I love “blogging.”

It’s such a funny, unattractive name.

But the idea/concept is great.

For me, it’s a way to get some of my thoughts about anything and everything “out.”  It’s not about how many people see it or read it, but it feels good to get some of my random thinking out of my stuffed brain.

And, yes, that’s the way my head feels sometimes – thoughts overload!  So much information coming in.  I have to make room for new information.   And putting my thoughts on “virtual paper” is perfect.

What a relief to clean out old thoughts!  What fun to bring new ones in!

Sometimes the new thoughts and ideas are a result of old thoughts and memories merging.  Sometimes they are totally unrelated.  And they are the best ones.

I love venturing down a new line of thought.  While I’m sure  previous experiences and memories influence new thoughts, they feel “new.”

I mentioned that I would fill you in on what has been going in my life during my hiatus from the blog.

Almost four years ago — alongside my Sister to Sister activities — I began writing a memoir.  It actually wasn’t my idea; it was my eldest son, Robert’s. And wanting to please him, I said, “Okay,” not fully comprehending what I was getting into.

I had already written two books previously, but they were for health professionals; nothing personal.   Certainly, my memoir would be personal!

But, being a psychotherapist, I was comfortable with that. I had no problem talking about personal experiences. What I didn’t realize, until I started writing, was how many life changing, personal experiences I have had over the years. And then, true to my profession, discovering what they all meant.

What became truly fascinating, were the connections. I began discovering how one activity at one point in time affected a number of other seemingly unrelated activities in the future.  And I began to see how and why I had made various decisions and to what result.

The memoir is almost complete, and it has been a lot of hard work. I am glad that I have done it; it has answered so many questions.

One thing is certain:  It has been an interesting life; I used to tell my husband, Abe, “We don’t want boring.”

And it wasn’t.

As I mentioned last week, I recently transitioned Sister to Sister to Cedars Sinai Hospital and closed our office here in Washington.  After sixteen years, it was time to do this.

Let me begin by stating without any reservations:  Sister to Sister was one of the best things I have ever done. This project brought together so many activities I have been involved with for a major part of my life: heart disease, coping with chronic illness, women’s health, community involvement, gender issues, working women’s lives, and promoting action beyond awareness.

I loved the challenge and will always remember the gratification on the day that we did health fairs in twenty cities in one day across the country, averaging three to four thousand woman attending. And then to count the number of women that we screened growing to over 100,000!  I am extremely proud of that.

So why did I close it down?

Since this is a blog, I will give the short answer.

I was greedy; I wanted these women to pick up where we left off. By that, I mean after they were screened, I wanted to make sure that they would do the follow up necessary to prevent heart disease and then I wanted to see that happen to large numbers of women. And I tried for a number of years with various campaigns; and we did succeed. But not in the numbers I had hoped we would get.

Then, I worked for several years trying to determine why there was so little follow up. What I discovered was a basic problem that women around the world are currently facing:  Lack of time.  Particularly, women taking time for themselves.

Since all of the details would make a book, not another blog, I feel good about taking this vital issue to this point of understanding.  I know we made an enormous difference in many women’s lives; I know we took the issue as far as it could go at this point in time, and I feel good to have handed over all of our data and material to Dr. Noel Bairey-Merz at Cedars-Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles. I have been working with them for over eight years and have full confidence they will move the issue forward.

Speaking to one of the top researchers at the Harvard School of Health, Dr. Walter Willett, I asked what it took to finally make a difference in the no-smoking campaign and his answer is one that I believe will serve the heart health campaign, as well.

“Sometimes,” he said, “it takes a number of different approaches to reach a final goal.”

I believe that will happen with women’s heart disease as well.

I hope you missed my missives/blogs these past few months. I missed writing them.

It’s not that I didn’t have a lot to tell, I was just busy adjusting to a different schedule; different activities, different places, different people. I’m sure you know what that requires. The best news: all of the above is GOOD. The difficult part is the mental and physical adjustments to change.

What have I been up to?  How has life changed for me lately?

First: I have transitioned the Sister to Sister organization, the non-profit that I founded in 1999, to Cedars Sinai Hospital and closed the doors here in Washington.  It was time to do this.  More on this soon.

I also finished writing the main text for my memoir!  This was truly a labor of love and a journey through my experiences and memories.  I’ll also share more about this soon.

And finally, I took a wonderful trip to New York.

It’s not that I haven’t experienced major changes in my life before…I have!  But the difference, now, is that I don’t have my partner to share them with me.

I realize that, although I have always loved change and challenge, from the age of seventeen, I have always had someone to share these experiences with, someone I could turn to. This person rode the ups and downs with me; he was on the other end of the phone, if needed.

Of course, when we did talk about my ideas, challenges and change, I always started the conversation with, “What are you doing?” not with me telling him my problems. Once I began discussing the topics, he would offer some suggestions and then say, “Why do you ask me what to do when you’re going to do what you want anyway.”

We would both laugh, and I would respond, “You’re right. But I always want to know what you think.”

And I would feel better and move ahead with my plans.

That person was my husband of 64 years.

Not until now have I understood what a vital part of my life this person was. I always thought I was so “independent.”

Well, I guess I wasn’t quite as independent as I thought.