Karen Martin
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Emily: [00:00:00] Hey, hey, and welcome to episode number 149 of the Brave Widow Show. Today I have a very special guest on the show with me. I have one of my brave widow clients and amazing members of our tribe named Karen. Karen joined Brave Widow when we were running a very special Black Friday offer.
And so she has been part of the membership since December. It is now the end of April and. She has just been so vocal about how much her life has changed in just the three to four months of coaching and being part of the Brave Widow member experience, and so I finally. Invited her to come be a guest on the podcast and to share her story and to just talk about what her experience has been like.
As you might appreciate, not everyone wants to be on [00:01:00] camera. Not everyone wants to share the vulnerabilities of their story, but Karen is very bold and brave, and she's been such an advocate. I've just been so grateful to work with her, so you'll get to hear her story. As well as part of her experience in Brave Widow Coaching, and if you would like to set up a consult to join Brave Widow to be part of the coaching program, you just simply go to brave widow.com and schedule your consult.
I'd be happy to talk with you to understand where you are currently in the four Seasons of Widowhood and help you come up with your direct action plan that will help you move forward and rebuild your life. To get started, just go to brave widow.com. All right, let's dive
in.
Welcome to the Brave Widow Show, where we help widows find hope, heal their heart, and dream again for the future. I'm your host, [00:02:00] Emily Tanner. After losing my husband of 20 years, I didn't know how I could ever experience true joy and excitement again for the future. I eventually learned how to create a life I love, and I've made it my mission to help other widows do the same.
Join me and the Brave Widow membership community and get started today. Learn more at BraveWidow. com
Meet Karen: A Brave Widow's Journey
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Emily: Karen is gonna share her story and her experience being part of the Brave Widow crew. And we're just gonna get into all of the things. So Karen, thank you so much for being willing to come on the show, to put your face and your name out there and to share your story.
Karen: Thank you so much, Emily. It's thrilling. I, never imagined I'd be doing this in four months, ago. So I'm excited to do it and it's not hard for me to talk and share my story about my life with my husband Ben. And and also what [00:03:00] being a part of Brave Widow has meant to me, it's been an answer to a four year long prayer to have found you and responded to your call.
And so I'm so glad I did because it really has changed my life and given me a new outlook on life in an extremely short amount of time that I never expected. But it's happened and here we are. So thank you
Emily: absolutely. And I think that God just brought us together 'cause I definitely have loved getting to learn more about you and to just see not only for myself.
The growth and the changes and how you've changed. But it's just been great for you that other people have noticed. And just the joy I think that you've been able to come to the calls with has been awesome to, to see that change over time. Thank you. Yeah, so thank you.
Karen's Love Story with Ben
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Emily: Why don't we start just with your story of, you're a mom, you were married [00:04:00] to Ben and you're now experiencing the journey of being a widow.
Karen: I guess I'll start at the beginning as the song says in Sound of Music, my favorite musical. Let's start at the very beginning. I met Ben in 1983 when I was only 25 years old. He was 39, about to be 40, and he needed an accompanist, someone who would play piano and accompany and organ and accompany him as a musician.
He had spent 16 years in Europe when his family went to Finland after he graduated from high school and studied at the Bels Academy, which is the university, one of the best music schools in the world. Became an opera singer, a vocal coach. He coached the choral group that won first place and then an international competition and beat out the Soviets.
They were furious. Wow. Of course. And he, had amazing experiences. He even smuggled Bibles when he would go on some of his international trips and he was an musical emissary for the Finnish [00:05:00] government. And so the Lord protected him there, otherwise I wouldn't be sitting here.
And that was his background and he brought his family back here to the United States in 1978, which was about the same time I went to the Twin Cities. And after college I was a church, music major at St. Olive and, so we met when our church secretary put me together with him. I had been through a very brief, unfortunate marriage and literally the day before we met was the divorce hearing.
The day before that was Easter. And then that Tuesday I met him and I remember thinking there's something special about this day. And I wasn't thinking him. No way. And little did I know that would change my life.
Musical Adventures and Family Life
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Karen: We did music together. A year later, our choir director at church had a stroke.
So he became the director. I was the accompanist of the choir and we became a team. And he even let me choose the music. He had to work out of town. He had a computer job. For part of the week. [00:06:00] So I would get things ready for choir on Thursday ninth and or Wednesday nights, I guess it was at that church.
We were in eight churches during the course of our of our marriage together. We were not married until 1994. On Midsummer. June 21st, 1993. He proposed to me beneath the arch in St. Louis. Our family was there on vacation. My mother had reluctantly agreed to let him come along. I remember her saying he hasn't committed to you yet, so I'm not sure we should let him come this year.
But we would've fought it because he already knew what he was gonna do. He was a romantic. And so that night, after spending time with my family and he was getting a little antsy, we went down to the arch and it was close to closing time. In the parking ramp, I heard him say mutter to himself, if we don't get out there tonight, I don't know what I'm gonna do.
Light bulb. I knew then that something was up. Oh boy. He got out underneath that huge thing. I think it's 610 feet high and [00:07:00] 610 feet across. I knew what was up. And so he takes my hands facing each other, the Mississippi River on one side, the city of St.
Louis on the other, and asked me to marry him. And of course they jumped up and down and hugged him. And then we stood there and we prayed. We took our hand held hands and prayed for 15 minutes, probably about, about everything, about our future, the children. We would have, Lord, give us the children you want us to have.
And just all of the things. And there was a casino boat parked on the other side, the Illinois side of the river and. I kid you not, there were spotlights that went off and floodlights and filled the sky. The second we started to pray the second. We ended our prayer off they went and we were like, wow, maybe this is a confirmation.
