When I first heard about Camp Widow, I rolled my eyes at the corny name and wondered, why would I want to spend a whole weekend focusing on the fact that widowhood was indeed my reality?
And yet I exist in this reality in my day-to-day life already: the unavoidable burden of knowing that no adulting gets done unless I do it or manage it someway; the heavy sadness of my nights at home alone; and having to outsource all adult connection, as it is not built into my family home anymore. The familiar territory of partnership has become a haunting echo of the past.
But the truth is: the aloneness of widowhood had begun to chafe my soul, becoming restrictive rather than welcomingly quiet for my healing.
What finally skewered my decision to attend was binge-watching “Dead To Me,” and the possibility of meeting and making out with some hot widowed guy who got it. It was with this piercing decisiveness that I registered for Camp Widow late at night, after my son had gone to bed. I felt a sense of relief and satisfaction in the execution of registration - I did it! I felt brave.
Then I didn’t think about it much for a while.
I kept the “Camp Widow” box tucked carefully away in the back of mind, preferring not to think about leaving my son for four days. I was figuratively squinting my eyes away from the deep pool of emotion I knew was lurking in the weekend event. Instead of thinking about it anymore, I allowed myself to get lost in the minutia of a busy day-to-day life.
It wasn’t until 10pm the night before I was going to catch a 9am train to Camp, that I realized how much I’d been avoiding the reality that I was going to participate in Camp Widow. I stared at my empty suitcase and revolted against the hard work I knew was coming. I did a few more pieces of the jigsaw puzzle I was using as a distraction.
It was the need to get some sleep that finally pressed me into action. The practicality of packing for a few short days of conference was surprisingly easy and over in just a few minutes. Finally.
And then, as smooth as the gears of a well-oiled clock, I arrived at Camp Widow. Pulling my suitcase behind me, I put on my brave adult mask, while my insides felt childishly insecure, cowering against the reality that I knew would soon hit me. I entered the bustling registration room, and was surprised by the sounds of gregarious greetings and eager chatter. It sounded like a midwifery conference! I knew how to do this! It was under that false pretense that I began the registration process.
It wasn’t until 10pm the night before I was going to catch a 9am train to Camp, that I realized how much I’d been avoiding the reality that I was going to participate in Camp Widow. I stared at my empty suitcase and revolted against the hard work I knew was coming. I did a few more pieces of the jigsaw puzzle I was using as a distraction.
It was the need to get some sleep that finally pressed me into action. The practicality of packing for a few short days of conference was surprisingly easy and over in just a few minutes. Finally.
And then, as smooth as the gears of a well-oiled clock, I arrived at Camp Widow. Pulling my suitcase behind me, I put on my brave adult mask, while my insides felt childishly insecure, cowering against the reality that I knew would soon hit me. I entered the bustling registration room, and was surprised by the sounds of gregarious greetings and eager chatter. It sounded like a midwifery conference! I knew how to do this! It was under that false pretense that I began the registration process.
Everyone that checked me in was very kind, saying things like, “We’re sorry you’re here, but glad you came.” As I moved from one station to the next through the busy room, I felt my outside life slipping away incrementally. Each new ribbon and pin I chose to decorate my lanyard with, was like battle regalia. I am a widow warrior, I began to think.
And then... there was a little red heart pin that we were invited to write the name of our “person” on.
As I conjured the letters “M-A-T-T” from somewhere that seemed very far away, I realized that I had put Matt - my husband, friend, confidant, my cheerleader, the dear father of my child - into a convenient (or at least compartmentalized) part of my brain and heart, that allowed me to live the day-to-day subsistence of a working mom. I realized how much my busy-ness and the all-encompassing survival mode of my life had allowed me to pack away the enormous depths of the feelings I still had about being a widow. And yet by packing away those feelings, I had also packed away the real and potent memories of the man who loved me, wholly and purely.
