Let's get to know each other! Comment below sharing where you are in the world, a photo of your workspace, and something you like to do for self-care.

Welcome. I’m Carolyn J. Lockett, a widow who created this community to help other widows and grieving people navigate grief, recognize grief-shaming, protect their peace, and rediscover who they are becoming after loss. Here, you’ll receive practical tools and support to help you move from simply surviving toward rebuilding your life with purpose, emotionally, personally, and, when you’re ready, through new possibilities such as education, career, business, ministry, or other dreams you may want to pursue. You are grieving, but your life is not over. There is still more of YOU to discover. Let’s begin with something that can quietly interfere with that journey: grief-shaming. Grief-Shaming: The act of intentionally or unintentionally pressuring a grieving person to minimize, hide, dismiss, rush, or explain their grief to make others more comfortable. I didn’t understand what was happening to me when people asked: · How are you doing? · Are you dating yet? It’s been two years. · Did you donate his clothes yet? · What happened to him? How did he die? Even when people meant well, some questions left me feeling broken, overwhelmed, exposed, and pressured to move through grief the way they expected me to. I often questioned whether I was grieving “right.” I had never been a widow before. How was I supposed to know? There is no road map for how to be a widow. One day, in prayer, God gave me a name for what I was experiencing: grief-shaming. I want to share that revelation with you, so you won’t have to struggle to understand what is happening to you the way I did. Grief-shaming happens when a grieving person is made to feel judged, rushed, dismissed, or somehow wrong for how they grieve or how long they grieve. Recognizing grief-shaming doesn’t heal grief by itself. It helps remove obstacles to grief recovery. Have you ever experienced something like this? #GriefShamingStopsHere #DefendersOfGrief #GriefSupport