Grief & Love Well, Stacy Saindon Coaching, LLC

Good Mourning, Friday!

Today is the 30th anniversary of my mom’s death. This is a self portrait she drew. She had so much talent.

I’ve been lingering on the ways we celebrate 30 years of something:

Wedding celebrations
Birthday celebrations
Professional careers

There is no great way to name the acknowledgement of her death day. I’ve always used anniversary because there isn’t a better word for me. I looked up the definition and it’s a:

“Yearly return of a date on which a special event occurred.” I like that so I’m sticking with anniversary.

For fun I started daydreaming about the idea of memorial gifts, sort of like how we exchange wedding anniversary gifts. The gift for 30 years of marriage is a pearl, symbolizing beauty, wisdom and something precious formed over time.

Wow that really resonated. 30 years of grieving her has offered so much of the above. Something really precious has formed over time:

💗 appreciation for everything she taught me
💗 the importance of family
💗 we all are going to die so how are we going to live this precious life?
💗 grief is grueling but you can survive and then thrive again
💗 no one loves you like a mother
💗 gratitude for getting the chance to mother
💗 you can continue bonds with them
💗 how to swim in the depths of love

It’s not a happy anniversary today, more of a grateful one. I love you mom forever!

Grieve, Love & Pearl Well today friends!

Good Mourning, Wednesday!

For years there was a double whammy for me in May: Mother’s Day and my mom’s death day. These two dates stared me down like two glowing eyes in the backdrop of a dark forest. For years I couldn’t make out the animal, but the deep throat growl registered in my cellular memory that danger is ahead.

Three decades later, the danger has receded. It wasn’t the time that did it, because time doesn’t really exist at least not in a linear sense. It was befriending my grief.

May comes in now on the breath of butterflies and honey bees. The smell of the lilacs brings me back to her Charlie perfume. I remember how much she loved to host the Orfield Olympics. I remember how much she loved her first grandchild and how her hands looked cradling her. I remember the things that drove me crazy about her, which now makes my sisters and I howl with laughter. I remember how quick she was to yelling, years of her own unprocessed grief masquerading as anger and frustration. I remember how much she loved to travel and happily took us on fun weekend getaways. I remember how much she doted on her family, deeds of service was her love language.

I miss being a daughter. I miss the love only a mother can give you.

Be gentle noticing the subtle shifts this time of year. Even before the first signs of Mother’s Day, your body remembers. That dull ache when you see moms and daughters together, the emptiness, the hunger.

A piece of our soul goes missing when we lose a mom. It leaves a void. Since the universe does not like empty spaces-there’s an urge to fill it. Sometimes it gets filled with overworking, drinking, intellectualizing, avoiding, pretending. If there is any part of you that is ready for integration and healing you can retrieve this soul piece back. Maybe it’s your mom blowing a kiss to your soul piece and sending it back home to you. Maybe it’s imagining a golden thread stitching it back into you. Maybe sing your soul piece back home. The possibilities are endless.

I’m working on a group: Moving from Motherless to Motherful. Details to come soon!
Grieve, Love & Daughter Well today, friends!

Good Mourning, Monday!

The light poured into our yoga space yesterday so sweetly. It wasn’t a flood light coming in, it was more of a polite usher welcoming us back home.

Magic happens when women gather!
🪄🌟✨💫
This important time together isn’t about perfecting our yoga poses, it’s not about getting more flexible or about strengthening our bodies.
It’s about creating space to soften our minds + we ground like earth + we flow like water + we heat like fire + we breathe like air + and we take up space.

Having a container to do this work, with compassionate witnesses creates endless possibilities for integration, growth and healing.

I’m winding down my two 9 month series of:
🌳🪽Roots + Wings: An Anticipatory Grief + Joy Group for Mamas Launching Their Adult Child.
🌟✨Burn Bright Not Out: A Re-membering Group for Healers to Retrieve Scattered Soul Parts.

What a soul-ful experience witnessing these mamas exploring the depths of their love, joy, excitement, fears & grief as they continue to hold the paradox of untethering while staying connected. I am filled with glee + gratitude to be lucky enough to observe their vulnerable and tender discoveries.

And an awe-filled experience witnessing these healers find ways to bring back scattered soul parts. 2026 has been tough for most of us-but for healers like therapists they’ve had to hold space for their clients, their families, friends, communities all while trying to find their way through it all. This intentional time together has given them a place to be held without having to take care of anyone else. These healers are next level. They embody a wisdom, depth and power that was simply stunning! What a delight and an honor to be in their energy fields.

Words feel puny when I try to convey the beautiful integration over the last 9 months. Here is my best attempt through haiku:

In Fall, circle calls.
Start of the sacred spiral.
Ends with soul’s return.

Thank you to everyone past and present who has trusted me with their hearts + minds + bodies + souls. The energetic exchange has filled me with so much vitality, love, joy, hope, and playfulness.

Grieve, Love & Gather Well, Friends!

