Estrangement, Loneliness and the Power of Coaching

Have you experienced the pain of estrangement?

I was shocked at the number of people who have experienced this kind of pain in their lives. All stuck in their grief, and yes, I was one of them.  I am still estranged from my son, but I have learned so many life lessons around this topic, that I am now going to share them with you in the hope that you will find comfort and strength to talk about this new phenomenon, or is it?

Mother’s falling out with their daughters is not strange for a short time, but when the time passes the gap becomes more, perhaps turning into years, and why?  For what reason?

Now don’t get me wrong.  I know that some people have good reasons why they are better off not with their family. 

But this is only a few in comparison to those that I have met over the last two years.  The majority of these children come from loving homes, and it has been a complete shock to the loving parents left behind to pick up the pieces.

I can only guess why my own son has decided to estrange himself from the family, but if I did know why, could I do anything about it?  Probably not.  He is seeing life from his perspective and I from mine.  We are unique. 

When he was younger, we could have very interesting conversations around human psychology, in fact he took his GCSE in that subject.  I often though that he would be an ideal person to come and join me in my business, providing of course that it would have been something that he would like to have done.

And then things changed big time.  His dad died, he became a father and life happened around him.  That was a lot of losses to deal with.  Death, and loss of your decisions for yourself (now there was a family to think of) at only 25 years of age.  Then his business left by his dad started to fail.  We can summarize why; that is not necessary for this article but to say, it was a loss and another attachment to his dad also lost.  Added to this pressure, another baby and then the lock downs happened.  This has not been a good time for him.  Nor me. 

From my previous blog:

I can tell you that the years that followed have been heart breaking for me.  I never would have thought in all my days, that this would happen between my son and myself.  As I mentioned in last months blog, he did something that shook me to the core, something that I thought he would never have done in a million years….but he did.  What, is not important, the why is. (How I internalize that is). That was to become my gift.

If you are interested in how I internalized that, read part one.

I have always said that my family were my greatest teachers, they have been my influencers and they continue to be.

Mothers are quick to think that there is something wrong with us when we experience these types of rejection, stating:-

How everything is our fault

How this reflects on our parenting.  If I could have been, better, more loving, attentive. 

 How will society now ‘judge me’.

And nothing can be further from the truth.  It is not our fault and its not their fault. 

I can say that because of the way I was, he did not build much resilience to life and there is indeed truth in that but at some point, we must stop and remember that they are adults!

The modern family stays together much longer.  Financial situations keep children at home until nearly 30 years of age, while are generation were out the door as soon as we could make a life for ourselves.  I myself, married at 20, and my husband was 23 years old.  That can put strain on the modern family relationships.

We can pinpoint things in our childhood that we did that helped us with building resilience, for example how old were you when you had your first job?  Learning to interact with people. Have adult influences around you in those situations.  Good or bad, you learned how to navigate them.  I was 14 when I had my first job, and I can remember feeling so proud of myself.  My son until recently, only worked in the family business.  Yes, he was good with clients, extremely good as a PT and was very sociable, but it is different working for someone outside of the family.

Now of course you must be 16 plus to get a job.  I would definitely encourage that going forward.

You can tell from reading so far, I have been reflecting on this situation, before I worked on myself, I had same the point of view, with statements such as: ‘everything is my fault’ as a mother you ‘should know better’ and never mind society judging you, I was doing quite the number on myself!

I then proceeded to do what I did when I was dealing with my loneliness, I looked on face book for groups to help support me and my broken heart.  I found quite a few.  What I did discover is that reading these posts were bringing me down.  Reading everyone’s stories, living for that moment their pain it became too much.  As usual I was looking for ways to help guide me to heal.

Up to this point, I had not done my process on my relationship with my son, so I did that.  I said “goodbye” to what we had in order to let a new way appear when its ready. I let go of my ‘hopes, dreams and expectations’ of what I hoped our relationship would be going forward.

That was the hardest thing for me to do, but it helped me settle into where we are ‘now’.     The relationship between us has gone from what it was, but that does not mean that when we do reunite, it could indeed be a lot stronger. 

At the same time as doing my process on myself I was also working with Sebastien Koellner as mentioned in my earlier blog, on my saboteurs.  This was indeed a winning combination.

Having grieved the relationship that was, open to what was new, I was “back on the horse” to reach out and help others.  I commented on a few posts in the group I had found and came across a wonderful lady called Janet Hogan. 

Janet has created a group called Estranged Mothers – Rise and Thrive.  Janet had posted a comment in the group I was a part of, and I just instantly loved her energy.  I reached out and we have been sharing a lot of our thoughts around this topic.  I am delighted to say that in the near future, Janet and I will be doing a podcast and workshops on this very subject.

We feel strongly that this subject needs a voice, that those of you who are living stuck in your grief, constantly looking for the mere morsal of a communication from these children are not living you own life!

I know that when I stopped pushing ‘energetically’ then I had some movement from his side.  We will be talking about this and helping you find your feet again.  Give yourself permission to live your own life. 

There are so many people ‘out there’ who are stuck in this type of grief.  Some relationships do heal and reunite which brings joy to my heart.  We can all carry a little hope with that knowledge, but we do not need to put ourselves on a back burner until that day arrives.

Janet shares that there are 5 steps to estrangement.

  1. Shock/denial
  2. Despair
  3. Acceptance
  4. Transformation (of ourselves)
  5. Maintenance

I am sure you can identify with those stages from reading my blog, that I have gone through them all! 

I will keep you posted when we have the podcast done on Busting Life’s Challenges, and of course there will be a youtube video on the Busting Life’s Challenges Channel. 

We hope that you will find some way forward for yourself in this article and of course there is always the face book group,  Estranged Mothers – Rise and Thrive.  Yes, I know that Fathers can also be struggling with those issues to.  Do reach out if you need some support, more than happy to have a conversation with you, or I can pass you along to my coaching male colleagues.

Remember what Abraham Hicks says, go and do something that makes you feel good about yourself.  Put that boat of yours in your stream of life where you want it to be, make things easier for yourself, stop paddling up stream (trying to make things right) and allow, (just be) with healing (if you need some), flow downstream to where the next exciting part of your life will be, but for now,

Go and float in your boat!

Love Di x

Life’s Lessons As We Go

A never ending journey.

There have been three greatest impacts on me during my coaching training and experience so far:-

1. Neuro Linguistic Programming Coaching,
2. The Grief Recovery Method training and
3. Well that one was a surprise. Money Freedom Mindset.

It was a surprise because it was about building a ‘Money Freedom Mindset’. The course I attended was created by a coaching colleague Sebastian Koellner.

The main attraction for me after our pre course conversation was looking at my Saboteurs clearly and how they affect every element of my life.

How many times do you say to yourself, “Ill be happy when” and name some ‘thing, place or person’ that once that is in your life, you will declare yourself “happy”?

