Sometimes I wonder...

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Sometimes I wonder why I keep writing these posts.  I have over 2200 hits and not one single response, question or comment.

Then I remember;

            how hard it was to get up each day

            how hard it was to get things done I needed to do

     the constant pain, the bursting into tears, running to hide where I could so know one woud
 see the numbness that pervaded everything

            the anguish to join in life and appear normal

            the sense of futility and pointlessness

            the notion of joy seemed as far away as the moon

            the all consuming need to stop hurting and be OK again

Over time I began to see an image. It was of a very high seawall that I couldn’t see over but could hear people splashing, crying, keening, wailing-asking for help.  All I could do in this image is keep throwing life preservers over the wall and hope someone would be able to grab on and at least stay afloat for a while.

I remember how hard it is to share that terrible place that no one can really touch.

So, here I am, again throwing life preservers over the wall.  I hope a few of you grab on.

That’s the only reason to keep writing these posts.

Mother's Day

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Mother’s Day

Every Mother’s Day was a big deal for my kids as they were growing up.  They were so excited to make me something wonderful that showed how much they cared.  Sharon especially worked hard at making me beautiful things.  I still have most of them and often get them out at this time of the year.  As she got older the Mother’s Day cards got more beautiful and elaborate, I still have most of those also.  It is probably a bit strange that I have this private ritual of touching all her gifts and rereading all her cards.  I suppose it still an important connection that I cannot let go of.  This is totally a private thing that no one else knows about (until now), a quiet time of remembering her sweet ways and still missing her.  Years later I realized how fiercely she loved me.  That truth echoes in my soul and helps sustain me on these dark days.

The other direction is the loss of my own mother.  Here I am in the world, in the universe all-alone on that lineage line, no one to follow or turn to and she no longer follows me or turns to me.  It is very hard to write about as I get all fuzzy headed and the words don’t come.  This whole grieving thing is very messy.  It seems to come so randomly and what triggers it usually catches me off-guard and by surprise.  The smell of cinnamon rolls baking, like mom used to make, has sent me sobbing from the room.  I always picture my mother at the old Singer Sewing Machine making something for one of us.  I even remember the treadle machines.  Those are happy memories and I miss her still.

My mother had Alzheimer’s, which took her by inches long before it actually took her body.  One of the hardest days of my life was when she no longer knew who I was.

Either direction has its own pain, and yet, the process is the same.  All the stages have to be worked through, over and over again, all the connections cauterized as the rebuilding, healing continues..

For those

of us

who are

bereaved,

&

insist

on

facing

our grief,

Life has

a

quality

the

protected

can never

know.

                                               

“Making the choice to grieve—and it’s one you must make again and again for the rest of your life—because that choice expands your capacity for joy and brings new richness to relationships,” . “If nothing else sustains you this holiday season. Hold on to this. Life will never be the same, but it will be good again.”

My last point is the hardest to believe, but it’s true.  You’ll think, ‘I’ll never be happy again.’ You will.  Maybe not this Mother’s Day, maybe not next year, but eventually, you will.   

The Grief Journey Continues

Here it is again April 13 and I am so very weary of this pain that bubbles up from time to time, like this anniversary day or a song or just still missing her. I keep writing these posts hoping that that they will begin to draw people together that continue to face this year after year alone.  It is such a lonely journey and perhaps that is just the way it has to be, it is hard to share such a deep wound.

Sometimes all you can do is offer a hand in the dark, so I am offering my hand in the dark to all that have lost a beloved person and walk this path.

Over the years, the requirements of my grieving have waxed and waned, but there is always some demand to acknowledge several important dates. The honoring no longer has to be long or dramatic; it just has to be addressed. The relationship I have developed with my daughter over the long haul feels peaceful and bittersweet. I keep the grief in my pocket and take it out from time to time, but it no longer rules my life. It has been a gradual process of choices that have built up over time, like a coral reef. Each individual animal—or choice, in my case—is small and insignificant, but the sum total is breathtaking, though invisible on the surface. By now there is little drama left, and less and less to say. All the building and changes are under the surface. A reef and the human spirit are both easy to shatter, but both are also resilient and tend to rebuild in changed forms. Many other losses have occurred along the way, each with its own pain and recovery. Nothing comes close to the upside-down, inside-out world that the death of my child wrought. What is breathtaking is the healing.

Grief: The Healing Choice

I will never forget April 13, 1978: it was the day I walked into my house and discovered that my fifteen-year-old daughter, Sharon, had died of a drug overdose. Yes, I know that is a difficult sentence to read. And even though I have done so numerous times, it’s also difficult to write. Almost 35 years later, I still can’t look at that particular arrangement of letters and numbers without being mentally transported back to that horrific day.

If you’re a parent, you’ve probably considered what it might be like to lose a child.  (Chances are you quickly pushed the thought away, as it’s too dreadful to contemplate for long. I understand.)  Almost certainly, you suspect that the death of a child is the worst thing that could happen to a parent. How could anyone get over such a loss and resume living a normal life?

The short answer is, you can’t. There is no “getting over” the fact that your beloved child has taken her last breath. But the longer answer is, there is life after a child’s death. Not a life that’s identical to the one you led before—you cross an invisible line and there is no way back—but one that is worthwhile and that contains fulfillment…and sometimes even joy.

There’s a prerequisite, though: to move forward, you must first make the choice to grieve.

That’s right—to a larger extent than many people think, grieving is a choice. Consciously or unconsciously, you can decide to ignore grief when it presents itself: mentally squelching it, postponing it through frenetic activity, and neutralizing it with drugs or alcohol.