Good Mourning, Thursday.

Minnesota has one of the largest populations of Finnish descent in the United States, with approximately 96,000 to 100,500 residents claiming Finnish ancestry.

Finns are tough as nails. They are raised in saunas and snowbanks—unimpressed by systems, and loyal to people.

Sisu (pronounced see-soo) is a way of life for Finns. It can’t be fully translated. The closest way to describe it is having guts, persistence, tenacity, stubbornness and determination. Sisu is not momentary courage, but the ability to sustain that courage. It defines the Finnish people and their character. It stands for the philosophy that what must be done will be done, regardless of cost.

Sisu was like another member of my family growing up. My Finnish mom had it as her license plate, she had mugs and tshirts made of it, we had a Finnish flag and she was known by her friends and family as a VERY 🔥 fiery, stubborn 🇫🇮 😆 Finn. She drummed that term into our heads from as early as I can remember. As an adult and a mother myself I understand the importance of passing down this value as it has become a family member to my nuclear family. It harkens to not only a prayer for strength and determination, but really a vow to sustain it.

I’ve never been more proud to be a Finn and to embody Sisu. I named my therapy private practice after it as I wanted to illuminate and honor the sustainable courage it takes to do relational work.

Minnesotans we were built for this time in history. Dig deep, lean into eachother and to your inner Sisu.

Good Mourning, Wednesday!
Photo Credit: Pam Wood.

I ❤️ you, Mpls. I am so dang proud, all 59 miles of you.
While our federal government occupies our city and while our local government’s rhetoric sounds like a roar, their unwillingness to act is like the bite of a paper tiger. Guess who has stepped into the gap? Guess who has created, organized, coordinated, disseminated and followed through on action plans? Our neighbors. Without any real leadership from anyone. We learned no one is coming to save us, so we had to save ourselves.
For those who haven’t stepped foot in Minneapolis, have not participated in our peaceful protests, that get aroused by violence, that believe that Renee and Alex deserved death, that get their news from a source that publically admits to alternative facts may I share what is actually happening here?
I spent the majority of my day yesterday crying with clients who:
-Have decision fatigue from risk vs reward roulette, balancing if it’s worth the risk of leaving their homes (and if they do should they bring a passport even though they are a citizen, should I put a maga hat on, who can be my white es**rt)?
-Who are deeply hurt by being othered (again). My Asian-American clients still haven’t healed from the harassment they suffered from the pandemic and causing the “China Flu.” Their ancestry line also remembers in their bones how our government interned Japanese-Americans and the trauma of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882.
-My Somali-American clients who have nightmares, panic attacks and can’t get the image of a masked man pointing a gun at them out of their limbic brains.
-My Latino-American clients who aren’t going to work, not because they are undocumented, but they are taking care of ill and elderly parents and can’t risk getting detained and leaving them alone.
-My mixed race couples who are afraid that their kids present more black or brown which puts a target on their backs.
-My Euro-American clients filled with rage, powerlessness and vicarious trauma.

The trauma here is real but so is the love. Staying tender and connected in the midst of this chaos is an act of rebellion.

Good Mourning, Minneapolis!

“Where the City Remembers Water”

Minneapolis learned to breathe from water.
Before the streets, before the stone and glass,
there were lakes cupped in prairie hands,
mirrors teaching the sky how to look at itself.
Bde Maka Ska holds the long memory—
a wide blue lung where wind slows its thoughts.
Lake Harriet hums lullabies at dusk,
joggers orbiting like prayers said with feet.
Nokomis keeps the laughter of summers,
salted with sunscreen and the ache of leaving childhood.
The Mississippi arrives not in a hurry,
but with authority earned upstream.
She bends through the city’s ribs,
braiding past and future together,
carrying canoes, grief, wild rice,
and the low thunder of becoming.
Minnehaha Falls still leaps, white braid unraveling over limestone,
singing its old song of broken-open beauty.
Even in winter she whispers,
iced breath catching the light,
reminding us that motion never truly stops.
Creeks thread quietly beneath us—waters half-forgotten,
doing the holy work of persistence.
They listen while we build and rebuild,
while seasons tilt and lives change course.
This is a city held together by water,
by reflection and return.
Here, we learn resilience from rivers,
tenderness from lakes,
and how to keep moving—
even when the ground freezes,
even when the winter feels long.
Minneapolis flows.
And because of that, so do we. (A ChatGPT inspired poem about our city’s most beautiful & healing element-water).

Mourning, Thursday.

