BW 133: Finding Strength Through Grief: Shamber's Journey of Healing and Hope

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At 31, Shamber became a widow when her husband, Elgin, passed away suddenly. With a two-year-old daughter who needed heart surgery and a grieving heart, Shamber shares her incredible journey of overcoming loss, leaning into faith, and finding hope again.

 

Shamber opens up about:

•  Her unexpected and deep connection with her late husband, Elgin
•  The challenges of being a full-time caregiver to her daughter while coping with grief
•  How faith and community support played a crucial role in her healing process
•  How she found strength and purpose, leading her to start a support group for young widows
•  Her advice for widows who feel overwhelmed and alone, especially those just beginning their grief journey

 

This episode is a must-watch for anyone navigating widowhood and grief. Shamber's vulnerability and hope will inspire you to take action, reach out for support, and know that it is possible to find joy and purpose again after loss.

 

 

Key Takeaways: 

•  Widowhood can feel isolating, but it’s important to reach out for support and lean into your faith.
•  Starting new habits, meeting new people, and embracing a new routine can help with healing.
•  There’s always hope for the future, and life can be full of purpose again after loss.
•  Taking action in grief, such as joining support groups or therapy, can make a huge difference.

 

 

 

 

👉 Connect with Shamber: 

•  Northern Nevada Young Widows Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/84909 

 

 

💬 Let us know what resonated with you most in the comments below!

 

 

 

Chapters: 

00:22 New Year Workshop Announcement

02:37 Upcoming Changes in 2025

03:31 Introducing Shamber

04:27 Shamber's Background and Story

06:32 Challenges and Loss

20:09 Faith and Healing

25:40 Advice for New Widows

28:51 Taking Action in Grief

30:51 Conclusion and Community Invitation

 

 

 

 

👉 If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and leave a review on your favorite podcast platform. Your feedback helps us reach more widows and support them on their journey to healing.

 

 

#WidowSupport #GriefJourney #HealingTogether #LifeAfterLoss

 

 

Resources:

•  Brave New Widow free guidebook: https://www.bravewidow.com/start
•  Join the Brave Widow Membership Community: https://www.bravewidow.com/join

 

 

 

Join the Brave Widow Community:
If you're feeling overwhelmed and unsure of your next step in your grief journey, now is the time to take action. The Brave Widow Membership is here to provide you with the support, guidance, and community you need to heal and rediscover joy. Don’t go through this alone—join us today and start moving forward with confidence. https://www.bravewidow.com/join

 

 

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Hey hey, I’m Emily Tanner.  I was widowed at age 37, one month shy of our 20 year wedding anniversary.  Nathan and I have four beautiful children together, and my world was turned completely upside down when I lost him.  

 

Now, I love my life again!  I’m able to experience joy, achieve goals and dreams I thought I’d lost, and rediscover this next version of me.

 

I did the work.

I invested in coaching for myself.

I learned what I needed to do to move forward and took the steps.

I implemented the tools and strategies that I use for my clients in my coaching program.

 

 

This is for you, if:

•  You want a faith-based approach to coaching
•  You want to move forward after loss, and aren’t sure how
•  You want to enjoy life without feeling weighed down by guilt, sadness, or regret
•  You want a guide to help navigate this journey to the next version of you
•  You want to rediscover who you are

 

•  Join the Brave Widow Community: https://www.bravewidow.com/join
•  Schedule a consult with Emily:  https://calendly.com/bravewidow/widow-consult-call?month=2024-08 

 

 

Find and take the next steps to move forward (without “moving on”).

 

 

 

FOLLOW me on SOCIAL:

 

Twitter | @brave_widow

 

Instagram | @brave_widow

 

Facebook |   / bravewidow  

 

YouTube | @bravewidow

 

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TRANSCRIPT: 

 

 

[00:00:00] Emily: Hey, hey, and welcome to episode number 133 of the Brave Widow show. We are here just after the holidays, just after New Year, and it is You might have a lot of different thoughts about the new year and what that means for you. Maybe this is the first year without your person. Maybe this is the first year that your head is above water and for members of the Brave Widow community, I've planned and already have scheduled a two hour workshop on Wednesday, January 15th for planning your year.

