Write About Your Loss

  • Write About Your Loss

    Write About Your Loss

    By Ninette Hartley

    “Well, he has a broken leg but that’s the least of his problems. He has suffered some trauma to his head. In this country we . . . how can I put it? . . . we would say he is brain dead.”  

    On the 13th of January 2011 my twenty-seven-year-old son Thomas was rushed to intensive care in Porto, having fallen through a skylight whilst searching for somewhere to paint graffiti. I received a phone call from a doctor in the hospital, and when I asked her how bad it was she explained his injuries to me. Her English was good, but I couldn’t quite take it in.

    His step-father and I had to get from Italy (where we lived at the time) to Portugal as quickly as we could. The hospital was waiting impatiently for me, his next of kin, to arrive so that I could give permission for his organs to be donated. His partner and my other four children came to Portugal, travelling from Australia, Singapore and England. Together we moved through the days after the accident supporting each other. 

    When I look back now, I remember those first few days as a sort of numbness. I floated around in a mist of confusion and disbelief, with grief knocking me sideways when it arrived without warning in erratic bursts. The paperwork and tasks that have to be attended to after a death do, to a certain extent, distract the newly bereaved for some of the time. Funeral arrangements, cremation, bringing the ashes home; there was a great deal to organise. Then when all that was over, my children returned to their own lives, my husband and I to Italy, it was then I realised I needed some other kind of support. 

    I found it in writing creative non-fiction. 

    I began to write a letter to Tosh (his nickname) just to tell him what was going on. I wrote eight thousand words that were meant to be just between us. I never intended to share those words but as the years went by my writing became more important to me. I enrolled for online courses, began creating poetry, wrote short stories and flash fiction. A play and even a novel. But I kept coming back to Dear Tosh.  In September 2019, I was accepted onto the MA in Creative Writing Course at Exeter University and I completed that in 2020. For one module I pulled out my letter to Tosh and began to re-structure it into something that I felt I could share with others; at that time, it was just 5000 words.

    For the tenth anniversary of his death, I completed Dear Tosh, my first memoir, which was published in May 2021. It’s made up of twenty-seven letters, one for each year that he lived. It felt as though I spent time with him as I wrote, telling him all the events that had happened in the family and the world since he left us. I found it therapeutic to write, and even though it opened up the wounds of loss, it also helped me come to terms with so much that surrounds the loss of a child. One of those things for me, was the organ donation. I had no counselling for this, and the whole idea of it haunted me like a recurring dream for months and years after his death. Writing about it, sharing my feelings with Tosh, actually exorcised my fears and I was able, at last, to accept it. 

    Writing the book wasn’t all doom and gloom. Much of it made me smile and even laugh out loud — and readers often have the same reaction — so many memories brought back, of fun times with the family when the children were little. I have a strong sense of humour and realise that I have passed this on to my children and that it comes through in my writing.

    Writing saved my mental health, I’m sure of it. I would urge anyone to write about their loss in any way they can. It doesn’t matter if it’s never shown to anyone. The act of writing your innermost feelings can act as therapy. Grief may be difficult to share verbally but writing it down is a release and you never know, it might turn into a beautiful work of creative non-fiction. 

    “Write About Your Loss” first appeared on Brevity’s Nonfiction blog on July 2, 2022.

    Ninette Hartley is a writer, mother, grandmother, wife and teacher. She has followed many paths – from acting and dancing to magazine publishing, and even driving a pony and trap – but she has always come back to storytelling.

    Ninette has an MA in creative writing and has been published in three short story collections. Her first memoir Dear Tosh, published in May 2021 has been shortlisted in the Selfies Book Awards and long-listed in the Dorchester Literary Festival Writing Prize 2022 (shortlist and winner announced in August 2022). In 2015 she was shortlisted for the Fish Publishing Short Memoir Prize, and was longlisted for the Poetry Prize in 2020. She has won or been placed in several flash fiction competitions.

    After eight years living in rural Italy she moved to the Dorset countryside with her husband, Geoff, and beloved rescue dog, Jpeg. 