But here’s the irony. Not grieving is, in the long run, more painful than the pain you’re seeking to avoid.  It’s widely believed that repressed grief can lead to illnesses like upper respiratory infections, digestive problems and even cardiovascular disease.  This makes sense: the stress and anxiety that come from exerting that much control over your thoughts, emotions, and body are profound. And of course, the potentially dire consequences of self-medication are obvious.

It’s also possible to “shut down” and become stuck in one of the phases of grief.  Even though others may think you seem all right on the surface, the truth is, you have actually “agreed” to stop growing, loving, daring, and moving on in exchange for not feeling any more pain and loss.  Frankly, this is not living. It’s merely existing.

I have healed—and continue to heal daily—after losing Sharon, but only because I have made the choice to grieve. Over the years, I have screamed, cried, vented my rage, and submerged myself in intense waves of grief whenever they washed over me. Over time (and initially to my surprise) I discovered that I was able to enjoy my life once more. I have even found that my appreciation for life, my joy in small delights, and the richness of my relationships have grown.

This may surprise you. It surprised me.  But it’s undeniable: grieving my lost child has opened my eyes to everything lovely and wonderful about our world.  I see, act, and react more authentically. My compassion and gratitude for others has grown, and I stop to smell the roses more often—I call it ‘living from the gut.’ I see this as the “reward” for choosing grief: Once you have descended to the lowest of lows, you are also able to experience new highs, That’s because your soul and psyche are much like a balloon that stretches in all directions.

Be aware, however that grieving is not a linear, predictable process. Its progression and manifestations differ from person to person. You certainly never “finish” grieving. Rather, you must make the choice to grieve over and over again as the years pass.

If you are facing the loss of a child, please, choose to grieve. Yes, there will be darkness, but I promise, you will also come to see the “silver lining” gleaming through.  

Finally, let this truth resonate in your heart: the new life you’re creating would not possible without the love you felt—and still feel—for your child.  It is her final gift to you.  And accepting it graciously is your final gift to her.

Grief Cannot be Contained

Grief Cannot be Contained

The death of my child was like an 8.0 earthquake on the ocean shelf and the upheaval that followed was the tsunami that destroyed everything I had known, built and counted on.  As the shore cannot contain the ocean waves, neither can the enormity of my grief, or of a spouse’s or of a child’s.

I found myself puzzled, frantic and overwhelmed by my inability to regain control, or get back “to the way things were” I found myself suddenly sobbing and breaking down without my permission and, usually, with little warning, it is hideous. I found myself judging myself as crazy, weird and all manner of negative self-judgments.  All of my inexperience in managing feelings and constant implosions add to the horror of what I face.

Most of all I did not know who or what I am anymore.  Those around me try to help, but cannot because no one can see, touch hear, or smell the destruction.  It is invisible intangible and worst of all, immeasurable.  It is a hole in my soul.

I had very little experience in dealing with such powerful, pervasive, uncontrollable feelings.
 

The most common statements I hear from bereaved folk and asked myself, is, “What’s wrong with me?”  Or “Why can’t I seem to stop crying all the time?”    This is often followed by the statement. “I hate it, I just hate it!  Please make it stop hurting.”

At the end of the day, after all is said and done and all the help has gone home, the black hole of my grief cannot be contained, only expressed.

I wish it were otherwise.

More thoughts on Sandy Hook

Sandy Hook

As A Grief Center

As I listen and read to people’s suggestions as to what to do with Sandy Hook School, all the ideas seem sound and intellectually acceptable.  And, yet…and yet, my gut keeps saying turn Sandy Hook into a Grief Center.

What does that mean exactly?  It means, leave everything as it is and let the parents and their families go there when they need to , choose to, or not.   The gut behind the move is that if this were my child that had been murdered, I would be drawn to the last place my child was alive like a magnet.  Never mind the blood and whatever else, that would be MY child’s blood and the place that child last lay.  It is all I would have left and that would be precious to me.

Most people want to clean it up and, perhaps turn it into a shrine or memorial.  I feel it deserves a more living response then the usual antiseptic nonsense

A place to go and shake my fist at the forces that permitted this, and then scream, cry, get up and go on, as life demands.  The greatest gift to me during the beginning of my journey was the place and permission to keen and wail.  The nice thing about turning the school into a grief center is that no one would need to monitor the parents need to grieve.

I hope these parents get that gift.

Arleah on the Taboos against Grieving

Grief is one of those words that puts fear in the hearts of grown men. Women can cry, but they struggle with grieving, which has to do with the injunctions females hear about selfishness and upsetting others. It is forbidden for males to cry. Years ago I had about seven men in my practice who all sounded alike in their struggles and fears—so much so that it was eerie. I thought they would benefit from a group. They all agreed and we started to work that way. About six weeks into the group, each man took me aside and, in his own way, said, “I will do anything you ask, just don’t make me cry.”

The restrictions against grieving are numerous and powerful, and start very early in the socialization of children. I think that those taboos are there because the art of grieving changes a person, from one state of existence to another, like boiling water into steam. But steam can be condensed back into water; the change in people is irreversible and permanent. I am awed by the powerful taboos against grieving. I know about this from my work with people and my own struggles to grieve openly.

People have often expressed a deep, abiding fear that if they start grieving they will never stop—or worse, just be stuck in a funk. I have never worked with a person who didn’t continue with his or her life as usual while going through this healing process. I have deep respect for those who make that choice. I see how much strength and courage it takes to be that vulnerable and exposed.

What I would like to see happen with this book is the creation of safe places for people to grieve without being interrupted or scolded. The only partially safe place is a cemetery. It would be nice to bring back the notion of the ancient wailing wall. The only thing I have ever experienced that even comes close to what I would hope for is the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in D.C. Loved ones are permitted to bring little memorials and at least weep quietly. I would wish for every bereaved person a safe place for deep, healing grief and reflection, in the daunting work of rebuilding a life.