For 2025, even if you're newly widowed and everything feels overwhelming and you have no goals, Or if you're super pumped about a new year and what exciting things are in store for you and you have 2, 500 goals, wherever you are in your journey, you will get value out of attending this workshop.

It's called project 2025, and I am going to help you plan out your year. Whether it's specific goals that you have, or it's something that you want to invite more of, that you want to feel more of in your life. This is the perfect time to join the Brave Widow membership community and to get started. To sign up, just head on over to bravewidow.

com. Also, if you're kind of on the fence, I know so many of you are so close. I know you read my emails. I know you click on those links and there's still some reservation there, which by the way, is normal, like that's a normal thing. But if you would like to learn more either about the community, maybe about one on one coaching, maybe some of the other programs that you've heard us have in the BraveWidow membership community,

but you're not exactly sure if this is the right fit for you, then you can go to BraveWidow. com and actually schedule a consult with me. It's a no pressure consult. We have an hour together where I will learn more about you, about where you are in your journey and how Brave Widow would be able to help you in moving forward, whether that's healing your heart, whether it's rebuilding your life, whether it's making new friends, whether it's dating again, like wherever you are, Brave Widow will meet you there and help you take your next steps forward.

Also, next week, I'm very excited. I will be sharing how BraveWidow will be changing for 2025. And don't panic. Don't worry. We're not going backwards. We're not making massive, big changes that's going to disrupt something that you're already participating in, that you're already enjoying. I have heard loud and clear from people

what they have found the most helpful within Brave Widow, how they crave the connection, the coaching, the direct feedback. And I've been doing a lot of really deep thought work around how we make this as scalable and as accessible to as many widows as possible. And so I am so pleased. To be able to share with you next week, what that looks like.

You do not want to miss the podcast episode next week.

Alright, let me introduce Shamber. Shamber is from Reno, Nevada. She's 32 years old, was widowed at 31, and lost her late husband in March of 2023. She has a two year old daughter who has a heart defect and is in and out of the hospital. She is a full time caregiver to her, which has been hard since losing her husband.

She has a beautiful testimony with the loss of her husband and her relationship with Jesus Christ. She's excited to share how God has spoken to her and given her the strength to move forward as a medical mom, to truly find herself in solitude and to fall in love with life again. How beautiful is that?

Okay, let's dive in.

Shamber, welcome. And thank you so much for agreeing to come on the show today. Hi. Yes. Thank you for having me, Emily. I appreciate it.

Absolutely. So I know everyone would love to hear your background a little bit about what you do, and then we can dive into your story wherever you want to start.

[00:04:38] Shamber: Thanks. I am from Reno, Nevada. I was widowed at 31 just a little over a year and a half ago now. I am a full time caregiver to our daughter.

She started two and a half and she has a major heart defect. So I don't work. I do stay home with her. That's been quite the adjustment, especially without my husband. That is what I do for now until she's cleared to, go to daycare and stuff like that. But yeah, I met my late husband, his name is Elgin, back in 2019, so we only had a quick four years together.

It was very fast and cut way too short. But he passed when he was 41, so he is 10 years older than me. We met in 2019 and. He was just lovely. I wasn't really interested in him at first, but I met him when I was out with some friends and he was just so loud and obnoxious and just wild.

I feel like not normally what I go for. He offered to buy me a drink and I was like, no, I'm going to go home. And then a week later he found me on Facebook and he added me and asked me out. And I think by our third date, I was like, I think I might end up with this guy. He's pretty amazing.

[00:06:00] Emily: That's awesome.

So what qualities did you like about him besides the loud obnoxious part?

[00:06:06] Shamber: He was just really very charming, but he also loved the Lord and he was super humble. And I always knew he wasn't full of it because he would tell the same story multiple times and it was always the same and it was something that I really admired and loved about him.

So I very quickly fell in love with him and just knew like it was going to be him that I wanted to spend my life with.

[00:06:30] Emily: That's amazing. Did you have any concerns about the age difference? Did anyone in your family give you a hard time about that or it just felt seamless?

[00:06:40] Shamber: Everyone was open to it. My parents have always been amazing. They're like, if something feels right, just go for it. And yeah, the age wasn't a problem for us. I actually felt like I needed someone older who's just very mature and We had, the first year was rough, but we figured it out.

