Win a Book!

Thursday Thoughts on Reading and Writing



When you leave a comment on THIS post by 6 p.m. CT Sunday, January 20, 2013 you'll be entered in the DRAWING for a copy of the book shown below. If you mention in your comment that you’re a follower (see in the left column “Join This Site” and “Follow by Email”), I’ll add your name a second time in the drawing. You must be eighteen, have a U.S. mailing address, void where prohibited. You can read details about my book giveaways here.      

I’m happy to have Alice Wisler with us today. Her article appears below.

Alice was born in Osaka, Japan in the sixties. Her parents were Presbyterian career missionaries. As a young child, Alice loved to walk down to the local stationer’s store to buy notebooks, pencils, and scented erasers. In her room, she created stories. The desire to be a published famous author has never left her. She’s the author of Rain Song, How Sweet It Is, Hatteras Girl, and A Wedding Invitation (all published by Bethany House) and Still Life in Shadows (River North/Moody).

Her new devotional is Getting Out of Bed in the Morning: Reflections of Comfort in Heartache (Leafwood Publishers).

Alice has four children—Rachel, Daniel, Benjamin, and Elizabeth. Daniel died on 2/2/97 from cancer treatments at the age of four. Since then, Alice founded Daniel’s House Publications in her son’s memory. This organization reaches out to others who have also lost a child to death.

Alice presents online writing courses—Writing the Heartache—and other workshops across the country. She also has a line of remembrance cards and thank you cards. She is a contributing author at Open to Hope where she writes on grief and loss. Her three blogs are Writing the Heartache, Alice's Patchwork Quilt, and Broken Psalms.

Article by Alice Wisler

A weeping willow tree, one flowery journal, two pens (in case one ran out of ink), and a box of Puffs tissues. Those objects stayed close beside me. In my early confusion over the loss of my son, these items never ignored my grief or told me to “get over it.”

When it grew too dark to see underneath the stringy weeping willow, I carried my pen and journal inside a house that seemed too empty, and wrote some more. At night, I woke to grapple with turmoil, with the noises in my head, the flashbacks of the cancer ward, the cries of my son. I wrote the ugly words “why?” and “how come?” before I could sleep again.

I scribbled through myths and clichés. I unleashed resentment and longing. I addressed prayers to God.

And, surprisingly, I discovered. Some of the confusion slid away, some of the guilt abandoned me. There was nothing I could have done to save my four-year-old’s life. Even my love had not been strong enough to destroy that infection that flared inside his tiny body. I was human and really not as in control as I wanted to believe. I would have to live with that.

I began to understand the new me. She was a tower of strength and compassion; she was tender and vulnerable, realistic, with just the right touch of cynicism. She needed protection from too many plastic smiles; she could not go long without a hug or sharing a story about a blue-eyed boy with an infectious laugh.

My written words healed me. And I jumped at the opportunity to tell others. I’d found comfort and clarity. I smiled at my husband and three young children, and at last, I didn’t want to run my van over the cliff; I wanted to smell the peonies and taste the salt from the ocean on my skin.

The beauty about grief-writing is that no one has to read it. You don’t have to worry about a teacher correcting your spelling or grammar. There’s no grade, no pass or fail. No one cares if your letters are sloppy. It’s written by you and for you. And, yes, it works.

Use these tips to help write your heartache for healing, health and hope.

 Find a secluded place to write where you can think clearly without distraction.

 Write, at first, for your eyes only. It doesn’t have to be shared with anyone.

 Write to chart progress for you to read years down the road.

 Write with the feeling, “I will survive this.”

 Write to identify your emotions and feelings.

 Write to help solve some of the new situations you must now face.

 Think of your journal as a friend who never judges and who can never hurt you.

 Write your spiritual struggles.

 Write to rebuild your self-esteem and your self-confidence.

Remember: leave a comment on THIS post by 6 p.m. CT Sunday, January 20, 2013 and you'll be entered in the drawing for a copy of Getting Out of the Bed in the Morning by Alice Wisler. You must be eighteen, have a U.S. mailing address, void where prohibited. Please, please remember to leave your email address so that should you be the winner I can get in touch with you for your mailing address. I’ll announce the winner in Monday’s blog.

Till next time ... keep on smiling.