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    Gone Before: A Grief Journey in Poems: Ruth Fanshaw's Poetry, #2
    Gone Before: A Grief Journey in Poems: Ruth Fanshaw's Poetry, #2
    Gone Before: A Grief Journey in Poems: Ruth Fanshaw's Poetry, #2
    Ebook108 pages1 hourRuth Fanshaw's Poetry

    Gone Before: A Grief Journey in Poems: Ruth Fanshaw's Poetry, #2

    By Ruth Fanshaw

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    About this ebook

    Ruth lost her mum in 2020. For the last 6 years of her life she'd been living in Ruth's home, and they'd become very close.

     

    Writing these poems was a vital part of Ruth's grief journey, helping her to process the enormity of her loss and to work through her deep pain, finally coming to a place of acceptance, comfort, and healing.

     

    This book invites the reader to walk that road with Ruth, in the hope that it will be a help to them on their own path to healing.

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    Gone Before is an uplifting companion for anyone experiencing grief after the loss of a loved one.

    – Edith Wairimu, Readers' Favorite reviewer – 5 stars awarded

     

    I appreciated the soul and depth… that shone in this. It was very emotional but also grounding and so very touching and beautiful.

    – A.R. Harlow, professional editor

     

    [A] mesmerizing collection… Each poem… offers unique insight into the human psyche relating to grief… It is an inspiring poetry collection that I will highly recommend.

    – Pikasho Deka, Reader's Favorite reviewer – 5 stars awarded

     

    I… liked the soft and simple language that carried strong emotions and meaning with every word…

    – Ana-Maria Leasa, Reader's Favorite reviewer – 5 stars awarded

     

    Gone Before is an excellent book that will inspire readers to reflect on life…

    – Diana Lopez, Reader's Favorite reviewer – 5 stars awarded

     

    …I would give a whole bucket of stars if I could. I very highly recommend this collection.

    – Jamie Michele, Reader's Favorite reviewer – 5 stars awarded

     

    * * *


    37 KB; 8,215 words

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherOriginal Text Publications
    Release dateDec 24, 2022
    ISBN9781915704009
    Gone Before: A Grief Journey in Poems: Ruth Fanshaw's Poetry, #2
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      Book preview

      Gone Before - Ruth Fanshaw

      Special Thanks To:

      My sister, Debbie Fanshaw

      My ‘Bonus Mum’ Sue Brown

      My good friends, Nikki Mann & Helen Riley

      My former Christian counsellor & therapist, Joanna Burridge

      Thank you all for your help and support!

      I hope you know the difference you’ve made to my life.

      ~

      I also owe a debt of thanks to Dr. Henry Cloud, especially for his course on grief (see Helpful Resources).

      And, of course, to The Piano Guys, who always make me feel closer to God, and whom He uses every day to restore my soul.

      ~*~

      My Grief Journey

      My Mum passed away on the 19th June 2020, after a short illness. These poems were written over the first couple of years after we lost her, and have been an absolutely vital part of my grieving and healing process. My hope is that they will also help others who are grieving to find healing and peace.

      Mum had lived in my home for the last 6 years of her life, so that many of the problems I faced were similar to the problems of those who are widowed – expecting to see her in the home, adjusting to being a household of one again, and so on.

      My relationship with her had, at times, been problematic over the years. As Dr. Henry Cloud points out,¹ it’s important that we grieve the whole person – the good and the bad – if we are to grieve in a healthy way. But I haven’t included much of the less positive stuff in this book, because I didn’t think it was appropriate to make it public. In any case, I feel that we worked through most of that stuff during those last 6 years, and that we became very close. And I dare say I was hard to live with sometimes, too.

      Stages of Grief?

      People often talk about the ‘Stages of Grief’: supposedly denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. From my own experience, I’d say that these are more like aspects of grief than stages. Different aspects may be more to the fore than others at different times and for different people – and of course, some people may not experience some of them at all.

      ‘Depression’ or sadness is pretty much a given; I think, for most of us, this what we tend to think of as grief. For me, it was certainly very overwhelming at times – for the first month or so, almost all-consuming. From my experience, I would say that it is also probably the most enduring feature of grief, and the one that flares up again and again over the years, though mercifully not with the same intensity as it did in the beginning.

      For me, denial and ‘bargaining’ (including going over and over events in the mind, and wondering if things might have worked out differently if I’d acted sooner or in different ways) were also very prominent. Anger wasn’t really a factor until quite late on in my grieving process, for some reason.

      Worden’s Four Tasks of Grief

      A model I’ve found much more helpful is the idea of four ‘tasks’

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