And we did have a beautiful four years together. We got pregnant with our daughter in 2021 and she was a first for both of us. So we were really excited to be parents. And then when I was 30 weeks pregnant, I got gestational diabetes. And so they sent me to a high risk doctor.

And while I was at that doctor, we found out she had a really severe and rare heart defect. And so her heart defect requires multiple surgeries throughout her lifetime. So before the age of one, she needed two heart surgeries and that was a lot for him and I to jump into for first time parents.

It was just really overwhelming and But it also, I feel, plays a huge role in his life and what he needed to do before God brought him home. And he was a great dad. He really was. For the one year he got to be a dad, it was like his dream come true, and he was just wonderful.

[00:08:04] Emily: That's great. And that had to be really scary. Being in somewhat of a new relationship and having that time together and then bringing a new life in the world. And then just the whole, I worked in healthcare for 20 years, but I know it can be overwhelming. And there you see all the tubes and all the wires and hear all the noises. And that can be really scary when it's your baby

that's having surgery.

[00:08:30] Shamber: Yeah,. We actually had to move down to Las Vegas so that she could have her first heart surgery. And so she spent the first four months of her life in the ICU. She had a really rough recovery. So that was really hard.

And then when we brought her home, we were just, like full time caregivers. He went back to work. He worked for my parents. And so that was really helpful. He was able to take the time off needed for her doctor's appointments and stuff. But we were just in the waiting game after we got home because we were waiting for her full repair.

And I noticed that. That full year, actually, he was having a lot of issues with his asthma. He was an asthmatic. So he was struggling and I kept telling him, you have insurance. Let's go to the doctor. Let's just get you on some meds. Maybe they can, figure out what's going on. And he was just so stubborn and No, I gotta go to work.

I can't do it right now. So he just kept putting it off and we were so busy with her and her doctor's appointments that I just Didn't really push it which I can look back now and be like, Oh gosh, why didn't I just make him go? But that's just not how life works. And so by January of 2023, he ended up in the hospital, had a major asthma attack.

Went to the hospital, they ran some tests, looked at his lungs, and they said he was in the clear. They said he was completely fine. They didn't see anything so we thought it's okay. They gave him some steroid meds to help his lungs feel better. And he did, he felt better. Our daughter's second surgery was scheduled for April of 23.

And we miraculously got the call that they could get her in February instead. So we traveled to Stanford in Palo Alto, California, and we were there. Just a few weeks. We were there five weeks, but I noticed while we were there, he was getting sicker and sicker. He was sleeping a lot. He just was not feeling a good.

He was using our daughter's oxygen machine like a lot like we have it, so he's I'm just going to use it because he couldn't breathe and I was so focused on making sure our daughter was okay because she, was hooked up to all these machines and she was super sick and it was just really hard recovery after her second

surgery. So we finally got through that and he he said he was feeling better so I wasn't worrying about it. I trusted him. And we got home on March 18th from Stanford. So we were home and it felt really good. We felt like we had just gotten over the biggest hurdle in life. We're like, she should be good until she's in her teens now.

We shouldn't have to worry. about another surgery. We're just gonna, she's got to go to the doctor every couple months so they can check her heart and make sure everything's working well, and we've been lucky with that so far. But six days later, it was March 24th, it was Friday, he was getting ready for work.

And I noticed he was just really struggling, and I, I went into the bedroom and I'm like, what's going on sweetie? You just don't seem like you're feeling well. Do you need to call in? And he's I actually think I might have you take me to the hospital before you take Addie to her doctor's appointment.

So she had her follow up appointment that day with her cardiologist, which is, it was mandatory. I had to take her. And he was so sweet just sitting on the couch holding her, trying to soothe her while he wasn't feeling good and he was really struggling. And I'm so glad that he had that moment because it was the last time he would hold her.

And about 15 minutes went by and we were getting ready. We were, like, gonna take him to the hospital and then I'd go to her appointment. And he finally looks at me and he's I think I need you to call 911. I, something's wrong. And I was like, okay, all right I'll call him. And so I get on the phone with them and the fire department paramedics were, two minutes away.

