Grief | Dealing with Loss: Rex Gleim and Nancy Gleim

Dealing with Loss: Rex Gleim and Nancy Gleim

Submitted by Open to Hope Foundation on December 22, 2005 – 9:51 am

HEALING THE GRIEVING HEART
Dealing with Loss
Host: Dr. Gloria Horsley
With guest: Rex and Nancy Gleim
December 22, 2005

G: Hello. I?m Dr. Gloria Horsley. Welcome to Healing the Grieving Heart, the show that gives the opportunity for bereaved families and professionals to tell their stories of loss and renewal. We know you face the holidays and the New Year with mixed emotions. We know how holidays are filled with memories that bring you happiness as well as despair?that special ornament, a holiday picture, or just the smell of baking cookies can stir a memory in your heart. We miss our loved one during this festive season. It is surely not the celebration we had planned. However, we have no option but to soldier on with hope, courage, faith, and yes, even love. If I could give you one piece of advice during this season, it would be to take care of yourself. You are more important than Christmas cards, ten-foot trees, holiday dinners, or stacks of gifts. Give yourself the gift of time and give your friends and family the opportunity to serve you. Remember, take-out food is good as Christmas is only one day. Take a moment out to have a bubble bath, read a special story or a poem. This is the year to give others the gift of taking care of you and helping you take care of your family. True, it would be nice if people would anticipate our needs; however, friends and family are not mind readers. Therefore, you can and must ask for help. Our topic today is helping families deal with the holidays, and my guests are Rex and Nancy Gleim, retired educators. In 1992, Rex and Nancy?s son, Ryan, died in an automobile accident. After his death, they founded two local chapters of The Compassionate Friends in Indiana and in 2002, in response to their communities need, they founded Ryan?s Place, a grief center for families. Please join us on the show by calling our toll free number, 1-866-369-3742 with questions or comments regarding the losses in your life. You can email me through my website at www.healingthegrievingheart.org. These shows are all archived on www.thecompassionatefriends.org website as well as www.voiceamerica.com website. Well, as I said, today we?re going to talk about helping families deal with the holidays, and my guests are Rex and Nancy Gleim. Welcome to the show, Rex and Nancy.
R&N: Thank you.
G: It?s great to have you on the show. I know I had the opportunity last year of hearing you speak about Ryan?s Place and I wondered if you could tell our audience about how it got founded and about your son, Ryan, and what you?re doing now.
R: Sure, we?ll kind of take turns doing this. Our son died in an auto accident, as you said, and we had a second son who was seventeen at the time, and there was just really no place that we could go to get help for this young man. As we went through counseling because of the type of death that Ryan went through, the counselor said after a few sessions that Damon just was not talking to him, but he probably would talk to other teenagers. And as it happened, one of his classmates at school had a father who died in a very, very strange accident and the two of them were able to talk and share with each other when no one else at school really cared or was much interested. And so we know that teenagers talking to teenagers does help. We founded Ryan?s Place then a few years later when the counselor that we?d gone to had gone to a conference in Washington, DC, and met two people from Ellie?s Place, which is a grief center in Michigan, and they were very interested in sharing information, so Nancy and Don and Eunice Munn went and visited and as a result of that, we formed a committee to kind of look to see if there was a need in this area and from there we established a board of directors and after eighteen months of planning, we opened Ryan?s Place in January 2002.
G: And how many people do you serve and families?
R: We have been up to 140 people one evening; in fact, just this last Monday evening, we did some event we had never done before and that is we invited other family members to come and so we had upwards of 170 people that evening, but that?s unusual. We average probably on a Monday night about 110.
G: Is this every Monday night you get together?
R: Every other Monday night. We?ve also started one on Thursday night also now.
G: And is that just for teens or for all family members?
R: It?s for children from 3 to 24 and then parents and/or guardians or court-appointed people.
G: So now what are you doing during the holidays? Nancy, what have you cooked up for Ryan?s Place during the holidays?