And it was, we told our family the next morning when we were all sitting waiting to get into the St. Louis Zoo, so that is how we started we got married in the end of February. Really stupid time for two people from Minnesota.
[00:08:00] We should have known better, but we had to arrange it so that his, as many of his kids, he has three older children could be there and during school breaks or something. And my dad, who. What I was also a preacher's kid, so was he. And so PK and so dad, even though he had just retired a year before that said, and we were going to get married in his last pastorate that he served at, and he said Karen, Renee, you know better than to ask a pastor to have a wedding in December, and I'm like, but dad, you're not even preaching anymore. So we got married on February 26th between blizzards and almost froze to death getting into our our hotel, the St. James Hotel, a very historical place in Red Wing, Minnesota. And that was, how it started. And we started having children very soon after that.
I was 36 going on 37 he was 50 when we got married. And I didn't know if we'd be able to have kids, but we, definitely wanted that. And I knew he want, he was willing amazingly to be a father again, of how many children the [00:09:00] Lord blessed us with. And so the Lord blessed us with three living children and one our second child the Lord took him or her, Ben knows now whether it's a girl or a boy, I joke about that.
But he took that child directly to heaven. So that was a tough thing to go through that. And but a few months later I was pregnant with Lizzie. I wanted to be pregnant again by my 40th birthday. I missed it by a couple weeks. But she's our middle child and our oldest child is Rachel.
She just turned 30, which I can't believe. And then Liz is our middle child, and David is our youngest. And so had three kids, a lively household, and I don't know how I did it, but when they were. All under the age of four and a half and I was pregnant and having them, we sang in three choirs, two at our church and a professional church, musician's choir.
I don't know how we did it. I look back now and go, I was crazy. I even made a full dinner the day we did the Messiah at our church and we did, the whole thing except for maybe two choruses and a few solos, and Ben and I were both soloists. He actually had to take over for the alto soloist who got strep throat, so he did double [00:10:00] duty.
So it was, and members of the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra where our orchestra, it was just amazing. We got to do a lot of choral music in that particular church. And so we did all that when our kids were little. And then as they grew, we went to another church and they were in all three of the children's choirs and we did musicals with them.
And I accompanied one of 'em, and I was like the church gopher. And I did everything from subbing on the organ to directing hand bells and singing in two choirs. And so that was our life when our kids were young.
Facing Challenges Together
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Karen: But at the same time, we were extremely poor. Not quite as poor then as we became later.
But financial things were always a challenge. So we faced that. But I think music was the big equalizer in our life. And so that was something we had and we shared and we did together. And we were a team from the get go, from the very first time we started working together at our church in Minneapolis.
So that was where life led in 2001. There was [00:11:00] a big tornado. We had tornado here last night, but it wasn't major. And up in Siren, Wisconsin, which was very clear, close to where my grandparents had a lake home. And we, my parents would provide for a resort vacation for all of us every summer so we could, my two siblings and I, and they could get together.
And so it was very close to Siren where we usually went. We didn't that year, but they had a devastating tornado long track, 40 miles through Burnett County and woods and forests. And it was, it was really sad to see what happened. Three people lost their lives, but we became inspired because of that.
A Heart for Helping Others
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Karen: Went up there the very next day after it happened to start a relief organization. And Ben's dad had been involved in very intensive world relief. He would load up C five planes full of equipment and supplies to earthquake. Riddled areas in back in the seventies, and he knew world leaders and everything.
My father-in-law was an amazing man, put in water wells in India and Ben [00:12:00] helped him with all those things. So he had a heart for that, and I had always had a heart to help people. So we tried to start a ministry and I say try, because then 9/11 happened and we proceeded with it. We were part of sirens.
One year anniversary celebration of the tornado. And boy did they celebrate, never seen so much food in my life. And they were looking back and realizing how far they had come in just a year. So we were on that committee and helped with that. And then we started this ministry and because of everything that happened financially in the world and the Iraq war that started, we ended up having to sadly abandon, that.
And we came back to the cities and just proceeded on with our life. 20 years ago, we came to Eau Claire, Wisconsin. Decided to get out of the rat race of the Twin Cities and came here and we love it. And so as our kids grew, we homeschooled and we did homeschool choir with them. I was the accompanist.
And Ben helped boys who had no ability to carry a tune, learn how to sing. He was amazing. And, [00:13:00] and then for reasons I won't go into, it was a difficult time right at the time that my mother died 11 years ago right now actually. We left the group for a while and then after Ben died, Heidi, my friend, asked me to come back.
So I've been with the homeschool choir now the last few years. And it's really rewarding to do that. And the kids that were little back then are now having kids who are in the very smallest choir. So it's really fun to see that. And and then. Back in 2016, I am here at Church Decorating for Vacation Bible School.
We just decorated every, practically every surface in the building. And three days before VBS started, I get a call from the wife of our building manager, our custodian, and she said, Karen, do you know how to play Broadway music? And I said I played some Broadway music at your mom's funeral just a few months ago.
Remember? She goes, yeah, the accompanist at the children's theater just literally walked out tonight on the job. And the show starts a week from tonight. Could you play this show? And I'm like. Ah. [00:14:00] And the director is not the easiest man, and he is very opinionated and it's his theater and not always the easiest to get along with.
And a lot of people feared him, and I did too. And the night before we opened, I'm sitting in the van in the parking lot crying going, why did I say I do this? But I had to learn it do Bible school. And yet the people were so appreciative of me coming and helping them out and teaching, helping to teach them the music.
Besides learning to play. Steven Sondheim, who is a composer, that is extremely difficult. I think he used to torture the musicians, but. So that started that journey. One that I went on for six years and Ben was with me for most of that. We'd be, I'd be accompanist, he'd be a music director. And it was just amazing after he died the things that people had to say about him, and it always started with he was the sweetest, kindest, gentlest, most understanding man.
