'The Grief Lady:' NC woman uses mother's funeral flowers to create art, help others heal

Grief is a journey – and you never know for sure where it'll take you.

When Janet Willis' mom passed away from small cell lung cancer in her 70s, Willis said she felt like she lost more than a mother; she lost a piece of herself. The loss launched her on a 100 day journey, creating art with the dried flower petals saved from her mother's funeral and sharing her grief experience with her followers.

Each day she created a new piece of art – and each day it's as much a surprise for her as it is for her viewers.

"I didn't go into it thinking about what I wanted to make. I would pull a handful of dried petals from my collection at random, and it unfolded in front of me," said Willis. "Since each image came to me as a surprise, I thought of each one as a beautiful gift--like a message I'm receiving each day."

She began that project a little over four years ago, never imagining the journey grief was about to take her on. Since then, she's heard from people across the globe, and her 'grief art' has been published in magazines and books in languages she doesn't even speak. She's heard from people who are grieving, people who study grief, hospice nurses and many artists and writers.

"Grief effects everyone. They’ll share with me about the person they lost, how long ago it was. It’s a continued opportunity to talk about grief with people I don’t even know – but the journey is so common, across different cultures and lifestyles. We all grieve similarly. We can relate to each other," she said.

After years of healing, she is now helping others heal

Years ago, Willis told WRAL News that she hoped to "do something positive" with her own grief, and make her mother proud.

Aside from her art, she also began grief counseling and joined a grief support group. Now, four years later, she's a facilitator for that group -- helping others who are newly beginning their own journey through grief.

"After years of counseling, I've learned about how complicated and complex grief is," she said.

Each week the counseling group meets, and it's open to anybody.

"We talk about the common emotions you’ll be faced with. What happens to the brain. I learned so much about how I processed grief, how others process grief. A lot of how we grieve is common to everyone," she said. "I learned grief is so much more than, 'Oh, you're sad for a while, and now you're not.'"

She's turned her own grief into compassion and empathy – and taken a role as a helper and guide for others. She facilitates a group with GriefShare in Durham, shares her grief art in magazines and publications internationally, gives talks at events and women's gatherings and companies. And she still responds to people who just message her on Instagram, where she shares her art.

"People kind of know me as The Grief Lady," she said. "People just call me up when they know someone going through grief. I never imagined myself in this position. My mom's death really impacted a big part of my life. I never imagined I'd be working so much with grief."

But that's exactly it – grief changes you. It can change your whole life.

Re-creating the art: The pieces never fit the same again

Willis' art was originally created to be temporary and ever-changing. So when she was asked to display her art during the month of May – and in honor of Mother's Day – she faced a dilemma.

"Many of these petals are almost 5 years old. They've changed colors, faded, crumbled, disintegrated. Pieces are brittle," she said.

She picked up one stem, a major piece used in several important artworks -- and it fell apart.

"I wanted to cry," she said. "I didn't know if I had enough pieces left to re-create my art."

But isn't that just how grief works? We change. We lose things. Sometimes colors fade, and important parts of our life crumble away. Things change with time, and we can't always re-create those precious memories.

"It's a journey in acceptance. Accepting change, and accepting the process," she said.

Willis, once again, is adapting. She will create some pieces of art using the flowers from her mother's funeral – but she will also have to use prints from photos she took of some of the older pieces.

"Another lesson: Take photos. Take lots of photos of your loved ones and your life," she said. "So many people tell me they wish they'd taken more pictures."

Willis says she thinks her mother would be so happy knowing her daughter turned grief into something positive and beautiful.

"It’s a road I’ve been walking - and I keep going where the road takes me," she said. "You don’t really know where it’s taking you, but just trust it and experience it, it can be beautiful."

On Friday, April 26, Willis' grief flower art will be part of the Hillsborough Art Walk in the Hillsborough Gallery of Arts. For the rest of the month of May, her artwork will be hanging at 121 North Churton Street, Suites 104-109.

If you are grieving and want to learn more about counseling, Willis runs a local group in Durham through GriefShare.org.

Follow Willis' 100 Days of Pressed Flower art on her Instagram page.