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ANNOUNCEMENTS

We would love you to submit your story or writings for our newsletter email us on tcfsa@mweb.co.za or fax 011-887 9494

COUNSELLING COURSE 17 JULY

Educate and empower yourself, join the Compassionate Friends Councillors in the sanctity of TCF House as we embark on a
journey of Personal Growth. We will be holding a Counselling Course at TCF house.
The course will be given by Madge Rix, who is a
bereaved parent herself and is a trained psychologist.

As a bereaved parent, taking part in something like this might be the last thing on your mind, however, it can be a catalyst for great healing. Becoming the master of your own grief is step towards empowerment, it also allows the opportunity
to give back and assist other bereaved parents on their journey, once again unifying us all indelibly. The course starts at 9:00am and finishes at 3:30pm,
the price of the course is R200.00 per person, should you be among our less fortunate members, and would
like to attend please contact the office.

Please bring your own lunch.

Dearest Mommy

When you wonder the meaning of life and love
Know that I am with you,
Close your eyes and feel me kissing you
in the gentle breeze across you cheek.

When you begin to doubt that you shall ever see me again
Quiet your mind and hear me,
I am in the whisper of the heavens
Speaking of your love.

When you lose your identity
When you question who you are and where you are going,
Open your heart and see me.
I am the twinkle in the stars smiling down upon you,
Lighting the path of your journey.

When you awaken each morning
Not remembering your dreams
But feeling content and serene
Know that I was with you-
Filling your night with thoughts of me.

When you linger in the remnant pain
Wholeness seeming so unfamiliar
Think of me and
Know that I am with you,
Touching you through the shared tears of a gentle friend
Easing the pain.

As the sunrise illuminates the desert sky,
In the breathtaking glory, awaken your spirit
Think of our time, all too brief, but ever so brilliant.
When you were certain of us, together
When you were certain of your destiny

Know that God created that moment in time, just for Us

Dearest Mommy I’m with you Always

Pablo Neruda

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Forgiving does not erase the bitter past. A healed memory is not a deleted memory.

Instead, forgiving what we cannot forget creates a new way to remember. We change the memory of our past into a hope for our
future.
Lewis B. Smedes

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What is the definition
of guts? Grace under
pressure.
Ernest Hemingway
(1899 - 1961)

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JULY 2010 julypic

My dear Friends,

How do you explain premature death to young children? How do you explain without frightening them? How do you explain what you yourself can’t understand? Comparisons with nature – an old tree dying, leaves falling, flowers turning to seed – and images of a safe, happy Heaven don’t always stop the questions and the fears. Children are sensitive to nuances and your sadness does not go by unnoticed and worried about.

Accidental deaths, illness, violent loss, drownings, possibly create the most anxiety. If my sibling, friend, cousin, aunt or uncle died like this, could it happen to me too? It’s an enormous concern and challenge to bereaved families to cope with this situation. I don’t have easy, or indeed any, answers. Each of you with your own beliefs and values, your knowledge of your children and grandchildren, and your acute sensitivity to their needs, will find some way to
approach the problem. It’s daunting and honestly there will be some stumbling as you search for what is best.

However intimidating that realization is, it’s far better to communicate as openly as possible as you try to answer all those troubling questions. TCF has books, some written specifically for children, others to guide adults, that could assist you.

There’s one aspect of this quagmire that’s even harder perhaps to tackle – suicide. How do you talk about depression, differentiate to young, inexperienced minds between feeling sad and despair, remove stigma without those side-effects too awful to contemplate. It’s an horrendous task and I am awed by those who meet it. Speaking to someone who has faced the dilemma and done so magnificently, I learnt the importance of spelling out that mental illness is a sickness, often incurable and one that overwhelms the victims. You who have an inkling of the
desperation of these sad boys and girls know the hurt of ignorance and prejudice. You reject those judgmental views and it becomes your duty to teach youngsters about the nature of depression which is like a cancer of the mind and the soul, to remove the superstitions and stigmas, and to explore the ways of extending tenderness and compassion to the sufferers. Of course it’s very important to inform children of the many resources available that help to prevent further tragedies.