And some of these kids who are now in [00:15:00] theater programs in New York City and have moved on. They were in Annie and they were our Annie Orphans and they were the ones that said, he made me feel like I mattered. And that was my wonderful gentleman. And so after he died, then I thought, okay, I need to look back at Ben's life and learn from Ben and how he interacted with people and, especially at the theater.
So that was a very special time. Two of our kids started acting with us. So it was a family affair. And Liz, our middle child, and her husband they said, we're the professional audience, but this last November, li Rachel, Liz, and David were all in Beauty and the Beast together. And that was just, a really neat, a neat moment.
So we did that and that was the last sort of musical thing. Even, I'll even say it was a ministry because at November of 2019 at our cast party for Elf Ben ended up sitting at the island in elf's home. They were hosting the party beer bottles and [00:16:00] everything everywhere. We're in Wisconsin, so beer is a big part of everything.
So is cheese. It's true. And, he ended up sharing the gospel with these guys our tech director who was divorced and looking for a, hoping for a wife. And a couple of guys who were engaged to each other. Our other music director. And it was just really amazing. And I sat there the whole time just going, I can't believe I'm hearing this.
And I was praying, for him. So he just made a real. Impact in that community. And it was our outreach outside of Bethesda, our church. So it was really good. And it happened right after I had prayed and the pastor had given a sermon about reaching out beyond the walls of this church. And I look at Penn and I'm going, what is our ministry?
Where is it? Everything we do is here. The homeschool group, the choir, everything. And boom, then it happened. So that was at the end of his life. And our daughter, Liz got married to Jared. They had met on a the mission trip that they had to Haiti. And I think the night she got back, we didn't get any [00:17:00] sleep because then I think by the end of that night we knew that we were probably hearing about her future husband.
That's how quick that went. And they were together for six years, got married in 2018.
Ben's Health Decline and Final Days
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Karen: And then at that time I noticed Ben's health was declining. He had polio when he was 16, and I thought he was. Getting post polio syndrome and he was having trouble with balance issues and things like that, and his doctor just callously said one day you had polio, so you've got post polio syndrome and you'll end up in a wheelchair.
End of discussion. That was it. And so Ben never went back to that doctor. In fact, he never went back to anybody. But what I think is that he probably had Lewy body dementia and he started having some dementia signs and I started wondering about it. Then Covid hit and literally the week after we closed on Mary Poppins and we had also just done frozen.
So it was a real busy early 2020. We were all hacking away and we were probably all sick and it probably could, it could have been brought back to us via some people who had traveled on cruises during [00:18:00] our January break before we'd started up on the next big theater piece. And I. I think I had it briefly for two days during a blizzard, two days later I'm out shoveling snow so we could get out of the driveway to get to rehearsal, but we didn't know what it was at that point.
We closed on Mary Poppins the first weekend in March and the next week our governor shut down the state. During that time, we were, I was going to take him to the Aging and Disability Resource Center. I was, we were gonna get his eyes checked 'cause his eyes were jumping all over the place. He'd look at a piece of music and, couldn't see the notes.
I knew something was terribly wrong. He didn't wanna deal with, he was like, the Lord will take care of us. The Lord will take care of us. Which was always his motto, which is true. But I just really needed to know what in the world was going on. And so I remember being very impatient and angry with him during that time because he just didn't, he.
I think he was probably just as fearful as I was, but was afraid to acknowledge it and didn't want the treatment he had received from his other, his [00:19:00] doctor just brushing it off, which makes me angry, but it's something that I've had to let go of. And so then. We just decided, okay, we're gonna wait out this Covid thing, we won't go to anybody.
A year later we were still waiting and meanwhile he started getting weaker and I never will understand why. I couldn't really see that my husband was dying and fading away in front of me. I just, I had blinders on and I ended up having to basically care because I knew my daughter was better at it than I was.
Rachel was living with me at the time. David was off on his own and Lizzie was married and, so she was with us, but I knew there were things I obviously could not make my daughter do, and so I am not a caregiver. I never was ied him through the time he had emergency open heart surgery and when he had a sepsis infection.
So he really survived. The Lord kept him going twice when he probably should have died previous to his death. I remember when I realized, and this was a really important thing, when I [00:20:00] realized I was gonna have to do this, and I realized how impatient I had been with him, and I wasn't trusting the Lord.
As I probably should have. It broke me and we were lying in the bed one day and I just started to cry and I said, I am so sorry for how I've treated you, especially the last, year. Please forgive me. And he looks over at me and he said, I've already forgiven you. And those words just broke me and I just absolutely sobbed.
And to this day, I am so grateful for that because those last three and a half, four months, whatever it was, we didn't have anything that we, that set it out. We forgave each other for past stuff and impatience and the poverty. And health issues and all the stuff we had to go through. Oh, and I didn't mention we faced homelessness more than once.
We had, we ended up with a couple of not so great landlords who for no reasons, they never even gave, kicked us out. And so we spent [00:21:00] parts of twice in a hotel. We did a ministry in between that, but the ministry went under no fault of our own. We were residential managers for a a place where people who had been homeless, could live, but it was just riddled with problems and police calls and all sorts of things and scary for our kids.
And so that ended and then we had to find another place and we stayed with friends in our basements a couple of times. And so it was not easy and we. Grew to understand a little bit more about the homeless community. And it is a serious issue in our city. And whenever we went through something, whether it was him having emergency heart surgery and me having three little kids in elementary school or elementary age and losing a baby to miscarriage all of these life issues, homelessness, we.
