and change woven into the memories. Music and sound opens my heart to bring forth the tears or anger or other emotions of loss.

Many years ago, I was diagnosed with an automimmune condition called polymiositis. My immune system began to attack my muscles. I became weaker and weaker. I was so physically weak that walking down the street and tripping on a crack in the sidewalk would send me hurtling forward. Several times my face landed with a smack onto the pavement. I am amazed I didn’t shatter the facial bones. I also took 3 hour naps every day just to function. My daily goal was to keep my one year old daughter safe during my nap and to cook dinner.

After two years of holistic and traditional medicine, I was lying in a hospital bed suddenly unable to walk at all. I was in an isolation room because the doctors thought I had a bacterial infection and if they didn’t find the source I might die. I knew in my heart and soul that I was having a reaction to a new medication that I had started taking three weeks earlier. I just had to wait for them to figure that out and for the drug to leave my body. For a week, I was allowed to have visitors but was isolated from the other patients.

One day, a friend of mine named Lucky Sweeny brought a portable tape player, headphones and a tape of Kenny Loggins singing songs from “Return to Pooh Corner” to the hospital. If you have never heard of the CD it is listed under CDs for children and adult contemporary. Some of the song titles are Rainbow Connection, Return to Pooh Corner, and a Neverland Medley.

I had never heard the music before, but as I played the tape I began to sob. Huge tears fell from my eyes and I sobbed on and off for two days. All of the layers of pain and frustration broke open in my heart. I grieved the loss of my health, the 60 lbs I had gained on prednisone, the loss of control of my life, the quality of time with my children, and the failure to heal. Through the tears, I released the gunk that was surrounding my heart I was so frustrated and discouraged. In the sobbing, I wondered what was wrong with me. Why couldn’t I heal? No matter what I did, it seemed like I was getting sicker. I had fallen to my knees over and over again for two years. I thought I had surrendered and released. In my gut wrenching sobbing, I asked, “God, what else do you want me to do? What do I need to learn from this?”

I took the prescription medication and listened to the advice from the doctors. I tried a wide variety of vitamins. I had weekly acupuncture that included therapy focusing on the emotions and clues from my body. I prayed, and ate healthy food. I wrote about my emotions in a journal. I had daily rituals of affirmations and a positive focus.

People were praying for me.

It seemed like nothing was working. As I look back now, this is what I believe happened. I had been actively doing and being the inner work. I was doing exactly what I needed to do to fully experience a health crisis. And the last huge piece was to end up in the hospital and grieve. I had to let go of a picture of my life and release the vision I was trying to control. It took time to do that. It took time… The wounds were deeper and required a journey deep into my core center.

In the hospital, the music and the words of the songs on the tape pierced my heart. I opened to more love. I connected with my heart and completely surrendered. I released through tears. There were elements of forgiveness, gratitude, self-love and letting go and the willingness to let go completely.

At the end of two days, I experienced a light bulb flashing moment. I knew that I was going to get well and I was going to start home schooling my kids. I stopped feeling like a victim and I woke up to the power that is within me. I had taken a deep dive into the pain and had emerged with a new vision for my life.

It was one of the most powerful moments of my life. With the help of the music, I had shined a light into the core of my being. I discovered something new and I emerged to heal and live a fuller, richer, deeper life.

Posted in Andrea Hylen, Grief, Grief Transformation, Heal My Voice, Kenny Loggins, music