It wasn’t until I was here, at Camp Widow, that I finally gave myself the space to set aside the day-to-day tasks and open up the room of grief and memories in my heart.
My aversion to exploring the closed up room reminded me of that old food in the fridge phenomenon, when you know something needs to be tossed, but you whir by it several times, glancing sideways at it while you pack a snack for preschool or grab dinner items so you can make it to bedtime routine on time. Skimming the surface of life and avoiding the stinky stuff.
The thing is, it doesn’t go away. And usually, the longer you let it sit there, the worse it gets. And yet, airing things out, allowing room for the pain, also made room for the joy of remembering Matt.
As I wrote those letters, M-A-T-T, the double doors to the part of my heart where Matt lived swung open. A breeze of love and connection swept through the now-open doorway, the name coming through in a long-lost whisper. Tears stung my eyes as I softened into that connection. The softening felt scary and vulnerable, and I quickly hardened into anger for a moment, raging against the man who had left me to have to do this kind of stuff at all. I wanted to flip over the table of pins, send them scattering across the floor, just like how my dreams of my future shattered with the plane wreckage.
Somehow, I was able to breathe into my big feelings. I attached the pin to my lanyard, securing and including MATT into my experience. Then I sat down and dug in - grabbed my journal and wrote about the big feelings that had just surged through me in that “little” experience of writing four letters. After my journaling, I felt satisfied. I went through something big and remained present with myself in every moment. I didn’t walk out, I didn’t find the closest bar and order a margarita, or three. I moved it through my body, and felt debris fall away from the wall around my heart.
The rest of the weekend offered similarly refreshing experiences. There was something incredibly comforting knowing that the other attendees around me “got it.” Of course each of our experiences of loss were different, but the commonality of losing a spouse/partner bonded us in a way that overrode the differences.
In addition to the validation of an understanding community, I saw that by allowing myself to fully immerse in the widowhood part of my reality, I felt more able to breathe into the rest of me. Choosing this conference on widowhood was a step toward taking down the wall around the sadness and pain. Which of course, opens to more joy.
What inspired me most at Camp Widow was seeing the founder, Michele, and the other presenters, standing in their power after loss. Each presenter was a widowed person, and were there because they chose to make something more of their loss. Literally, peoples’ careers took right turns as they integrated their new wisdom after loss.
Seeing this all around me gave me permission to envision that for my own life. To step more deeply into my writing, to the wisdom I am harnessing to help others through their own losses and big transformations. In a “creating a meaningful career after loss” workshop, I shared that my current work as a midwife is very meaningful to me, and yet I’m looking for a way to deepen my work and weave in my new experience of loss to be able to offer more wisdom. Deepening and weaving… yes, this… I’m still in the exploration of all of this.
Returning home after Camp Widow and attempting to integrate this big shift into my life as I’m back amongst the “norms” (those who have not experienced the loss of a spouse), has been challenging. I hear people complain about trivial things, and it is hard for me not to roll my eyes and point out how much they are erroneously taking for granted. I still must work hard to sit down and write my book about being a widow, making that a priority above work emails, sweeping the floor, the resistance and distraction. And yet, I do it.
As one of the keynote speakers quoted as the weekend kicked off, “none of us are getting out of here alive.” I’m even more aware of how resistance to and denial of death rob us of our full aliveness. In thinking that we have tomorrow guaranteed, we easily allow ourselves not to be in the present moment.
If we remember that there is nothing but the present moment, and we are not guaranteed anything beyond that, we will likely do more and feel more in the present moment. Additionally, I came away from this weekend feeling the truth that resistance to and denial of our own power and wisdom denies us the experience to more deeply heal and connect.
So that is my practice these days. Living the question of how I can stay fully present in connection - to myself, to the earth, to others, and to spirit… How do I continue to lean into the deepening, the opening, even as my chest aches against the rawness and vulnerability?
How do you lean into the tides and continue opening? Tell me in a comment below!
