Some people don’t believe in therapy. Some people are afraid of it. Some people just don’t understand it.
I may have been in one of those categories a long time ago.
That changed for me about 20 years ago when Howie and I had fertility issues. It took a long time and a few rounds of in vitro before our girls were born. I had a very hard time dealing with this back then. My mother-in-law suggested talking to a therapist that she hah heard of. I made an appointment with her and very quickly found her to be helpful. I continued to see her for a few years. After our daughters were born and life was a little more settled, I stopped going to therapy.
A week or so after Howie died, my mother answered my phone while I was out one day. When I arrived home, she told me that my old therapist called. She told my mom that she had heard about Howie and was reaching out to me to see how I was doing. It was so thoughtful.
My therapist and I spoke over the phone and she asked if I wanted to come in and talk to her. I absolutely did. She squeezed me in the following day. After that I started to see her regularly.
I am certainly not trying to preach to anyone. We are all different. But going to therapy at that time really helped me get through those horrible first few months. My therapist made me realize that everyone has to get through things in their own way and in their own time. That I needed to do what I felt was right for myself and my girls. That is what I tried to do and still do.
Eight months later, my therapist told me she was retiring. She actually said I was the patient she was dreading telling the most. This was obviously upsetting.
I tried someone new but it didn’t feel right to me. I was not comfortable talking to her the way I did with my therapist.
It needs to be the right fit.
A couple of years later I felt I really needed to go back into therapy. After a few tries I finally found another therapist that I love. I went regularly for a while but now just go as needed, which seems to be getting less frequently :).
My girls have also gone to therapy. Different therapists for their different needs. And where Amanda is concerned, I believe it saved her. She has given me permission to tell her story and I will be doing that soon…
Stacy was a stay-at-home mom/part-time preschool teacher whose life was turned upside down in 2011 when her husband passed away suddenly of a heart attack. She is raising her two fabulous daughters, now ages 18 and 20, who are turning into wonderful young women. In 2016, she started a blog about her experience as a young widow, The Widow Wears Pink. This led her to write for other publications including Huffington Post, Today.com, Scary Mommy, Grown & Flown, Kveller, Modern Loss, Thought Catalog, and many more. In 2018 she started Living the Second Act with fellow writer Mimi Golub. Today, Stacy and her daughters are happily living their “new normal” while always keeping her husband’s spirit alive.