How many times have you got that ‘thing, place or person’ perhaps been happy for a day, then that elation/excitement fizzles out?!

Have you taken time to think about how that influences your life?
Your decision making? (very much including money)


Saboteurs

I knew about saboteurs, as many of us get to know these parts of ourselves over our lifetime. I did not realise which ones were the most active in my life or why that mattered!

The strongest one for us all is the judge. Yes, you do judge! I have been saying for years that “I do not judge” as in reference to another person, yet we do, it is ingrained within us since we were children. In the Grief Recovery Method, we call it ‘comparing.’ “How did your spelling test go today?” Followed by “and how did Sue do?”

As you have been reading this article, you have been judging if you would get what you need from the contents. So sometimes the judge is good, but not when it is taking over, judging everything! Have you heard the expression “they are so judgmental?”
Sebastian introduced the idea of our saboteurs being ‘board members’ in our mind. I liked that analogy, and adopted that going forward.

We have the judge, avoider, controller, hyper-achiever, hyper-rational, hyper-vigilant, pleaser, restless, stickler and victim.

Sebastian asked me to complete an online quiz to see which ones were more active than others. The biggest surprise for me was that my Hyper-Achiever was the stronger! But the one that resonated with me to work on was my third one which was, Restless.

To acknowledge and identify this part of me ‘took me back’ a little. I did not consider myself to be restless.
This is the description –
Constant need for busy-ness. Rarely at peace with current activity.
Strengths of this saboteur is “Flexibility and Risk Tolerance”,
The lie or tactic of this saboteur is “this is the way to accomplish and experience the most.”

Wow. This resonated with me so much, I recognized that I had been doing this, more so since losing my husband. When Andrew died I had been under the influence that ‘time is precious, and we should spend it wisely’ which was interpreted by me to make every moment count, not leaving time for me to sit and read a book – smell the roses….every moment needed to be accounted for.

I was now on my own, responsible for me. I had to make my business work, to achieve the income I desired in order that I could support myself and be there for my two sons, whenever they might need my support. I had been under that pressure from the time he died in July 2016 to March 2022! That is quite a while for me to be pushing and beating up on myself. I had a leaky bucket and I had not realized it!

The leaky bucket is an analogy I use for clients when I bring into their awareness that they have been constantly giving and not taking their needs into consideration. Their energy draining through those holes. When they work through the issues in their buckets, plug the holes, fill themselves replenishing their energy, they can start to flow from the top. Then feel better and when you are in that space the ‘overflow’ to others is from a place of love, rather than perhaps, resentment (drainage!).

Man, how that made an impact on me. I realized that I needed to put myself first.
I have spent years reframing this to allow clients to give themselves permission to put themselves first, ‘gosh, even I thought that that was exactly what I was doing,’ especially when my youngest son told me that I was “being selfish and putting myself first”.
For those of you who have read my earlier blogs will be aware that I have had a journey in my relationship with my son and estrangement. (I have always thought and said that my children were my greatest teachers, they still are amongst them! More on this in my next blog).

Now I found myself reflecting on that power word of ‘me’, the restlessness saboteur and what I had been doing throughout my life, more so since losing Andrew; and how all this was showing up in the situation that I was dealing with, my youngest son.

I have mentioned in earlier blogs that I engaged a mediator to try and sort some of the issues out that we had between us. Lovingly supportive and knowing that he was on his own life journey I hadn’t realized the impact of the restless saboteur in my actions. I had tried to stand my ground on a few things to try and get him to ‘step up’ to ‘take action’ to ‘take responsibility’ from his side, but nothing was forthcoming. In fact he did something that shook me to the core, something that I thought he would never have done in a million years….but he did. What, is not important, the why is. (How I internalize that).

You see, I was still trying to make things easy for him. Line everything up for a smooth transition (triathlon training!) and while praying for a happy outcome, what I was doing was ‘actually pushing’ him further away.

The programme that Sabastian introduced me to showed how the restlessness was showing up in this situation!

My working on making things smoother, was my restlessness saboteur! Still at it! Time is precious and this is a waste of time! Let us get on with things, time is not a healer, action is! But sometimes we do need time to stop, breath and smell the roses! Sometimes there is great learning in the pain.

The penny dropped. I was pushing to make things as smooth for him as I could, he tested my unconditional love, which is unconditional, and I ‘woke up’ to what I had been doing. I made the decision to stop. I was going to stop trying to make things happen, and just let it be (as in the Beatles song, there will be an answer, let it be). I realized this had been strong in me since Andrew’s death, but I had been doing this more so since he was 3 years of age, when his dad was diagnosed. In trying to create a happy (no matter what) childhood for him and his brother, the restlessness had been in overdrive!

The weight of this stress lifted from my shoulders, as I reflected at how the Restlessness Saboteur had been ‘showing up’.

The next thing that Sebastian had us do was to look at a baby picture. I picked one from before my sisters were born. A nice happy smiling little girl around the age of 3.
There was a whole process around this, but for now, what came up for me (even if this was not what happened, it is my perspective), shortly after my twin sisters arrived, I had played mother from that moment on. Putting everyone else first, making sure that everyone else was happy (being a good girl and not selfish) and if they were happy, then so was I. Wow another lightbulb moment!

I knew instantly that in deciding to stop ‘pushing’ with my son, with my power word for the year being ‘me’ and this new insight, that I was blown away by this new learning. I could let go of the stress that came with the issue.

I have been doing a lot of deep diving in this course, received coaching and tremendous support from my HPC family, Pod and especially Sebastian. I have now realized that working on ‘me’, is not just okay, but essential to my wellbeing. It is not selfish, and I started to plug my leaky bucket. I now flow from a different place, and it feels great!

New creations, inspirations, and energy has arrived in ways for me to work with clients going forward.

I am now more mindful, allowing these new learnings to become part of me. My ‘board of directors’ keep throwing the odd thing up for me to think about, but now I know what I need to do to send that part back into the board room, with a firm “sit down and shut up”. I know what I need to do to get back into what was called ‘sage’, (you might know this as trusting your gut) to be fully present for you.

If you would like to find out more about Sebastian’s Money Freedom Mindset Course, you can contact him through LinkedIn or visit his face book profile Sebastian Koellner. I have a podcast interviewing Sebastian on my YouTube Channel, Busting Life’s Challenges with Di Parker.

What you can do for yourself right now.

I also listened to the videos of Abraham Hicks talking about the ‘river of life’ on YouTube, our journey downstream; we all think the things we desire are up stream; we fight the current thinking the destination is up stream (with phrases like “get to the top of your career”) When the destiny is the boat! Life is a journey, where you are is exactly where you should be at this given time, if you don’t like it, stop paddling! Be happy, have fun, enjoy life – now you’re in the flow, whether enjoying white water rapids, fast stream, or floating down. You are supposed to be in that boat, it is your destiny, enjoy the ride!