If this is one of your many burdens, may you be able to manage it with the same courage and strength you are bringing to every aspect of your mourning.

Much love,

ROSEMARY DIRMEIK

tcfemblem We Need Not Walk Alone
We are The Compassionate Friends. We reach out to each others with love, with understanding and with hope. Our children have died at all ages and from many different causes, but our love for our children unites us.

Your pain becomes my pain just as your hope becomes my hope. We come together from all walks of life, from many different circumstances. We are a unique family because we represent many races and creeds. We are young, and we are old. Some of us are far along in our grief, but others still feel a grief so fresh and intensely painful that we feel helpless and see no hope. Some of us have found our faith to be a source of strength; some of us are struggling to find answers. Some of us are angry, filled with guilt or in deep depression; others radiate an inner peace. But whatever pain we bring to this gathering of The Compassionate Friends, it is pain we will share just as we share with each other our love for our children.

We are all seeking and struggling to build a future for ourselves, but we are committed to building that future together and reach out to each other in love and share the pain as well as
the joy, share the anger as well as the peace, share the faith as well as the doubts and help each other to grieve as well as to grow.

We need not walk alone.

We are The Compassionate Friends.

Relationship with Grief

South Africa is on a high, at the opening game of the 2010 World Cup Soccer our Bafana Bafana, ranked 83rd , drew 1 all against a team that is ranked 17th. This is a relationship, it is how our National Team is ranked in relation to the Mexican National Team What is your relationship to grief? Do you feel totally undermined by this world ranking emotion or do you see yourself as equal to it?

soccer1

Grief is just an emotion, this may sound completely crass and uncaring, sadly or rather with relief, I say again that grief is just an emotion. Just like joy, hurt, anger, happiness, sadness, disappointment and all the rest that lay in the spectrum of our emotional range lying in wait to be released at the appropriate time. Saying it like that makes me feel like Pavlov’s dog, give me the right bell and I’ll react with the appropriate emotion. Are we in control of our emotions? Nope, we aren’t. They pop up like annoying little turret syndrome speech bubbles. Can we control how we relate to them, indeed, and that is where our mastery lies.

Pavlov’s dog could not control how he related to food, thank heaven’s I don’t know of any Fido’s, Fifi’s or Benji’s amongst our members. Relating to
grief means that you need to see yourself as equal to it, like you could see grief as a person and stare it dead in the eye, say “hi, I know exactly who
you are, I know precisely what your motive is and you can bring it . . . and I
will honour it, but I will do so as an equal” Grief has a right to a place in
your life as does all the good feelings, but as human beings we avoid
feeling anything painful, rightly so, its rather unpleasant to feel something
hurt, and that’s putting it mildly.

How to relate to grief as an equal, is quite a tough lesson to learn. What would it mean to you to not avoid feeling grief, not by default because you can’t help it, but by actually consciously giving yourself permission to feel that specific brand of pain? Imagine that you took ownership of the grief emotion? Imagine that it was no longer pushed to the outside of who you are, but allowed in to be integrated into who you are? Would this not give you some modicum of control, or at the very least the perception of control? I have a feeling that this might be a step towards empowerment, and once empowered you could possibly then channel your grief into something constructive, maybe even a legacy for your departed child . . . it’s a thought, and for some of you too alien to even consider.

soccer2

So think of yourself as Bafana Bafana, with the entire nation of TCF supporting you, blowing our vuvuzela’s looking at Mexico, your grief, and saying I know that I’m 83rd on the log and you are 17th, but it doesn’t
matter because I am equal to you.

Inspirational Quotes from

Maya Angelou <img src="Images/Photos/Maya Angelou" />

As a poet, author, actress, filmmaker, educator, and civil rights activist, Dr. Maya Angelou is one of the most renowned and influential voices of our time.

1. "Ask for what you want and be prepared to get it."

2. "Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away."

3. "If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change your attitude. Don't complain."

4. "I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel."

5. "Love recognizes no barriers. It jumps hurdles, leaps fences, penetrates walls to arrive at it destination full of hope."

6. "A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song."

7. "Success is liking yourself, liking what you do, and liking how you do it."

www.compassionatefriends.org.za 2010 | Updated: 1 July 2010