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How I Healed After My Mother Died with Helen Fernald · Groove with Portia

0:06
Speaker 1: Welcome to Grow with Porsche, the podcast that uncovers the
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Speaker 1: hidden treasures within grief. I'm your host, Porsche the Producer,
0:12
Speaker 1: and I'm inviting you to join me on a transformative
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Speaker 1: journey where we were exchange laughter, of course, the best
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Speaker 1: medicine of them all, reflect on cherish memories, Remember that
0:21
Speaker 1: time that the little boy grabbed my hand instead of
0:23
Speaker 1: his mother's at the amusement park yikes, And of course,
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Speaker 1: discover gratitude while navigating one of life's hardest challenges lost.
0:31
Speaker 1: So get ready to grow with me, Porsche the Producer,
0:35
Speaker 1: let's dive in. Hello everyone, and welcome back to Grew
0:46
Speaker 1: with Porsche. I'm your host, Porsche Booker. Before we begin
0:50
Speaker 1: this conversation today, don't forget to like, share and subscribe
0:54
Speaker 1: to keep up with the latest and greatest of all
0:57
Speaker 1: with Grew with Porsche. So today I have the honor
1:00
Speaker 1: of having miss Helen Fernald on the show. She is
1:04
Speaker 1: a grief recovery mentor, photographer and also the author of
1:09
Speaker 1: Love Helen Letters to My Mother. So welcome Helen to
1:13
Speaker 1: Grew with Porscha. How are you today?
1:15
Speaker 2: Bet? First of all, thank you so much. I'm very
1:17
Speaker 2: grateful to be here, very grateful to be with you
1:19
Speaker 2: and your audience, and I am great so thank you
1:22
Speaker 2: for asking.
1:24
Speaker 1: Helen. When I saw that your book was titled Love Helen,
1:29
Speaker 1: Letters to My Mother, and the fact that you also
1:33
Speaker 1: had a mother transition, I'm like, yes, we have to
1:35
Speaker 1: have this conversation. Yes, because mothers are so precious, right.
1:40
Speaker 1: We don't realize the heartbreak, the deep heartbreak that you
1:45
Speaker 1: have when your mother transitions, And so Helen, I'm curious
1:49
Speaker 1: for you. I always love to start off my conversations
1:52
Speaker 1: with gratitude. What are you grateful for today?
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Speaker 2: First of all, I am just grateful to be here.
1:57
Speaker 2: I am very passionate like you about sharing the message
2:00
Speaker 2: that grief is very real. So I'm extraordinarily grateful to
2:04
Speaker 2: be able to talk with you and your audience about
2:06
Speaker 2: this theme, which in the end is a universal theme.
2:09
Speaker 2: At some point in our adult lives and also sometimes
2:12
Speaker 2: as children, all of us will face grief over something
2:16
Speaker 2: or someone. So it is an extraordinarily important topic. But
2:20
Speaker 2: I think it's sort of got lost in the shuffle
2:22
Speaker 2: in this culture. So I think it's our turn to
2:25
Speaker 2: bring it back up so that people understand that it's
2:28
Speaker 2: a real thing. And understand that there are many ways
2:31
Speaker 2: to deal with it. So I'm very grateful to have
2:34
Speaker 2: this opportunity. Thank you.
2:35
Speaker 1: You know, Helen, I'm glad you brought up the many
2:38
Speaker 1: ways to work with our grief. I'm a firm believer
2:42
Speaker 1: that we can learn to integrate it into our every
2:45
Speaker 1: day And Helen, one of the things that I love
2:47
Speaker 1: about you is you took the opportunity to write, to
2:52
Speaker 1: really write these letters and integrate your grief into a
2:57
Speaker 1: creative funnel such as your book. And I'm curious, Helen,
3:01
Speaker 1: for you, what was that journey like for you to say,
3:06
Speaker 1: you know, I'm going to use writing as my form
3:11
Speaker 1: of expressing the heartbreak, expressing the numbness, that empty void.
3:17
Speaker 1: What was that journey like for you to open yourself
3:20
Speaker 1: up to start to write when you have so many
3:23
Speaker 1: emotions fighting for the spotlight.
