Grief and Valentine's

I've written before about how ambivalent I am about Valentine's day. https://www.widowbythesea.com/post/happy-pancake-day. But this year...

Feb 14, 20244 min read

FEATURED POST

Never Miss a New Post.

TRAIN OF THOUGHT

Grief and Valentine's

I've written before about how ambivalent I am about Valentine's day. https://www.widowbythesea.com/post/happy-pancake-day. But this year...

Feb 14, 20244 min read

Being a divine diva!

“Who am I now?” is a question that has plagued me in the five-and-a-bit years since Chris died, and it’s been at its loudest in the last...

Nov 9, 20236 min read

Flying solo

I have never been the sort of person to confidently claim that I love my own company. I love company. I don't mind time alone but I'm at...

Sep 8, 20232 min read

Allowing grief to expand your comfort zone

When I first started writing this blog, I wanted to help open the conversation about grief. I wanted to help people to speak openly...

Sep 1, 20233 min read

Valentines day thoughts

I’ve never been a big fan of Valentine’s day. I was deeply scarred(!) in my teenage years when a Valentine’s card in the class register...

Feb 14, 20233 min read

Grief in a time of mourning

How do you cope with your own private grief in the face of a country in national mourning? The UK is in a period of national mourning. ...

Sep 14, 20223 min read

When it's not just resilience: A response to Piers Morgan

During Mental Health Awareness Week, how sad, but unsurprising, to see Piers Morgan, blasting it all as “crap” and telling grievers,...

May 11, 20228 min read

22228330_10155854979383000_5549557101236

I am a young* widow, living through the grief of having loved and lost my husband Chris, when I was 45. This blog is a series of ramblings about our love, his illness, my loss, grief, the support of other young widows and learning to live again. I once told my story to a journalist, and realised that I need to tell it in my own words, and I need more than 500 of them to do it justice. I have also found that writing my grief is a therapeutic exercise that helps me look at where I have come from and where I am going.

I don't have any answers, but I hope to share some of the lessons learned along the way as well as some of the music we loved, and pictures of the beach.

Why Red Kites and Beaches?

Red Kites often soared above our homes in Reading and whatever we were doing, we would stop to watch them. Now when I or my older daughter see a Red Kite we think of Chris. When I started my business, I named it after these birds, because they made me think of him. And the beach is where we now live (next to one, not on one!) I think if he were ever looking for me, he would start at the beach.

*Defined as being widowed before 50. There are many widows much younger than me.