If you have read my articles or my personal blog, you know that I love to scrapbook. I originally started collecting scrapbook supplies when I was pregnant with my older son, Nicholas. My friend had done a book each for her daughters and I loved the idea, so she got me started with some basic supplies. And then being pregnant sort of took over everything, and then having a newborn took over anything that was left. Despite gathering supplies, I didn’t really start to scrapbook until after Mark died.

A small part of the reason I started scrapping after Mark died was because I was trying to hard to keep my mind occupied after Nicholas fell asleep and I was alone in our apartment. There are only so many people you can call in the middle of the night before they fall asleep on you. The biggest reason I started scrapping after Mark died was because I was scared I would forget him. I latched on to scrapbooking as a way to “save” Mark for Nicholas.

That is one of the reasons I was so intrigued when I read about the Good Grief Blog recently. The purpose of the blog is “a scrapbooking journey through loss and healing.” If you scrapbook or have ever seen someone else’s scrapbooks, you know how effectively the craft captures stories and memories. If you scrap like I do, the journalling or storytelling part of the process often comes before the corresponding photos. To me, the memories are best captured through the journalling, and writing has always been my best therapy.

The layouts on the Good Grief Blog are beautiful and the stories are touching. Amanda Probst started the Good Grief Blog after her father died in a farming accident. I recently talked with Amanda about scrapping, grief and her blog.

Sherry Carr-Smith: Why did you start the Good Grief Blog?

Amanda Probst: I started the Good Grief Blog for two reasons. First, it helps me. I’m one of those people who really benefits from deadlines, so challenges are awesome motivation. Through the challenges on the blog, I hope to continue to push myself to scrapbook about my dad and am stoked that I’ll get to share that journey with others…and be inspired by the fabulous contributors there.

My second reason for starting the Good Grief Blog is that I truly believe that this is what my dad would want. He’d want me to live my life and remember him in this way, not dwell on what could have been. I feel like this is his message that he wants me to share, and I’ve always trusted my dad.

SCS: Why do you think scrapbooking helps with grief?

AP: I think that grief is such a very personal thing. For me, though, scrapbooking is a therapeutic outlet for my grief. Through it, I can work through things I especially miss, things I wish could be different, things I want to remember. I am also able to document and celebrate my dad’s life so that my sons won’t completely miss out on knowing their Papa. Basically, it gives me the power to actually “do” something rather than just dwell on my sadness.

SCS: How do you suggest people capture memories?

AP: I suggest people capture memories in whatever way works best for them. That’s kinda the point. It has to work for you, not for everyone else. I’d also suggest taking it one memory at a time. It’s easy to become overwhelmed and I know many people steer away from scrapbooking about lost loved ones for that very reason. By taking it one memory at a time, though, it all seems more doable. For me, taking it slowly like this actually makes me feel like my dad is still with me for even longer as I continue to tell his story. It’s not something I’m in a hurry to “finish” because then his story would be done, if that makes any sense.

SCS: Do you see people scrapbook about the moment of a loved one’s passing?

AP: This isn’t one of the topics we’ve covered as of yet on the Good Grief Blog, though I can envision it being a strong challenge. This one, in particular, would be a very emotional layout…one that not every one is willing to face just yet.

SCS: Anything else you think would be helpful to encourage widowed parents to capture memories either through scrapbooking or other means?

AP: Mostly, through the blog, I’ve found that so many women write to me to thank me for one of two things…showing them that they’re not alone and/or showing them that scrapbooking about loss can actually make them feel reconnected with that lost loved one. More than anything, I truly believe that sharing your loved one’s story is one of the best ways to keep his/her spirit alive.

Looking through the Good Grief Blog has encouraged me to work more on Mark’s story in scrapbook form. There are several pages in Nicholas’ first book about Mark, unfortunately, those are the only photos we have of them together. The challenges Amanda’s blog poses will help me find ways I can talk about Mark for Nicholas and save pieces of him for both of us.

I hope you all take a moment to look at the Good Grief Blog and possibly take up the challenge of scrapping (or writing or painting) about your lost one.

I miss scrapbooking. I used to do it all the time, but since I spent the last year or so doing tons of crafty stuff for the wedding, I didn’t have much time to scrap. That’s where Cathy Zieleske comes to my rescue!

