On The Other Side of Grief

Over the years, since 1978, I have heard a refrain that troubles me and seems unfair. It’ s the frequent response I hear from those around the bereaved person.  So often I hear people say, “Oh I was just a friend” or “I am just the cousin.”  As though their grief isn’t as valid somehow.  It is.  I don’t know how one measures the degree of pain for the death of a loved person.  “Mine can’t be as bad as theirs” is what I often hear.  Perhaps, who knows, but whatever degree of pain anyone feels is as important to his or her life as it is to the central figures in the tragedy.   In answer to that mistaken assumption I wrote the following article, “On The Other Side of Grief” for all those who are on the other side yet part of the inner circle.  Shutting down grief always creates distance and safety; getting close risks being vulnerable to loss once again.

     Just as grief is the natural and normal human response to loss, so is our response to a grieving person.  It is very difficult to see someone we know who has experienced a great loss and not want to "do something" to help.  Both grief and the response to grief have gotten lost along the way.  This essay then is about describing and supporting our natural and normal responses to someone else's grief.  It is a parallel process and embodies similar stages, but requires only the awareness to trust what we can do to help.

     This parallel process is important not only to help the grieving person recover, but also to accommodate and create the inevitable new relationship with the bereft person.  Significant loss irrevocably changes people and therefore any and all relationships.  So part of the helping process is to accept the changed person and relationship along with their loss.

     There is so much to say about loss because the range of emotions and behaviors is so enormous.  Much has been written in recent years about the stages of grief that have become part of the common wisdom and seem pretty accurate.  However, the mourner

does not experience stages - just feelings.  Often these are strange, unfamiliar and very intense feelings that people have spent a lifetime learning to control.  So reassurance is one of the first responses anyone can give.  It is often helpful for people to at least understand what is happening to them.  Then they do not have the added burden of thinking something is wrong with them. What is "wrong," is that they have lost something or someone significant.

     It seems important to understand that any encounter with a grieving person is unsatisfying.  This is so because neither party can give the other what they want.  We do not have the power to give back what has been lost, and the grieving person cannot give us the smile and assurance that our help has made everything all right.  The greater the loss, the longer this will be true.  However, over time our help does help.  It is analogous to applying salve to a wound.  The salve will not magically heal, but over time the salve plus the healing power of the body, will at some point heal the wound.

     What seems important is to recognize some of the signs of mourning and to know we will have a parallel process.

     Having dealt with grief from the inside out as a bereaved parent and a bereaved child, and from the other side of grief as a professional, there are a few other things I have learned.

            Sudden, shocking loss is one of the most difficult aspects of our humanness.  I am talking about any loss, not only death.  There is divorce, loss of jobs, loss of health and youth, moving, etc.  And the biggest surprise: Wonderful events always embody loss.  The birth of a child, marriage, a promotion, a new house and any success means leaving something behind.

            Most people move through grief in the context of family, friends and community.  Many with the help of their faith and church.  It is only a problem when a person gets stuck in one of the stages.  This brings me to the two most common questions asked.  First is "Well, how long will this take?" or "How long should it take?" Second is, "Is this normal?"

            In the attempt to answer these questions I have defined grief as either acute or chronic.  Acute grief is the normal, natural process that people move through.  Chronic grief is when the grieving process is shut down and stuck in a particular phase of the grieving process.  It doesn’t matter how or when this happens, if the process is shut down it will never be finished.

The first year is the hardest.  It is the hardest because it is the anniversary year.  Each holiday or special time is the first without the lost person, lost job, lost community, or whatever the particular loss might be.  Around the first year anniversary a marked change is usually evident.  Not that grieving is done, but the acute submersion is less.  I am deliberately not being very specific, because grief is so individualized.  To set time frames would compromise the respect and dignity of a person's right to grieve in their own time and in their own way.  There simply is no logical sequence to all the feelings - they come when they come, and not on schedule.

            However, given all that, there are some behaviors that suggest when a person is in chronic grief.  Let me step back and say that what makes grief so mysterious and hard is that it cuts right through all the defenses and touches our core.  In cutting through it touches all other grief and unresolved issues and brings them to the surface with the current grief.  That is a lot of the sense of being out of control and feeling crazy.  If there are significant unresolved issues, the defensive system will go into overdrive and the result is that a person gets stuck.  Much like a record, just going round and round in the same phase.  This is also true for those around the grieving person.  If we have unresolved issues, we will have a difficult time being around any grief.  It is difficult to discern the difference, because "stuckness" is simply an extension of normal, acute grief.  The key is that it "feels off" to people around them.

Poem #6

 

  Sometimes I

am tired

of grieving

&

protest so much

pain

I cannot seem

to

ever get

finally through

Roz said,

“Don’t try”

“The pain of her

death

is part

of

keeping her

alive

in

you”

                                                                    

  

Reaching Out Is Hard

Reaching out is hard

Bereaved families never congregate in easy to identify or common groups.  We are scattered through out the population.  That keeps us safe and at the same time isolated from each other.  As I say in my book, it’s all the small choices along the way that make the difference in recovery.  Below is one of the thousands I made along the way.