While reading through this article, and you got this far so thank you…how many losses did you notice?

The Grief work (I do and did on myself) gave me the tools that I needed to help heal the ‘deep diving moments’ of this experience.

Loss of elements of my childhood, loss of down time moments to really relax and read a book, smell the roses, loss of creativity trying to push things into creation instead of being! The ability to do the work on my relationship with my son, now allowing him to flourish without ‘energetic interference’ to just be……Me and know my Worthiness in this process.

What losses are stopping you from creating the life that you desire to live right now?
Like to talk that through? Go to calendly and let’s have a conversation.

Until next time,
Go and float in your boat!
Love Diane x

The Shame Of Estrangement

When Families Fall Apart

If you would have asked me 6 years ago, if I thought that this would ever have happen to me, I would have said “no way”. But I am sad to share, that this has happened to me and my heart is breaking.

I have worked with clients and people within a local charity who have had to endure these awful experiences, never would I have envisaged this happening to my family. While we are all unique in our experience of estrangement, the pain of these people I now share.

Estrangement is happening to more people that you maybe aware of and the reason why they are not talking about this subject, is because they feel shame.

I am curious, what was the first thought in your mind when you started to read this article? What has “she” done? She must have done something? This is the root of misperception which usually can be sorted out in conversations.

Parents do mainly blame themselves for the situation that they now find themselves in or justify (as I have been doing to a degree) why the person has created the estrangement between themselves and their family.

I stayed in that space that I often talk about (justifying) until I decided to be responsible. To be responsible for my own self, my health and how I am showing up in the world for people like you.

The first thing I understood for sure was that I was grieving. I was grieving the special family I had with my late husband and two sons. I was grieving the special relationship I had with my son. I was grieving not being allowed to be apart of my granddaughters lives.

I had kept a distance to help my son and his partner both find their feet as parents which has been misinterpreted by my son, with the help of his partner that I do not care about him through gaslighting. Now, the once caring person I knew is battling with his own issues, and I have become the easy target for their aggression.

What Action Can You Take?

I want to share with you what I have discovered for myself, once I acknowledged the grief. I stepped out of justifying my situation and started to take responsibility for my own mental health. I started to do some research.

Where do most people turn to at my age in life? The “How To” section of Youtube. I have recently been uploading videos to Youtube and thought there is bound to be people on there who like me are showing up to help others and perhaps about this heart breaking subject of estrangement.

Prior to this video, I had invested in a mediator to help me with my situation, and from the work I do, I understand that conflict of any kind is brought about by misperception. If we can establish from the start that we all see things differently, then this can lay foundations for a resolution to be found. All it takes is for both parties to be willing and open to having a conversation. However, mediation does not work if one or both of the parties are not wanting to participate. Sometimes this can take longer than hoped, after years of conflict, before situations can be resolved.

The video I found and watched was called “Rules of Estrangement: Why Adult Children Cut Ties & How To Heal The Conflict – Josh Coleman, Ph. D.” I have since ordered his book and will do a book review later.

He suggests that a letter of “amends” is created in which we acknowledge the mistakes that we have made and to try and find that kernel of truth.

Josh suggested that when you are creating your letter, you say something along the lines of “I know you wouldn’t cut of contact with me unless it was the healthiest thing for you to do”. This makes sense to me as my son has felt like he has had to “pick sides” between myself and his partner. His two daughters mean the world to him, as they do me. So in that statement, I can surely find peace. He is doing what he has been taught to do by his family, that family comes first.

When you are still in some communication with your child, Josh further suggests that by creating a letter of amends for the adult child, that this puts him/her in the context of growth and happiness. This really helps the adult child to be seen and heard – by adding “take the exact time you need. If there are things you need me to work on in the interim, I am happy to do that.” Using that language validates the person.

Josh now talks about the Mothers Wound. He admitted to not knowing much about this, but I can for sure relate. You have given birth and raised this child to the best of your ability. Nurturing, supporting and doing in my case a lot of compensating for the difficult circumstances we found ourselves dealing with. As much as we did not discuss Andrew’s health with the children, children are not stupid. They absorb their environment. I discovered much more about that as I completed my NLP training. As a loving mum, this was part of my heart ache which I acknowledged and grieved.

Because I have a great understanding the ‘misperception part’ of this ongoing issue and having worked on myself, I can be in a stronger place emotionally for the conversations that may follow. Examples below for you to understand the tone.

Josh said “anything that the child comes back with say, I hadn’t really though of myself that way. Is there anything you can suggest I can read or find out about it (issue raised)?” This takes the conversation off labels and onto behaviours. “What would you like us to work on/family therapy?” These are a few of his suggestions, of the type of language to use.

A side note here about the use of parts language. This will help the person that you are speaking with understand that they are not “all bad” that we have sad parts, happy parts, loving parts, challenging parts. Particularly when used with small children – “you are a naughty girl” (all of you is bad) to “what part of you felt that it was ok to do xyz”.

Resist saying that you are proud of them. To say that continues the feeling of parent/child. But say that you are impressed by them. By doing this you elevate them, which then allows for the parts in the relationship that didn’t feel good, to be healed.

He went on to say, that you don’t have to like what is being said, but this is about building a relationship once again.

Josh then went onto talk about the area which is in my field of expertise, grief. Using the typical thoughts parents have as mentioned and the questions above, I started this process of healing my pain. I used the Grief Recovery Method (GRM) programme on this situation! I had to heal the pain of the loss of my relationship with my son, in order to help me be in a better place to move forward in hopefully healing our situation.

These are typical questions a parent might use. How do I live like this? (meaning living in grief). You have given birth, nurtured during their growing up and feel like you should be doing more. Now it is important for you to decide between suffering and pain. We are going to feel pain, our hopes, dreams and expectations of the relationship that we have dreamt about, being apart of has gone, at least for now. We also go through the suffering by going through all the mental processors that tie us to the pain, such as “what if I don’t see my child again”. From this can come social isolation, guilt tripping yourself, and getting mad at yourself.

Josh suggested some processors that you can learn to help yourself. Meditation, radical acceptance, (all as it is) or my tip is you could do the Grief Recovery Method (GRM) on this situation. As in the above comment made by Josh, the guilt tripping term is used in his explanation. Now in the GRM, we education the reader/client to know that guilt means to imply harm, so if you had murdered someone, then that use of the word is correct. It is misused in every other context. What you feel is sad, the feelings of which are fueled by you staying the cycle of blaming, shaming and justifying yourself and/or the situation that has been created in the estrangement.

Josh said “The more we fight our misery the longer the path out of hell, the more we struggle, the worse we will feel” He is so right. For your own health, mental and physical you need to put yourself in a place of acceptance (that doesn’t mean liking it) by working on yourself with some of the tips above. To forgive does not mean to condone what you feel was done to you.