Felt like we wanted to connect with people and we wanted to help people based on their experience. And now as a widow, this has not changed.
Coping with Loss and Moving Forward
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Karen: So on Mother's Day, almost four years [00:22:00] ago, the anniversary is a week from Friday I went off to church to play and everything seemed fine. I came home to ask him if he was okay if I just went out for lunch to Olive Garden with our kids for an hour and a half or so.
And he said, of course, you go and have a wonderful time. And I kissed him goodbye. And then at the door, I turned back into the room and I said, thank you for making me a mom. We sure had fun doing it. And he looked back at me and with a, his strong base Baret tone voice said, we sure didn't we?
And those were the last words that he spoke to me and. Later on that day, I could see that he was fading. And so I started looking up, trying to figure out, okay, what hospital is gonna be the safest hospital for me to take him to where I won't be separated from him? And in retrospect, and we both felt through this whole time, we were just waiting for Covid, the restrictions in Eau Claire County to be over.
Ironically, they ended the day before his funeral nine days later. And [00:23:00] so we knew, and we knew from experience with other people we knew, and people I knew at church, people who never saw their father again, never saw their, wife again. Your story, of watching the ambulance go off, taking your husband off we just, we were just hanging on, and I did not know.
I don't know how I, like I said, I don't know how I didn't recognize it. But anyway I went and picked my daughter up from church and I said, I think we need to get your father to the hospital. So instead of calling 9 1 1, we literally got Ben out of the house and we're just outside the house. And she goes, mom, you just gotta call nine one one.
Just call 9 1 1. So I ran to the car and I plugged my phone into the car because it needed to be charged and I called and within almost seconds, because we live pretty close to the fire station there were all these emergency vehicles up there. And the one thing that really hurt me was not one neighbor popped their head out or looked or came over and asked what is going on?
And that was, we really didn't know our neighbors in [00:24:00] the area, and we still don't, in the area that we live in there are a lot of ritzy houses just up the road. And then there are side by side duplexes on our side of the road, which backs up to I 94, the freeway. And so there's kind of a. Economic dividing line there too.
It, it they, I was trying to do chest compressions and I was not getting anywhere, of course, and I think I knew he was already gone. I don't know what second, but he was not pronounced dead until the medical examiner got there. It took her an hour to get there from a neighboring town, Menominee.
And so we were there with one lone police officer, a young man standing there while Rachel and I were, on the ground sitting next to, his body. And, all of a sudden his eyes opened up his beautiful blue eyes, which were the first thing that I noticed when I met him. And he was looking up, and I remember Kathy Lee Gifford describing her husband Frank, when she came down the stairs and found him dead that Sunday morning and said to her son, Cody, dad [00:25:00] just thought your dad just saw Jesus. He just, frank, just saw Jesus. And that's exactly the way I felt when I looked at Ben lying there looking up. And I called the I had, I think the police make the call to funeral home, just down the road and had worked with this man because I, in my job as a church musician here, I play for all the funerals that went organ or piano.
And so I knew him and thought, okay, we'll just call him. And so he came and we said goodbye, put him in the body bag, took him off. And then I had, I think I had called the kids. I had asked. Liz and Jared to go get David at his apartment. And because I thought we'd be going to the hospital and then I'd let them know what we would do.
And then I had to call him and tell 'em that their father had died, that their father was in heaven. So that wasn't easy. So I went right over there, then drove over there with my daughter. I don't know how I did, but I did. And we cried and I don't remember a whole lot about what we did, but I do [00:26:00] remember this that I said, okay guys, whatever you do not try to set me up with anybody.
Once your father always your father. And they looked at me like, mom, weird. And the other thing I thought of too, and this is me, I knew that I had committed to playing for a women's event that Thursday. I knew that the next Sunday I. My brass players, I accompany brass players and trumpet players from the university.
The head of the trumpet department, Bob Bacca, is a very close and dear friend of Ben. Mine was. And so he sent me all his students and I had a wonderful connection and I still do, but I don't, since Covid I haven't done as much playing with them. And the brass group was gonna play that Sunday and I thought, I can't have anybody else play with them.
I, they're gonna play the pre, that'll be fine. I'll just play with 'em on the hymns. So I played organ that Sunday, I played piano that Thursday and afterwards I. During prayer time, I went up and I told people what had happened and it was news to most people, and I could hear the gasps in the audience.
And and one of our dear friends [00:27:00] saying, we love the Martins. And afterwards, all of these widows surrounded me. They were all older than me. I was 60 going on 63 at the time, and most of them were, in their eighties. And but they were there. They were giving me all sorts of advice and this will happen.
And I still cry two years later in all of this. And so they were there for me and I was just, somewhat overwhelmed. I had to plan the service and I had to have calls back and forth to Finland. His two kids, two of his kids were in Finland, could not get out of the country because of Covid.
They would not let. Them come here, which was very sad. His daughter from who's in Brooklyn, New York, did come. But because of COVID, my son-in-law, who was the chief tech at the time and others turned this place into a recording studio. So where I sitting right now, I don't think it was there back then, but they built it.
And, we recorded our services for months upon months. I hated it. I just missed the live. It just wasn't the same. But because [00:28:00] of that, we were able to have the service be recorded, or it was live and it was sent all over the place. If you could get on the internet, you could see the service and and his family back in Finland, including his former wife, had a funeral watching party. I won't, I shouldn't say party, but they did. And my brother-in-law who was caring for Ben's younger sister who died a year later on Father's Day of Alzheimer's, was at home caring for Joanie. And he was able to watch it.
And so were other family members. And I stood up to speak, I spoke at the beginning and I said, if you're here and people who might wanna be watching it, this is what you tune into. I gave them, the Bethesda address, and they did. And so as a result of that many people in the theater community got to see the funeral.
