By Martha Carr, Psy.D., LMFT

It’s 11:38 pm and I am jolted awake by an earthquake. It’s so rough it feels like I am thrown straight up in the air, taking me out of slumber instantly. My brain scrambles to figure out what is happening and, while I am still moving, my right arm instinctively and spontaneously reaches out, grabbing for Richard. For 42 years he slept to the right of me. The bed is empty of course. It’s been empty for four years. It takes me a few seconds to reconcile the two realities – the one in which he is still there and the one in which he is gone. My heart breaks a little again as consciousness brings me into the actuality of my life.

Download the Gratitude Calendar

As Thanksgiving approaches you may wonder what you have to be grateful for. If you have recently lost your spouse or another loved one, this may be the first significant holiday you’ve spent without them. Your grief may be so fresh that it’s hard to feel anything else. If some time has passed since your loved one died, this is still going to be a strange, perhaps surreal holiday season. The pandemic is raging anew, even while there is hope on the horizon for a vaccine. But that is in the future — this is now. What is there to be grateful for this very day? Discovering — or rediscovering — gratitude can actually be a simple and thoughtful process, beginning with a Gratitude Journal. Download this Gratitude Calendar — created by HOPE therapist Lori Oberman — and use it daily as inspiration for your Gratitude Journal. Day by day you may discover the healing power of gratitude — an especially miraculous gift at this time of the year. Wishing you all the blessings of this season — All of us at HOPE Connection.