Feelings of fear about the returning to the “relationships” can also happen, which is where building a pathway and strategies can help. If they need space, respect that for one year. Having compassion is the gift of joy. From their perspective, they may then allow a window into their life through social media. And so pathways can be rebuilt.

What about when you are met with silence, (no communication) and everything you try is met with silence? Josh recommends a really good amends letter, take responsibility and send after 6 to 8 weeks “just checking in”. Again if you hear nothing, do a follow up in a couple of months or a year. Clearly continuing to reach out.

For the contents of that letter, do not go on about what is fair. The son or daughter in law maybe gatekeeping the letter, contact or email. You do not want the amends letter to be about them, or doing things for the audience of that person. Continue to be loving parents instead of creating back lash for your child.

When There Is No Communication, What Can You Do?

Keep a journal or letters for your son/daughter and grandchildren. Do not make these critical, but fill with love and share the parts of your life that they are currently missing out on. Josh also suggests that you do not cut your child out of your Will, (and a few friends have suggested this to me). Unconditional love.

Again let us briefly look at misperception.

Things are not always as we see them. We can both experience a chick flick, I think it is great, while you wonder if you will ever recover from the hour and a half that you feel you have just wasted!

There are so many factors to these situations, particularly in estrangement. Is what is happening that persons fault (your son/daughter)? or do they have a mental illness? Mental abuse can be as bad if not worse than physical abuse, the emotional damage without the physical injury to be evidenced. We know as a society that there are so many disorders out there that these must be considered. You may not recognise these in your child, but in the behaviours of their partners.

Has you child been visiting the doctor for depression, anxiety and sleep apnea. If you are not sleeping well, from stress, you are not getting into REM Sleep cycles which exasperates the situation. This will continue until the child looks at their part/responsibility. That is up to them to arrive at that decision and for us parents to be open for when they may ask for support.

“You can’t change what you don’t acknowledge, but change is inevitable. Are you going to take action or be in reaction?” Diane Parker!

As A Parent, What Can You Do?

The only thing that you are in charge of and responsible for is you. In this scenario, the action would be to reclaim your life and your part as a parent. My family was close. My sons had become so close as in ‘we had friendships’ when they had became adults. I felt like they were friends I could rely on for sure. In my own grief (before GRM) I found this to be a great comfort. But one son was under increasing pressure as he become a father so closely after loosing his own father. This was to become the start of his journey to where we find ourselves today.

So empower yourself by healing your pain of loss, by letting go of your hopes dreams, and expectations. Using the information above in that process will help you in regaining your strength back to cope with this situation. If you chose not to, then that is your choice as well, and in suffering you will remain.

Josh suggests that you get on with your life. As much as you have been a good parent it is time for you to exercise your own trust in you. As a parent, you did the best job that you knew how to do.

In the meantime, join groups for support. Keep reaching out making the light touches mentioned above. True unconditional love.

To my son, my door is always open, my arms ready to hold you and to know you never left my heart.

Bye for now

Love Diane x

Loneliness

I decided to use just that one word.

I put out a poll asking my group what topics they would like me to cover, and this one topped the pole by an astonishing amount.

Loneliness can mean so many things to people, each holding their own perspectives from their own experiences. From sitting in an empty house to sitting in a room full of people, yet still feeling alone.

I had never really experienced loneliness myself, it had become more a space for me to do something for me, from riding my bike to having ownership of the remote control! My life had been full of people.

Yet I could relate to the other experiences, such as sitting in a room with someone, who had become distant, and so, in that moment felt alone. It didn’t last but touched me.

It did not even hit me after Andrew died, not for some years.

After he died, my sister was ill, and I was trying to deal with the grief I was feeling. Still no space for loneliness, I was keeping busy, although not on purpose, there was much to do and sort. After Pauline died, I renovated a property, and then in the winter of 2019, some 3 years after my husband died, I realised I was lonely.

I did not like this feeling at all. That is when I did “keep busy”. I would try and fill my weekends, walking Ruby, helping at swing dancing workshops, all to avoid being on my own. But Sunday’s were a challenge, particularly on wet Sunday’s.

As much as friends made offers to “call around anytime”, the one time I did that I felt like I was intruding, so I didn’t like to do that again. Everyone was busy getting on with their own families, as indeed they should. My sons would be having the day with their own partners and family. (Two granddaughters). I would drop around to see my parents for a few hours, but then there was the rest of the day.

All those times I thought what I would do if I had time to myself, read a book, do a jig saw, in some way they felt like I would be wasting time. One thing that I had been focusing on since Andrew died was not to waste any time, it is so precious. I know now, that was putting pressure on me too, having that perspective.

So I turned to the garden for the most part, with Ruby at my side, unless of course, it was raining.

Those were the worse days. After months of this feeling, I decided that I had had enough, that I needed to take action. I was starting to feel more like my old self in every other area of my life and to be fair, some friends on their own were saying how hard it would be to have others in their space. That also frightened me a little. I did not want to get that comfortable either.

It suddenly dawned on me that I was not on my own, that there would be others like me “out there” in the same boat. I had already dipped my toe in the online dating scene and decided that that was not for me at all. People saw “widow” and thought “vulnerable”. It was nice to have people to talk to, but I decided I was not looking for a relationship, but company, people in a similar boat.

Having recently done my marketing course and getting more familiar with face book. I decided that one thing I could do was create a group, which I did and called this group Isle of Man Finding Friends Over 50.

At first I had made this for those who were single but it soon came apparent how many other people were lonely. I was contacted by a gentleman who looked after his wife. She had dementia and he wanted people to just talk to. So many who were not looking for relationships, but company. I made that adjustment and within two weeks the group had grown to over 120 people. We ended up with a ‘making friends event’ and a Christmas do for charity, raising between the two over £1,000.

I simply made sure that all applying to join the group were from the Isle of Man, agreed to the simple rules similar to those adopted by face book, and the group grew. We now have over 420 members. We use the events section to create something say a coffee meeting, placing day and time, and then people just let you know if they are coming along. Movies, meals out, walks (with or without a dog), cycling, bridge, dancing, and the latest, a book exchange. I have just created a live dance challenge in the group. What would you like to do?

I share that because if you are indeed reading this and find yourself lonely in your area, then you can set your own up.

What got you to that space in the first place? Are you an introvert? You know, you can’t change what you don’t acknowledge. Are you telling yourself that you are sad today, because the truth is that you feel lonely? Telling yourself to “get out” will be hard but one of the best things you can do for yourself.

Before the group started, I sat in that space and thought, I need to go out and meet new people. I had always had a passion for dancing. (I am a believer of thoughts becoming things!) I decided that I wanted to learn how to do a jive. Next there is a post on face book for a workshop “first time in the Isle of Man, Learn to Swing Dance”. I was hooked, but I couldn’t get to the workshop as my first granddaughter was to be christened.