And the day after the funeral, I went to a show that I had promised at the theater that I wasn't involved in. That I had promised my friends I would go to and I couldn't believe the number of people that came up [00:29:00] to me and said, we saw the funeral yesterday. We were so moved at all of this. So it was a combination evangelistic service, I think, and a concert and be in addition to the probably that our dear friend, a former music director played.
We had 10 pieces of music in his service for him, I believe The Hallelujah Chorus at the end with the brass. And it was just, it was amazing. And it was an absolutely wonderful sendoff. I remember every second of it. I don't watch it very often anymore, but it's out there on YouTube, Ben Martin funeral. And and it was, an amazing time.
There weren't as because of Covid and because that was just all ending in our community anyway. There weren't as many people here as I wish they had been.
Reflecting on a Life Together
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Karen: But it's really rewarding knowing that it was gotten out there. So that was the journey up to that point. And then the journey of widowhood.
Began
Emily: so well, I just wanna take a minute and really commend you for the amount of time that you were married, the love and the dedication that you had to [00:30:00] each other when you truly were like in sickness and health and rich or poor. Like you guys, you stuck, you're waiting for rich together.
Yeah. You really stuck together and loved each other. And were, it seems really a united front and Yeah. We, that's not something that you see really often anymore or is celebrated. Yeah. I just wanna commend you for your love and the relationship that you two had. That was amazing.
Coping with Loss and Grief
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Karen: Thank you that means a lot because it wasn't easy, the Lord got us through without the Lord. I don't think we would've made it. I, in fact, I know we probably wouldn't have. But we did and we treasured those simple times and we were, our dates were at the bookstore.
We got free food from Panera where our daughter was one of the managers. And I just start, after he died, I started remembering all of those little simple times. And those are what mean the most to me. So whenever [00:31:00] I send a wedding card or go to a wedding or something, I always tell the couple that treasure those little moments, those tiniest little things.
And there were things that we. You know what about, and he was, he always wanted to be so certain of what he was doing before he did it. And I was the one who would dive right in. I was the one that would learn a Bach p and Fugue on a Saturday afternoon to play on Sunday. And he thought I was crazy.
And he would go, Karen, space learning. He would go spot, just spot like this, in a fake Italian. He studied in Italy, but yeah. And so I was more, dive in. He was more think through things. But that was good because we balanced each other out. But just remembering all those simple times and, 'cause that's all we had to be creative because we didn't have much money.
We were truly a team.
And I will be forever grateful. But that's also why it's so hard now, not having him, here. Yeah. Especially in my job at church. And that's, [00:32:00]
Emily: that was one of those. So how long has it been since he died for you now?
Karen: It will be four years a week from this Friday. So it's been four years and he died a couple months before your husband died.
And I wish I looked everywhere. I did not know what to expect. I was not new to grief. My parents had died in 2014. His parents died. My grandparents, I was a preacher's kid. I was dragged to funerals when I was a little kid. So death was nothing new. I knew where believers went. I knew my husband was in heaven, and I would join him there one day.
I know that without a shadow of the doubt. And so it wasn't that part of it that I feared or misunderstood, and I'm so glad I had, I have that encouragement and knowledge that I know where he is and I know where I am going. Because I don't know what I would do without that.
Seeking Connection and Support
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Karen: And I listen to podcasts and listen to [00:33:00] people on the internet and hear people and widows and sometimes the people who had the very organizations that were trying to help people and they didn't know.
They just thought their spouse was probably flying around in the air. Their, I don't know. But it just, it was very discouraging, I felt so bad for them. At the same time, I was feeling my own grief. I was also feeling bad for other people and other people I ran into. In my life here, but I was in the middle because I wasn't a young widow, but at the same time, I wasn't 80 years old or more waiting to go home and, into heaven to be with my spouse.
And it was a hard place to be in the middle. So I was searching and I wanted connection. And in January seven months after he died, it was suggested by leadership here at church at my job that I needed to go to therapy or counseling. And I knew from the time I started filling out that application, this was not right.
I knew in my spirit it wasn't right. And that was a hard thing. I went to two sessions and I just quit. I couldn't handle it, she said things like, [00:34:00] you need to move on, and by the time we have our next session, I expect that you'd be on the road to healing. And I'm like, what? And she was a young woman who was an intern.
I did not know that at the time, and she was like, my daughter's age. So she, I don't even think she was 30. And I just knew that wasn't right. So I went on this search, I went, even went to a thing called the Death Cafe. Whoa, tease. And it was all sorts of interesting people. It was somebody who worked at the university and I was able to share my story a little bit and the Lord with these people, but they were like, oh, I just wanna be buried in the woods and I'm just gonna be a spirit in this.
And there were all sorts of weird new agey things that they embodied. So I didn't go back. But anyway, I just was longing for connection, right? And I could not find that connection.
Challenges of Widowhood
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Karen: And and so my search lasted the whole issue of counseling again came up because I was teetering on the brink last fall and the Christmas season, which is.
So hard without Ben, because [00:35:00] we had 38 years where we did Christmas together in the many churches and places that we were. So it was, that was really hard. So we weren't married for 38 years, 27, but the 11 that we were together as most of the time as colleagues and musical colleagues in the same churches for the most part.
And that was really tough. I was looking for connection and I could not find it. So when they brought it up again this fall and even giving me a list of people you'll have to do it on Zoom. I don't wanna do it on Zoom. And I was fearful of that. And because there were, I looked up every counselor in this town.
There was only one that I could tell that did grief and we had a big healthcare shake up. A year ago, this last winter, and two of our major hospitals in the area closed. And so a lot of medical people left, lot of big houses up for sale. My daughter, the realtor experienced that and people just, left because there was nothing here for them, it was taken away.