3:25
Speaker 2: Yea, that's such a great question, thank you. I think
3:29
Speaker 2: for me, it was a very long journey. My mother
3:33
Speaker 2: died when I was only forty. I honestly thought she
3:36
Speaker 2: would live forever. I'd already lost my great uncle, who
3:39
Speaker 2: was like my grandfather. I'd already lost my father so then,
3:43
Speaker 2: but I just thought my mother would be there forever.
3:44
Speaker 2: And then suddenly I got the news that she was gone,
3:47
Speaker 2: and that was the end of that. But I grew
3:50
Speaker 2: up in a family, I think, as many of us
3:53
Speaker 2: in this country. I grew up in the family where
3:55
Speaker 2: we were taught to just stuff our emotions inside and
3:59
Speaker 2: just carry on with life. And I had actually watched
4:02
Speaker 2: my mother do that. My mother and father were very close,
4:04
Speaker 2: they were deeply in love. But when my father died,
4:07
Speaker 2: that's what my mother did. She just smiled and pushed
4:10
Speaker 2: herself onward. And so I did that. Actually that year
4:15
Speaker 2: prior to my mother's death, and right and three months
4:19
Speaker 2: after my mother's death, I actually had two miscarriages. So
4:22
Speaker 2: it was a year that was filled with horrible grief,
4:24
Speaker 2: and yet I didn't know what to do with anything.
4:26
Speaker 2: And then nine months after that, after the miss second miscarriage,
4:30
Speaker 2: our son was born. So then I just got very
4:32
Speaker 2: busy taking care of my family and my newborn and
4:34
Speaker 2: all those things. And then, as so often happens in
4:37
Speaker 2: these stories, five years later, I completely fell apart. But
4:42
Speaker 2: the gift of that was that that was like an
4:44
Speaker 2: opening for me to begin a new part in my life.
4:48
Speaker 2: And I come from a family of letter writers. I'm
4:52
Speaker 2: not sure how many people can still say that in
4:54
Speaker 2: this world, but I feel like, you know, I basically
4:57
Speaker 2: left home at eighteen when I went off to college,
4:59
Speaker 2: and from the time I was eighteen until I was
5:01
Speaker 2: sixty eight when my brother died. So for fifty years,
5:05
Speaker 2: I actually wrote weekly letters to my family. You know.
5:09
Speaker 2: At first it was my mother and father and brother,
5:10
Speaker 2: and then it was my mother and brother, and then
5:12
Speaker 2: it was my brother, and so that was how we corresponded.
5:17
Speaker 2: But I hadn't really thought about that. And one day
5:20
Speaker 2: I have a back room, a family room where I
5:22
Speaker 2: go in the morning to meditate and to pray, and
5:25
Speaker 2: I remember going back there sixteen years after my mother
5:28
Speaker 2: had died, and I had done a lot of grief work,
5:31
Speaker 2: but I still just felt so overwhelmed. And I remember
5:35
Speaker 2: going back there and just I literally threw up my
5:38
Speaker 2: hands in the air and said, I don't know what
5:40
Speaker 2: to do now. And I immediately heard the answer in
5:43
Speaker 2: my head, write letters to your mother. And I thought, oh,
5:47
Speaker 2: I can do that. I spent my life doing that,
5:50
Speaker 2: so I never did it in a fancy way. I
5:52
Speaker 2: honestly just grabbed the notebook that was clearest, that was
5:55
Speaker 2: closest and for eight years, I just allowed every part
6:00
Speaker 2: of my grief to just come out. It would just
6:03
Speaker 2: pour out, and it was the first time in my
6:05
Speaker 2: life because I could do it in my own private space.
6:08
Speaker 2: Nobody was watching, nobody had to ever read those letters,
6:11
Speaker 2: and I could just cry and cry and release and release,
6:16
Speaker 2: and then I would get new memories and new memories,
6:19
Speaker 2: and it was just this extraordinary experience during these eight years. Also, honestly,
6:26
Speaker 2: I'm not a poet under normal circumstances, but during those
6:30
Speaker 2: eight years, I would just get these beautiful prayers and
6:34
Speaker 2: these beautiful, beautiful poems. And one of the poems that
6:38
Speaker 2: I got was Grief the Greatest Mentor. And I thought,
6:42
Speaker 2: by the end of my eight years, that is so true,
6:45
Speaker 2: because befriending for me, that is what is befriending my grief.
