How Do You Mend A Broken Heart How I Survived Loss Life Over 60

Hello and welcome. It is so wonderful to see all of you again. Thank you so much for stopping by for a few minutes to join in on this conversation today. I have so many subscribers who have asked me, how do I heal loneliness? How do I heal the loss of a loved one, a friend, a relationship? Just how am I going to get through it? Because I have been through something very similar, I thought today we're going to talk about how we can heal or how we can mend a broken heart. I can still feel the breeze that rustles through the trees and misty memories of days gone by. We could never see tomorrow. No one said a word about the sorrow. Barry and Robin Gibb. We're going to be talking about this today because I have had firsthand experience on loss of a spouse and of course I've lost a lot of dear friends along the way. One of the most difficult human experiences is to have a loss or experience a loss in your life of a loved one, of a relationship. Any type of loss is very difficult to go through. If you have followed me for a while, I have done several videos on what happened to me and my loss and all the circumstances around it. But because I have made a couple of videos in particular about that and I will put the links below if you're interested in my past and how I know an awful lot about loss. I will put those videos below this one. When you lose someone in your life or even if you lose a relationship, you feel that a part of your heart has died. You feel that a part of your heart is broken and you'll never ever be able to make it whole again. Grieving is a process and it does take a long time. But if you're patient, you can get through it. Now the steps of grieving and that's the first thing that I'm going to be talking about. Give yourself time to grieve. It is so important that you do. It took me 10 years actually before I could even talk about what happened in my life. The first part of grief is you're in denial. I can't believe that this has happened. You are denying that this has happened to you in your life, whatever that loss is. And then maybe you get angry. You say, why? Why did this have to happen to me at this time? Why did God do this? Why did life do this to me? It's not fair. But life is not fair. And everyone, if you are human, experiences a loss somehow in their lives during their lifetime. After you go through that anger, then comes another period in your life and that is depression. The reality of what your life will be going forward or what you think your life will be going forward settles in and you become very depressed. It's only natural. And if you have counseling or friends around you that can help you through that depression, it's even better. But do not think that what you're going through is unusual. That is a part of the grieving process. And the final one and the final stage that you will eventually come to is acceptance. You accept this loss in your life. You accept that now you will have to move forward and your life can be good, but it will be different. Grieving and getting that process and allowing it to happen and not hold it back like I did is extremely important for you. And during this process that you're going through, allow your emotions to flow. Don't suppress them. I suppressed them. I didn't cry. I really wasn't facing what happened. It took me so long because I had not gone through the grieving process. I didn't allow myself to do it. And I suppressed all of the emotions that are normal and natural in this process. So if you are recently have lost, had a loss in your life, allow all of that emotions to flow. Allow it to just clench yourself and to allow it just to stream because it's a natural part of the grieving process. Acknowledge the thoughts that you have of your former boyfriend, your former spouse, your former loved one, your child. Allow all of those thoughts, whatever it was that happened to that is making your heart breaking now. Don't cut off those thoughts, but allow them also, like I said, allow your feelings to flow, but also allow your thoughts about your former loved one flow. Don't stop it and say, I really can't think about that. Allow all of those things because the more open you are, the faster you are going to heal. And I know if it's something that's happened to you recently, it's very hard for you to understand, but you really have to do that. Don't hold your feelings in. Don't try to be a martyr. Your friends and family around you will understand and they can be a great support system for you. Don't feel that if you share how you are suffering and how your heart is breaking inside will make you look like you're a weak person. It's a normal part of loss. It's a normal part of heartbreak and it's a normal part of grieving. It helps also to take time and sit down, make a list of all those things that you love about the one that you lost. Sit down and write your thoughts down because when you write your thoughts down and you allow them to flow freely, you really, that is part of the grieving process. Make a list also of all the wonderful things that you like about yourself and why it is important to move on. This is especially important because sometimes when you have been married a long, long time, if you are widowed or a widower, your whole life, your whole adult life has been joined by another person. Your thoughts, your decisions, everything you did usually was not just a singular decision. It was a combined decision by both of you. And sometimes when that happens, when we're alone, we have a fear of standing on our own two feet and saying, can I do this by myself? I've never been alone. Can I do this? We forget some of our wonderful virtues. We forget our strengths that we had before we were married or before we were in that relationship. Make a list of all the wonderful things about you that will allow you to move on and move past the heartbreak and grieving that you are going through now. It also helps to find a new sense and a new source of joy in your life. Whatever that may be, I don't know you individually and we're all unique, but whether it is to start painting, to write, to start playing tennis, to start thinking about expanding your life and doing something else, maybe it's even to get a puppy, a new fur baby. Find a joy that you love so that you can bring joy back into your life. Something that you can love and will take the focus off your grief and off your past path. You know, it may be writing down all of your feelings in a memoir. It may be taking a painting class, learning to play tennis, doing yoga, tai chi, planting a new garden, whatever it is that will bring you joy in your life and we are all unique so your joy may be different from someone else's. Whatever brings you joy, bring that into your life and it really will help you so much. What was important for me, I turned my attention to other people. I focused on my children. I focused on the family that I had surrounding me and I turned that grief eventually, but it took me a long time. I am not a role model as far as my time element took me to really begin to grieve and let go of all this, but I turned my grief and my experience into writing a memoir and to also helping other women who went through what I did. I began lecturing at women's shelters. I devoted and I still devote much of my time to brain and behavior research. I took my grief and what happened to me and I turned it into something positive to help others and in the process, do you know what? I actually was helping myself and if you would like to watch the videos as I said earlier about my life, I will put the link below, but I will just tell you in the capsule. I was married to a man who was diagnosed with and he was murdered and if you want to listen to those videos or if you want to read my story, it's on Amazon in book form. Please, I hope you can do something wonderful for yourself today. Be kind to whomever crosses your path and of course, let's share the love and pray for world peace. Please know that it is possible to heal a broken. Thank you for joining me today and I hope to see you next Tuesday. Please have a wonderful week and I'll see you then.