Minneapolis is still reeling from the death of Renee Nicole Good. If you don’t live in the city it’s hard to describe what it’s like to be here right now. Our city has been saturated with so much unnecessary violence and collective grief.
At the end of the day we still choose to live here warts and all:
-it has ridiculously high taxes
-a chaotic public school system
-corruption and mismanagement of funds
-sharp ideological divides
-so much collective grief (Philando Castile, George Floyd, Annunciation, Renee Nicole Good)
-there is a slant towards passive aggressive communication
Like any relationship, it’s complicated and nuanced, and we have a lot of work to do.
But the beauty marks are here too:
-how neighbors take care of eachother (if you haven’t read the Star Trib article about how the neighborhood mamas circle Fletcher Merkel’s mom in her deep grief then stop right now and read that).
-you can walk, bike, or drive within minutes to a lake, creek, river, waterfall
-the Gen Z kids are fluent in diversity, inclusion, social justice, they are true citizens of the world and aren’t afraid of differences or new pronouns
-my next door neighbor is one of my closest friends, our tiny houses are so close it sometimes feels like dorm living
Whether you see Renee’s death as murder or self defense one thing is true, Minneapolis neighbors show up for one another.
🏡 Maybe it’s because we practically live on top of eachother so it’s impossible to not build a relationship from proximity alone.
⛵️Maybe our access to beautiful parks and lakes brings us additional joy.
🌇Maybe it’s because urban cities tend to attract people who value diversity so there is less unchecked implicit bias and othering.
I don’t know, but I do know when the neighbors sounded the alarm yesterday against ICE they did what villages and herds do-they rallied around their young & vulnerable. Their circling became a protective boundary, their whistles became an elephant’s trumpet and their growls became a wolf pack’s warning.
Minnesota Nice donned its fangs yesterday not from aggression or fear but from a deep held value that relationships and neighbors matter.

Good Mourning, Tuesday!

Anxiety is a common experience after we suffer a loss. The world suddenly feels dangerous like at any moment the other shoe (which really feels like an anvil) could drop.

Anxiety can come in many forms: body sensations (butterflies in your stomach, headaches, nausea), thoughts (something bad is going to happen, I can’t handle this) or feelings (panic).

I heard this quote in a masterclass series. It’s a way to acknowledge and honor the sensation of anxiety but alchemize it in a way that evokes imagery and empowerment.

Often un-noticed body sensations can go hand in hand with anxiety. The goal is to improve our interoception (reading our body’s sensations which are signals or messages).

Practice:
1. Scan your body everyday, get to know where you carry feelings (notice where you contract with tension).
2. In this example, the fluttering sensation in the stomach is a common anxiety metaphor of “I have butterflies in my stomach.”
3. Allow this sensation with neutrality, what we resist persists.
4. Use your imagination, imagery, metaphor to alchemize in a way that feels empowering.
5. Instead of denying, shaming or trying to drive away the flutter, engage with it, play with it. Be the director of your own movie-metaphor.

The butterflies may be there for a while. The fear of another loss makes total sense since this current one turned your world upside down.

Sometimes they may fly in formation and other times they may run into one another like a gaggle of toddlers in a bounce house.

This takes practice. Just remember the butterflies are on your side. They aren’t trying to hurt you. On the rough days maybe lay on the grass in your mind and heart’s eye and let them flutter around you. Focus on their beauty, the patterns on their wings, the miracle of their metamorphsis.

Grieve, Love & Formation Well today, friends!
PS This song made me think of Janet Jackson’s choreography and then I imagined butterflies dancing in this formation 😆🦋

Good Mourning, Winter Solstice, the longest night of the year.

Grievers intuitively know this day. It is etched into the grooves of their hearts. They know the descent into darkness all too well.

The holidays can feel lonely and dull when we’ve lost our beloved(s). What once held a tenor of magic and glee, now can feel devoid of feeling, just a numbness. I think of this as a spiritual bruise. A swollen, inflamed mass that protects a wound and signals “there is pain underneath, healing in progress.”

It’s ok to feel numb today. It’s our bodies natural way of protecting ourselves. Today is a day that we are invited to descend into the darkness. Winter in its wisdom also invites us to explore what we need to die to, what needs releasing.

Your descent into the darkness of grief will last longer than one day or a season, but today is a day to honor it. You don’t have to mask it today. Take it off and breathe deeply. Use the gift of today to resonate with where you are in your grief cycle.

What happens when you tip toe into the darkest parts of your heart? Do you bring a lantern? A companion? A sherpa? Or are you alone in the dark?

Ideas:

Go for a nature walk and notice what you see, hear, feel, smell, taste.

Watch the sunset rise and sunset, find comfort in this threshold + thin space.

Make (who am I kidding, buy) a hearty soup with some crusty bread.

String a popcorn garland.

Stay in your cozy jammies and drink tea, hot coco.

Take a hot bath.

Light a candle or a bonfire and gaze into the aliveness of the flame.

Write a letter to the darkness, what shadow parts need acknowledgement and releasing?

Linger here. People who don’t understand grief will anxiously remind you that light returns. There is an impulse for them to bypass the darkness and beeline to the light. Smile and nod and say to yourself “that’s adorable.” Let them feel their anxiety, their hopelessness, their helplessness, it’s not yours to manage for them. Instead embrace the dark.

Grieve, Love & Descend Well today, friends!
❄️