Thursday's Therapy - Complicated Mourning? I'll Say!

Up From the Ruins...

Snow plant grows in the thick humus of mountainous coniferous forests from 4000' to 8000' high.

A Sierra Wildflower: Snowplant from Carson Iceberg Wilderness

The Snow Plant is so rare, it is protected by Law!

Thursday's Therapy

Complicated Mourning? I'll Say!

When a loss hits us,

we have not only the particular loss to mourn

but also the shattered beliefs and assumptions

of what life should be.

These life beliefs must be mourned separately.

Sometimes we must grieve for them first.

We can't grieve the loss if we are in the midst of

"It's not supposed to happen this way" . . .

We intellectually know that bad things happen ~

but to other people, not us,

and certainly not in the world we assumed we were living in . . .

Your belief system needs to heal and regroup as much as your soul does.

You must start to rebuild a new belief system from the foundation up,

one that has room for the realities of life

and still offers safety and hope for a different life:

a belief system that will ultimately have a beauty of its own

to be discovered with life and loss.

Think of a lifeless forest in which a small plant

pushes its head upward, out of the ruin.

In our grief process, we are moving into life from death,

without denying the devastation that came before.

~Elisabeth Kübler-Ross and David Kessler, in

On Grief and Grieving : Finding the Meaning of Grief Through the Five Stages of Loss

Snow Plant: Sarcodes sanguinea Torrey, Snow Plant, Ericaceae (Heath Family)

Picture and info from the following two sites:

http://outhiking.com/sierra_flowers_11.html

http://www.calflora.net/bloomingplants/snowplant.html