Aine's Story
The world stopped turning for our small family one ordinary Thursday in August of 2021. My husband, Mark, and the father of our two sons died suddenly that day. We were forever changed, forever scarred, and left to pick up the pieces of ourselves we couldn’t even begin to know were damaged. Losing our foundation, our safety, our person, and greatest love is the single most stressful thing our body can go through.
During the first year of this type of paralyzing grief, your body and mind are simply focused on survival. Staying alive is the priority. I remember making a promise to myself that I would get up every day, even if it was only to walk downstairs to sit outside. I would get up, for me and especially for my boys who needed me to keep showing up.
The outside world kept moving, school was beginning, and each of my boys were entering a new phase of life. My oldest was just one week into his first year of college, and my youngest was about to start high school. We didn’t even have time to digest the changes before us when the unthinkable happened, and our whole world flipped upside down.
Being in the wellness field, I work with clients daily, helping them to prioritize their Self-Care and Health. It’s truly amazing how your body and mind protect you from feeling everything at once by holding all of the pain and trauma for you until it’s ready to be felt and processed. Staying in long-term stress affects every part of you…mind, body, and spirit.
Mentally processing my grief is the hardest for me personally. Having support during this time is crucial. Letting my friends help us wasn’t easy for me, but I realized very quickly I couldn’t do this myself. They showed up in big and small ways from making sure my boys were fed to sitting with me in quiet prayer, helping with mountains of paperwork my brain couldn’t begin to understand, and loving me through all the uncertainty.
Your circle becomes small and loyal during these moments, and I wouldn’t want it any other way.
Physically, your body starts to want to release and move the grief out of your body. I resisted this at first, and then the body just starts talking louder until you listen. I started walking, doing somatic exercises, breath work, long conversations with God, seeing my holistic dream team and getting regular chiropractic adjustments, acupuncture, massages, and pedicures. Don’t underestimate the power of touch while grieving!
Emotionally, I used the power of water to get through a lot. The calm water of a bath, a shower while no one could hear me cry; my feet in the ocean were all so healing. Lots of prayer, music, and conversations with God. I also used my essential oils I’d used for years in new ways, specifically targeting grief and parts of my body like my heart and lungs, which held the most pain and anxiety. I journaled my feelings as they came up, even the hard ones, and tried my best not to censor myself. I wrote letters to my husband; these are still the most healing even now.
It’s almost been five years since I’ve seen my husband’s sweet smile, heard his strong voice, watched him with our boys, and I still reach for him, wishing I could talk to him at the end of each day, then my mind, body, and soul remind me…
Grief is sneaky that way. Our healing is living in his honor. He was a proud retired veteran of the U.S. Navy, an Air Traffic Controller, and a southern gentleman. We love baseball as a family, and something we always talked about doing was taking trips to all 30 of the ballparks. We got to do a few all of us together, and now my boys and I are finishing the list for him and for us.
Healing comes in waves and isn’t easy, but I now have more tools in my toolbox to navigate them as they come.
Psalm 23 ~ “He leads me beside quiet waters. He restores my soul.”
“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me.”