So hence very little. I have a friend who has to be [00:36:00] regulated on the medication and she can't even get a psychiatrist. She has to go to Minneapolis or contact somebody. I don't know how she does it, but she can't even get, help when she needs to have her medication adjusted here in this city. And we're a, not, we're a mid-sized city, an area, larger area, so it's just been really tough.
So I started listening to your podcasts and, really related to you and the widows you had on and your god-centered focus and all that. And I've looked into this and so when you made the offer, you did, I decided, okay, it's now or never. I didn't even have time to go to see if I could get assistance from people here.
I just put it on my credit card and said, I'm gonna do this. And that's when it started and it couldn't have come at a better time. And I had a very difficult Christmas. I did things and acted and responded in ways that I should not have. And I'm very sorry that I did, and I made life difficult for my fellow beloved staff mates.
And I don't know, two months ago, three months ago, I got called on the carpet after [00:37:00] Christmas, after nobody talked to me for several weeks and got called into one of those meetings where, I can't remember the name of the document. You would know where you have to, agree that you're going to make these changes.
Like a performance improvement plan. Yes. That, and I sat there thinking I am 67 years old. I have been doing church music for 50 years. What am I doing here? And I was really. Upset. But then our executive pastor, also the person who helped, who did Ben's funeral and was a close family friend who married our daughter also was more angry with me, I think, than any, from what I heard from my immediate boss, more angry with me than anybody that he had, had been.
So it was really tough and our lead pastor just sat there quietly and I talked about, I just wanted to be heard. So at that meeting where I exploded and I cried and I ran out and I was upset and I challenged you guys, was because I wanted to be heard. And at the end of that meeting. He [00:38:00] said to me, Karen, I'm so sorry I didn't listen better to you.
And I think that really struck a chord with him and it moves me to even, say that.
Finding Purpose and Moving Forward
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Karen: So I was in the middle of grief recovery method at the time and was loving that, those myths, those grief myths, which I had to deal with, the whole time we're being busted. And I knew in my spirit the whole time that those, the Elizabeth Kubler Ross stages that just didn't really apply.
I was never angry about Ben's death. I was angry about some other things, angry that I killed cars and I couldn't handle the practical things of life as a widow, which were my biggest challenge. And parenting young adults. Getting them off into the world when they didn't think they needed to be parented.
And I still do. And we have one car between three of us, so I am the driver, it's chauffeur. And I also sometimes am like a DoorDash driver too. When I get a call at 10 30 at night, mom, can you stop at McDonald's and get me this? And I, most of the time I comply. Although. [00:39:00] Following your guidelines to set boundaries.
I am doing more of that. Yay. They're liking it, but I could do more of it. Yeah. And I'm gonna stick to that, just, it's Hey, I do this for you, I want to help you, but I also deserve respect and I don't deserve to have somebody get into the car and be all up flushed and upset and telling me how to drive when there's ice on the road.
And it's dark and just chillax guys, please. So that's secret challenge. But, I love my kids dearly. They all, they get along with each other. They love being with each other. And I'm very blessed. But, all that was really hard.
Family and Personal Growth
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Karen: And letting my kid go off, my son, go off to winter camp six months after his dad died, or seven months and go to places out west.
He even climbed Angels landing. And I did not know till afterwards that is the most dangerous hike in the country, oh wow. And he did it. And he was, other than the fact that he loves to walk and he. Works out. He's in pretty good physical shape still. He didn't have the right equipment.
He didn't have the right shoes, and he did it. And I found out about it afterwards and almost killed him [00:40:00] myself. So yeah, I survived, Lord protected him. But all the men in my life, pastors, friends of my students, other guys would say, Karen, just let him go. You've gotta let him go. But it was so hard.
It was so hard to be a solo parent of a son who wanted to go off. And I knew he was gonna call eventually and say, I wanna come home. And he did. And I wouldn't let him. I said, you're with your roommate, you, he's counting on you to foot half the bill. You stay and let this be a lesson to you. I know you were, I knew you weren't prepared, you have to stick it out now.
And, we'll help you get home. We'll help you with money if we have to, which we did. But. I just, I wasn't gonna let him do that. So there were all of these challenges and I had just no connection with anybody and very little support. My friends here on staff. Yes. And I have very good close friends.
I can't, but like you said, and you explained, and I wish I'd known this from the beginning, that people are going to walk [00:41:00] away. They just will, your life changes and your social circle and the people who are around you, it changes. And I didn't realize it would change as much as it did. So I wish I had known some of the things that you have taught me and you've taught all of us and had that experience of connection, earlier.
So I thank you so much for starting Brave Window Widow, and it's been wonderful. And the woman you put me with in our little groups in grief recovery Method. Both of us married at 36. Both of us married 27 years. Both of us church musicians both of us piano teachers. And it was just amazing how she and I clicked.
Both of us had some of the same issues with our mom. Oh. And she was a PK too. Just really really interesting how the Lord works through those things, through you and arranged all of it. And I have just loved just this afternoon we'll have our heart to heart, our group our group time together and appreciate that.
And it's just nice hearing these women, these widows, whether they have seven [00:42:00] kids or no kids or whatever, or this stage or that stage, talking about the things that they do in their daily life. Just seeing that hey, they're starting to blossom. They're starting to find things to fill their life with besides besides their grief and they're moving forward not on.
And it's just been really good to connect with other people. So that connectivity is what I needed so desperately. And then, our one-on-one sessions, which I want to continue with and hopefully one day I'll be able to have you counsel me in real estate investment. That's the other thing.