    Find more from Ninette on her website www.ninettehartley.com 

    Ninette and Baby Tosh

    Marlene C

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  • Defrosting

    Memorable writing that sparks imagination. Lean in. Hear the writer’s voice on the page.

    Defrosting

    By Patricia Morris

    After all these years, I stand in front of the refrigerator this afternoon and hear my mother’s voice, “Don’t stand there with that door open!”

    I chuckle. I’m standing here because I can’t remember what I came to the refrigerator for. As that kid, some 60 years ago, I was probably looking for something to eat. Maybe a slice of bologna. Maybe the green Jello salad with a layer of cream cheese on top. Maybe that rare delicacy – a green olive stuffed with a bit of red pimento. Whatever it was, I’d grab it and close the door at my mother’s command.

    I imagine what she was thinking. Holding the door open meant using more electricity, which meant a higher electric bill, which meant more financial worries. It also meant more ice build-up in the small freezer compartment that sat along the top of the interior of that short squat white machine. This was long before the days of automatic defrost. Ice would build up on the top and sides of the narrow shelf every time the door opened and closed. Every couple of months or so it took pans of boiling water and a strong dull knife to clean it out, making room again for the ice cube trays and freezer paper-wrapped blocks of hamburger and bacon.

    A few years after my mother was gone, of all the household tasks that fell to me, defrosting was the one I dreaded the most.  I would let it go for too long, until the contents of that small compartment were engulfed by a virtual glacier. It would take hours and multiple pans of boiling water to loosen it enough to chop away at it with my small freezing hands. Tears were shed. I felt like Cinderella – before the ball. And I never actually made it to a ball. I just kept cooking and cleaning and doing laundry and homework, knowing I didn’t want this to be my life forever. I was too dutiful a daughter to plot an escape, and yet one ensued.

    So, after all these years, here I stand in front of a refrigerator with a completely separate, frost-free freezer compartment, powered by 100% local renewable energy that I don’t worry about paying for, trying to hurry up the search in my memory bank for what I opened that door for anyway.

    Patricia Morris lives under the trees in Northern California and writes on Monday nights at Jumpstart Writing Workshops. She dates her love of stories to being read to while sitting on the lap of her Great-Aunt Ruth, a children’s librarian. Her writing has appeared in Rand McNally’s “Vacation America, the Ultimate Road Atlas,” and The Write Spot anthologies “Possibilities” and “Musings and Ravings From a Pandemic Year,” edited by Marlene Cullen.

    Marlene C

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  • The Old Gray Mare

    Memorable writing that sparks imagination. Lean in. Hear the writer’s voice on the page.

    The Old Gray Mare

    By Susie Moses

    After all these years I am beginning to understand that I have to face the fact that old age is getting a toehold. I am not exempt. I am loathe to use it as an excuse, not wishing to define myself by numbers, but the signs are there, harder and harder to ignore. Harder and harder to resolve or fix. There has been a resetting of the bar. Firm reminders that I cannot slow this process down by sheer will.

    I have come to accept certain limitations. It seems I will not be hiking the entire Appalachian Trail after all. It does remain beyond my capabilities, no matter that someone else born in the same year might accomplish that very thing. I face the fact that I have missed my window. Cross that dream off the list. And others, on and on.

    Acceptance does not mean capitulation. I continue to fight the good fight, in search of The Answer. Or at least An Answer. Miracle foods, diet plans, sleep improvement strategies, exercise regimens, body work, anti-inflammation protocols. But the bottom line is, no matter how well we treat them, our bodies will not last forever. They will fail us in one way or another. Physical decline, mental struggle – the old gray mare just ain’t what she used to be.

    I see it in daily banter, my cohort joking about various calamities of our advancing years. Or commenting to my daughter about my sense of abrupt aging and waiting for reassurance that it is not so. It is not forthcoming. Apparently, she concurs. I might have been willing to be talked out of it, but it seems we are on the same page, acknowledging the limitations of my years. I am caught up short. I had not expected her to agree so readily. I vow to double down and prove us both wrong. Cleaner diet, more yoga, Pilates, massage, and meditation. I will show her! And myself. But the task seems more daunting by the day.