N: Well, we had this get together last Monday night with our regular meeting time and we had a carry-in dinner and Santa came and gave out beanie babies to all of the children because we had a lady in the community who died and she had been a big beanie baby collector and she was very supportive of Ryan?s Place and so she gave all of those at her death to Ryan?s Place and so we?ve been giving those out because we find that children will talk more openly and stuffed animals are very important to them and so they all got a beanie baby.
G: Well what a wonderful significant thing and what a wonderful thing to do in her memory. That?s great. What are some of the things that you see with your families during the holidays? What are their needs?
N: I am a facilitator for the parents who has had a child die, and some of the things that you mentioned at the beginning of the show were very important.
G: We?re going to have to come up on break right now so when we get back, I would like Nancy Gleim to speak more about the needs during the holidays of bereaved families. We?re talking with Nancy and Rex Gleim today about their place for bereaved families called Ryan?s Place in Indiana. Please stay tuned to hear more from Healing the Grieving Heart with Rex and Nancy Gleim. I?m your host, Dr. Gloria Horsley.
Welcome back to Healing the Grieving Heart. I?m your host, Dr. Gloria Horsley and our topic today is helping families deal with the holidays. My guests today are Rex and Nancy Gleim, retired educators. In 1992, Rex and Nancy?s son, Ryan, died in an auto accident. After his death, they founded two local chapters of The Compassionate Friends in Indiana and in 2002, in response to their community?s needs, they founded Ryan?s Place, a grief center for families. Welcome back, Rex and Nancy. Nancy and I before break were talking about what the families? needs are that they see at Ryan?s Place. Nancy, did you have any more thoughts about that?
N: Yes, I think one of the things that parents, especially, ask is how do we memorialize our child without making them like they were something angelic? So we talk about how to save those holidays and what they can do to make them a little easier for their family. Since we deal with the family, I try to help the parents and give them some ideas of how they can incorporate all of their children into this holiday celebration. So some of the things that we deal with is like maybe at Christmas dinner have a rose on the table that is in memory of the child or the person who died.
G: Yes, and nothing needs to be said, does it? You can just have it there.
N: No, it doesn?t. And relatives, when you have people in, they tend not to talk about, especially in our case, that deceased child.
G: Especially during the holidays because they don?t want to make other people sad, right?
N: Right, as if we aren?t already sad. Yeah, so just the rose on the table. Sometimes people have a special candle on the table. And your point of making sure they take care of themselves is very important.
G: Now what would you think about, do families ever visit the grave or do things like that? Because it seems like if you have a special time, you don?t have to spread it out through the whole day. I don?t know. People tell me and I?ve felt that way. There?s kind of a satisfaction in having acknowledged it.
R: In fact, we know one family who has a tradition of visiting the gravesite early on Christmas morning and then they go on with the day. They?ve honored their loved one and even the grandchildren have learned to accept the fact that one of the things they do on Christmas day is visit their aunt?s grave and then they talk about her, and it releases them for the day. It?s been a really good experience.
G: You know, it?s interesting because I work with the 9/11 firemen families in New York City and one of the most powerful things that we?ve been able to do with those families is give them permission to have some family fun time.
N: Oh, yes.
R: And you know that?s one of the things that people after a death, they think they?re disrespecting their loved ones by enjoying themselves, and I think part of the healing process has to be you have to get on with your life. It?s not going to be the same, but you also have to think of yourself and part of the healthy part of you is being able to laugh again. And it?s not showing disrespect for the loved one.
G: And enjoying that holiday. If something comes up funny for you, if you remember something, give yourself the opportunity and the gift this Christmas to have some time and we want to give you permission to do it, because sometimes people need permission, don?t they?
N: Exactly.
G: I?m sure that?s part of what you do at Ryan?s Place is give people permission to go on with life.
R: We also, one of the things we do is encourage families to write a note to their loved one and then do a balloon launch. It?s not quite as effective in the wintertime because healing doesn?t quite operate the same in cold weather as it does in warm weather, but that has been very healing to the families, that they can do this, and it gets people to the cemetery as well.