You never Yeah, you never know. You never know. Yeah. And we made we made some investments 16 years ago and because of the world economic. Issues that has, those investments have not come to fruition, but I believe will. And so that was another thing. We had to wait through this. So I've had one foot in poverty and the other foot in the future of something that will be very different.
But I'm so grateful that Ben and I talked about how we wanted to help [00:43:00] people when this happened and what we wanted. Our life to look like, even the house, that we would love to call our earthly forever home. And he used to remind me, Karen, our forever home is not on this earth. It is in heaven.
And you know that, and yeah. I hope for that. So that's what I'm looking forward to.
Embracing Change and New Beginnings
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Karen: And after, even in the year after he died, I said, I'm gonna write a book. And I have, his story because she just had such an inspirational life in our life together as well, and how the Lord worked through us.
And so I'm gonna write that book. And I also wanted to start a choir, which is one of our dreams, and we talked about it incessantly, but then you have counseled us too, that don't feel that you have to do what you and your, your person thought talked about doing and wanted to do that, this might not be right for you at this time in this part of your life and it might be something different.
And so I think, at my age that probably will be, but I still get to be with the homeschool choir kids. I still get to be with ladies who ring hand bells. And we were in a hand bell festival on Saturday and I [00:44:00] still have the daughter of the man who helps me set this up through is just one of my favorite people on earth.
And she and I just have more fun when I do her lesson, and it's just, it's I have those connections and the kids at the university that I occasionally get to be with. So I am so grateful that I had, the Lord gave me the gift of music, and music brought Ben and I together. It kept us together.
And now it's helping me to have this life that, that I really do love, even though I miss him terribly. He was my partner. He was my. Teammate and even his older kids admit that, yeah, you guys were a team and and I still feel his presence with me. And it's just, it's been really good.
It's been hard. But then through all of this, I've changed so much in the last months that my employers have said, you have just changed so much. I've seen the changes. And so tomorrow I'm gonna be going in with one of my second required meeting with Pastor Brian [00:45:00] and, just talk about the latest and how I, how things are going.
And so where two months ago I felt like I could lose my job. Now I feel like, hey, I'm able to, I don't agree with everything that goes on here. And they've changed a lot of things that are hard because they were things Ben and I did together, but I. Now I can respect that and live with and enjoy and love what I'm doing.
And when you have people come up to you on an Easter Sunday, practically in tears just saying how much they love the organ and how much it means that we still have this music in our church it makes it, it makes it all worthwhile. And I'm here for a reason and the Lord has me here for a reason.
I ministered at a lot of funerals of friends and people that Ben and I were close to people in our Bible study. They're having a great old Bible study up in heaven now. I just know it. And we're just time together and they're with the Lord. So it's just cool to think of that. So he's given me strength to get through those things too.
And so it's, I feel purpose. [00:46:00] In my life, in what I get to do.
Concluding Thoughts and Gratitude
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Karen: And you and Brave Widow have been such a big part of just teaching me so much in the last few months that I don't even recognize the person I was last November and the horrible things that I, the ways I acted back in December, and it's just, it's been wonderful.
So thank you. And I would encourage anyone who is yearning for connection and yearning for someone to understand and guide you please come to Brave Widow, come to Emily reach out. And it's just amazing what she offers here and it's, there's nothing like you and Brave Widow out there that I have found, on the internet.
So thank you for taking that bold step that you did through your own grief. I. To, to bring this to the rest of us and bring your experience in what you did in your former life, in the hospital industry. And I'm just amazed that you led as many people as you did, wow. And raised four kids and all of that too.
So it's just, [00:47:00] you've been an inspiration,
Emily: Thank you. And I just really, I know you like brushed over your experience the past few months of like where you were versus where you are, but I really want to give you so much credit and so much I have so much respect for you because you were, yeah, you were part of the Black Friday, I think group that joined, we had several people join at one time. And we had the holidays to get through, which being involved in your church, there was a lot of tradition that was changing and new ways of doing things and for anyone changes difficult.
But when you have so many years of memories of, no, Ben and I did this together, and now you're changing all of that, and yeah. Now what else is gonna be taken away from me? That was really difficult. And then I think we started Grief recovery method in January. Yeah. Went that for a couple months, but you. You could have had every [00:48:00] right to sit back and feel like a victim, that your leadership was changing your processes, your what you have always known. Just everything felt like it was changing. At one time you could have felt very taken advantage of maybe by family or close people around you who just expect you to do what they want.
Yeah. And still, instead of sitting back and saying I guess it's just the way it is, or I guess nobody appreciates me, like you never allowed yourself to stay in a place of being a victim and. Believing that this is just the rest of my life now. There were even almost four years later.
That was, that there was that desire in you to say there has to be something better. There has to be a purpose for me, there has to be a reason why I'm still in this situation that I am. And I have put many employees on performance improvement plans. [00:49:00] And when you do that, when you do that, you always hope for the best, prepare for the worst because you hope it's like a wake up call. Like either. Yeah, exactly. This is gonna be like, okay we're getting back together, or this is the beginning of a series of the end, right? Of this relationship. And so you always want the person to rise to the occasion, but in my experience, a lot of times.
People tend to shrink back and feel like, oh, I'm just not wanted here. I need to find another job. But in all of our conversations and all of our working together, you were very firm. I can do this. I wanna be able to do this. I believe I'm still here for a reason and I know I'm going to have to change the way I've thought about things and overcome some personality differences or figure out how to navigate like new relationships.
Yeah. And now for your employers [00:50:00] to say wow, you've made so many changes. This is amazing. That is not easy to overcome. And yes, I've been in the journey with you and you have done the work, and you have made the changes, and you have decided that your life didn't end when your husband died and that Yeah.