Cathy’s blog is my favorite. She’s hysterical, her family is lovely and normal, and the woman can scrap like nobody’s business. She’s teaching a class next month for Big Picture Scrapbooking called “Me: The Abridged Version,” and I’m in the class!

That’s right, I’m going to do a book of 28 layouts just about me and my story. It’s never been done (by me, anyway). The coolest part? I won a spot in her online class completely at random. I commented (along with more than 1,000 others), and her random number picking thingy chose me and one other person for a free spot in her class. Word.

Not only do I get to be pushed back into scrapping in a fun and creative way, I’m going to do a parallel book about Mark for Nicholas. I’ve wanted to do a book about Mark for Nicholas since Mark died, but for some reason haven’t really been able to do it. I’m going to use Cathy’s class as the template for it, and I hope I’m able to capture a small part of who Mark was so that Nicholas can know the part of himself that comes from his Daddy Mark. I think it will be good for Mark’s family too, to help me capture some of the stories about him before the stories are all gone.

Who knows, maybe I’ll get to know myself a little better in the process too.

During the few months that Mark was sick and for quite a while after he died, I was amazed at the goodness in people. At the people who sent me flowers, at the people who called, at the people who sent me nail polish when I couldn’t find my favorite color, at the people who cared. I was grateful in a way I had never been grateful before. I wasn’t taking anything for granted. Now, almost four years after Mark’s death, I’m working on getting that level of gratitude back in my life.

Obvious Gratitude

It’s easy to be grateful about the obvious things like a casserole someone has brought you or someone watching your baby for an hour so you can nap or take a bath by yourself. I’m pretty good about expressing that gratitude, and even though it’s a little fuzzy, I think I even wrote thank-you notes to people for different kindnesses after Mark died. Even if those notes were in the form of e-mail.

Now the things that I should be obviously grateful for are things like a colleague who makes a couple of calls for me when they see I’m swamped, or my husband making sure that I have an hour to myself to write a post. I’m usually pretty good at both expressing my gratitude for those things and reciprocating when the chance comes.

Obscure Gratitude

I think most of the not-so-obvious moments come when you aren’t aware of them. Or you are vaguely aware of them, and they hit you in hindsight. For example, I am immensely grateful to my former boss, Christie, for the work she had to do to pick up my slack while I was either physically or mentally gone from the office. And the part I am most grateful to Christie for is that she was never anything but worried for us as friends, and I never heard a word from her about where something was or when I might be coming back or why I was sitting at my desk crying.

I’m working to be more aware of the things people do for me so that I can thank them, or at least do the same for someone else some day. I’m also working on awareness of things around me that are going well so that I can be grateful for them (the weather, my car works well, air conditioning, air conditioning, and also air conditioning).

Struggling for Gratitude

The one place I always have to struggle for gratitude is my own health and my body. If I were truly grateful for it, I would take better care of it, it’s as simple as that. I can use all the excuses I can think of (I’m going to start exercising tomorrow, I’m not that overweight, I need this 837th can of diet soda to help me stay awake) but it all boils down to my lack of gratitude for my body. Right after Mark died, I hit panic mode, and tried to get healthy so that nothing would “happen” to me and Nicholas wouldn’t be a total orphan. That lasted a few months until the complacency kicked in again.

I thought I was a grateful person, but now I know how far I’ve got to go. I’ve got a few people I really love who are fighting cancer right now. Awesome, incredible, smart, tough, I-want-to-be-them-when-I-grow-up women. They are moms and wives and daughters and they are fighting harder than anyone I’ve ever known to live good lives and enjoy every minute of their lives while fighting the disease. I’m proud to know them and I’m trying to take their attitudes and apply it to my life.

I’m trying to be grateful that I can get up in the morning without being sick, that I can feel an ache in my hip and know it’s because I need to get fit and not because there may be a tumor in my bone, that I can pull my hair back in a clip. I’m also trying to be grateful for movies, music, books, blogs, art, friends, ripe nectarines, naps and time. And I’m trying to do it in the matter-of-fact way that those people I really respect do it. There is no show of “look how grateful and evolved I am!” They are just aware of all of their blessings (and yes, the crap they are going through too), and are happy to have them.

Forever Grateful

I hope I can say with some truthfulness that I don’t take the most important things for granted. I am aware of how spectacular my child, my husband, my family, my colleagues, my country are. I am also aware of and grateful for the time I had with Mark. I hope that I can use my own example and always be grateful for those people and things while trying my hardest to become more aware and grateful of all of the other spectacular things I am and I have.