So they got here super fast. And then the actual ambulance didn't get here for about six minutes. But I let them do their thing in the bedroom with him, so I was in the living room just taking care of our daughter and letting the paramedics do their thing and I couldn't hear him, so I actually didn't know if he was conscious or not at that point.

They had him laying down and they were, I heard them asking him questions, but I didn't hear his responses, so I wasn't really sure, but I was like, they're gonna. It's going to be fine. They're going to handle it. And so they ended up having to carry him out. He couldn't walk out to the ambulance himself.

They carried him out. He one of the paramedics came up to me and said, I think your husband's going to need to be intubated. And I was like, what? What do you mean? That's crazy. And they told us, they told me they were taking him to Renown, which is one of our big hospitals, and that they that I would just need to call in a couple hours.

And so by then I was like, just, I was not feeling very good. I was like, this is terrible. What am I going to do? So I called my mom and I was like, Elgin's, Not going to be into work, like an ambulance just took him away, something is wrong and I was starting to get really panicked and she's okay, just take Addie to the doctors, go get that taken care of, and then when you get home, I will come watch Addie so you can get down to the hospital to be with her.

I was like, okay, and so I called his mom and she was able to go down to the hospital to meet him. To try. They actually really wouldn't talk to her. And she did finally call me after I was done at the doctors with our daughter. And she said, so he's stable now, but the doctors told me he went into cardiac arrest on the way to the hospital.

And I'm like, What? I was so confused and at that point in time, I'm, I don't know anything about cardiac arrest in my mind. I assumed it's like a heart attack. That's just what I thought. So I had no idea how severe a cardiac arrest could be. And it wasn't until he was in the ICU for four days that I actually found out he went into cardiac arrest twice on the way to the hospital.

And we actually live probably 30 minutes from the city, so it's a longer drive to get there. And So I still don't know what happened exactly. I wasn't really told. I know that he also tried to go into a third cardiac arrest when he got to the hospital and they were able to stop that one. But at that point in time, I just, I didn't really understand what was going on, and I just thought he'd be in the hospital for a while, and then he would come home.

[00:15:36] Emily: Right, which is super confusing when you're like I know he wasn't feeling good, but what has brought all of this on?

[00:15:45] Shamber: Yeah, and I didn't know an asthma attack could turn into that you just don't know those things. The third day he was in the hospital, I witnessed something very miraculous, which I know now was very much God just letting me know that he was okay but I had walked into Elgin's hospital room and I saw a bright figure standing behind him for a split few seconds and I know people might think that's crazy but it's very much like I saw it and for me it felt like it was Jesus, like they're to heal him and I thought maybe, okay maybe he's gonna come back to us.

He's going to be okay. Like God was healing him in that moment, but really, I think it was just him letting me know that he went home to be with the Lord. And I really love that part of my story. It was so beautiful. It was really hard for me to accept it back then, but now I just think it's a beautiful part of it, and I'm really grateful I got to experience that.

But he was in the ICU for a full week, and then the doctors finally were able to get his lungs healthy enough to do the full brain scan. And then they let us know that he was without oxygen to his brain for 32 minutes. And so he was completely brain dead. And so on March 31st, they were able to say time of death was 2.

39 in the afternoon. And we weren't gonna be coming home with him. Yeah.

[00:17:21] Emily: How did you even begin to process everything that was happening? My husband was in ICU for several days and it's very like up and down. Oh, we think things are going good. Oh no, they're not. I don't know if you experienced the same thing, but I know that the weight is excruciating.

Just every day feels like an eternity. What were those days like, if you can even really remember?

[00:17:50] Shamber: Yeah, so I feel like there's so much trauma, right? With my daughter being in the hospital for as long as she was. And so seeing him in that state, like that, like she was, I actually laughed a little bit because I was like, Oh, this is crazy.

Like my daughter was just on a breathing tube for weeks and now my husband is on a breathing tube. What is going on? But I feel like I actually handled him being in the ICU really well. I've, I think just being in the hospital for months with our daughter, like really probably just prepared me quite a bit for that.

So that, that part, not, wasn't as hard as, I think it could have been for others. I know that's pretty traumatic for people. I almost feel like desensitized to it now because it's just been my life. So that part, it's more so just like accepting that I was now going to be taking care of a medical baby by myself.