6:49
Speaker 2: I actually took my grief and instead of stuffing it down,
6:52
Speaker 2: I let it just pour out, and I listened to
6:55
Speaker 2: my grief and I listened to whatever I needed to
6:57
Speaker 2: know and to do, and it was just this extraordinary experience.
7:01
Speaker 2: And by the end of those eight years, I felt
7:04
Speaker 2: like I was in a completely different place in my life.
7:07
Speaker 2: I suddenly I think the greatest gift for me was
7:10
Speaker 2: that after writing all of those letters and really allowing
7:14
Speaker 2: my inner feelings to be exposed, I realized I felt
7:18
Speaker 2: such compassion to myself, such compassion to my mother. I
7:24
Speaker 2: think my mother was always very busy when I was young,
7:26
Speaker 2: and you know, as a child sometimes represent that. Wow.
7:29
Speaker 2: By the time I finished writing letters for eight years,
7:31
Speaker 2: I would think to myself, I have no idea how
7:33
Speaker 2: my mother did all the things she did. She was amazing.
7:36
Speaker 2: So I had this completely different relationship with my mother.
7:40
Speaker 2: And then I think, once you have compassion for yourself
7:46
Speaker 2: and you have compassion for another person, you have compassion
7:49
Speaker 2: for the world because you understand that every single person
7:53
Speaker 2: is going through something, and I just think it changes
7:56
Speaker 2: our entire outlook. So I feel that it was really
8:00
Speaker 2: this extraordinary journey that I never had anticipated in my
8:04
Speaker 2: entire life. I have felt very guided by this whole journey,
8:08
Speaker 2: and I just feel such deep gratitude and such gratitude
8:12
Speaker 2: because really writing letters is not complicated. You know, you
8:16
Speaker 2: don't need fancy things. You don't need, you know, fancy
8:19
Speaker 2: stationary not when you're doing this work. And the other
8:23
Speaker 2: piece that I loved about doing this. Obviously, I chose
8:26
Speaker 2: to publish my letters because I felt that they could
8:28
Speaker 2: be of great help to people. But what I always
8:31
Speaker 2: tell people is, no one ever needs to see your letters.
8:35
Speaker 2: And that's why we can really be honest with ourselves,
8:39
Speaker 2: because grief always involves anger. Grief always involves so many
8:44
Speaker 2: expressions that we're so afraid because we're gonna be somebody's
8:47
Speaker 2: gonna judge us, or we're gonna be bad people if
8:49
Speaker 2: we let anybody see those. But when we write them,
8:52
Speaker 2: we can just throw that notebook away, we can burn it.
8:55
Speaker 2: Nobody ever has to see any of that. So it
8:58
Speaker 2: really is a lie liberation of our soul. I think
9:01
Speaker 2: when we choose to write letters.
9:03
Speaker 1: You know, Helene, you brought up something that grief was
9:07
Speaker 1: your greatest mentor yes, And when you look at the
9:11
Speaker 1: word grief the way that it's spelled, it has I
9:15
Speaker 1: E in the middle, an I E stands for what
9:20
Speaker 1: example is right?
9:23
Speaker 2: My gosh, I loved that. I never looked at it
9:26
Speaker 2: that way.
9:27
Speaker 1: I love it.
9:27
Speaker 2: Thank you so much.
9:28
Speaker 1: I love that, and I'm glad that you reiterated that
9:32
Speaker 1: because I think a lot of times, as a society,
9:36
Speaker 1: we think grief is the enemy. We think game is
9:38
Speaker 1: the enemy when grief. We go through grief, not just
9:42
Speaker 1: when we experience a transition of a loved one, right,
9:46
Speaker 1: we grieve when that job that we thought we were
9:49
Speaker 1: going to ask level up in it's cut. I mean,
9:53
Speaker 1: look at the way of the world now, we have
9:55
Speaker 1: social media changing how we interact, how we a apply
10:00
Speaker 1: for jobs, how we do everything and helen. Another thing
10:04
Speaker 1: you brought up was about your faith, and I'm always
10:07
Speaker 1: curious about this. What did it take for you to
10:12
Speaker 1: walk towards your faith and not walk away? Considering your
10:17
Speaker 1: mom at transitioned and you also had to miscarriages kind
10:21
Speaker 1: of in the mix of that, So I'm curious what
10:23
Speaker 1: did it take for you to hold on to your faith?