Soon after it was announced that the classes would be starting in what was once a night club in Douglas. I said to myself, go. When you face the vulnerability, the fear, magic can happen. I did just that. I put the shoes my late sister had given me to dance in on, and off I went.

Now, I am used to meeting people. It’s what I do. But when you are facing learning something new, that can seem a challenge. I rose to that and smashed it. They were so welcoming, you got to dance with everyone (no partner necessary) and by the end of the night had a little routine going. I was elated, I was buzzing for days……its now my 3rd year and I just love it. The people are lovely, sociable and we have so many dos.

And that dear reader is also how I met my partner Rob. He joined my group IOM Finding Friends Over 50, and saw that I liked swing dancing. We had an event on in Castletown, he rocked up to see what Swing Dancing was before committing…..then turned up at classes.

So you don’t know where pushing through your vulnerability to go out and meet people can change your world from feelings of loneliness to joy.

For the month of December I will be looking into this topic with several people and asking how they cope with loneliness and what action they take. For me, the best way to change a state is to own it, then you can take action towards what you want.

Much love

Diane x

I Hate The Term, Moving On

Do You Think I Have Moved On?

I cringe when I hear this term “moving on” with regard to life after you have lost your loved one. Because it is false. It is untrue. And it puts too much pressure on those who are struggling to find a life after their loss.

I have experienced so many people saying that to me “oh now you have moved on” or the assumption that I have “moved on” because I have welcomed a new loving man into my life. But I have not “moved on”. This has also been an issue for the widows and widowers that have become my clients.

It puts so much pressure on how they are feeling, how they then interact with the new person in their lives, perhaps torn between feeling “guilty” (I will come back to that) and wanting to find happiness. And there is nothing wrong with wanting to find happiness, so long as it is not to “replace the loss”.

What about a parent who has lost a child. My own father broke down in the car park in the summer saying to me “I haven’t got over her yet”. He was referring to my little sister who had died the year after my husband. I said “Dad, please take that pressure off yourself, you will not get over her, but you will learn to live with her not longer physically here”. Of course, dad has not done the Grief Recovery Method programme to heal the pain of his loss, but I have. This is what I now do with others.

You see, when you do this programme you learn that “guilt” is used to commonly. It’s true meaning ‘means to imply harm’, so unless you have murdered someone, with regard to how you feel about the person who has died, where does the “guilt” come in?

I cover this on the course, and a few other things that it is important to mention here. Comparing. There is no comparing of people. We are all unique and on our own unique journey, yet we do this. It comes from as early as childhood. “Oh look, Robert’s walking but Hayley hasn’t started yet”. A typical conversation between two friends with babies born a day apart, yet here the lessons are being taught on how to compare. Next it will be “how are they doing in school”, to then of course, class mates, “where did you come in your spelling test”. I am sure that you get my point and can now see how this pattern has unfold in your own life.

And so when it then comes to inviting someone else into our lives, it is completely unfair to then compare the relationships. They are different, they are unique. The values might be the same/similar and this is why that might be important to notice for yourself. It was important for me that the person in my life values family, mine and his. Andrew, my late husband was a family man, my family mean the world to me and now Rob has arrived. His family mean the world to him. When beliefs and values are our too far out of sync, then you may have issues, for example if he had not had children. He would have no understanding of how important they are or attention that they may need with support extra.

If you have gone out to find someone because you do not like being alone, the pain of your loss hurts so much that you need someone to fill that space, you can easily find yourself with the wrong person or worse, someone who is ready to take advantage of your vulnerability. If this is you, you may find that you have been shown to “replace a loss” most likely again early in your childhood. (I will write my next article on loneliness).

For now, lets imagine that your pet hamster had died when you were 6 years old and you were so upset about Harry dying (that was my hamster!). You parents seeing you so upset say “don’t cry, we will get you a new one at the weekend”. Perhaps this continues with more crying and a parent then offers a biscuit. Confused by the words, “this will make you feel better,” the child eats the biscuit.

The child feels different, not better. You have stopped the natural grieving process. What an opportunity was missed for your parents to have had a conversation about grief. How you were feeling, acknowledge those feelings and ask about your relationship with Harry. This little friend who had meant a lot to you.

When this opportunity is missed, then the new hamster appears, you feel different. More importantly you have been taught to replace your losses. When you get older, and a boyfriend or girlfriend leaves you, guess what, you are out looking for the next one. If it is you breaking the relationship, do you look for the next person to invite into your life before you end the one you are in? Is there someone you can recognise who does this after divorce? Perhaps someone who has affairs?

By the offer of the biscuit from the person who you look up to, you can spend your life then looking for that one thing to “make you feel better” instead of acknowledging your grief. This can be wine, food, over exercising, or sex. This is called in the Grief Recovery Programme, Short Term Energy Relieving Behaviours. I had used red wine!

By doing the programme, I healed the pain of my loss of Andrew, which was accepting my hopes, dreams and expectations of what we were going to do after his transplant had now ended. I have referred to this in previous articles and podcasts as a “block” between us, between our connection, spiritually. This melted when I healed the pain in my heart.

No amount of psychoanalyzing will help when it is your heart that has been broken. To face this part of your life, you must connect with your feelings. It can be painful, uncomfortable and most do try to avoid it. But there you will find your peace, your healing and in the programme, a structure to take any other losses in your life through.

So you see, I have not moved on. To move on implies that you are leaving someone behind. After 31 years of marriage, I have history, two sons, and so many memories, therefore to “move on” is just not going to happen! I have healed my pain, and Andrew will always be in my heart, forever. What I have found is a way to ‘find a future’.

4 years after my husband’s death, I was lucky enough to find Rob. Without comparing! I have been blessed to find a loving caring man, who is secure in his own self and our relationship not to feel threatened by my life with Andrew, but lovingly gives me the space to grief when it shows up. And it can so easily.

We were watching a movie called “The Afterlife” (guess the clue was in the title). One scene at the end had me breaking down, with raw grief. As I sobbed, he put his arms around me and say “that’s been in there for a long time, let it out”. That my friend, meant the world to me. He did what I offer others, a safe space to grieve and release the pain, so healing can occur.

You see it is another part of this myth about thinking you “should be over this by now” because we do not know when events are going to show up in our lives that trigger this raw emotion.

I advise my clients that this can happen using the example of taking my boys and their partners (and one granddaughter) to Centre Parcs, just a year after Andrew had died. Pauline, my sister had past two months. I was trying to keep some small part of my family together, have something familiar that I could hold on to.

For the first two days, all was well, people were getting along ok then day three they went off with their partners (as they should) and I was ‘billy no mates’! It hit me then, my playmate was gone. Fortunately I was in the pool when this happened! I spoke with my friend Di, and she said just sit with it, if it doesn’t go then we may need to do some work on the loss. But it did, and as I acknowledged the loss I found peace and acceptance. Didn’t like the feeling, but it is what it is, or so I thought!