This is a cross-post from Type-A Mom and Paper, Scissors, Keyboard

I thought we had the labels pretty well defined, Daddy Mark is the daddy in Heaven and Daddy is the daddy here. My son, Nicholas had just turned 2 when William (a.k.a Daddy) and I started dating and we’ve been married a couple of months now. Nicholas will turn 4 tomorrow, and suddenly the ease of knowing the difference between the two daddys is sliding a bit.

We’ve had confusion about Daddy Mark in the past year. We have photos up in N’s room of Daddy Mark holding N,

Daddy Mark & Nicholas

and there are two particular photos that N is fascinated with. They are both of Mark holding N just after delivery (see right), and N loves for me to tell him about his birth. For a while, N would get confused between his birth story and the story of Mark’s time in the hospital when he died. N thought that the picture of Mark and him was when “Daddy Mark was so sick in the hospital that the doctors couldn’t make his body better.” I spent quite a bit of time explaining the difference in why we were in the hospital for N’s birth and why Mark was in the hospital when he was sick. Nicholas seems to get it for the most part, but is still confused about it sometimes.

William and I began referring to him as “Daddy” after we got engaged. Nicholas didn’t seem to have any trouble with the transition (I’m sure it helped that he wasn’t quite 3 yet), and William has been Daddy ever since. In the past three or four months though, Nicholas has referred to William as “Pretend” Daddy a few times. When asked what he meant, Nicholas said, “Daddy is Pretend Daddy and God is the Real Daddy.” And who can argue with that. We had a brief discussion about how God created us all and so he is parent to all of us but that doesn’t make Daddy pretend Daddy or Mommy pretend Mommy. I should have known that wouldn’t be the end of it.

Now Nicholas is saying that when Daddy Mark gets better, Daddy won’t be his real daddy any more and that will make Nicholas sad. I think part of this stems from the conversations we’ve had where I told him I believe that Daddy Mark is healthy and happy in Heaven and his body isn’t sick any longer. But who knows, Nicholas could be making this up from whole cloth.

Daddy & N

I probably wouldn’t think too much about it, and just keep reinforcing that William is Daddy and that Daddy Mark is in Heaven, but I know it’s painful for William. I try to help him see that it’s not a preference or judgment on him as a father, that N is just confused; but, I can see how it would hurt. William is N’s Daddy, and nobody who sees them together would doubt it.

Any thoughts on where you think the origin of the confusion might be? Do you think there is a better phrase for Mark? Is it confusing for N to have two daddys? I would love to hear what you think!

*Photo of Daddy and N courtesy of Rebel With A Camera.

A sick child is a scary thing. As a parent, your instinct is to do whatever you can to make sure your child is safe and well and when they are sick, you are not fulfilling that duty. After your spouse or partner dies, you may have even more challenges to overcome than the feeling of worry when you can’t cure your child’s illness.

Overreacting

I have no idea what kind of parent I would have been if my first husband, Mark, hadn’t died. Or maybe just if he hadn’t died when Nicholas was only 5 months old. As it is, I can’t tell how much of any of my reactions or choices are “first time mom” choices and thoughts or are a reaction to the fact that the doctors never really knew what caused Mark to get sick and die. Because of that, I have a tendency to get overly scared when Nicholas gets sick. Especially if it involves throwing up since the doctors think vomiting contributed to Mark’s death.

So, when Nicholas gets sick, I have to stop myself from overreacting. Again, I don’t know if this is a first time mom thing, or a panic because Mark died thing, but it happens. Thankfully, it doesn’t happen as often now as it did the first year after Mark died. I think part of it was that I didn’t have anyone on-hand to bounce thoughts off of. I would often call my mother or Mark’s parents and describe sounds or looks (no, his poop is more of a chartreuse color), but it’s not the same as having someone hear and see for themselves.

I think some of the overreacting came from knowing that if Nicholas got sick, it was just me to take care of him and we’d both be exhausted. When it was just me walking the floors, remembering to give him his medication on schedule, etc., I think I would go into panic mode just knowing how hard it would be until N got better.

I can say now, when I don’t think I could have even a year ago, that part of my panic and overreacting was knowing (even subconsciously) that I would get angry with Mark for dying when Nicholas was sick. I would get mad because I needed help, I would get mad because Nicholas needed his Daddy Mark, I would get mad because Mark didn’t take care of his body and he died, I would get mad because I’d have to miss even more work, and I would get mad because I had nobody to talk me down from the panic. It took me quite a while to figure out that it was okay to be mad at Mark, and until I did, that was a big part of my worry during any of N’s illnesses.