10:26
Speaker 2: Thank you. I feel like I was very fortunate because
10:31
Speaker 2: I grew up in a family where there was a
10:33
Speaker 2: lot of faith. And it's not something that honestly, we
10:37
Speaker 2: talked about a lot, but I feel like my parents
10:41
Speaker 2: demonstrated that in their own lives, and you know, they,
10:45
Speaker 2: like every other person, had great challenges in their lives
10:49
Speaker 2: and they had to have faith in order to get
10:52
Speaker 2: through that. If I ever think about my parents, I
10:55
Speaker 2: think one of the most challenging times in their lives
10:58
Speaker 2: was that they were married and my father had already
11:01
Speaker 2: enlisted in the army. He didn't have to because he
11:04
Speaker 2: was actually above the age limit, but he felt it
11:06
Speaker 2: was his responsibility, so he enlisted. And then he had gotten,
11:10
Speaker 2: you know, a special weekend so they could get married,
11:13
Speaker 2: and that weekend got completely cut off, so they had
11:16
Speaker 2: the service, and then they spent their honeymoon night, which
11:18
Speaker 2: back in those days really was a honeymoon night on
11:21
Speaker 2: the train all the way from Cleveland, Ohio to the
11:25
Speaker 2: University of New Hampshire. And then they were separated for
11:29
Speaker 2: three years, and what did they do. They wrote letters
11:33
Speaker 2: to each other and they had to have that faith
11:35
Speaker 2: that carried them through in every moment until my father
11:39
Speaker 2: got back home. So I think that those were powerful examples.
11:43
Speaker 2: My father was a great lover of music, and you know,
11:46
Speaker 2: this was way back in the day when we had
11:48
Speaker 2: the you know, the records and the vinyl records, and
11:52
Speaker 2: one of his favorite things to listen to were hymns.
11:55
Speaker 2: So I grew up all the time listening to this
11:57
Speaker 2: extraordinary these beautiful hymns have this very high vibration just
12:02
Speaker 2: you know, they're talking about joy and love and hope
12:05
Speaker 2: and faith, and so I think that all of those
12:08
Speaker 2: things just were so instilled in me as a young child.
12:12
Speaker 2: And then I lived in Spain for two years, and
12:14
Speaker 2: Spain is just so filled with faith. People talk about
12:19
Speaker 2: their faith all the time, much more so than I
12:22
Speaker 2: We talked about faith with my own family growing up,
12:25
Speaker 2: and so I feel that that was also an integral part.
12:28
Speaker 2: So I think I'm very lucky to have had that experience,
12:32
Speaker 2: because I think it was just natural for me. I also,
12:35
Speaker 2: I think my mother was a very optimistic person, and
12:38
Speaker 2: that's also faith, and so no matter what, she would
12:42
Speaker 2: always find the blessing in it always, and she taught
12:46
Speaker 2: me to do that, which was just an extraordinary, extraordinary
12:49
Speaker 2: gift also, so I'm very grateful for all that.
12:52
Speaker 1: And you know, Helena, it's beautiful that you're able to
12:57
Speaker 1: honor that piece of your mom, because I think so
13:01
Speaker 1: many people when they lose their mother. I can say
13:05
Speaker 1: for me, there's a level of addiction that you have
13:10
Speaker 1: to that grief of their transition, because it's hard for
13:15
Speaker 1: you to recognize and remember all of the positive qualities
13:21
Speaker 1: that you came from their optimism, their intellects, their smile.
13:26
Speaker 1: You know, my mom always had us saying make the
13:29
Speaker 1: best of it, Darling. That was.
13:33
Speaker 2: Your mom and my mom were a lot alike. I think, yes,
13:37
Speaker 2: and so you did it.
13:39
Speaker 1: And I'm curious to Helen, you brought up about the
13:43
Speaker 1: ability to cry, and I think in our society there's
13:49
Speaker 1: this notion that weakness, vulnerability is frowned upon unless you
13:58
Speaker 1: have certain accolades or stature. In yes, yes, And I'm curious, Helen,
14:05
Speaker 1: what did it take for you to give yourself that
14:09
Speaker 1: permission to be vulnerable and crime? And how can we
14:14
Speaker 1: encourage others who are on their grief journey, whether they've
14:18
Speaker 1: had the physical transition of someone or they're going through
14:22
Speaker 1: other transitions in their life, to give themselves that permission
14:27
Speaker 1: and grace.