Not giving up, I took them all back the following year, and what I had to grieve then was my family holidays. The times when Andrew, Robert (son) and James (son) would go away. Andrew would relax and be playful (living with a long illness was extremely stressful for us all) and we created so many happy memories. Those days were also to be grieved. Yes, of course I will make more, but not with my little family. Can you see the layers that had to come to the surface in that process?

I do feel extremely blessed to have had all the times we had. We had made a point of doing this so the boys would have happy memories to look back on. I know that I for sure have.

And Now? Now I get to make more happy memories with Rob, and his two lovely children who are 9 and 11 as I write. For me, I get the best of both worlds. My time with Rob and my time with his family.

So I am not moving on, I am living my life. My life after loss.

With love

Diane x

Why I Do What I Do.

On a recent course we were asked to look into ourselves and ask “why do I do, what I do?”. For me that was an easy answer, but they insisted that we “dug deep” when answering this question.

I want people to understand the emotion of grief, and the impact that not knowing this emotion well, has on us physically and mentally.

For me, as I was going through the process of early grief for the loss of my husband Andrew, at least in those first 4 weeks after his death, my head felt “spongy”. I could have moments of clarity, but then nothing. It was hard to hold a thought for too long. Then, when I returned to seeing clients, I could be focused in that space of an hour, but would have to arrange power naps after I felt so drained physically. I am good at boundaries, so it wasn’t what the client was bringing up, it was just me – trying to keep myself together.

Other times, I would sit feeling a heavy heart of deep depression trying to worm its way into me. The feeling of how hard it would be to keep going on with my own life. It was not suicidal thoughts, but the recognition of how hard it was going to be without my husband with me.

I could feel a deep sharp pain in my chest like someone had stuck a knife in my chest. Using all the coaching techniques I had in my tool box, I could not shift this pain. What is worse for me, it felt like a block between the connection that Andrew and I had. That hurt me more than anything.

I spoke with my good friend and colleague about this feeling. I said that I wanted to find steps to help me heal, an action plan. I was sick of hearing my own story, going around in loops, which is a constant when people ask you “what happened”. One person asked how I was feeling, I felt relief in that moment, but then as I spoke, and I know it was her not wanting to feel the pain, so she changed the subject. I knew why but felt hurt.

I had “googled” grief, and Cruise Bereavement came up, how to become a counsellor came up, but nothing that I was looking for. And I wanted something now, not 6 months down the line!

I said to my friend, “I am going through this for a reason, and if I don’t find anything, you and I are going to sit down and write a programme, I never want anyone else to go through this pain who wanted to find a way forward”.

Dianne said that she had heard of something and would look into that to see if it was an option. And she did. The Grief Recovery Method.

Before this discovery, my little sister was diagnosed with cancer and I had to stop my grief, “pull myself together” to support my family through this next journey. I actually had resentment towards her at first. I was still in pain in my own grief. What I didn’t know was that because I was going through things with Andrew, my family had not told me concerns about her, until it was diagnosed. When my family reached out to me to talk about this, I said “mum I can’t deal with this, I am not in a good place to help”. Her reply was “well how do you think I feel”. At that moment I was so angry with her, with my sister, how dare they “interfere” with my grief. They dismissed my pain.

That is how it felt emotionally, logically of course, I knew that my mum couldn’t face her own grief, she would always keep busy. My other sister, her twin was busy looking after her children and now Pauline’s two. And Dad, well, he just was processing in his own way.

So I had to do what any “big sister” ends up doing. Putting myself aside and dealing with Pauline’s hospital routines. I think that my mum expected me to take over looking after her, but I had to work. In case they hadn’t noticed…I was on my own!

Thank goodness for the Grief Recovery Method (“GRM”) and it’s training. Now 11 months after my husband’s death, I am on this course with my friend Dianne taking myself through these steps. First 3 parts, educational. About how we are taught how to deal with grief, or as in most cases, not! And the last 3 parts how to heal the pain of your losses.

On the healing side, I learned that I also had to grieve my ‘hopes dreams and expectations’ of what future I had planned with Andrew. Logically yes, I know that he was dead, but there was this part of me that had not made that connection and it was yet to be grieved. When I did, I howled as much as the moment he died.

But I am also the person who observes myself! When we loose someone, there is so much trauma and shock, that the force of the current would be enough to “blow our brains out”. So the body drops dopamine on us to stop that from happening. This is why you experience a spacy feeling.

In that moment, you are feeling in a different time and space to everyone else. Their conversations can be like you are listening through a glass, it takes great effort to focus on their words, you can start to worry about “is there something wrong with me”. Then the clarity will come and you think, ok, nope, this must be grief.

There was also confusion. Trying to make sense of what has happened. Everything you knew has gone, (or at least that is how I felt). No matter how hard you try, you can’t seem to have the space to make a decision in your mind.

If you imagine your brain as a computer, it is like someone has gone around the back and pull most of the wires out. You have enough to turn it on, have it light up but nothing is working properly.

When I completed the GRM training, and grieved my hopes dreams and expectations, something strange happened. In that moment, I went inside of myself. I could feel a warmth rising up from my feet, through my body and when it got to my heart, I felt the pain I had been carrying like a knife, dissolve. The warmth continued up through my body and into my head. In my head those “computer wires” that had felt like they were floating for months, unable to make any connections, well in that moment, I could feel each one find a place to land and “plug back in”. The peace I felt in that moment was so connected and spiritual for me. I felt great. I felt like the block between Andrew and I had dissolved and I could “feel” him once more. That was so important for me.

Returning home, I also felt in another “place” to be with Pauline. I could be present to what I was now supporting her with as I felt should have been. I was able to have conversations with her about her process, buried or cremated. Answered her questions to the best of my ability about spirit. I understood that she did not want to think of nothingness. We spoke about a bigger connection and how much closer I now felt to Andrew since the course.

Also for me, how important it was that her children were spoken to and supported in the right way. The consequences of this can and does impact people and the way that they live their lives. For example, a child looses a pet, the parent replaced the pet “at the weekend” not stopping to talk to the child about their feelings towards the pet and companion that they have just lost. They may also have been offered a biscuit to help them “feel better” and told not to worry as they still have Fido the dog. So stop crying.

Let me break that down for you now. Firstly ignoring the child’s feelings and the opportunity to talk about grief, teaching them a more positive way to acknowledge allowing them to heal. Answer with, I am so very sorry for your loss of your friend, tell me, what will you miss the most….and open the conversation up. Acknowledging and letting that child know that they can talk to you. The idea of replacing a loss, means that they will learn to do this throughout life. An example not being done, can be seen in those that you know who have broken up with someone only to be with someone else a week or two later….or they look before ending up the relationship. They do not want to feel that pain.