And I didn't I couldn't comprehend or understand in that moment, like how this was real life. Like I, she was one. So it just was really a shock to me. And the weeks following that. As hard as they were, I feel like I just, I'm so grateful. God just blessed me with the best mom and sister in the world because they made sure for two months that one of them stayed with me at night and they were always with me.

And I was never alone. I wasn't doing it by myself. And then my friends would show up during the day. And so I just had an amazing support system. The following months after that. But yeah, obviously it's, I think the harder part is the months that follow and like processing and trying to accept what happened because you're just waiting for them to walk through the door And they're not going to walk through the door.

[00:19:46] Emily: It's incredible that your family was truly there for you. I know a lot of people experience, a lot of distance and feeling of being alone. And so even though I know it was hard and it doesn't diminish the hurt that you had, I'm grateful that your family was able to, to be there and to help you just feel, fully surrounded.

I'm curious because people have so many different experiences with faith and with loss and wrestling with the concept of, okay, God, could save my husband or he could heal him, but for whatever reason he didn't my, he's not here anymore. So what was your faith experience like, it in the aftermath.

And then as you think about it now, what was that like for you?

[00:20:38] Shamber: The first few weeks I spent on the floor, crying out to God and telling him I hated him. If I'm being truthful, I hated him. But I didn't really hate him. I was just so angry and trying to process like how I could be 31 and widowed and taking care of this baby by myself.

And I really chose to just dig into my grief and not run away from it. I knew that the only way to get through it is to go through it and to feel all of it. And six weeks in I chose to join the program grief share. And I know that's been talked about on your channel before. But for those who don't know it's a faith based program and it's 13 weeks and it's free.

And you go through a workbook and you watch videos, and I did that program twice, and I really truly feel like that just made my relationship with God so much stronger, and it really helped me understand death in a better way, in a biblical way. Because he tells us so many times that our days are numbered.

And there is so much scripture to support it. And I feel like because my husband and I were believers, I feel like I was able to accept it a little bit better. Just because I have the promise that I will see him again someday, and that he's okay. He is right where he is meant to be and that doesn't, that hasn't come without difficulty, because it's a rollercoaster, right?

There's days where you're angry, there's days where you're sad, there's days where you're happy, and just trying to process. All of those emotions. But I really dug close to the Lord. I ended up at a completely different church with different people just because I needed to be close to him.

So I know that some people can really just pull back from him and question, but I just chose not to do that. I felt greatly that he was the only one that was going to carry me through it.

[00:22:53] Emily: That's beautifully said. So thank you for sharing that. And I try to encourage people is that in grief, a lot of times we have to embrace two things.

Like one is this bad thing happened. And I also have faith that God is still in control and I don't like this. I don't understand it. But, I know that he also promises that he won't ever leave us. And so for me, that was really how I tried to, wrap my mind around what was happening and reconcile that.

And I, for people that are struggling, I would tell him like, I hate this. I hate this situation. I don't know why you allowed this to happen. I don't like it. I know that I know what the Bible says and that you are true and faithful and that you never leave us. And so I'm just going to live in surrender to that and, see where this path takes me.

But that's not easy to do to always refocus your faith and your focus there.

[00:23:54] Shamber: It's not. And I definitely got close to him and then there were days where I just didn't talk to him at all. And it's just a part of reality. But I feel I feel that he really helped me see that I was going to use this.

This pain for a greater purpose. I think that he always knew that I was gonna be a widow. And it led me to opening up my own young widows support group and that wasn't as successful as I thought it was gonna be, but I think it provided just enough healing for a lot of us. That needed it in the moment.

And so we had a good, six month run with that. And that was nice and it's still open. So if anyone's in the Reno sparks area and they need it, I am still running it. It just, it's not as active as it was before.

[00:24:45] Emily: Is that in person or do you also do it virtually?

[00:24:48] Shamber: It's in person, so we were doing like one to two meetups a month, and then it, people just get really busy, especially when you have kids, so a lot of us were like, I just can't make it this month, but I think it was, I think it did serve its purpose for a while, and I'm glad that I had it.