14:28
Speaker 2: I think that's such a beautiful question because I agree
14:32
Speaker 2: as I said, I was certainly never taught to cry.
14:34
Speaker 2: I was just taught to smile through life. So I
14:38
Speaker 2: think for me, though, it was once I started writing
14:43
Speaker 2: those letters, I couldn't help it. It just literally poured
14:47
Speaker 2: out of me. It just it was as though I
14:51
Speaker 2: had no choice. It was as if I just opened
14:53
Speaker 2: this gate and said, okay, grief, do what you need
14:57
Speaker 2: to do, andh it just came out. But I think
15:01
Speaker 2: what you're asking is such an important question because I
15:04
Speaker 2: think if we look back, let's say, one hundred years ago,
15:08
Speaker 2: I remember, you know, as a child, the Westerns were
15:12
Speaker 2: really popular, and I didn't particularly like Westerns, but my
15:14
Speaker 2: brother loved Westerns, of course. So I remember, you know,
15:17
Speaker 2: walking through a room one time and seeing this whole
15:22
Speaker 2: scene where it was some western town and somebody had died,
15:26
Speaker 2: so they just put the body on the table and
15:28
Speaker 2: everybody came in and they were all surrounded and they
15:30
Speaker 2: were all crying, and I just at the time I thought, oh,
15:36
Speaker 2: that's terrible. But then when I started crying, I thought, oh,
15:41
Speaker 2: we have missed this, we have lost out on this.
15:45
Speaker 2: This is really the natural reaction. This is what we
15:48
Speaker 2: do when we lose. This is how we are actually
15:52
Speaker 2: programmed as human beings, and it's an extraordinarily beautiful thing.
15:57
Speaker 2: I think it's what you're saying. When you see somebody
15:59
Speaker 2: who as the act, it's somebody important who begins to cry,
16:04
Speaker 2: We're like, yes, yes, but do we let ourselves do that?
16:08
Speaker 2: Not always? But I remember seeing I have a masters
16:13
Speaker 2: in Spanish, and so I love to watch TV in Spanish,
16:16
Speaker 2: and I remember watching some dance show and they had these,
16:19
Speaker 2: you know, very well known actors and actresses who were
16:22
Speaker 2: partnered with, you know, with good dancers, and then they
16:27
Speaker 2: were they would interview them, and there was one young
16:29
Speaker 2: Mexican guy who was I don't know, maybe in his thirties,
16:33
Speaker 2: very very well known as a as a as a singer,
16:37
Speaker 2: and I remember he started to talk about his grandmother
16:41
Speaker 2: and how she had passed and what she meant to him,
16:43
Speaker 2: and she started to cry and it was so moving.
16:47
Speaker 2: It was so moving to me, and I was like, oh,
16:49
Speaker 2: my gosh, wouldn't it be wonderful if we could all
16:52
Speaker 2: be so honest, because that's how we really feel. We
16:55
Speaker 2: want to cry. And I think when we do cry
17:00
Speaker 2: and allow other people to see that, I think we
17:03
Speaker 2: give permission to other people also because they think to themselves, Okay,
17:07
Speaker 2: well she could do it, so I guess I'm not
17:09
Speaker 2: just made to do it. I guess I can actually
17:11
Speaker 2: do that too. We kind of have this old expression.
17:15
Speaker 2: I knew, you know, my brother used to say it
17:17
Speaker 2: to me, Oh, don't be a cry baby, you know,
17:20
Speaker 2: And and I am grateful to say I have not
17:24
Speaker 2: heard that lately, but I don't have young children anymore either,
17:27
Speaker 2: so and I mean I certainly never said it to
17:29
Speaker 2: my children. I actually always encourage them to cry because
17:31
Speaker 2: I think it's really important. It's just another human emotion.
17:35
Speaker 2: But I think you're right. I think we need to
17:37
Speaker 2: begin to change that back to the to when it
17:42
Speaker 2: was safe to cry and when it was okay because
17:46
Speaker 2: we are expressing deep emotions and it's such a normal reaction.
