Why is grief so scary?

             

 The most

creative

task

I have

ever

accomplished,

is

to find

new

meaning

&

value

out of

the

absurdity

of

her death.

                            

The short answer is that grieving is a change agent.  Once we start, there is no turning back.  We can never be the same.  That seems to be the purpose of grief, to create a path from one state of existence to another, a before and after.  There was life before Sharon’s death and after I buried her.  The only way I found to survive that pain and dislocation was to grieve out loud.  It was all about rebuilding my life and myself after the A-bomb.  If grief were only about death we could just leave it at that and go on.  But as I have said in other posts, all change is loss and demands letting go, grieving.

The long answer is that deep grief changes our perspective and challenges everything we have believed and all our cherished philosophies about the meaning of life.  It realigns priorities and fundamentally alters how we relate to others and ourselves.  Grief always cuts through our carefully built defenses and drags any unresolved issues to be dealt with or reburied.  Like Godzilla it tromps on the orderliness of our lives and leaves a trail of rubble.

It actually is scary because we don’t understand the intense, all-consuming nature of our own grief and just want to stop the pain and confusion.

Most of my clientele are ultimately dealing with unresolved grief issues.  People are always astonished by how a little grieving “changes everything.”

So what is my point?  I am hoping to start a movement that creates safe places to grieve and encourages more acceptance of grief.  I would hope to see grief centers that bring people together in healing ways.