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Hi all,

I would be very interested, and I'm sure others would too, to find out how you coped with your particular trauma?

I'd like to know how you coped in the first days/weeks/months, and how some of you feel now maybe years later?

I'm sure it would help others who are at a different stage to ourselves, if only to make them feel that they are not alone and can get some support.

I'm just an ordinary mum who has found friends on this site and been helped to realize that we're not alone.

.........

Personally I went to Compassionate Friends to a group meeting.  Maybe it was too soon after my trauma because hearing other people's stories all at once seemed like an emotional overload. Others I've spoken to seem to find it helped them though.

I then went to Road Trauma Support in Vic, as I was told I could get some free counselling, which certainly helped me more on a one to one basis rather than in a group situation.

When I felt strong enough, I offered to volunteer with them, which made me stronger as I felt as though my grief in losing my daughter Jane, was put to some use in helping others. I became a peer supporter and spoke to other people who had lost children. I also speak to traffic offenders sent by the courts for education seminars.

I know that isn't for everyone, and some will not either want, or feel ready to do anything like that and that's fine, but I'm just saying that it helped me to feel as though I was doing something positive after having no control over losing my daughter.

Some other people who've joined this site have been injured in a road trauma, and they have told us of their recovery, warts and all, but it helped them, and was also a great interest to the rest of us.

Please don't let the site die, it can be so instrumental in helping both yourselves and others in their healing process.

Ann.

Hi Ann,

My husband and I did not join into any groups, we did what we have nicknamed 'diversions'.

We did stuff together that diverted us away from the reality of the nightmare we were and still do live. In our first twelve months of life after Jack, we both got tattoos for the first time, we made a garden in memory of Jack, we commissioned a portrait of him, we wrote letters and poems and ran away from society. We coccooned ourselves into our own little world.

We had enormous support from family and friends and over those first 12 to 18 months we had many weekend visitors. We live hundreds of kilometres away from our family and between them someone would spend a weekend or two every month or so with us. They kept checking on us and down the track still do, though of course not so intently.

It will be 4 years in April since Jack died and we still need those 'diversions'. Our grief comes in waves, sometimes together and sometimes seperately. We accomodate each others grief and go with the flow of it.

We talk about Jack every day. There is not one day passes in which he is not mentioned. Some people find that uncomfortable but that is there issue, not ours.

Anyway Ann, we cope in the best way that we can. Sometimes we do that well and sometimes not at all. It is our lifes journey and so we try to make the best with what life has presented to us. We work at it each and everyday day.

Xo Rose

Thanks Rose.  It's interesting that you say that writing and poetry helped you.

You poems are very moving, and you have the talent to create how you feel in a poem, which is wonderful. Thanks for sharing them with us Rose, I really appreciate reading them.

At Road Trauma, they had a series of workshops run by the counsellors, one of them being creative writing.  Quite a big group of us attended, all having being affected by road trauma in some way or another. One lady said that because she had two young children, she wasn't able to grieve openly for their dad, who had died only months ago.  She started to write, encouraged by the presenter and the words just flowed on to her paper.

After that session, she said that at last she had found a way to put her grief into words and let it all out. She walked out with a smile on her face because of what she had achieved. Her loss will not be any less painful, but she found a way to express it through her writing, and she was able to hide her pain a little from her young children, in turn making her feel better.

Attending a creative writing session each week, now in my third year has helped me to express my feelings, and I've found support from the lovely friends I've me there.

Looking forward to hearing from more of you.

Hugs Ann  xx