G: I was also thinking when I was a little girl we used to write what we wanted for Christmas and put it on tissue paper and then we would let it go up the chimney with the fire draft and something like that might be kind of fun for little children to write something about their loved one and kind of send it up to the universe.
R: One of the projects we do with our families and we?ve done this several times is we cut paper dolls out of family members and then we glue them together or put them together and then the person who has died is made out of transparency film but is also connected so that that person is still there in the family group. We just can?t see that person now.
G: Oh, that?s sweet, and that could even be a Christmas ornament, something on the tree, or around the house. Very sweet thing to do with families. Well, what about blended families or divorced families? Do you see issues of that during the holidays?
R: We do have two or three families that are coming to us who have remarried after the death, and it?s interesting how in almost every case the new spouse has been extremely supportive of what the children are going through. Now I?m sure that doesn?t happen in every case, but the ones that are coming to Ryan?s Place, we just find the new parent has been extremely supportive of what the children?s needs are. That?s been rewarding for us because it allows the remaining spouse to still go ahead and grieve maybe the death of the husband or the wife, but the new spouse is supportive and encouraging of that. I think that?s important.
G: I was also thinking about ? I?ve had some experience with situations where the parents are divorced and it was a child that had died, and that?s kind of a sticky wicket during the holidays because you?ve got the children whose sibling died and their dad is in one place and their mother is in another so trying to give them support through that is an interesting proposition and getting the families together and having them talk. So the holidays can be a healing time for us or it can be a disruptive time for families who are bereaved. Have you seen that?
N: Yes, and we also have the situation where the parents were divorced and one of the parents is killed and so the other parent is bringing those children. The parent is not grieving the loss of the other person, but the children are and so that becomes another issue of how that parent can continue to help those children heal.
G: And what suggestions would you have during the holidays for that parent where it wasn?t their spouse, they have their stepchildren, right?
N: I think if you can be the open person to listen to your children, listening is a real important facet of grieving, and I?m sure it?s not something that they like to do but if that parent can bring up the topic of what do you remember about your mom? And even though there was a divorce, it probably wasn?t a real happy situation. If that surviving parent can be open and listen and let all of his anger go to focus on those children.
G: And maybe talk about past holidays or fun times with the family.
N: Something they?d like to do this Christmas.
G: Exactly. How would they like to have it the same? How would they like to see it different?
R: And many families, the opportunity to do things different is presented at Ryan?s Place because you don?t need to have the same family dinner that you had in past years. You don?t have to put up the same ornaments or celebrate in the same way. It doesn?t mean that you aren?t celebrating. It?s just that it may be uncomfortable to do it the same way and so we encourage parents to try new things or do different things and establish new traditions.
G: However, don?t you find that the first year sometimes it?s best to slug through it?
N: Yes. It?s tough that first Christmas. I know going out and shopping was hard. One of the things I suggested to my parent group is maybe this is the year to give gift certificates or if you?re going to go, go with a list because making decisions is just so difficult. So go with a list or shop through the catalogue. Sometimes people want to do things in their own home because when you go out to stores, there?s all this Christmas music and there are some songs like ?I?ll Be Home for Christmas,? that?s a real tough one for me. So music, you?re out shopping and you can be blind sided and then here you find yourself standing in the aisle crying which is okay. We need to let them know that it?s okay to cry in the line or in the aisle. So maybe it?s just easier to give gift certificates or money this year rather than having to pick out gifts.
G: I think it?s also important during the first year or two and on beyond that depending, but the first year or two, family members and friends and everybody needs to know that you may have to get up and leave the table or you may have to walk out of the room and you need permission to be able to do that, you can?t just do it. You need to tell people and people should be aware. The most wonderful thing would be if you had a hostess who came up to you and said, ?You know, please leave at any time.?
R: You need to be compassionate especially with newly bereaved families because you don?t know what?s going to strike when. It might be an after-shave lotion that just triggers tears or it might be the back of a cousin?s head or something. They need to give you permission to handle that grief how you need to.
G: Exactly, it may be somebody might put stuffing on your plate or something and suddenly you leap out.