17:52
Speaker 1: One hundred percent. And I think to your point, Helen,
17:56
Speaker 1: I know when my mom transitioned, I could not cry
18:00
Speaker 1: for a while.
18:01
Speaker 2: Exactly.
18:03
Speaker 1: Yeah, there was a lot of and you touched on anger, right,
18:06
Speaker 1: and as women, anger is frowned upon we. That's almost
18:11
Speaker 1: saying a bad word.
18:15
Speaker 2: Yes, exactly exactly.
18:19
Speaker 1: That was my primary seat of occupancy when my mom transitioned,
18:25
Speaker 1: that anger of God, I'm not happy with you. Yes,
18:29
Speaker 1: I'm you because you yes me yes, yes, and I'm here.
18:34
Speaker 1: I don't know what to do.
18:38
Speaker 2: Yes, I felt exactly the same way. And you reminded
18:42
Speaker 2: me of one other point that I think is very important.
18:45
Speaker 2: I think that often we don't cry because there's a
18:49
Speaker 2: voice in her head that says, if you start crying,
18:53
Speaker 2: you will never stop. And we know that we can't
18:57
Speaker 2: go through life crying. We know that we don't realize
19:01
Speaker 2: that if we let ourselves cry from time to time,
19:04
Speaker 2: we can go on with our lives. But I think
19:07
Speaker 2: you make such great points. I felt the same about
19:09
Speaker 2: my mother. I was like, why did you leave me
19:11
Speaker 2: so soon? I need you? What were you thinking? And
19:16
Speaker 2: yet it's that horrible feeling. There is actually a letter
19:18
Speaker 2: in my very towards the end, when I finally had
19:22
Speaker 2: the courage to write about that anger, I said, Mom,
19:24
Speaker 2: I can't believe that I have to write this to
19:26
Speaker 2: you because I feel like such a terrible person. But
19:28
Speaker 2: the truth of the matter is that when you died,
19:31
Speaker 2: I was really angry. I needed you desperately. You left
19:35
Speaker 2: way too soon, and I think that's you know, all
19:39
Speaker 2: of this is such a natural I mean, you know,
19:41
Speaker 2: in Koobler Ross, I believe when she talked about grief,
19:44
Speaker 2: anger was very much a start of a step in that.
19:47
Speaker 2: But I also think for me, at least, that I've
19:49
Speaker 2: heard this from other women also, that you know, if
19:52
Speaker 2: we start to cry, we're just never gonna stop, so
19:54
Speaker 2: we just have to stuff it inside and be tough.
19:57
Speaker 2: And I think that explains a lot of we can't
20:02
Speaker 2: we can't cry in those moments. We're just trying to
20:05
Speaker 2: hang on to whatever strength is within us, so we
20:09
Speaker 2: don't look so completely vulnerable because we're taught not to
20:13
Speaker 2: be vulnerable. So I think it's it's just a very
20:16
Speaker 2: complex situation. And I hope that our conversation, and I
20:20
Speaker 2: know other conversations that you will have with other people
20:22
Speaker 2: on similar themes, will begin to allow people to understand
20:27
Speaker 2: the importance of being authentic in our emotions, not just
20:31
Speaker 2: showing one side, but truly being authentic.
20:34
Speaker 1: And I'm glad you reiterated that, Helen, because you're right.
20:38
Speaker 1: I think vulnerability is said, but it's not accepted.
20:43
Speaker 2: R Oh. Yeah.
20:44
Speaker 1: That reminds me of the notion of we are inclusive
20:49
Speaker 1: of all walks of life. However, if someone comes in
20:55
Speaker 1: and they have purple hair, everybody's given them the side
20:58
Speaker 1: eye eggs. Yes, the real alignment to the saying vulnerability
21:06
Speaker 1: is welcomed here. And this is why I hold space
21:10
Speaker 1: for people, Helen when I host my grief groups, because
21:13
Speaker 1: that's what a lot of people need is they just
21:15
Speaker 1: need someone to listen, to talk about their person and
21:18
Speaker 1: not try to fix them or hide the messiness of grieving.
21:23
Speaker 1: That's for a whole another day. Helen, first of all,
21:28
Speaker 1: thank you so much for coming on. We're going to
21:31
Speaker 1: be wrapping up here soon. But I know that there's
21:35
Speaker 1: somebody out there in our audience who would want to
21:39
Speaker 1: connect with you get a copy of your book. You
21:42
Speaker 1: please share with them how they can connect with you
21:44
Speaker 1: and where they can get your book.