The biscuit….you interrupt the process of grieving, you are a higher authority who they know/believe they can trust, you have just told them that this will make them feel better. They feel different, not better but then spend the rest of their lives believing that “food or things to comfort” will make them feel better. Mine was red wine and chocolate!

Stop crying. Well what else are you supposed to do when you’re crying? What can come from that is that people start to grieve alone because “no one wants to see them cry” and teaches them to be alone.

As Dianne and I looked back over our years of coaching, we could see clearly the effects of unresolved grief and what that had had on our previous clients. Understanding that any loss has an impact, small or to the more traumatic and the emotion is grief. But people put on masks, am alright, what we call “academy award recovery”.

Whether you are grieving or feel that you are not at this moment, understanding this emotion will help empower you. We all have challenges in life. These are mine which I share not so you think “poor Diane” (although that is sweet of you) I share these so you may now reflect on your own life. Any of these “trigger you”, take notice and empower yourself by asking for a coaching session.

Living with a long term illness of a partner

Miscarriage

Pet Loss

Career change

Death of grandparents

House move

Major change in family circumstances

Estranged Grandparent

Emotional journey of a business

Wanting to work together/spend less time working yet find you do more plus!

Have an au pair to look after your children for a year, when you know/feel it should be you

Sale of your first car (my independence)

Financial rollercoaster

Now some of those had a bigger impact for me that others but I know that they are all stages of grief. We are taught how to get things in life, but not what to do when we lose them.

Here are a few others that I haven’t personally experienced, but I know many would have.

Divorce

Children dying

Bankrupcy

Mortgage reclaims

Car reclaims

Parents estranged and the children perhaps living more with one than another parent.

I could go on. We can have up to 41 odd losses in our lives. The usual emotions that peoplego to’ is Blaming themselves or others, Shaming themselves or others, or Justifying themselves or others. When in actual fact, take responsibility through kindness to yourself. You are/were grieving. That is where I come into your life with Results Coaching.

You just need to acknowledge/notice that this is what you have been doing, decide that you no longer like the way that feels to you, and want to make changes. You want to get fitter, you hire a Personal Trainer. You know to succeed needs accountability, or you want to run more, you get a running coach. Your mind is no different. There is nothing wrong with you, you are not broken, you just have not had the training you need to help you at this moment.

If you do nothing, how does this impact you in your business? Your team? Your relationships? Your children? The way you live your life? Fear or empowerment? Reacting to everything or responding?

I never, ever want anyone to think that there is no one “out there” for them when they are struggling with grief or their ‘life’s challenges’. I never want anyone to feel that hurt, pain or want to take action, without knowing that there are people like me out there that can help support you.

Yes I know that there are therapists, etc and if you need that level of support then please do reach out to them. Do something, do what feels right for you. But know this, there are coaches who specifically help in this area, just like me. Read Michelle’s story. Having seen a therapist, she reached out to me for coaching.

I offer two approaches to my business, Grief Coaching and Results Coaching, helping you Bust Through Life’s Challenges.

www.lifeafterlossiom.com www.resultscoachingiom.com or podcasts anchor.fm/d369

Diane@lifeafterlossiom.com Diane@resultscoachingiom.com

Also Facebook, LinkedIn, and Youtube channel: Busting Through Life’s Challenges

Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions or would like to discuss in confidence, your current circumstances. Book a free call https://calendly.com/diane-227/invitation-to-talk

Or see my website and come and join me on my next free workshop

Bye for now

Diane

Michelle, The Amazing Transformation

This was the start of Michelle’s Story, by Michelle:
When you read this, please bare in mind that at the time, Michelle was just 25 years of age. When we started working together, she was just 27.

Today is not a good day. Today is my worst day so far this year, I don’t know why today is my worst day, I woke up in a good mood and then I BINGED and BINGED until I felt sick and horrible. I then went back to bed to try and sleep and forget how horrible I felt but it didn’t work. I have cancelled on Becky because I feel too disgusting to leave the house.
I have DEPRESSION. I have an EATING DISORDER. I need to get better. I will get better. I will get better. I will get better. I need to feel like me again. I’m just a little lost at the moment, I just need to get a grip on myself and sort my life out.
GET BETTER MICHELLE ONLY YOU CAN MAKE ME HAPPY AGAIN. PLEASE DO THIS. GET BETTER.
I need to get up now and go down stairs and work out what to do next.
This is my diary entry the day I got in touch with Diane Parker. What I did next was crawl down the stairs, I found my phone book and wrapped myself in a blanket and cried. Eventually when I stopped crying I phoned for help.

It was five years ago when my parents went through a very traumatic separation ending in an equally traumatic divorce. The whole family experienced lies, deceit, heart break and anger. There were false accusations, arrests, restraining orders and violence. There were even suicide threats, attempts and missing persons. With all of this going on I was the person desperately trying to pick up the pieces and glue them back together. I just about managed to remain in control enough to support my brother, sister and my parents whilst my parents were destroying themselves, each other and our family, but nothing prepared me for what happened next. Both parents just left the country my dad overseas and my mum to the UK, abandoning my little sister who has special needs and mental health issues, no warning, no explanation and no forwarding address.
Not knowing where to turn or what to do, I moved into the family home put it up for sale and took on the role of Jenny’s full time carer. Both of our lives turned completely upside down we struggled through and got on with life. I then had to juggle being in full time employment and a full time carer. I lost all my freedom, free time and social life. I was consumed with hate and anger towards both of my parents but I managed. My life was no longer my own but I made sure Jenny was as happy, healthy and as mentally fit as she could be. We joined the Special Olympics, I saw social workers, psychiatrist, anything I could think of to help Jenny through this time. What I didn’t do was look after myself in fact I completely lost myself, my identity and my love of life.

In 2010 I reached breaking point and couldn’t see any way out of my despair. I went to my GP and broke down; I was then quickly referred to a psychiatrist who told me in no uncertain terms I had to be on anti-depressants. This was not the path I wanted to take but not knowing what else to do I took them, but only for a couple of weeks as they made me paranoid, shaky and all together ill. Not knowing where else to turn, I looked in the phone book; luckily for me and my sister this led me to Diane.

From me:

Michelle I am sure you would agree was extremely brave to write that for me and indeed her need to help people like herself is so very important.

So the “presenting problem” is one that is easy to say, right, I have a weight problem. When I met Michelle, she was on the sofa, wrapped up as I sat and listened to her story. I had to harness the “mother in me” as she was so young to have this burden, but she had took it all on and had done her best to that point to manage the situation.

I worked with Michelle to give her steps of action, for herself, for social services and for her sister. We put boundaries in place to manage some of the above, created time and space for her to spend quality time with her sister instead of filling that time with all the jobs that any parent has to do around the house, shopping etc.