R: We laugh about the first year that Ryan had died and we bought our second son I think everything he had said he liked during the year. We just were crazy. We got up on Christmas morning and we both looked at each other and said, ?You know, this is one of the dumbest things we?ve ever done. We?re not going to do that again.? As we went down to celebrate Christmas, we just said to our son, Damon, ?We will never do this again. This is really dumb.? He just laughed and said, ?It?s okay to spoil me.? He had the right perspective but we just had gone overboard because we just felt we needed to.
G: And you want to take in. It?s a time when you want to take in. You want to get more. In fact, I think some people get in trouble probably spending too much money that first year.
N: We tried to make up for the loss of his brother. We try to fill a void that?s not fillable.
G: Absolutely. Well, it?s time for us to go on break now, and I?m your host, Dr. Gloria Horsley. Please stay tuned to hear more from guests Rex and Nancy Gleim, retired educators. In 1992, Rex and Nancy?s son, Ryan, died in an automobile accident, and after his death they founded two local chapters of The Compassionate Friends in Indiana and in 2002, in response to their community?s need, they founded Ryan?s Place, a grief center for families. And our topic today is helping the families deal with the holidays. Please join us on the show by calling 1-866-369-3742. You can email me about this and upcoming shows through www.healingthegrievingheart.org. Stay tuned. I?m your host, Dr. Gloria Horsley.
Welcome back to Healing the Grieving Heart. I?m your host, Dr. Gloria Horsley. Our topic today is helping families deal with the holidays, and my guests are Rex and Nancy Gleim, retired educators. In 1992, Rex and Nancy?s son, Ryan, died in an automobile accident. After his death they founded two local chapters of The Compassionate Friends in Indiana and in 2002, in response to their community?s needs, they founded Ryan?s Place, a center for grieving families. Joining us on this segment is going to be Dwight Greezer, who is the president of the Board of Ryan?s Place. Did I say your name right, Dwight?
D: That is correct, Gloria.
G: Anyway, when we had a break we were talking about families during the holidays and how tough the first year was and how sometimes you have to slug along with that year, and Ryan?s Place is a place that helps families get along with the holidays and all during the year and they deal with all types of loss. Am I correct, Rex?
R: Yes, that is correct.
G: Great. And also you have a large Amish segment there.
R: Yes, we?re probably the only center in the United States that has a large Amish segment that comes to us. And we also have two Amish facilitators and I?m sure we?re the only center in the United States that has Amish facilitators.
G: Very interesting, and the Amish are very family oriented.
R: Oh, extremely, extremely family oriented.
G: Well, Dwight, welcome to the show. Did you have a thought or a question for Nancy or myself and Rex?
D: I just have a couple of ideas. I think one of the things that, and you mention about the Amish families. One of the misnomers is that because of their culture and religious background, you would have a tendency to think that God takes care of things for them. And while that can seem to be what that community or that culture expects, it doesn?t always happen that way. And that can be true for other families and communities as well.
G: Let me follow up on that point a little bit. I think it?s a wonderful point during the holidays that grieving families, sometimes they are a little out of sorts with God. And during the holidays, this can be probably a difficult thing. Have you noticed that Rex?
R: Yes. In fact, I joke about the fact that after Ryan?s death, I said I was mad at Ryan. I was mad at God. I was mad at my minister. The list went on. So my counselor in his wisdom said, ?You know, we can?t handle that all at once. Why don?t we just take one at a time.? And you know just by him saying that, it just kind of broke that whole anger thing. And so I think sometimes we need permission that it?s okay to be angry at God.
G: Right. God can take it.
R: Yeah. He?s got broad shoulders and he?s used to that. But just giving permission is sometimes all it takes to kind of get over that hump that we have.
G: Absolutely. Well, Dwight, did you have another thought?
