Jan Warner - Grief Day By Day: Simple Practices and Daily Guidance for Living with Loss

Copyright 2018 by Althea Press, Emeryville, California

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ISBN: Print 978-1-64152-131-4 | eBook 978-1-64152-132-1

To grief warriors around the world and the people who love them.

To my beloved husband, Arthur Warner. I love you. Youre my heart. Always.

To my daughter, Erin, and my granddaughter, Gwendolyn, who open my heart wider every day with fun and love.

To my friends all around the world who love and accept me as I am.

Contents

Broken open is the phrase I often use when grief wells up inside of me. Grief breaks ones heart wide open, and even though we work at healing that brokenness every day, we are always vulnerable to even the smallest occurrence that may shake it loose once more. Being in touch with those feelings is a reminder that the losses weve endured are profound.

Jan Warners writing about her relationship with grief reaches into those cracks we try so hard to fill. With this book, Jan has created a beautiful ritualan offering, reallythat provides a connection for all of us, because grief is our common language.

As I move through the themes and exercises in Jans book, my tears are flowing once again, prompting me to notice how deeply my feelings fall, and how important it is to pause and hold those feelings for however long they need to rise and be.

There is nothing I can write here that Jan, coupled with the power of other writers words, has not already artfully crafted. What I can share is my own relationship with loss and the inevitable jumble of feelings that follows. Everyones experience with grief is uniquely their own, and Jan reminds us that grief is messy.

As with many of our life experiences, what we carry from our parents and generations past seeps into our souls. My mother experienced devastating loss while she was pregnant with me. My family often reminded me that I cried for the first year and a half of my life and that my mother was the only one who could console me. I believe she and I shared a grief connectionmy tears were the manifestation of her deep sorrow. Ive always been a very sensitive and emotional personperhaps that is why I pursued a career in acting. Even though the focus of my work has been in comedy, I was always able to tap into the pain that resides deep inside of me. Ive walked through the loss of many relationships, including my brother Dannys death when we were both in our twenties. Jan suggests that death can deepen your relationship with God or a higher power; it certainly did for me when Danny died. He was close to God while he lived, and I had a knowingness that he was close to God in afterlife. His spirit has remained by my side throughout the decades, as has my mothers. Her death created a deep chasm in my heart, and much of my grieving for her has been in solitude, because my family dynamic shifted after her death. I still grieve the loss every day, but I am also able to find her in lifes joyous moments, offering me peace.

Finding Jans book now, finding her friendship and her ability to bring us to the core of the greatest tragedy of lifedeathhas given me great comfort. Its as if someone has extended a loving hand for me to hold as I continue my journey day by day.

AMANDA BEARSE
Actor, Director, Producer & Teacher

Take my hand and walk with me a while through the barren fields of grief. Is it true that this rocky soil, when watered with our tears, can still grow food to nourish our body and beautiful flowers to nourish our soul?

My husband, Artie, was charming, handsome, and stubborn. He lied to me about his age when I met himI soon discovered he was 21 years older than I was. Imagination told me that his death would cause me great sadness and that I would miss him very much. When he died, I was so totally blown apart that when he didnt come back to get me, I thought it was my purpose to go to him. I didnt kill myself to make that journey only because I could not be the cause of others grief.

Choosing life meant I needed to figure out how to be fully alive with grief. I started showing up at places where life was, in the hope that a bit of life would seep back into me. I went to a therapist. She told me I had complicated grief, and that I should stop mourning my husband in six months to a year. She was a wonderful therapist, but I thought that was the most ridiculous thing I had ever heard. Why would I stop mourning a person who had been central to every part of my life? I didnt need to let go to move forward. I needed help in finding a home within myself for my grief.