New Year: New Sadness

With the new year in full swing, I have had my happy moments and working on all of my goals to finish up my 30th year and my new goal for saving money this year, by saving a dollar a week. With all of these great moments, there has also been some sadness.
January brings new knowledge knowing that this is the "first" new year in which my brother will not be. You see, he passed away in 2011, but he was still here for part of the year, this is the first year, where he will not be here at all to make us smile and laugh. It brings me great sadness to know that not only is this the first year but is is getting closer to the one year mark of when he passed.

This still boggles me, I know I have said it many times, but Life is different and this is the "new" way of life and to be honest it SUCKS! There are so many times when I want to send him a text with a funny picture I have seen or a quote that I know he would love.

I have looked into the stages of grief, mainly because I was curious as to which one I was in or experiencing. I came across this website Recover from Grief and they have the stages listed. According to this website there are 7 stages:

1. SHOCK & DENIAL-
2. PAIN & GUILT-
3. ANGER & BARGAINING-
4.  "DEPRESSION", REFLECTION, LONELINESS-

5. THE UPWARD TURN-6. RECONSTRUCTION & WORKING THROUGH-
7. ACCEPTANCE & HOPE-

One of the reasons, I have wanted to read up on this is because I wanted to make sure what I was feeling was normal. I am not one to care what others think or spend my time worrying about it but lately, I feel a little bit lost.

I have done a lot of things to help myself learn how to live my new life, I write him letters, share pictures with the kiddos, watch videos, share stories with his friends. Most days, I do alright and then wow, there are others days when I don't even want to get out of bed.  I am blessed because even thought this is a huge and complicated adjustment, I have a strong family to fall back on. My sister and I have become closer than ever and I think it has taught me that family (I consider my family to be the people I love and hold dear to me, not just because we are related by blood), is there and lean on them whenever you need to.

How do you hold on to your love ones that have left us?