Created social time for her to reconnect with friends, follow a healthy eating programme of simple clean living while at each session we would work on her challenges. For example introductions would be along the lines of “oh, this is Michelle, she cares for her sister, she is autistic”, which of course made Michelle feel labelled as nothing more than a carer. We devised a response for those occasions which helped Michelle feel better and ready to deal with.

Through time, Michelle had become anxious, and meeting up with friends a big issue. We started working through decluttering her space, wardrobe and makeup. I started having her as I do many clients, working on the bedroom. It is the place that you rest your soul at night, and Michelle would often crawl in under a pile of clothes, cleaned and ready to be ironed…..but it was just easier to slide in under this pile. This was representing the weight of the world on her at that time.

Michelle did have an inner strength for improving her life, she had embarked albeit added to her overwhelm with a degree in psychology. Typical of someone who wants to try and get better along with helping others…
I didn’t know until after we had finished working together at that time, that she had visited a psychiatrist prior to phoning me. But she knew that the pills would not solve her problems. Only she could with support.

We did that work over the first 3 months and during the process we created a vision board. Something I love taking my clients through. On that she put that she wanted to travel. We discussed how that might happen, and she placed the pictures on her board, with clothes and makeup. By the following week, Michelle had been contacted by a friend who was out in Mexico and a holiday arranged! I am always in ore on how quickly these things happen!
This was May and the holiday set for September. We had further sessions spread out to keep accountability and support in place. Then the holiday. Michelle loved it and her friend returned with her. She then made an announcement. I want to go again, this time, to South Africa to swim with sharks, get my paddy diving certificate, while I am there build a hut for a charity or something, then pop over to Australia.

I sat there in awe of this beautiful young lady and though about how far she had come in just the 6 months. And she did. Planned and worked out how she was going to do this to put things in place for her sister and off she went. Pictured above is Michelle using what she had learned with me, creating a hut in one week which normally takes three! I will share more of these stories on my podcast.

When she came back we did sessions on other things that she wanted in her life, a husband and family of her own. She still felt that this would be so hard with her sister being part of the package. I reminded her of how far she had come, in fact blew me away…..and she just needed a new vision board with the man who is caring and understands the life she has and is happy to join her.

A few months later, another tip to Australia, returning with her future husband. They now live happily on the IOM with two lovely boys. Yes they have their challenges, and her first response is often, what would Diane say…..then if unsure books another session. And Yes, I got my Cilla moment!

I would like to thank Michelle for her honesty and openness during the journey. Michelle will soon be a guest on my show.

The Challenge Buster

You may have recently noticed a new addition to my programmes in the creation of The Challenge Buster.

Having worked as a Grief Recovery Method Specialist, following on from that Grief, Loss and Integration Therapist, it seems the word Grief still keeps people from talking. Which as a coach is not good.

I had to sit and think about what I wanted and how I wanted to serve more people. If because people do not understand the emotion of grief, then how are they going to apply it to their lives.

A brainstorming session took place with the lovely Diane Lurie who is a Leadership Coach and Brand Strategist. I was reminded of one of my first impact clients Michelle. We sketched out all the work I had done with her and the amazing transformations that happened.

There has to be a willingness from within someone for change to happen and so what keeps us stuck? What stops us from reaching out and saying hey, I want this and I need help getting there? Old limiting beliefs? We should know how to do this on our own?

As someone who works for the most part on my own, a recent course through High Performance Coaching has brought to mind how great it is to work and brainstorm with other coaches. They put us into pods, and mine rocked.

And so The Challenge Buster has arrived with the new title of “Loss and Transformational Coach”. So what is the challenge you have that I can help you with? Life can hit us with so many challenges, right? Click on the link for the programme to see how I can help you. Are you ready to conquer your challenges? Fed up with feeling stuck? Are you ready to do what it takes to apply changes in your life? Need accountability and support? I can help you bust through life’s challenges, but first you will need to book a call. I do select who I work with and you do need to be ready to commit to you!

Join me on my free Monday workshop sessions if you would prefer to talk this through. See the website for more information.

Bye for now

Diane

Is Instagram The Next Tinder or Plenty of Fish?

Life After Loss with Diane Parker

A few months since my last post and its been quite the journey – yes more self discovery!

I have been reviewing and changing the way I am going to bring my skills to my clients for my business. But I have also been on a personal journey of self discovery!

I went on a marketing course in March. We had to do exercises to find where our ideal clients might be. To hold a presence and to let more younger people know about my services, I joined Instagram.

My purpose was to connect with those who carry the pain of their loss(es) in order to help them heal their hearts through my skills as a therapist and Grief Recovery Specialist. If not in my area, seek out someone close to them to contact.

I am so very glad that I did do the training in The Grief Recovery Method. GRM teaches you about the need to Replace Your Loss! Opening yourself up after a significant loss is not easy! Especially if you are trying to heal that pain of loss by looking for another love to “Replace” your loss with. I can clearly see how vulnerable people on this platform could be taken advantage of, especially by those who ‘seek out’ those looking for love in their lives.

Nothing wrong with trying to find someone new for you, and yes, not everyone is doing that. I am sure that there are equally some genuine good people out there, perhaps lonely, looking for someone to share their life with.

By doing the Grief Recovery Method training, I healed the pain of loss that I had held in my heart from the death of my husband. I ‘let go’ of my ‘hopes dreams and expectations’ of our future together. Once I did that, I found such peace that I can look at his photos and laugh about the things we did during our 31 year marriage. Yes, I have moments of grief, but in those moments, I grieve and it passes.

As I started sharing my story on Instagram, I started to get messages from men. I asked how I could help with their loss(es). While most of the time the conversations were polite, they soon started asking if they could connect with me through email etc. At this point I kept them in the conversation part of Instagram. I know I could just have said ‘no’ to all these conversations, but I am here to help. Some of these just might be genuine! Especially with men who take a little longer to build a connection before sharing their pain.

If can relate to this? Are you looking for someone to heal your pain that you are holding in your heart? If so, please stop and address that pain. Please find a Grief Recovery Specialist in your area or contact me; email: Diane@Lifeafterlossiom.com I will help you find someone to support you. Then if you are luck enough to connect with someone in the future, you will be coming from a different place. From “I need you in my life” to “do I want you in my life”. A better quality question and more empowering.

There are some smooth talkers out there! Widows and Widowers beware! Embrace the future your heart desires after healing your pain of your loss(es). You will be much stronger to have direct conversations!

I can share with you, that having addressed ‘the pain of my loss’ that I often wondered if I was approached; would I feel guilt of thinking of another relationship after my husband? Interestingly I discovered the answer to be no. As you can guess one conversation continued for a while for that to be the answer. Where that ever goes, who knows, but I do count this as a gift for me to know that its okay for me to think about a future with someone else by my side.

With Love

Diane x