D: I think to add to that, and here?s where Ryan?s Place comes in, here?s where the community in a center like this can help families be in touch with each other so that even though as Rex mentioned you could be mad at God or God doesn?t seem to be real close to us now, it is that touch with other human beings who have had that same experience that in my estimation gives us the kind of success we?ve had here in the Michiana area because those families have touched other families and they can share that idea that, ?Yeah, I?m not real close or maybe God hasn?t been that close to me because of this death,? but as they talk with each other, they get help, the human help from each other, to move on.
G: Right. And Dwight, wouldn?t you say that that?s God?s help when we help one another? So as they say, God works in mysterious ways or whatever. Those helping hands we give to each other. My husband always says that he thinks people at Compassionate Friends and people who work in this area are angels.
D: I would agree with that.
G: Well, listen, Dwight, thank you very much for being on our show and good luck with Ryan?s Place. It sounds like a wonderful thing and outreach you?re doing for the community and people like you are wonderful to have that are willing to work with the bereaved and I know you?ve had some bereavement in your own life as we all do. Keep up the good work and thanks for being on the show.
D: If I could add one more thing. In a comment that Brian Greesey, the quarterback for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, made to our gala last February was that grief is a community responsibility. It isn?t solo. To me, it?s a great statement, and if communities can begin to observe that, then the whole community heals, it?s not just the families.
G: Well, one of the things I want to talk about is how somebody would go about doing a Ryan?s Place kind of thing and maybe we?ll find out ways to get in touch with your community and you can outreach to people, too, because it sounds like you?d be willing to do that, helping other communities. Thanks so much for being on the show, and thanks for the good work you?re doing.
D: Thanks very much, Gloria.
G: Well, it sounds like you?ve got a good strong President on your board.
R: We have a good strong board. They have just taken this issue on and they work very very hard in the community.
G: When Dwight came on the show, we were talking about that first year and the first couple of years. How long do people stay in your program would you say?
N: They stay from about nine months to eighteen months. We?ve had some that stayed longer. We had one family that ended up staying a little over two years because as they were ready to phase out, then there was another death and they ended up having three very close deaths in that period of time so it kind of depends on what is happening in their life, but the average length is from nine to eighteen months.
G: So you?re really seeing them in those first years of the holidays. You get involved in that a lot don?t you? As the holidays come up, you have people who are newly bereaved.
N: Right.
G: Do you find them coming more during that time for support or calling each other?
R: The attendance is really pretty regular. It?s amazing because I think that they find strength in being with each other and we find that especially true in the single parent group because the issues such as dating come up again after a year or so after the death, they may be ready to date but who?s going to date a woman who has three children or five children, and so those issues come up and are discussed at great length in those sessions.
G: Now do you see people going on to say Compassionate Friends from your group or do you think people look for support beyond that or it probably depends on the individual? But Compassionate Friends, of course, is for people who have had children die. So do you think that there?s a longer grieving process for that? Do you see people going on?
R: One of the things we were concerned about with Ryan?s Place, and I?m sure every center in the United States like ours has the same concern, especially open-ended programs like ours, is it becomes a social gathering. Sometimes the children are ready to phase out but the adults who are coming have found a social support group that they?ve not had in the community and this is a whole different set of problems for us.
G: So do you recommend that people go on to say Compassionate Friends if they?ve had a child die?
R: Yes, we think that we are simply one organization in the community that can help and so we do have a couple of people who have used The Compassionate Friends and then they come to Ryan?s Place or vice versa.
G: And then you might recommend the widows to go somewhere else and there are a lot of resources. So you?re kind of the first early intervention. Is that how you see yourself and then people moving on to other resources?
R: Not necessarily. We like that, but we also find that some people have gone to other groups and then found us. With Nancy being editor of The Compassionate Friends newsletter in this area, she incorporates a lot of Ryan?s Place information and so we?re doubly blessed that we can get information to two or three different groups at the same time.
G: And so you cover really all losses that we have in our life.
R: No, just death.
G: So you don?t do any divorce, but it can be of any family member?
R: Yes. Aunt, uncle, it can even be the next door neighbor who was a significant person in their life. A classmate. We have a number of children coming to us that had a classmate die and they?re not handling it real well and so a school counselor will say, ?You know, I think you could go to Ryan?s Place.?
