Mending Broken Hearts - The Grief Recovery Method San Antonio

08/06/2025

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In 1999, Dr. Guillermo Gutierrez, one of our board members and Nico's dad, keynoted at a MISS Foundation event, sharing with a room filled with 400 grieving parents about fetal microchimerism. I knew about it from recent studies; but hearing it again, so comprehensively explained, brought tears to my eyes (and the eyes of many in the room).

During pregnancy, a quiet biological miracle occurs: cells from the unborn baby pass through the placenta and take root in the mother’s body. This phenomenon, called fetal microchimerism, means that a mother often carries small populations of all her children's cells—cells that are genetically distinct from her own—for decades after birth, or even if her child/children have died.

These cells are not inert. They migrate like pilgrims through her bloodstream, embedding themselves in her bone marrow, skin, lungs, liver, and even the sacred folds of her heart and her brain. Some of these cells appear to aid in healing tissue. Others act as sentinels of memory, marking the body with a cellular fingerprint of the children who once grew inside her.

In the context of grief, fetal microchimerism offers profound implications. When a child dies—whether in utero, infancy, childhood, or adulthood—the mother remains, biologically, a mosaic of that child. The boundary between self and other dissolves: her body carries not just the memory but the material presence of the one she mourns.

This intertwining defies reduction. It means that grief is not only psychological, not only spiritual—it is cellular. The child is not only remembered; the child is, in some small yet enduring way, still within.

What science confirms, poets have long intuited: that is, we carry them in our bones, in every heartbeat, in the blood that flows through us, and in every wound that eventually closes, even when scarred.

This unique microchimerism is a quiet truth—one that affirms the depth of the maternal bond and the embodied nature of mourning. In a world that so often pathologizes grief, this phenomenon offers a sacred reminder: to grieve is not to be broken—it is to remain connected at the deepest biological level.

We carry them still. In so many ways, we carry them still.

With loving compassion,
Dr Joanne Cacciatore

07/30/2025

01/25/2025

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Healing from grief is not a straight path. Some days, it feels like the pain softens just enough to breathe, while others, it returns with a force that takes your breath away.

And that’s okay.

You’re allowed to have days where it hurts more than usual, where the memories feel sharper and the tears fall heavier. Grief is not a journey of perfection—it’s a testament to the love and loss you carry.

Progress isn’t measured by how quickly the pain fades, but by your courage to face it. To feel it. To honor the ebb and flow of healing.

On the harder days, be kind to yourself. Healing doesn’t mean forgetting. It means learning to carry the weight of your loss while still moving forward.

You are doing the best you can—and that is enough.

~ Dealing With Grief Dealing with grief

~ Art by Kristin Vestgård

12/31/2024

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Don't be sad... we will meet again. Open your little eyes, maybe you can't see me but in your dreams you can find me.

Don't cling to the idea that I should continue by your side, everything has a beginning and an end but I promise you that I will continue in your memory.

When you can't find me in your dreams, don't wake up with discouragement or anger, I went to take refuge in your heart.

There will be days that will fly by and that's okay, it's not necessarily so that you forget me, it's so that your wound heals sooner.

Life has not been unfair or cruel, life with all its good and bad things, is beautiful, very beautiful.
No matter where each of us is now, our hearts will continue to connect.

Don't cry for me, please, I'm very well, in a state of deep tranquility, with a peace that I couldn't explain to you but that makes me feel happy, your tears will not bring me back, don't torture yourself anymore, don't think that It could have been different because that doesn't make a difference, if I have accepted it, accept it too and move on.

Never think about giving up, be strong, don't give up, you can, you have always been able to and you always will be able to.

We can't touch each other but we can still feel each other. The magic is not over if you continue to remember me and carry me in your heart.
Live for you, for me, for whoever you want but live, enjoy this beautiful life that God gave us today we are here and tomorrow maybe not.

Seek your happiness in those precious little gifts that life gives us; the light of the moon, the wind, the rain, the flight of a bird, the beauty of the landscapes.

Live and I will continue to live through you. And when you can't feel me by your side, when I no longer appear in your dreams, in those small gifts that we almost never value, you will find me, I promise that I will give you a sign.

Breathe, flow, move forward, you can! You have always been able to and you always can.

12/02/2024

https://www.facebook.com/share/14exCzM1D9/?mibextid=WC7FNe

I had my own notion of grief.
I thought it was the sad time
That followed the death of someone you love.
And you had to push through it
To get to the other side.

But I'm learning there is no other side.
There is no pushing through.
But rather,

There is absorption.
Adjustment.
Acceptance.

And grief is not something you complete,
But rather, you endure.
Grief is not a task to finish
And move on,
But an element of yourself ,
An alteration of your being.
A new way of seeing.

A new definition of self ..

~ Gwen Flowers ~
Credit to unknown artist

11/30/2024

More interesting thoughts on grief.

Hear psychotherapist and author Francis Weller, MFT discuss the communal nature of grief, the expressive virtue of anger, false happiness, and the two hands ...

11/07/2024

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Instead of saying, “I know what it feels like,” let’s say, “I cannot imagine your heartbreak right now.”

Instead of saying, “You’re strong, you’ll get through this,” let’s say, “You’ll feel the weight, and I’ll be right here beside you.”

Instead of saying, “You look like you’re doing well,” let’s say, “How are you really holding up today?”

Instead of saying, “Healing takes time,” let’s say, “Healing doesn’t follow a clock; it will happen at your own pace.”

Instead of saying, “Everything happens for a reason,” let’s say, “This must feel so painfully unfair and senseless right now.”

And when words fail altogether, there’s no need to search for more. Sometimes, love shows up strongest in shared silences.