Yeah, in itself is amazing. So kudos to you.
Karen: Thank you for the encouragement. I'm just almost surprised at how naturally this has unfolded over the last three months and because this isn't me, I am a quarter German a quarter, I just found out I was a quarter Ashkenazi Jew, which my sister and I suspected that for many years.
We finally found out the truth. I'm a quarter Irish and I go, I English, and so I'm quite the combination and there's a lot of feistiness or Irish fire in me, as my husband used to say. And so it, hasn't been easy. But I tell you, the Lord, through you. Grief recovery method and everything. The Lord [00:51:00] just helped me to release that, a lot of that stubbornness and I want it this way and I, there are certain things I don't like, Easter Sunday, there are a couple of things that I can't experience that I once did, but, realizing I'm still here. God has me here for a purpose, and God has me here to minister to others through music and the gifts that he gave me and the hard work that I've put in, down through the years and also through that hard work to be an example for my kids. And I'm so proud of them. David is in Newsies right now, and he got in the car last night and he said, oh, I feel like an old man.
I just feel, oh, I don't know if I can do this because the dancing is so strenuous and so hard. But 10 years ago, this was a kid who could not dance. He didn't know his left foot, his right. And now he's in the front row of these Broadway shows that he does and loves it. And he was in SpongeBob and he danced, tap danced with four legs, as Squidward and all my [00:52:00] kids, Rachel and Lizzie, and the three of them doing it together.
And they have an. Unbelievable work ethic at their jobs, even though two of 'em are in food service and that's not what they wanna do the rest of their lives. The other one is building a real estate businesses, and it's already, she started during COVI and already has won awards, for what she's done.
And so I'm just so super proud of my kids and the fact that they looked at Ben and my example too, of, not giving up, of keeping on and just working very hard and having that work ethic. And so I thought, I can't give, I can't give up. I can't. What kind of an example would that be for not only my children, but kids inquire and other people I know I need to, the Lord has placed me here for a reason and these people have supported me and they've loved me.
It's not that they haven't, even if we disagree, but it's, I, I just slowly, the Lord worked in my heart and I realized I can't quit. I can't leave this place, these people mean too [00:53:00] much to me. I have a purpose for being here. I just did, he guided me. There, I'm not always perfect.
I still have my frustrations but I just can feel that I'm different and even different in how I respond to things, how I respond when the police stop me for driving too slow. I'll tell you that story later.
Emily: Oh, I can't wait to hear,
Karen: Or the tornado last night waiting for the tornadoes that, fortunately blessedly ended up not being what was predicted and all of that stuff.
And so I'm just not responding or not. Giving in and responding to my kids the way they think I'm gonna respond and just being firm, whether they like it or not, so I can feel the change in so many other areas, not just in this widowhood journey. And it'll always be hard. And I will sit in my car and I will, pray and I will look up and talk about it.
And even on Sunday nights, because that's when this all happened on a late, on a Sunday night almost four years ago. And I have ways of commemorating and remembering and I love [00:54:00] doing that. And I still have a little bottle of his ashes and throw some of them over the Stew water lift bridge, which is Stillwater was a special place in the oldest city in Min, Minnesota.
And I go there every once in a while because we used to go there a lot. He did with his older kids too. And I just have ways of commemorating and remembering. And that also brings beauty in. And the relationship, if you wanna call it the relationship that I have now in thinking about us and what we had and where I am.
So that's a cool thing I like to do is commemorate as well. Yeah, and I got to share all this when I was the music director for the Nuns in Sound of Music the year after he died, and I shared our engagement story I think almost the first night. These were a group of ladies and girls who most of them had never sung on a stage before and they ended up sounding better than the Broadway nuns.
And I was so proud of them. And they gave me a picture the night before we opened of St. Louis with the city from the perspective of the river and the arch [00:55:00] and everything, and even our honeymoon hotel was in there. And it just really meant a lot to me. So people have resonated with parts of my story and I never hold back in sharing the Lord and his.
His part in guiding us. And so I just hope in the future that he'll give me other opportunities to do and I'm so grateful for you having me on today and just being able to share my story and I want to be available also for widows who have been in and are in my situation and just know, reach a hand out of understanding and listening.
And I've been so grateful to you because as you can tell, I talk a lot, but you haven't muzzled me. And, my prayer requests would get muzzled, because I was sharing their, they were too long and everything, and I realized I was wearing people out and I probably shouldn't have done that, but I was just longing for connection.
And so it's been so nice just to be able to be open and share my story and share what's going on. And also, I've learned to listen. To others a lot better [00:56:00] than I did before. So I'm grateful for that too.
Emily: And you, yes, you do a great job in our heart to hearts and other meetings and allowing people space to share their story as well.
Thank you. And yeah, I think you just have such a great future ahead of encouraging others. You have the heart of a servant and so just being able to share your story and being able to help other widows along the journey, I think is like a no brainer. I definitely can see that in your future.
And so this is just maybe one small way of kicking that off and who knows where you're gonna end up. A year from now, several years from now, whatever that is. Yeah. But I just thank you for coming and sharing your story and some about your experience, and I will look forward to seeing you later today.
Karen: Thank you so much. Thank you. I appreciate it so much, Emily. Love you. Love you too.
Resources for New Widows
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If you're newly widowed and aren't sure where to [00:57:00] start, you need the brave new widow's starter kit inside brave new widow. You'll find a starter guide to help you through your first few months. A quick start guide. You can share with family and friends so they know how to help you. And a collection of some of the frequent topics that widows want to learn more about. To get the brave new widow series.
Just go to brave widow. Dot com slash start it's free and you'll get instant access. That's brave widow.com/start S T a R T. See you there.
