The Compassionate Friends

I have good news.

Recently, I've been accepted to be a contributing writer for the Open to Hope column within The Compassionate Friends E-Newsletter.

You may read my article, Overcoming Fear After Losing Son to Suicide. Once inside the column, enter my name, Jean Williams in the search box to the right. Please feel free to leave a comment to let me know you were there.

At joshua-mom, I've penned over 35 articles about the process of grieving and living after our son, Joshua, died by suicide in March of 2004. That's where most of the articles will come from, but edited to better fit the column. I am glad I did not quit writing after my son's death.

Less than a week after Joshua's memorial, I decided I needed to keep writing. I had articles and book projects of various stages, but I knew I could only concentrate on one project at a time.

First, I sat myself down and wondered where exactly were my writing weaknesses. I worked on the most completed novel and honed my skills as a writer. I took online classes from the comfort of my home. I read writing how-to books from the masters of the craft. I even got to a point I was ready to hire a freelance writer to go through my novel. When I felt ready to venture to the outside world, I enrolled and completed a speech class.

Those were the hardest three years of my entire life, and writing, researching, and studying the craft of writing gave me a creative outlet.

Agent Mary Kole wrote that you have to write a million bad words to begin to write well. I am sure that I wrote 500,000 thousand of those words during that three year period.

Until next time . . . never give up as a writer.