A newly bereaved person needs an advocate because she is just not “with it” for months. Another of those small choices that proved to be far reaching came after the funeral. Both Morrie and I were just tired. He made the absurd suggestion of, “Why don’t we stop at Burger King and just be alone for a minute?” At that moment anything was fine with me, just stop the world. So that is what we did—had a burger, fries, and a Coke. Those few moments allowed me to regroup enough to go on. That incident was the beginning of a pattern that still works for me: the intense grieving followed by something mundane and “normal.” If I ignore  the intense feelings, then I never get the mundane and normal, because those intense feelings are always trying to escape.

I have learned over the years that my grief upsets most folks that haven’t dealt with their own, and my sadness triggers theirs. The further one gets from the funeral, the less tolerance others have for one’s grief. “Shouldn’t you be over it by now?” is the most common question. What an absurd and insulting statement. Bereavement is a condition that never clears up. The loss of a child is a never-ending process of feeling wounded and regaining wholeness. Telling grieving parents to get over their grief would be like telling an amputee not to miss her arm.

Sometimes

I am

reduced to

nothing

but

my

grief at

loving &

missing

her.

When I am

able

to

let that

be,

I rise,

like the

Phoenix.

Sometimes,

it is

very

hard

Poem #4

  Anguish,

                                                                                         Agony.

                                                                                                Screaming pain.

That is my world

my universe.

How do I survive?

Why do I want to?

Because

You are there

Poem #2

        

      Your death has

split me

wide open,

I am gutted

like a  steer

freshly slaughtered.

Your death

has spared me

nothing

in horror,

in terror.

in guilt.

What I didn’t expect,

had no way

of knowing,

was that the

depth I

plummeted

would

also find

new depths of

living

&

loving

&

laughter.

Any Change is Loss

Arleah on the grieving process:

Any change is loss, weather it is good change or bad change, and all loss requires some grieving.  Grieving is on a continuum, from the death of a loved one, all the way to “Oh rats, I lost my umbrella.”    The built in mechanism for dealing with this wide range of feelings is the grieving process, which is as necessary as the breathing process etc.

          

Life as We Knew It – Emotions – Choices

In the center of the spiral is life, as we knew it, which is followed by all the actions we tried and attempts we made to keep everything the same. In the event of an accident, this is often the “if onlys” and “what ifs” recriminations that we fantasize could have changed the outcome. As we move around the spiral we come to the choices. This should actually look like a web, as it is difficult to know which way to go, and it is easy to get trapped in one of the arms.

 Grieving

The next point is grieving itself, which is essentially an invisible, intangible, and immeasurable internal experience that is difficult to share. The rest of the spiral is benchmark points that create the long-term consequences of change. This is why people resist change (grief); it is hard, even brutal, and very unsafe—unsafe in the sense that life is no longer predictable, measured, or secure.

Realigned Priorities

As people move around the spiral they find that what was important a year ago seems to fade in the background or may seem trivial. These old issues grow into new awakenings, avenues, and endeavors. In short, most of our priorities are realigned. For me, this is where I began to find political correctness less and less tolerable, and my relationships more precious. I found myself more open with people I care about, and more confrontational and demanding, as I didn’t want anything left unsaid or undone ever again.

  

Different Viewpoint

 As priorities shift and realign, it leads to all sorts of tangled feelings, thoughts, and outcomes. Our point of view is like a kaleidoscope; all the pieces are the same, but what and how we see the world is ever squiggling. This is quite unnerving, as it is hard to predict our own reactions anymore, and that is downright scary. My own political viewpoint began to slide across the spectrum of liberal to conservative, which required a whole renegotiation with the world I lived in. All of this happened over a period of years, so the new outlook was gradual. I don’t know what life would be like if Sharon hadn’t died, but what I do know is what I have rebuilt has been worth the effort. Through all the grieving, where I finally landed is in the present, a very nice place to live.

Integration

 I have always seen my life as a journey through a dark and scary forest, where there are all sorts of obstacles, cliffs, and wild beasties to deal with. Every once in a while I come to a meadow—the sun is shining, the grass is green, and it is good to be alive. That is when the integration of all the hard labor is accomplished and I get to rest for a while. What I know about myself is that at some time I’m going to get tired of the meadow, look up and say, “Gee, I wonder what’s over that ridge,” and plunge right back into the forest. This meadow corresponds to the acceptance and in memoriam stages of grief.

New Behavior – Current Behavior

Any new behavior emerges out of the previous points along the way. New behaviors, like standing up for myself better, grew out of feeling more confident that I can deal with the forest, which grew from accepting that, sadly, I can never go back to the way I was. This was an important choice point: To decide whether to go on or shut down. This, then, becomes current behavior, which leads right back to the center of the spiral and starts all over again with any significant change in our lives. Less significant change is simply a smaller spiral. With the pace of change in our world today, there are commonly several spirals going on at the same time, certainly adding to our sense of stress.