    I spent the weekend with dear friends just a few years ahead of me. I am alarmed by what I saw. They have capitulated to failing bodies in many ways and I want them to take action! To be proactive, do things to improve their lives. I watched him put on his hiking socks. Sitting in a rocking chair on the porch, it must have taken him ten minutes to wrangle his feet into the woolen tubes. He could barely reach, trying to move up and over his expansive belly, breathing hard and grunting his way, he cursed as the sock got hung up on curling toenails which he can no longer manage to keep trimmed. It was not a pretty picture. His wife commented that we really were not meant to live this long. Our bodies just wear out. But I stiffened my resolve to work towards staying limber and active, determined to avoid the fate of not being able to reach one’s own toes. I will never let that happen to me!

    I reassured myself as I headed out on a brisk morning walk, full of self-righteousness. No need to let oneself succumb to the vicissitudes of aging. Just keep moving I told myself as I strode out, arms pumping. By the time I returned home, my hips had stiffened to the point that I was hobbling up the stairs and wracking my brain to find a remedy for this ridiculous outcome. Tart cherry juice! Good for inflammation! Green tea laced with turkey tail mushrooms. Yoga poses, acupuncture. I may go down, but I will go down fighting, always believing that somewhere in there I will find, if not the fountain of youth, some fix for what ails me. There is an answer somewhere and I am determined to discover it.

    I read a book not long ago which describes aging as a spiritual process. At some point I will have to embrace that premise, that aging is a master course in acceptance, of infirmity, of pain, of loss and ultimately of death. It’s not that I am afraid of dying, just getting old and dependent. So I fight the good fight, understanding I may have to hang up my gloves for good one day and focus on the spiritual aspects of the end of life. But not yet! Not just now. New books to order, new podcasts to watch. New hope to be excavated – magical supplements and elixirs, intermittent fasting, cold water plunging, avoidance of alcohol. Maybe it’s all just a distraction, but I’m not ready to throw up my hands and admit defeat. I am determined to keep my toenails cut and the ability to ease my socks on without strain.

     We’ll see how it goes.

    Susie Moses is a generative writing junkie, enjoying the process and dreaming of actually doing something constructive one day with the piles of papers and notebooks she has accrued, that are spilling out of closets and off shelves and out of drawers.  But for now, just getting words down on the page is an accomplishment and a delight. She spends a good part of each year in Marin County to be near her daughters, but always is drawn to return to her beloved Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia for a fix of East Coast flora and fauna.

    You can read more of Susie’s writing here and here.

    Marlene C

  • Greatest Extravagance . . . Prompt #670

    Write about your greatest extravagance.

    Or something you paid a lot of money for.

    Was it worth it?

    Would you do it again?

    Marlene C

  • After all these years . . . Prompt #669

    After all these years . . .

    Just Write!

    Marlene C

  • The Seagulls Came and I Knew

    Memorable writing that sparks imagination. Lean in. Hear the writer’s voice on the page.

    The Seagulls Came and I Knew

    By Norma Jaeger

    The seagulls came to the back yard. We didn’t live that close to the coast, Portland, about 80 miles inland. We had never had seagulls in the yard before, as best I recall.  But there they were, drinking out of the bird bath, flapping around querulously, and generally making strident seagull noise, breaking the otherwise early Saturday morning quiet. 

    I had returned the night before from an intense, two-day job interview in Seattle.  With the seagulls in the backyard, such gulls and their cries, being ubiquitous in Seattle, I knew I would be offered the job. Because I had become disenchanted with my job in Portland, I was pretty clear I would accept the job. What I did not know, but realistically what I should have considered, based on what I had always observed about government in Washington, was how the decision would ultimately turn out.

    While I thought I was moving to Seattle, what was really going on was a short stop on my way home to Idaho – there, to an unclear future but one that became the best future of all – 22 years ago. 

    Birds, as ancient augurs, have always conveyed both positive and negative omens.  

    It takes time to sort it out.

