Just a Note of Thanks

My dear brothers, we have come to the time of year for many of us called the holiday season. For many of you are entering this season for the first time without your loved one. To those of you that are, you have my heartfelt prayers.

Recently as the year moves toward a close, I find myself spending an increased amount of time reflecting on what for me has been a year of transition. I have met so many wonderful people, have started a new job, have traveled to support friends, family, and colleagues in their endeavors, have seen my son get engaged while spending quality time getting to know my future daughter-in-law better. I have honored my daughter by Celebrating her life with an amazing event in her hometown. I have also been humbled by visiting her grave-site, yet another reminder of how precious life is. I have had the privilege of sharing my thoughts and receiving feedback from many of you. This has been a year I am so very thankful for.

However, I would be remiss if I did not take the time to thank yet another person who remains very much a part of my motivation to move forward, my late wife, Robyn Street-Whitener. During a recent time of reflection, I focused on three key things that I am so very thankful for when remembering the remarkable 22 years we spent together. Robyn taught me how to live, learn, and to love. Let me share with you my thoughts on this matter.

Robyn came into my life at a very pivotal time. For the first time in my life, I had experienced a string of significant setbacks in my life. I honestly had lost some of my confidence in myself. As a non-custodial parent, however, while wounded, I never felt defeated. But I never stopped believing that if I could just experience another win, I would be back on track. A meeting orchestrated by my father would introduce me to a woman that would change my life. It started that the initial quality that we had in common was that we both liked to talk. Boy, did we talk! Those conversations led to a relationship and, eventually, marriage. By the way, my father would not live to see us get married. During what would be the course of this relationship, she helped me to restore my confidence, challenged me to return to excellence in all aspects of my life and gifted me by spending the rest of her life as my wife. Robyn truly helped me to learn to live again.

My time with my wife was also a time of great learning. She lived her life in a style that was completely unknown to me. She grew up much better off than I did, private schools, European vacations the right clubs. Even though we were so different, I always felt that she was grateful that we could just be ourselves together. The fact that I came from a different world never seemed to matter to Robyn. She could exhale with me. We could just have our private time together working on living a quality life. I learned so much from her.

Finally, she taught me how to love again. Together we were able to give my son a life I could never have done alone. Though at times the parental learning curve was tough for her, she stubbed her toe a few times but often was behind the scenes making sure things happened for us both. Like most married couples, we had our trying times. But we never stopped loving each other. Our struggles were our struggles; we always had each other’s back. I guess we just loved each other. She has set a high bar for me when I think of love these days. That is because I honestly believe I had the perfect teacher for me.

So, as we head toward our Thanksgiving season here in the United States, I wanted to take another moment to share my thoughts about the remarkably complicated women that filled up space in my life for 22 very full years. Any time I receive a compliment, any time I achieve anything in this life, I achieve it on the foundation she helped me to build. I am profoundly grateful to her for doing so.

Like always, I encourage you to take time to reflect on the memories you have of your loved ones. Also, if you feel so inclined to share them with the rest of us, your reflection may be just what another brother needs during a difficult time.

Terrell Whitener is an author, motivational speaker, and coach. Terrell is the author of The First 365, Learning to Live After Loss. Terrell can be reached at my newly redesigned thedebriefgroup365.com; there you will find all of his social media contacts or through the Widower’s Support Network.