White As Snow

We hear the phrase "white as snow" from time to time. I don't think you can really grasp how white snow is until you see it all around you. We had one of our famous February snowstorms recently here in the heart of the Rocky Mountains. The snow was so beautifully white as the sun shone on it the next day! It was completely necessary to wear sunglasses even making a small drive to the grocery store.

The whiteness, the newness, the crispness...the concepts of being covered with such a pretty blanket of white reminded me of my clients who come to the intensive counseling programs. They are so desperate for a fresh new place to start again in their lives.

They want the old gone and a new blanket of whiter than snow to envelop them. This does happen so many times! It is an awesome experience to be rid of the things that weigh a person down. To be brand new...white as snow...this isn't an impossible goal. The clawmarks of trauma taint us all. It is encouraging to see so many women walk away with a newness of life after taking part in brief intensive therapy.

Sad Grandma?

Future and past met and collided when I held my first Grandbaby in my arms. Women of choice are often overcome with an unexpected flow of happiness and grief when they meet their first grandbaby.

If you have chosen a voluntary pregnancy termination you need to know that grief after an abortion choice is real. While our culture says that abortion is the closure, what I see from my personal vantage point and also the professional venue, the abortion is a start of a long process to resolution.

Here are some things to consider if you are a Grandmother with voluntary pregnancy termination in your past.

1). The grief you feel is real. You are experiencing disenfranchised grief over your abortion experience. There is no permission to grieve your choice. There is no public forum to even talk about what you feel.

2). You are not alone. Over 50 million women have made choice decisions. The majority of us feel just like you do. We want to cry, but don’t feel like we deserve that option.

3). Grieving an abortion is a process that can take many years and can run in cycles. An event like holding your first grandchild can trigger all those feelings of confusion and sadness to rise up inside of you.

4). There is a lot of hope and many places to talk about your abortion experience where people understand how you are feeling. You can go to www.amazon.com and type in “help after abortion” to find books on the subject.

5). You can find a support group where other ladies feel the same as you. There is a lot of comfort available in a support group setting. The best Web site I’ve found for this help is www.abortionrecovery.org They will have a listing of counselors and support groups and other helpers available 24 hours a day.

Be encouraged! You are not alone in your overwhelming celebration of new life and sadness over life that wasn’t allowed. Collin Grant is an amazing person. I feel so privileged to be “his Gammy.” I will always remember holding him that very first time. Even when he walks down the aisle at his high school graduation, I will think of him as that little person all wrapped up in the soft blue blanket. I grieve, but not without hope.

That little baby gave me hope for new beginnings. I wish this hope for all my sisters of choice who sit silently in their prison of silence over a past voluntary pregnancy termination.

Grandbabies: Abortion Reality Check

I compartmentalized my voluntary pregnancy termination so many years ago while in college. Now as I was holding this wee little bundle of a grandchild I was hit with emotion I didn’t know how to handle.

Working with women who reach a new level of reality concerning the deep dark secret of their abortion choice, I never cease to be amazed at how the birth of that first grandchild can be an incredible trigger. On one hand I am always comforted that I am not alone in this place of pain. On the other hand, I never cease to be amazed at how much buried angst resides in the hearts of women who’ve made a choice decision.

I accomplished some level of healing over a period of years. But abortion is (I say probably much too often) the gift that keeps on giving. I was visiting my son and his wife after the birth of my first grandchild. I was excited about the visit. I thought the plane to Ft. Lauderdale from Colorado would never get there. I thought I was prepared for seeing Collin Grant. The name fits him appropriately now. But at the time, I thought it was an awfully grown up name for a brand new baby. I imagined that “first hold.”

But in retrospect there was no way to fathom what looking down in that little face wrapped in the soft flannel blanket would mean to me. Words can’t describe the emotion that welled up strong inside of me.