21:46
Speaker 2: Thank you so much. Yees. So everything is on my website,
21:49
Speaker 2: which is simply Helenfernel dot com. They can actually buy
21:53
Speaker 2: the book through my website, but they can also buy
21:54
Speaker 2: it on Amazon and Barnes and Noble. It can be
21:57
Speaker 2: ordered through Barnes and Noble also, and it does come
22:01
Speaker 2: in both the hardcover, the softcover and the audiobooks, so
22:05
Speaker 2: people have and the ebook outso so people do have
22:08
Speaker 2: a selection on that and yes, and I will be
22:11
Speaker 2: teaching classes beginning in later in the fall, but all
22:16
Speaker 2: of that information will also be on my website, so
22:18
Speaker 2: thank you for asking.
22:20
Speaker 1: Excellent. So those of you who want to get a
22:22
Speaker 1: copy of Helen's book, Love Helen Letters to My Mother,
22:26
Speaker 1: you can on Helen's website and also on any of
22:30
Speaker 1: the major book distribution platforms, whether it's Amazon, Barnes and Nobles,
22:35
Speaker 1: wherever you prefer to go. Right, Yes, Helen, before we
22:40
Speaker 1: wrap up, I mean, you have shared so many amazing
22:44
Speaker 1: things with us today. Number one, about honoring our space
22:48
Speaker 1: of occupancy no matter where we're at in our grief journey. Right,
22:52
Speaker 1: utilizing writing as a tool to really help us to
22:56
Speaker 1: heal and to really integrate our grop and to our
23:00
Speaker 1: every day and also reminding us that it's okay to
23:06
Speaker 1: be angry. Right, We're allowed. And I'll say number four
23:11
Speaker 1: that our faith is what keeps us afloat during the
23:16
Speaker 1: seasons of grief. Yes, And for our listening audience, Heather,
23:21
Speaker 1: I mean Heather, Helen, for our listening audience, what piece
23:28
Speaker 1: of wisdom can you leave with them today, no matter
23:31
Speaker 1: where they're at in their grief journey, in order for
23:34
Speaker 1: them to give themselves grace and permission to integrate and
23:40
Speaker 1: also to just be.
23:43
Speaker 2: I think that my greatest advice would be to simply
23:46
Speaker 2: befriend our own grief, to really listen, to stop and
23:50
Speaker 2: listen and to cry, or to write, or to speak
23:54
Speaker 2: with a therapist, whatever it is that allows us to
23:58
Speaker 2: continue to move forward. To always remember that grief is
24:01
Speaker 2: real and that it's looking for help.
24:03
Speaker 1: And remember, as you said in the beginning, grief is
24:06
Speaker 1: your greatest mentor. And I've said to all of you
24:10
Speaker 1: before that grief is the birthplace of transformation. It may
24:15
Speaker 1: not appear as though it is in the beginning, but
24:18
Speaker 1: if you open yourself up, you need to be broken
24:21
Speaker 1: open in order to be refilled.
24:24
Speaker 2: I love that. That's a beautiful way to look at it.
24:27
Speaker 2: Thank you so much. I appreciate that, and again, thank you,
24:30
Speaker 2: thank you so much for this opportunity. I just I
24:32
Speaker 2: loved talking to you. I felt like we had so
24:34
Speaker 2: much in common and it was truly a gift. So
24:37
Speaker 2: thank you so much.
24:39
Speaker 1: No, Helen, thank you the pleasures on mine. I was
24:41
Speaker 1: excited when I saw your book and the fact that
24:45
Speaker 1: you lost your mom too, because there's so many of
24:47
Speaker 1: us who are walking around out here who have experienced
24:51
Speaker 1: that loss of our mom and we don't know what
24:54
Speaker 1: to do, and so we need that example right that, yes, yes,
24:59
Speaker 1: help us. So yes, everybody, that was miss Helen Fernald
25:04
Speaker 1: that you heard from that it concludes another episode and
25:07
Speaker 1: grew with Portie. Thank you all so much, and until
25:10
Speaker 1: next time, Peace and hair Greece. Everybody,