[00:25:07] Emily: That's awesome that you chose to give back and you chose to help other people that were struggling because as young widows, and I say young, loosely, 60 and under is. pretty young from a widow perspective. You just have different challenges. You're just at a different point in life than someone who's in their seventies and eighties.

And so it's nice to know that there are other young widows out there and that you're facing some of those hurdles together.

[00:25:37] Shamber: Yeah, absolutely.

[00:25:39] Emily: Awesome. So what advice or encouragement would you give to, the widow that's in those early stages and just really struggling and asking the question, is my life always going to be like this?

I don't see how it could ever be any better. What words would you share with them?

[00:26:01] Shamber: Yeah, so I'm, I'm like 20 months out now from my loss. I thought about doing this podcast last year. I had reached out to you and I was like, okay, maybe I can do it. And then I held back because I was like, I don't think I have the best advice to give just yet.

But I, I do feel now greatly that I have really done most of my healing from this. I just want to say life is beautiful. Again, 20 months in, I I really, dug close to the Lord. So that was a huge thing for me. So if the grieving widow can find the strength to do that, definitely If therapy is what you need, get into some therapy.

It's, I think it's really healthy for us. If it's group therapy like grief share or just a, a different program, definitely recommend that. And then for me The Widows Podcast. I found so much healing in these podcasts. I listened to yours and then I also listened to I think it was called Widow 180.

And I think I listened to every single episode. I would just be driving and cleaning my house and I completely redid my house. I painted all the walls. I changed all the decor while I listened to these podcasts and it it, It really just gave me a lot of strength to push through. So yeah, I just, it does get better.

It may not seem like it. I know, I feel like a lot of widows further in their journey tried to scare me by saying The second year is harder. And I was like, what? There's no way it can be harder. It hasn't been harder for me. I am in a new relationship again and planning on getting remarried next year.

Yeah he's amazing. And he was actually my boyfriend in high school. So we reconnected 15 years later. So I hope that newly grieving widows know that it does get better. You can love again and you can move forward in a really healthy way. Just don't run from your grief, accept it and let it in.

When it comes knocking at the door, let it in and sit with it for a while, but don't let it sit, stay for long. Just yeah, keep pushing forward every day, the best that you can. And sometimes Some days are going to be really bad days. I still have bad days where something triggers my grief and it's like, Oh, wow, I haven't felt this in a while.

But it's not so magnified anymore. So I hope that widows that are more fresh in their grief know that it can get better and it will get better. It's just, it really does just take time. A lot of time.

[00:28:51] Emily: I want to give you credit because. You took action during that time. So you didn't, sit at home and do nothing and just wait for things to miraculously get better.

You joined grief share and you went through that twice. You started up a group, you like proactively took those steps. And I think that's so key in the difference between someone who's really struggling five years down the road and someone who's been able to process their hurt and their loss. And move forward and create a life that they love again and that they enjoy again.

So kudos to you for doing that.

[00:29:31] Shamber: Thank you. Yeah. It really breaks my heart to see other widows struggling so many years later. And I really just give it all to God. I feel like he is the reason I'm, As happy as I am today, and I've pushed forward. And I understand maybe it's my personality too. I understand that some people are not more outgoing like I am.

They're a little bit more to themselves. And so I can understand getting out and doing those things can be hard for some people. But I hope that. Widows and widowers can listen to these shows and just say, okay, I'm going to take the leap and go for it. And just try and make friends, try and meet people, change up your routine because it really does help in the grieving process.

I think I had A bunch of new friends, like I said, a brand new church. Those were things that I think were really necessary in my healing.

[00:30:27] Emily: I totally agree. And for all you introverts out there, if I can get out there and meet new people and make friends and rebuild a social circle, you definitely can too.

So Shamber, thank you so much for coming and sharing your story. I know it's gonna inspire so many other people. I hope it does. Thank you so much for having me today. Yes.

Are you a widow who feels disconnected? Do you feel like you're stuck or even going backwards in your grief? Widowhood can be lonely and isolating, but it doesn't have to be. Join us in the Brave Widow membership community and connect. We teach widows how to find hope, heal their heart, and dream again for the future.

Find your purpose and create a life you love today. Go to bravewidow. com to get started.