As the semester has come to a close, I have decided to update every now and again. When I find something interesting that I think could be helpful I will log on and blog about it, but until than I hope that everything I have talked about over the past few months has helped you in some way. the whole point of this blog was to help people and if I even touched one person’s life than I feel like I did a great job!
Godspeed everyone and just remember to keep living your lives to its fullest!
Many people will tell you to go to a doctor when you are depressed, but a doctor will not only give you a medication (which might only temporally help you) but they will also make you feel just like another “sad person” in their office.
I have recently seen one of the most uplifting stories in the news about a little boy named Aaron Ware who lost his twin brother to cancer and his struggle to battle depression. He went to many doctors trying to find the answer, but the right answer seemed to be under his nose the entire time. When his family took him to his local pediatrician, the doctor asked Aaron if he had any mixing bowls at home. With a quick responce of a yes, Aaron was off baking things to help his depression. No medication or drugs were needed to help Aaron overcome his sadness.
Now Aaron is using all the profits from what he makes and sells to help all of the groups that helped his family when his twin brother was sick. If you would like to read more on this story click here.
With light on that news, I decided to try to myself. I baked brownies, being that I’m not an amazing cook like many other people, I just stayed with something simple. You know what though, it did help. This past week I have been very depressed due to numerous reasons, but the therapeutic nature of baking made me feel good. Below are some pictures from my experience in the kitchen!
Here is everything you need, plus water and brownie powder of your choice.
You need to spray down the baking pan with butter and grab a mixing bowl to put all your ingredients in.
You need:
2 eggs, 1/2 cup of vegetable oil, 1/4 cup of water, and the mix.
Mix it all together for about 50-70 strokes and than pour it in the pan and pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees.
When the buzzer goes off pop them in!
Wait about 25-30min or until you think they look done and than pull them out!
Below are some more pictures from my experience!
I hope this helps you in a more therapeutic way than medication, because it sure did help me!
I was recently cleaning out my basement and found a book that really helped me in the past after my father had died. It is for children to help them understand death as a natural occurrence. This book is for children from the ages of 5-10 and really addresses the children’s fears and questions about death. Its a great book for any child dealing with a loss!
Its called ‘When Dinosaurs Die: A guide to understanding death” by Laurie Krasny Brown and Marc Brown.
I found the book on Amazon for only $7.99 and also at my local Boarders for $6.99! I hope this helps!
I have been talking with many of my friends and family and it truly made me come to a decision about the difference between someone dieing unexpectedly and someone dieing suddenly.
Their really is a true difference. When you think about it, if you know someone close to you is dieing you try to mentally prepare yourself for the occurrence to happen. You think to yourself that when they die they will be out of the pain that they have to long have suffered in their life. This occurrence had just happened to one of my best friends. Her aunt had been sick with cancer for quite awhile and the family as a whole was trying to mentally prepare themselves for the day that she would be taken from them. On April 20, 2009 my friends aunt died peacefully in her sleep with her husband and children around her. When I asked my friend how she felt about it, knowing that they were so close, she told me she is happy. Yes, happy. It may sound surprising but she thought that he aunt was in a better place now away from pain.
I now think back at all of the loss that I have suffered in the past. I never really had the experience listed above, but I have had the one where someone was taken suddenly away from you. Your whole mental capacity seems to break down and you begin thinking what did you do wrong and what you could have done to stop it from occurring. Your not physically or mentally prepared for that person to be taken away and that is why is can sometimes be so much harder to say good-bye.
No matter which situation you have encountered you have to remember that it was their time to go. Their is nothing you or anyone else could have done to save them and they are in a better place now. The sooner you realize that the faster the person will be able to remain in your peaceful memories.
After discussing the assignment with my professor, I decided to change the topic a bit. I know will be posting an interactive map with support groups around the area. The great part about this tool is that you can type in your address and it will give you exact directions to where you want to go. I did the support groups I mainly knew about in the Camden and Gloucester Country areas, but added a few other in the central part and northern part of NJ as well. I hope this helps and if you need any more information feel free to ask!
For next week I will be doing a time line on the grieving process. It will have pictures and examples along with full instructions on what you should do when you are grieving. The loss of someone can really effect you so I hope that this time line will help. Remember that your symptoms can be completely different from what I will cover. This is just a time line to show what could happen and when. Hope it helps!
One of the hardest things people go through with grief is trying to find someone to listen to them. Not everyone has that one person who devotes their entire life to listen to you grieve, especially if you’ve been grieving to them about the same thing for a very long time.
One of the best things to do is find releases so that your not always depending so much on one single person to help you feel better, because quite frankly they might not always have the best information to give you in order to make you feel better. What if they are in a bad mood and you try to vent to them and you accidentally catch them in the wrong moment. You could feel like its your fault and than you could feel even more depressed.
Word of advise, have multiple people to talk to and try not to over-whelm them with the same topic over and over again. If your sad all the time than people are not going to want to hang out with you. Yes everyone has their bad days, but when a bad day occurs every day than their might be something wrong.
When you have multiple people to talk, you get different forms of advise which can help you out in the long run. Just remember that if they help you cope that they are going to expect you to be there for them when they need help coping about something that has gone wrong in their life.
So just remember to truly appreciate those around you who have given you advise and listen to you when you need it, and always remember to lend a helping hand when they are in need. Do good unto others as they would do unto you =) !
I was searching through You Tube when I came across this instructional video on dealing with the death of someone you love. It is very informative and it looks like it has helped a lot people! Enjoy!
Here are a couple of books that you can buy from Amazon that I think could be very useful…
The Bereverd Parent – By Harriet Schiff
The Grief Recovery Handbook – By John James and Frank Cherry