    Norma Jaeger spent more than thirty years managing and evaluating addiction and mental health programs in Portland, Oregon and Seattle, Washington.  She developed programs for pregnant and postpartum women, children’s mental health programs, and several programs for individuals in the criminal justice system. 

    She was the Program Manager for offender programming at the Idaho Department of Correction for one year leaving to become the Statewide Coordinator for expansion and support to Idaho’s 70+ Drug, Mental Health, and Veterans’ Courts.

    She served two terms on the Board of Directors of the National Association of Drug Court Professionals, and received the Stanley M. Goldstein Hall of Fame Award from that association in 2018. 

    She taught for fifteen years at Boise State University in the Department of Criminal Justice.

    She currently serves as Executive Director for Recovery Idaho, a statewide recovery community organization.

    She holds a Masters’ Degree in Health Administration and is completing a dissertation for a Ph.D. in Public Policy and Administration from Boise State University, focused on procedural justice. 

    She is honored to serve as Executive Producer for “I Married the War,” a documentary film illuminating the stories of wives of combat veterans.

    Believing that writing can be a meaningful pathway of support for recovery from mental health issues, addiction, and trauma, Norma organized “Poetry for Recovery and Writing for Recovery,” a successful online program.

    Marlene C

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  • Burgeoning

    Memorable writing that sparks imagination. Lean in. Hear the writer’s voice on the page.

    Burgeoning

    By Su Shafer

    How many petals are in a peony?

    There’s no way to tell from the bud – a closed hand

              holding more than you can imagine.

    They unfold slowly, the way a smile spreads

              before a secret is told.

    Each petal

              a curled finger uncurling

              an alluring promise of beauty to come

              a whisper – just wait, just wait…

    And then suddenly

    It blooms

    Su Shafer is a creative crafter, fabricating bits of writing in poetry and short stories, and generating characters that appear in paintings and sit on various bookshelves and coffee tables.

    Marlene C

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  • Adversity . . . Prompt #665

    The idea of using prompts is to inspire writing in a freeform style.

    There are no rules, except to write without too much thinking.

    Let your thoughts flow and capture them in writing.

    Give your inner critic time off during this writing.

    The challenge of freewriting is getting Self out of the way.

    With freewrites, you are writing for yourself, not for an audience.

    Give yourself permission to be open to whatever comes up while you are writing.

    Writing Prompt: How do you handle adversity?

    There are several prompts, ideas about freewrites, and resources about how to write without adding trauma in “The Write Spot: Writing as a Path to Healing,” available from your local bookseller and as both print books and ebooks on Amazon.

    Marlene C

  • Cleaver Magazine

    “Cleaver” publishes craft essays on writerly topics. If you are a poet, fiction writer, essayist, or graphic narrative artist and would like to propose a craft essay, contact the editors with a query before submitting.

    Guidelines: offer a reaction to or exploration of one’s personal experience as a prose writer/artist/creative; pieces that delve into something you’ve either found compelling, learned along the way, figured out, gotten obsessed with, found surprising, and want to share with other writers.

    Quirky is okay.

    Nothing too scholarly/academic/ teacher-y.

    Aim for between 800 and 2000 words.

    “Riding West Towards The Woods” by Deb Fenwick is a sample of the type of writing “Cleaver” is looking for.

    Marlene C

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  • Resilience . . . Prompt #664

    “Resilience is the ability to scrape yourself off the floor relatively quickly after a giant trauma, medium-size setback or everyday disappointment.

    Resilience is a set of coping mechanisms we develop over time. This quality is determined by how we take care of ourselves, the people we surround ourselves with and what we do to find meaning and purpose in our lives.”

    — “How to Bounce Back From Anything,” by Elaine Chin, M.D. and William Howatt, PH.D, Good Housekeeping magazine, July 2018

    Writing Prompts

    How do you define resiliency?

    What are your coping mechanisms?

    What do you do to take care of yourself?

    Is there someone in your life who hinders your ability to be resilient?

    Write about the times you have been resilient.

    #justwrite #iamwriting #iamawriter

    Marlene C