I wrote this on my Facebook profile two years ago and it’s still one of the best things my husband and I have ever gone through together. I highly, highly recommend the Grief Recovery Method. Friends, if you have a loss of any kind that you need to walk through and process, please reach out to On Angels’ Wings: some of the best people to help you along the way!
Caitlin Smiley
Mommy to Bentlee
Congenital Heart Defect
Read Bentlee’s story here

Wednesday night we finished 8 weeks’ worth of grief recovery therapy❤️

At first, I felt really horrible showing up because I have my child & shouldn’t be “grieving” anything. But man- was I surprised to find out that this journey truly has been full of grief for us. Grieving the moments we missed, grieving the decisions we had/have had to make, and grieving the life we thought we would have with our child. Grieving the fact that our child is forever sick with only a mended heart- no cure.

We put it off and put it off- thinking therapy for the situation wasn’t for us, or that we wouldn’t be able to take it seriously because it’s not the kind of grief you think of when that word comes to mind.

Our losses through the journey were so validated. We were made to realize how important it is to allow ourselves to miss what should have been. We finished the session Wednesday with a letter full of forgiveness, apology, & emotional statements. I cried. I cried a lot. The feeling of reading that letter is something I can’t really describe to you, but I haven’t felt this way in almost 2 years & it’s so awakening. I feel like myself again, & not consumed by my child’s diagnosis—and that…man I needed to feel like that again.

That’s not to say I don’t still hate the situation, or wish things were different. My heart still hurts because i can’t fix it for B. But I have the coping mechanisms now to deal with the hard days & the trials to come. I’m armored and ready.

Thank you to my hubby for going through this with me & opening up like he has. He committed to this with me & im so grateful. We have met some amazing people these past 8 weeks with stories that are heart touching. You truly never know what someone is dealing with. 💔

I guess the moral of my post is- if you’re struggling with a loss of any kind, allow yourself to grieve & start the process of grief recovery when you feel ready. It truly is life changing. I’m always here & I know I need to go through this process to cope with other losses I’ve endured in my life, including the most recent. I’d love to go through it with you if you want to walk the journey of grief recovery with someone❤️

“So very often, we try to make other people feel better by telling them that it will get better (which it will), or that there are worse things in the world (which there are). But that’s not what I actually needed. What I needed, was for someone to tell me that it hurt because it mattered.”—John Green