I thought I was prepared, but I wasn’t. This is often the reaction I hear from other ladies who also go through the experience of that “first grandbaby hold.” The impact of the generational flow of life is beyond comprehension and very powerful. When you add the component of grief surrounding your own decision for voluntary pregnancy termination, the experience is a double edged sword. The little bundle is a reminder of the hope of the future and a reminder of things not meant to be from the past.

Future and past meet and even collide. Women of choice are often overcome with an unexpected flow of happiness and grief when they meet their first grandbaby. If you have chosen a voluntary pregnancy termination you need to know that grief after an abortion choice is real. While our culture says that abortion is the closure, what I see from my personal vantage point and also the professional venue, the abortion is a start of a long process to resolution.

Tomorrow I will give you things to consider if you are a Grandmother with a volutary pregnancy termination in your past.

Abandonment-A Real Hurt

OK...so I have the appearance of abandoning my blogging. I haven't really left. My heart has been here. I wake in the middle of the night thinking ...I need to jump up right now and write something. Yes, I think about my blog. But have I done anything? Nope. This is the same concept as abandonment that clients I work with deal with when trying to reach a place of peace. They say, "well, my parents weren't that bad. They bought me things. I didn't go without food. There was a roof over my head. I know they loved me. Yes, their parents had the appearance of caring, but were they really there? There were no messages of encouragement, no words of hope. Only silence. All the while their children were wondering...do I exist? Do they know I am here waiting to hear...waiting to know if anyone cares? Abandonment can be one of the most painful experiences a human can go through. The recovery process is slow. This sense of absence of important people who should be there and who should give verbal and physical messages of caring can only be healed in community. Having a new reality of someone walking beside you offering their presence in a real way...this is the hope that brief intensive therapy provides. It really works! Yes folks, I am back and I promise, promise, I will no longer abandon my commitment to my blog. I have missed you too. Really, I have!

A Reminder of How Talking Helps

The tragic shooting at Ft. Hood left our nation in a cloud of sadness. The grief touched our hearts and souls at the deepest levels. I was sad about the loss of people I'd never seen, never met, never knew. Deep inside us there is a natural grief that follows a loss like this. I found myself trying not to think about "it." Yet a few hours later, I would start talking about "it" again. I was compelled to send my two boys emails reminding them I loved them. I called my mom..."just to talk." Something about grief and loss drives us to want to connect. We don't want to be alone in our sadness. Thinking about this, while a completely different circumstance, I was reminded of how those of us who've chosen to voluntarily terminate a pregnancy are so alone in our grief. We don't, won't, can't talk about our feeling of loss and sadness. This isn't a natural reaction to grief. We need a better way for women.

The Real Losers: Women Who Sit in Silence

The buzz on the blogs is that the pro-choicers are losing the battle to the pro-lifers. Once again this confirms my mantra. In the midst of all the dialogue and political rheteroic and debate, women sit silent afraid to talk about their abortions.

The real people getting hurt, dismissed and minimized are the women who know the most about the issue. They sit silently with no where to go with their disenfranchised grief.

The blah blah continues while women cry in their closets. It is time to stop the debate for lets say two days or so and let women have their voices. Come on people! We can do better for our women. Pro-con...whatever... It's all a bunch of words to the woman who suffers in her disenfranchised grief bed.

Common Ground

In his controversial speech to Notre Dame this year, President Obama challenged us all to find common ground on the abortion issue. Our culture needs to understand: letting women talk about their abortions is the common ground that each side can embrace.

The "A"- word (abortion) incites an incredible amount of political and religious rheteroic. In the meantime, women of choice sit silently with no venue to grieve. Women don't talk about their choice decisions for fear of risking rejection, condemnation, misunderstanding or invalidation of the pain they might feel.

Glamour Magazine courageously offered an article (February '09) that will be the catalyst, I believe, for revolutionizing the way women process their choice decisions. You can read the article titled, "Abortion: The Serious Health Decision Women Aren't Talking About Until Now" here: Abortion: The Serious Health Decision Women Aren’t Talking About Until Nowhttp://www.glamour.com/sex-love-life/2009/02/the-serious-health-decision-women-arent-talking-about-until-now