The Perils of New Year’s Eve
Yet another New Year’s Eve is upon us! Why is this particular holiday such a trigger?
As I was driving home from the gym this morning, I suddenly felt panicked to support the many women in Paisley Project for whom this will be their first New Year’s Eve as a widow. Then I called my business partner—who happens to be my sister—to address this panic. She reminded me that my first New Year’s Eve as a widow was so impactful that I wrote about it in my book, Lovely Tragic Miracle. When I got home, we found the page that told the story of this evening for me.
I spent New Year’s Eve at Russ and Tracy’s house with several members of their family. I waited for the minutes to tick away until the arrival of the New Year, and then gathered my kids and we made our way back to our apartment. I crawled into bed but felt unable to sleep, swarmed by the ever-present thoughts in my head.
My sister Barbara had given me a journal for Christmas. She had encouraged me to write about what I was going through and sent along a black, leather-bound Moleskine notebook and a black felt-tipped pen. I pulled both of them out in those early hours of New Year’s Day, 2011, and tried to write something down.
January 1, 2011
As everyone is wishing a happy new year on Facebook, I’m alone in my bed for the first time in 29 years. I keep thinking that I have the same difficult struggles ahead that were there 30 minutes ago. Sadness fell over me in the last hours of 2010 as I realized that we mark a person’s life by the year that they were born and the year they die. Pat’s years were 1965 and 2010 and both have passed now. I am mostly returning to the disbelief that has been my state of mind for much of the last three months. How did this happen? Is this really my life and not some poor family that I have heard about in passing? God, I must trust you! I would certainly not have picked this path to walk. I long to walk the streets of gold and not measure time by days and years. Tonight I beg God for mercy and grace.
We are all having to figure out how to live each new moment.
What can I say about this now, fourteen years after that lonely night? I don’t have all the answers. I know everyone has different ideas about what makes things hard and helpful. I am in a different space now than I was all those years ago. I have grown and learned and been led by that mercy and grace I prayed for to create the Paisley Project. It certainly hasn’t been easy, but it has been more meaningful than I ever imagined.
And so, and this New Year’s Eve, 2024, I want to reach out and acknowledge those of you who are early in grief and for whom this holiday may hit heavy and hard. We see you, and we understand. And we want to offer you some insight from some of us who have been on the same path.
I called on our own Paisley Project coaches for their advice on this particular date/holiday. Here are a few of their responses:
Nothing will make this experience significantly better. It is what it is, and it can be challenging to accept. However, I have found that simply knowing someone cares and truly understands your feelings can feel so much better than facing the overwhelming sense of aloneness. You aren’t alone in this journey, and there is comfort in shared understanding. —Michelle Nelson
Do something to remember your loved one tonight. Light a candle, listen to music, call a friend, tell stories about him. Raise a glass to him. But most of all be gentle with yourself. Cry, laugh, let yourself feel it. It will all be okay and you will get through it.
If you are ready, write about the things you are looking forward to doing next year. He would want happiness for you. Don’t forget to pat yourself on the back for how far you have already come and how much you have grown. He is proud of you and so am I. —Suzanne Milani
Although it may be difficult to imagine right now, there is a world of possibility in front of you. If you feel up to it, think about or write about what it would be like to step out of your comfort zone and do something you’ve always wanted to do. Figure out what that thing or things are and make it happen. Lean into the Paisley Project ladies for help and community in doing it. We are here for you! —Cindi Betz
The plans, the heightened anticipation of friends gathering for fun, frivolity, and laughter to ring in the new year, or a magical trip planned forever ago to celebrate, just you and your love! The day has come but plans have been upended.
Anticipation and magic and enchanting plans are now a wax candle left unattended, slowly melting away. You are that melting candle--a crumpling sadness fills the minutes, the seconds. Your love is gone, he is gone, swept from your arms, your dreams, your nights, your days.
We know the death day will arrive for all of us, but, dammit,
We.Are.Never.Ever.Prepared.
Paisley girls have walked before you on this blur of a highway, and we are here, standing beside you, also bracing ourselves again for a holiday that stirs our emotions. Paisley Project is here to welcome new widows perhaps still in unbelief.
The refuge created intentionally by Karyl, now Paisley Project, comes from sorrow and pain. It is a safe haven for your tears. We are sorry for your loss. We ourselves still grieve and in our grief we find refuge with one another. Tell or scream your story with us. It’s fine, it’s fine. Other widows will reach out to you. Embrace this place of refuge and know that we are walking forward with you in this new season, in this new year. —Diane Farris
Leaving the year (2014) was another death.
I hoped for hope and knew that the Paisley Project was there to walk beside me.
I felt safe with the Paisley Widows. Safe to be any version of my crazy, irrational self. I felt completely accepted and not judged.
The Widows who had gone (on this journey) before me, inspired me to find my brave. They inspired me to dig deep and also to be vulnerable in reaching out to them for guidance. —Holly Leigh
All of us here at Paisley Project are sending a circle of support to you on New Year’s Eve. Try hard to carry those memories and feelings of love with you, not necessarily in a sad or morose way, but more like “it happened and it was special and it was a big part of my story and it has helped to shape me” sort of way.
Here with you all and with hope for the new year,
Karyl