G: And so your referrals are really through school counselors. If we had somebody in the audience that was looking for somebody to help a family member during this holiday season, how would you suggest that they go about finding somebody in their community?
R: Well, one of the best sources right now would be going to the Dougy Center website and that?s out of Portland, Oregon, dougycenter.org, and they give a listing in every state of organizations like ours and so if you were in Florida, you just go down and hit the Florida button and it would list all the centers similar to Ryan?s Place.
G: Well, that?s great, so someone could go on and do that if they?re feeling stressed during holidays and see if something is going on in their community. Also, sometimes local hospitals will have something available.
R: And some hospice programs do, too, but many times the hospice programs are like four weeks or six weeks and that?s not really long enough to work through a grief situation.
G: What would you say to somebody who feels like they need some support during the holidays?
R: Don?t hesitate to get it. Reach out. At the funeral home, people say, ?You just let me know what you need.? Well, the grieving person isn?t going to do that.
G: I remember a partner of my pediatrician went through the line at the funeral home and he said, ?Call me when you?re ready.? I?m like, ?No, that?s not going to happen.? Well, right now, it?s time for our final break, and please stay tuned for more comments and advice from our guests, Rex and Nancy Gleim. In 1992, Rex and Nancy?s son, Ryan, died in an automobile accident. They are founders of Ryan?s Place, a grief center for families, and stay tuned to hear more about next week?s very special guest and topic. You can email me through my website www.healingthegrievingheart.org and these shows are all archived on www.compassionatefriends.com and www.voiceamerica.com.
Welcome back to Healing the Grieving Heart. I?m your host, Dr. Gloria Horsley and our topic today is helping families deal with the holidays. My guests are Rex and Nancy Gleim, retired educators. In 1992, Rex and Nancy?s son, Ryan, died in an automobile accident. After his death they founded two local chapters of The Compassionate Friends in Indiana and in 2002, in response to their community?s needs, they founded Ryan?s Place, a grief center for families. Well, welcome back, Rex and Nancy. This is our last segment on the show and I wanted to ask you if there was anything that you felt that we missed and anything you?d like to talk about.
R: Well when we found out that after the death of our son there just weren?t any centers around and as we looked about, we knew that there was a great need for it but we discovered in Indiana there were only three centers and so we?re only the fourth center in the State of Indiana. We know that there are only about 180 centers throughout the United States so there is a great need for centers like this to be established. We discovered early on that the Dougy Center in Portland, Oregon, is the oldest center in the United States for grieving children and dealing with the families, and they do an excellent training job every summer. So we went out and were trained for six days in 2001, and we laugh about the fact that it was probably six of the more stressful days we?d ever spent and we were retired educators.
G: Now how did they choose you? Can any of our audience go and decide to do this? Do you have to have special requirements?
R: No, I don?t believe so. It?s a fairly expensive training process but worth every cent because when you return to your home community, you have all of the information that you need to really establish a center. All you?d have to do is come back and get a good Board of Directors established to assist you.
G: Do they send you information? Do you have materials? Do they support you and follow up?
R: Their training materials are outstanding and then they also publish quite a number of materials that we continue to buy because they?re so good and they work so well with children. It?s worth getting involved with the Dougy Center.
G: Then how do you recruit people to do this training?
R: We haven?t had much trouble. We handpicked the first ten people we trained and in fact the next group we trained were pretty handpicked too. Now we let people know in the community that we?re looking for facilitators. We ask for at least a year?s commitment. They have to have a police check. And they have to want to help children and families. I think that?s the key. And we train them on how to be more effective listeners and how to work with grieving children.
G: Oh, what a wonderful gift, thinking of gifts and the holidays. What a wonderful gift to give the world and also I think that one of the things that I found with healing and service, it?s such a wonderful thing for healing your own grief after a certain point. You certainly wouldn?t suggest somebody open a Dougy Center or a Ryan?s Place a year after their child died.
R: We like to have our facilitators go two years after the experience of a significant loss.