Under Reacting

In an effort to keep from panicking over every cough, sneeze and booger, I went through a period of under reacting about every illness. I didn’t want to make N into a hypochondriac, and I didn’t want to become a mom who completely freaked out each time he got sick, so I shrugged off some colds and an ear infection before I shook myself out of that stupidity. I’m careful not to get overly worried about illnesses, but I have to be just as aware not to underestimate illness. I’m very lucky (and so is Nicholas) that nothing serious happened during my time of under reacting.

Balance

Ironically, it wasn’t until Nicholas was diagnosed with asthma right before his first birthday that I confronted this pattern of my reactions when he was sick. I can only guess that the threat of a severe asthma attack put a sniffle or a slight fever into perspective. I count myself lucky every day that Nicholas is a happy healthy child. I consider it one of my biggest goals in life to keep him that way. I think I can do it if I can just keep from panicking.

Sometimes, after your spouse or partner has died, it seems like there is one holiday after another. Like you’ll never get a break. That’s how the spring and summer are for my family, full of birthdays and holidays; but, Mother’s Day can be a particularly hard day to get through. Or it can be great.

Your First Mother’s Day

Your first Mother’s Day, you know, “after”, can be really difficult to get through. Our son, Nicholas, is a June baby, so I was just about 36 weeks pregnant when Mother’s Day hit for what turned out to be mine and Mark’s only Mother’s Day. Because he was that kind of guy, I got a card that year, and it was sweet and wonderful and perfect for an almost-there-Mom who felt huge and was getting more and more excited and nervous about the baby coming.

It wasn’t until my first Mother’s Day after Mark died that I realized just how important Dads are to the holiday, particularly when a child is an infant or too young to do something on their own for Mom. I hadn’t had a father in my life since my own had left when I was 11 and my older siblings had made sure we did something for our mom, so I just didn’t know the importance of a Dad!

I can clearly remember how very sad I was for a good week before the holiday hit. I did everything I was supposed to do (I was still on auto pilot at the time), I got cards for N’s grandmothers from him and made a note to remember to call my mother. Then I started to panic because it suddenly hit me that unless a Dad or someone else takes the initiative, Moms don’t get much when a child is a baby. I had completely underestimated my in-laws, however. They did a project with almost-1-year-old Nicholas, imprinting his hand in putty and putting it in a frame with a picture of the two of us.

I was saved from a forgotten Mother’s Day, and I’m really glad because I know I would have been devastated. It would have been yet another reminder that I was a Mommy without the Daddy who was supposed to be there to sign N’s name on a card, to do goofy craft projects with him, to make me breakfast. I was in no shape to handle that first Mother’s Day without a little something. If, with the little something, it was hard, it would have been impossible without it.

Your Second Mother’s Day

Well, it’s not that much better, but you’re more prepared. I’m sure I’m totally Captain Obvious on that one, but that’s what it all boils down to. If you’re lucky, you’ll have someone who can help your child celebrate Mother’s Day. If not, then you have had a year to prepare for it, and maybe it won’t be so bad.

Making New Traditions and Continuing the Old

I think Mother’s Day is a great holiday to start some new traditions. Maybe you and your children can take a bouquet of flowers to an area hospital and ask the nurses in labor and delivery to give it to a new Mom who really needs it. Or you can use Mother’s Day as a time to share lots of family stories, everything from memories of your own mother to the day you became a mother. Of course, I encourage the breakfast in bed, never getting out of your pajamas kind of tradition.

If you feel that the best way to celebrate Mother’s Day for your family is to keep the traditions that you had when your spouse or partner was alive, then do that. Don’t feel as if you have to change everything because that person isn’t there, especially if your kids love those traditions too.

Don’t Celebrate

There is no law that says you have to celebrate Mother’s Day. There is also no law that says you have to celebrate it every year. Maybe it’s never been a holiday you enjoyed and if that’s the case, you’re in the clear. If it’s a more difficult year for some reason, skip the holiday this year. Or, you could do like I did last year, and completely forget it is coming because you are  busy, and it passes without much thought (except for the guilty call you make to your mom hoping she doesn’t notice you are calling at 11:30 p.m. to wish her a Happy Mother’s Day).

