Grief Support Cards: "The First Holidays™" 

A Holidays Educational Video Gift from the Volunteers at MyGriefAngels.org

Real life grief journeys and personal strategies on how each of us got thru our first holidays after the loss of our loved ones

For anyone grieving anywhere these and every holiday.

Grief Support Cards: "The First Holidays™" - Video 5 of 5

A Holidays Educational Video Gift from the Volunteers at MyGriefAngels.org

Real life grief journeys and personal strategies on how each of us got thru our first holidays after the loss of our loved ones.

For anyone grieving anywhere these and every holiday.

Grief Support Cards: "The First Holidays™" - Video 4 of 5

A Holidays Educational Video Gift from the Volunteers at MyGriefAngels.org

Real life grief journeys and personal strategies on how each of us got thru our first holidays after the loss of our loved ones.

For anyone grieving anywhere these and every holiday.

Grief Support Cards: "The First Holidays™" - Video 3 of 5

A Holidays Educational Video Gift from the Volunteers at MyGriefAngels.org

Real life grief journeys and personal strategies on how each of us got thru our first holidays after the loss of our loved ones.

For anyone grieving anywhere these and every holiday.

Grief Support Cards: "The First Holidays™" - Video 2 of 5

A Holidays Educational Video Gift from the Volunteers at MyGriefAngels.org

Real life grief journeys and personal strategies on how each of us got thru our first holidays after the loss of our loved ones.

For anyone grieving anywhere these and every holiday.

Grief Support Cards: "The First Holidays™" - Video 1 of 5

A Holidays Educational Video Gift from the Volunteers at MyGriefAngels.org

Real life grief journeys and personal strategies on how each of us got thru our first holidays after the loss of our loved ones.

For anyone grieving anywhere these and every holiday.

MyGriefAngels.org's Volunteer; Professor; Published Author and "Grief Walking @ Books" Videocast & Podcast Host - Kendall Klym Interviews Author Stephanie Zamora on her book - "Unravel: Rising Up and Coming Back from a Season of Living that Damn Near Killed Me"

About the Book: "Two years after beginning it, my relationship with the sweet Southern boy comes to an end. After a couple of weeks of showing up at my door, I ask him to leave me alone. Two days later, he commits suicide, and it turns my life inside out. Over the following months, my brain begins deteriorating rapidly. To the point that I cannot put my own life story in order, let alone remember what I did the day before. I sit in front of my computer and just cry because I cannot remember half of the clients on my list, nor can I remember how to build websites."

The title of my sign is Eight Hundred and One Thousand.

Since mom's unexpected death in ICU, our father went into schock, developed PTSD within a week of her passing on, and that accelerated the onset of an aggressive Dementia.

While prior to her death, he was healthy, driving, and exercising everyday, after her death - his started on a steep decline that found him bed ridden and under 24/7 home care soon after her death. 

Under the supervision of an excellent mobile care medical unit, and a team of 24/7 caregivers, he was doing well at home until two weeks ago. We got the call Friday night that his blood test results were not good, and because he had not shown any signs prior to this - both his doctor and us thought it had to be an error with the test, which had happened before. Saturday night we got the second test results and they were worse. 

After consulting with the doctor, we felt the only option was Hospice at home, and they were to start him on that the following morning.

We got on the first flight to Los Angeles on Sunday morning, and were able to spend the afternoon with him. He was alert, eating, joking, watching baseball and enjoying having the whole family together. He had a good night and as he did most of his life, he talked in his sleep all night. Then at 5 am, my brother suddenly woke up, jumped out of bed and rushed to his bedside. Minutes later, he woke us all up as he knew that dad was in his last breaths. Like he did every morning since her death, he called out mom's name, but this morning - she responded, as we knew that mom was there to take his hand from my brother and guide him thru.

Dad had a single tear of joy from his eyes as they opened wide, and we knew - he was at last with his lifelong partner of 60 years. This happened right before thanksgiving, and we buried him on the Tuesday of Thanksgiving Week. Two weeks to the day of his passing, we were still in a sort of surreal phase trying to understand and accept that all that had just happened right before what we thought was going to be a family thanksgiving get together. 

