HeART Therapy
Illuminate
Illuminate is a free photo healing class experience designed for those who have lost a child during pregnancy or infancy. It’s a creative outlet for processing grief, for remembering your loss, and for finding healing behind the lens of a camera.
Click HERE to download your Illuminate Photography Workshop materials and begin your Illuminate journey now.
Journaling
Grief Journal Prompts
How to Get Started When the Blank Page Makes Journaling Seem Too Difficult
By Elizabeth Czukas
Updated March 12, 2012
So, you’ve decided to try journaling as part of your emotional recovery from pregnancy loss. Maybe you’ve even written a few entries. But now you’re having trouble. What are you supposed to say? How do you know if you’re doing it right?
First of all, there is no right way to journal. As long as you’re expressing yourself, you’re doing it right. The single most important thing is just taking the time to write down a bit about your thoughts and feelings. There are many types of journals, and if you’re stuck, you might want to try another creative outlet.
However, when you’re dedicated to writing, there are many prompts to get you started if you’re having trouble. You might even find prompts a fun and challenging exercise as your journal progresses.
Just remember not to worry if you’re getting it “right.” There are no grades in grief journaling! Just jump in and try your hand at some of these ideas.
Jumping Off Words
Sometimes, what you need is just those first few words to get you started. Here is a selection of ideas that might open up a whole new side of yourself.
- One year from today, I will be…
- Today, I learned…
- The day I got the news about my baby, I was
- The day my baby was born…
- On the day my baby died…
- I feel ______, and I think I need to…
- I miss my baby most when…
- I’m most sad that I’ll never…
- I never got to tell my baby…
- Something that reminds me of my baby is…
- My favorite thing about being pregnant was…
- I think of you every time I…
Some Unique Ways of Writing
- Poem – Whether it has a formal structure or is more freestyle, putting together words to make something beautiful can be a wonderful way to express yourself.
- Dream – Write down your dreams. Another way to think of this is to write out your dreams for your future.
- Gratitude – Writing about what you’re thankful for in your life can help you focus on the positive in your life and bring you some moments of joy in your bereavement.
- Memory snapshots – If you were able to spend some time with your baby, even if it was after death, you might want to write an in-depth account of your moments with your baby.
- Unsent letters – A letter to your baby, or to anyone else in your life with the freedom of knowing you won’t send it, will give you the freedom to be as honest as you want. Some journals are done entirely in this style.
- Timed entry – Set a timer for 10 or 15 minutes and don’t let your pen come off your paper until the time is up. You’ll be amazed what comes out when you’re on a deadline.
- Reaction journaling – Try looking at photographs, especially if you have photos of your baby, and write down the way it makes you feel.
- Time capsule – Document some of the details of everyday life from the time of your baby’s death. From the headlines, to the top songs, to the cost of a gallon of gas, someday you’ll look back on your time capsule and marvel at how much the world has changed.
- Lists – Most people feel comfortable writing a list. The trick is to try a few different themes. You can go focus on something directly related to your grief process, such as a list of names you’d considered for your baby, or you can use a list to focus on the positive and look ahead to the future.
Reiki Therapy
What is Reiki?
By Nikki Bricker Cameron
“What is Reiki?” This is a question I am often asked and it’s a hard question to answer. These are some of my quick answers: Reiki is light. Reiki is energy. Reiki is healing. Reiki is universal love. Once you have experienced Reiki, you know it when you feel it.
I started practicing Reiki in January 2013. I discovered Reiki after I experienced a traumatic loss in my life. In October 2009, a dear friend was killed in a car accident. This experience left me feeling depressed and questioning things I had previously taken for granted as core beliefs. The journey I embarked on eventually brought me to a level 1 Reiki class. Shortly after that, I took the level 2 class. As I progress on my spiritual and energetic journey, I continue to grow and learn more. I incorporate daily practices which strengthen my intuition and spirituality.
I think the challenge with defining Reiki is twofold. First, it is an ancient healing technique that has been passed down from master to apprentice, and often not recorded in written (English) language. Second, I haven’t found the appropriate language in English to accurately describe, or honor, what Reiki is. Reiki isn’t a religion, but you will find that people who practice Reiki may share similar beliefs and knowledge that isn’t succinctly summed up into one specific religious practice.
