Two weeks after her husband’s death on June 30, 2000, trying to get the grief behind her, Diane Dettmer accepted a new position as a literacy staff developer. Traveling with colleagues to training sessions in various parts of the country added more stress and did little to speed up the grief process. Diane and her husband, John, enjoyed twenty-eight years of marriage; the sudden loss of her loving husband devastated her. 

In the following excerpt from Diane Dettmann’s memoir, Twenty-Eight Snow Angels: A Widow’s Story of Love, Loss and Renewal, Diane shares insights into the grief she experienced a year after her husband’s death.

All the relaxation and calm I had stored up from summer vacation had disappeared within the first few days of the new school year. Sitting with my colleagues at the Minneapolis-Saint Paul airport, my stomach whirled around as I stared at the Chili’s menu. Nothing appealed to me, but I settled on a breakfast taco. Plastic spoons and forks had replaced the metal eating utensils, and there were no knives anywhere. Picking at the tortilla shell with my plastic fork, I realized how the terrorists had changed every part of our lives. The thought of a Bloody Mary or screwdriver passed through my mind, but I hoped the early morning pill would squelch the anxiety storm brewing inside of me.

Gray skies and a hotel in the middle of nowhere greeted us in Cincinnati. During the continental breakfast before the first session, I spied Jane and waved to her. We wound our way through the crowd and hugged. She tipped her head to the side, looked me in the eye and asked how I was doing. “Great,” I answered, which was a lie. The session started with a memoir study with the trainer reading children’s books to us about death and loss. Not my favorite topic. I looked forward to the morning break, hoping a tray of chocolate chip cookies would be waiting for me.

The first night alone in my room, I stared out the window at the full moon’s glimmer on the Ohio River. I thought of all the sunrises and sunsets John and I had enjoyed together. The warmth of his arms wrapped around me. My life felt more settled now than a year ago, but the loss still followed me everywhere. Nothing magical had happened at the end of the first year of grief. John was still gone. Instead of a 50-yard dash, my journey through grief seemed more like a grueling marathon that required endurance and strength to reach the finish line.

Diane Dettmann

Diane's the author of two memoirs, Twenty-Eight Snow Angels: A Widow's Story of Love, Loss and Renewal, and Miriam Daughter of Finnish Immigrants. Twenty-Eight Snow Angels was selected as a runner-up in the national "2013 Beach Book Festival" awards. She has presented her work at libraries, historical centers, Barnes & Noble, local bookstores, the “Minnesota Reading Association,” and at international immigration conferences in Turku, Finland and Thunder Bay, Canada. She has facilitated writing workshops at the Bloomington Writer's Festival and Book Fair in Bloomington, Minnesota and at local writer's groups. As a literacy staff developer in the St. Paul Public Schools, she attended national literacy training and provided staff development for teachers in the area of writing and reading instruction. She has attended national writer's conferences where she has met and interacted with authors, publicists, agents and writing instructors. Her books have been reviewed in local newspapers and also in national and international publications. Diane is a contributing author for the “Women’s Voices for Change” website. Her writing has also been featured online on “Brandlady,” “The Finnish North American Literature Association,” and the “Grief Project”. She has been interviewed by KAXE radio in northern Minnesota, Dr. Gloria with Open to Hope Radio in Palo Alto, California and the national magazine for retired educators, neatoday This Active Life. Reviews of her writing have been published in the Finnish American Reporter, The Woodbury Bulletin and the St Paul Pioneer Press. A portion of her book sales is donated to the “American Widow Project,” a non-profit that supports military widows, widowers and their families. Diane is currently working on a post WWII novel.

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