Then that same Friday, their favorite picture of the two of them was posted online, and within hours - it had over 801,000 views and on the front page of reddit. We knew that was dad sending us all a sign, but specifically to our younger techie brother, because he sent it to us thru the only medium he knew he would get our younger brother's attention - Online and his message was short,clear and on the picture: "I am OK and with mom again"

This is an introduction to the "Signs" series from the podcast "Grief Walking".  

The podcast was developed, created and is currently managed by volunteers with the nonprofit My Grief Angels. 

If you have lost a loved one, you have probably heard it from others who have grieved before you - You will get signs soon.  

When you least expected, you will see signs that will remind you of your loved one.  

However, not all of us grieving get or feel these signs, so don't feel there is anything wrong with your grieving process because you do not get any of these so-called signs. In fact, there are many theories on why some of us experience these signs, and our objective in this series is not to dwell into a discussion on why these signs are or are not real, or whether they help or not, but our singular objective is to share the many signs shared by online community members of the nonprofit My Grief Angels. 

To share your signs, please visit the "Shared Signs" section of the MyGriefAngels.org website.

https://www.mygriefangels.org/shared-signs.html

The Books segments of the "Grief Walking" Podcast, hosted by author Kendall Klym, reviews and discusses grief writings, poetry and books as suggested by the online community members of the non-profit My Grief Angels - MyGriefAngels.org.

In this segment on Poetry and Grief, the host interviews the author Louise Morgan Runyon on her latest book of poems. Louise Morgan Runyon's fifth book of poems, "Where Is Our Prague Spring?", was released in October, 2022. 

This book examines Runyon's deep love for the mountains of Western North Carolina; her childhood experience of love there; and her attempts to reconcile this love with the hatred and division found in the present. A great-niece of Lucy Morgan, founder of the renowned Penland School of Crafts, Runyon honors her visionary and activist family in these poems. 

On Louise Morgan Runyon: 

http://www.louiserunyonperformance.com/about.php 

"Louise Runyon graduated from Oberlin College in 1970 at the age of 19 with a degree in Theatre Arts and English. Her artistic work has been influenced most deeply by Joseph Chaikin's Open Theater in New York, the legendary experimental theatre group with whom she apprenticed in 1969, and by Leslie Uhl and The Dance Unit in Atlanta, who watered and nurtured the New York seeds. Runyon has toured her one-woman shows, Finding Home and Crones, Dolls and Raging Beauties, throughout the Southeast and the nation, often through university women's studies departments. She produced her first book of poems, Reborn, in 2004, followed by LANDSCAPE / Fear & Love in 2007, The Clearing in 2011, The Passion of Older Women in 2018, and Where Is Our Prague Spring? in 2022." 

“Runyon is an artistic force to be reckoned with, a woman of substance.” - Atlanta Journal-Constitution 

To order the book "Where Is Our Prague Spring?": 

http://www.louiserunyonperformance.com/orderbooks.php 

Louise Morgan Runyon Books include: 

Reborn: Selected Poems - "Louise Runyon proves that her body is not the only thing that is lithe and graceful. Her poetry ebbs and flows and takes the reader on an emotional journey from her days as a steel mill worker, a dancer, a mother and beyond. Her words capture a life in motion and a life that continues to evolve. Reborn is a splendid tango of words and thoughts, urging everyone to join the dance."- Collin Kelley, author of Better To Travel 

"Runyon has a special skill of using words and songs as rhythmical underpinnings to her skilfully modulated movements...intensely personal and intensely portrayed."- Atlanta Journal-Constitution "Runyon reads as if words were dance movements flowing from her open heart."- Art Papers 

The Clearing - "Based in archetype, mythos, and a panoply of forms, the poems in this book explore the concept of “clearing” in many contexts and on many levels – personal, geographical, spiritual, individual and communal."