If you google “what is Reiki”, you can find a basic definition. The word Reiki is made of two Japanese words – Rei which means “God’s Wisdom or the Higher Power” and Ki which is “life force energy”. Reiki is “spiritually guided life force energy” (www.reiki.org). However, Japanese language doesn’t translate perfectly into English, and some concepts may be lost in translation.
Internet searching will also tell you that it is a hands-on healing technique. Reiki can help with many concerns, from physical to emotional. Maybe it would be best to compare it to a massage with less focus on muscles, and more focus on the chakra system. (Chakras are like major energy points. We have seven on our bodies). It can be described as a long mediation session with quiet, relaxing music, gentle, glowing candles, and the fragrance of essential oils or incense. You may notice the beautiful, colored crystals and stones, or messages of inspiration hung on the walls. Each Reiki practitioner will have their own unique style, their own language to describe the process, and their own routine. Nevertheless, one thing that is consistent is the feel of the energy coursing through our hands. We can all tell you the moment we feel connected to the Universal Energy Source. You may feel the warmth from our hands, experience feelings of safety and relaxation; you may receive beautiful colors or visions, messages, or experience a feeling of peace.
Each session is unique, as each person seeking healing is unique. Some sessions may feel more powerful at first, but all sessions bring healing light energy from something greater than us. The best way I know how to describe Reiki is this: Reiki practitioners are like giant flashlights. We are simply a vessel that aims and focuses energy. Our batteries are from an ancient place, greater and more powerful than we are. In a session, a practitioner’s energy never mixes with the person receiving the energy, and vice versa. It is never a harmful thing. It is sourced from love and can do no damage. However, if you are experiencing an overwhelming, uncomfortable emotion, our focus on that emotion may cause it to intensify as we release it. We have to experience emotion in order to process and move through it. Humans are capable of healing ourselves. The energy received during a Reiki session can help us self-heal. However, it should not be used as a medical substitute, and you should seek attention from a medical professional as needed.
Reiki can be done from a distance, with pets, and can help heal many ailments. It is an ancient art that is grounded in love and wisdom. Just when I think I have it figured out, I realize there is so much more to learn. Reiki can be an amazing tool to help you on your journey, whatever it might be. It is for our greatest and best good. I encourage you to try it and see how it works for you. Sending light and love.
For more information on chakras:
http://www.chopra.com/ccl/what-is-a-chakra
For more information on what to expect during a session:
To contact the author of this article: nikkibc888@gmail.com
Quiet Comfort: Reiki Healing for Grief and Loss
Yoga
Within my yoga practice on my mat I have found a place of connection, peace, comfort, release and stillness amid the chaos and confusion of grief.
– Tiffany Breininger (bereaved mom)
Yoga and Grief
by Jessica Bell (Yoga instructor)
Yoga is innately organic and an instinctual way of movement. Across cultures and even different species, there are forms of movement, rhythm and unification that bridge bodies and minds together in a world full of fragmentation.
Many of us who experience the wave of connectedness on our mats find this invitation to come back again, and again. It is a process of breaking down old habits that form in the mind, in the body and subconsciously, that allows for true growth to evolve. Sometimes the things that stay dormant the most in our bodies are fear, loss, heart break and grief. Grief is cumulative, it is something that stays in our body if we don’t deal with it and talk about it.
When we experience these tests in our life our natural response may be to withdrawal, to shut others out and believe that if we quietly retreat within they will eventually go away. When we come to the mat, we begin to notice what arises, be it joy, sorrow, pain, love, anger. These feelings arise and are a tool for how to better serve ourselves, how to move from the heart, our true nature.
Beginning and sustaining a yoga practice will create new space within and will serve as a means of discipline and taking action for ones own life. To love yourself is to give yourself the best possible care and health that you can provide. My wonderful teacher Shiva Rea calls this, “living yoga.” The process of not just showing up on your mat but living out what you receive on the mat- off the mat.
Sustaining a practice whether it be at home or in studio, is about taking the time to nurture yourself, it is a living organism that needs attention and devotion all ways. Providing an outlet for grief through the art of movement meditation, is acknowledging that you want healing, that the ways before were no longer serving you and you deserve to be free. Seane Corne sums this up beautifully saying to deal with grief we should name it, claim it and release it in a more ritualistic way.
Whatever your path to healing may be, consider the deeply rooted benefits of yoga as a way to invite healing back in.