G: So they?ve worked through it a bit. Nancy, I know that you are the editor for The Compassionate Friends newsletter in your area and I wondered if you could talk to our audience a little bit about what if they wanted to start a Compassionate Friends group.
N: I contacted the national office and you have to be two years out of your grief before you can start a Compassionate Friends chapter, but I contacted the national office and that?s the national office at compassionatefriends.org and they sent a notebook of information that gave you step by step instructions on how to start your own chapter of The Compassionate Friends, and I found that extremely helpful. And if you need help all you have to do is call the national office and they just walk you through and the main thing is you have to find three other people to help you start this chapter and that was no problem because I had three friends and my husband were willing to help me. We were driving around forty miles to the closest Compassionate Friends chapter in cold, icy, snowy weather. It was just too far. And so that?s when we decided to start our chapter here locally.
G: Yeah, that?s a great thing to do now if you want to do a Ryan?s Center or using the Dougy Center model it would be for everyone, for the whole family, and then if you did a Compassionate Friends, it might be just for bereaved parents, grandparents and siblings.
N: We have some adult siblings coming to our Compassionate Friends but we don?t have anything for younger children and so some chapters have something for younger children but we don?t.
G: The national conference is a great place to come with younger children and teen-agers. It?s fabulous. The national conference is really wonderful. It will be in Detroit this year. I believe it starts on the 16th of July. It?s a great place to come with your family. Lots of wonderful healing activities. Well, I think it?s great that they say you need to be out of grief for two years and somebody might say to me, ?Why, what?s the two year thing?? What I want to say is the first year, your first Christmas, your first holiday is really, really tough. The second one is tough but it?s like, in fact, in some ways it?s almost harder because it?s like, is this it? And the third year, you?re saying, ?Okay, now what?? So wouldn?t you kind of say that?s the way it goes?
N: I thought that second year was worst than the first one.
G: It?s very hard.
N: Reality has set in that they are not coming back.
G: Yes, absolutely. I think the second Christmas, if you?re into that right now, is really one you need to take care of yourself and I don?t think you have to do even at your own home or whatever. You can go to a relative?s. The first year you might want to stay home. Who?s got the energy to do anything else? But the second year, you may need to go out.
N: Yes. And when a relative offers to have the family in, let them do it.
G: And buy the pies that you take over. It?s more important to have you in tact than it is to have homemade food. Before we end our show, I want to make sure people know how to get in touch with you. Could you give them your email?
R: Certainly. I?ll give them my own personal email and that?s nrgleim@aol.com.
G: Okay, great. And if you can?t get a hold of them, you can also get a hold of me at my website, www.healingthegrievingheart.org, and talk to them about doing a Ryan?s Place or ask them questions about your family or teenagers or whatever. And we hope that you?ll all have a wonderful holiday and that you take care of yourselves and thank you so much for being on the show, Rex and Nancy. It?s been great to have you on and have you tell us about Ryan?s Place, and have a wonderful Christmas yourself.
N&R: Thank you. You too.
G: And thank you for all the great work you do with those families and blessings to all of them for Christmas, too. It?s time to close our show and I want to thank my guests, Rex and Nancy Gleim. Please stay tuned in again next week, and as we are on the cusp of the new year, our topic will be New Year?s Resolutions for the Healing Heart. My guest for the show will be Sharon Greenlee, licensed professional counselor, educator, and consultant. Sharon is a twice bereaved mother and grandmother. She has written a beautiful children?s book called When Someone Dies. She also facilitates workshops, writing, and therapy and is an inspiration to all who know her. This show is a great way to start your new year. This show is archived on the website, www.healingthegrievingheart.org as well as www.thecompassionatefriends.org website. This is Dr. Gloria Horsley. Please stay tuned again next Thursday at 9:00 Pacific Standard Time, 12:00 Eastern, for more of Healing the Grieving Heart, a show of hope, renewal and support. Remember others have been there before you and made it, and you can too. You need not walk alone. Thanks for listening. I?m your host, Dr. Gloria Horsley.