Remember, you are the boss of you, and you can celebrate your day any way you’d like.

Sherry Carr-Deer is Mom to almost 4-year-old Nicholas, wife to William and widow of Mark. She is a public relations counselor with a not-for-profit healthcare system where she sees a lot of Moms who have it a lot worse than she ever did. You can connect with Sherry on Twitter @prCarrD. This post is a cross-post from www.tyepamom.net

The good news? I’m marrying an incredible Fella on Saturday. The not-so-good news? I can’t decide on my name.

When I got married to my late husband in 1995, I was 20 years old, and wanted to keep my name. I became Sherry Carr-(c-a-r-r)-then-a-space-and-a-capital-”D”-(D-e-e-r)-like-the-animal. No, not Carter, not Cartier, not Carr-Deer, just Sherry Carr Deer. And I’ve been explaining it ever since.

The positive thing about my name is that once someone gets it, they never really forget it. This has been very helpful professionally. The negative thing is that it’s a pain in the rear to have to explain my name every time I call someone or meet someone new; I never know where someone has alphabatized my name; it’s always spelled wrong; and I have about six different variations of my last name on accounts and legal papers in my life. I guess I’m just tired of the two last names with no hyphen thing. Maybe it would have been different if they had been names with a couple more syllables. Regardless, it is what it is.

But now it could change. I could be Sherry Smith. I probably will be, I think it will be nice to have a simple name I don’t have to spell. I’ll just have to make sure Sherry Smith makes as big an impression as Sherry Carr Deer.

Have you changed your name recently? Did you get married after your professional life had been established? Tell me your experiences with a new name.

You can connect with Sherry Carr Deer (Sherry Smith?) on Twitter at prCarrD.

Nicholas is starting to differentiate between girl stuff and boy stuff (purses are for girls, cars are for boys).  I really hate making any kind of assignments for gender (especially to things that I would love for him to play with or do) and it bugs me when I find myself doing it. There are some things that I am finding are total boy things where he is concerned.

Peeing standing up

I was really sweating this one when we first started potty training. I mean, it’s not like I can show him how to do that in any real way. Thankfully, my fiance, William, took over the “peeing standing up” lessons. Seriously, this is one of the first things I thought of after Mark died, “Who is going to teach N to pee standing up?!?”

I think that some of it must be instinctive though, as Nicholas was arching his little back and pointing aiming at the toilet from pretty early on in the potty training process.  On a side note, I think he must have seen one of the construction guys around here peeing outside because there is a certain part of the yard that, for several months, he insisted on “peeing” at each time he passed it (he would go to the spot, spread his little legs, tell me he had to pee and arched his little back). Weird.

Baseball

Here is where my own gender bias comes in. I played basketball in school and have never been a big fan of baseball or football. Just not my sports, but I’m aware that there are many rabid fans who are women. Shoot, one of my grandmothers was such a huge baseball fan that we played “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” at her funeral. Anyway, Mark was a huge Astros fan, and since I don’t particularly care for the sport, I think of it as a “boy” thing. Here’s my problem: I want Nicholas to love the sport as much as his Daddy Mark did, I don’t like the sport much, know nothing about it, and William doesn’t like baseball. My solution? My friend, Jeremy, has been assigned baseball duty with Nicholas. He is an Astros fan, he knows how important the ‘Stros were to Mark, and he folows the sport/team. He’s my go-to guy for teaching N about baseball and the Astros. Crisis averted. I hope.

Women

Okay, I know this isn’t really a “boy” thing I need to teach Nicholas, but I am really hoping to raise a son who loves women, respects women, and surrounds himself with quality women (both friends and partners). Maybe this isn’t a traditional boy thing to teach him, but I feel as a woman it’s my responsibility to teach him the finer points of the female mind. Do open doors for them, do use manners and be polite, do take it slow with a woman romantically and allow them to dictate the pace as much as possible. Don’t assume a woman is bad with numbers or math. Don’t blame anything on PMS, even if she’s brought it up first. It will only lead to badness.

What “boy” stuff have you come across? What gender assignments have your kids made that you’ve been surprised by? What about your own gender assignments?  What do you wish your spouse or partner knew or did as a man?

Sherry Carr Deer is a Mommy to 3-year-old Nicholas, fiance to William, the widow of Mark, and a PR professional at a non-profit hospital.