A Friend Died Last Week

It was a shock and I'm still rather stunned. I'm feeling lost and confused about how to integrate the whole thing with my daily life. I'm thankful that I had her in my life for nearly thirty years, yes. And I'm grateful that she is no longer in pain. But after that, I'm at a loss. I'm sure I'll move through the grief process with time. But I keep wondering things like "who will die next?" and "is this going to happen often now?"

You see, I'm nearly 76 years old. While my friend was a decade younger, many of my friends are closer to my age. We are going to be dying, I suppose, sooner than the younger folks.

I remember my mom commenting that all her friends were dying. She outlived nearly all of the people in her childhood. The people she had stayed in contact with were all gone. There was a group of friends who had been in the same Sunday school class since their teens and they met once a month for decades for lunch together. She was the last one living from that group.

She was less than a decade older than me when that happened. Am I to that stage now? Is this friend's death just the beginning of a cycle of losses?

That's sure a grim perspective of my future! And this time of year it doesn't take much to plunge me into depression. I can't let that happen, though, because depression is detrimental to my health. So what to do?

First, I need to take good care of myself. To take good care of myself I need to pay attention to those things that fight depression:
a.) avoid mood altering chemicals like caffeine, alcohol, etc.;
b.) interact with at least one other person every day;
c.) exercise, twenty minutes of physical activity each day;
d.) get sunshine/daylight every day - even sitting beside a window will help;
e.) set and achieve small goals each day - write them down the night before and work toward them the following day.

You'd be surprised how much difference those simple things can make. Try it.

But what about having more friends, or better friends? I've always had a hard time making new friends. I'm very introverted and find it hard to start and sustain a conversation with someone I've just met. And because of my introversion I struggle to be social. But I'll need to overcome this if I'm to make new friends. It is even harder to do as I get older - I have less energy and more physical challenges. But that can't be allowed to get in the way. So how do you make new friends, especially when you are older?

I found a YouTube video that is helpful. If you are interested, click on the link below.

And would you share with me your ideas of how to keep depression away and how to make new friends? I'd appreciate it.

I know this isn't my usual blog post, not all that inspiring. But we all need to know how to take care of ourselves in this way in order to do that which makes the world a better place for all.