Grief is a funny old word. It is broad. It is a word we use to describe what happens to us when we experience distressing events. Grief is commonly associated with death. While that certainly causes grief, death is not always the subject. Other events cause grief too.
Amputees might grieve a body part. Lost your arm? You will probably experience grief. Lost your job, you may experience grief, especially if that effects your identity. If you have lost a relationship you may experience grief. If you move an elderly member of your family into residential care you may experience grief, even though the relationship may still be there. If a pet dies, we grieve them. These are examples of primary grief. Examples of secondary grief include an adult child moving out of home and going away for work or education. That is a normal part of the life cycle, and we are pleased for them, but where there has been a close relationship there will be grief as well. Another example might be an ex partner who re-couples. While the relationship ended a few years ago, and probably a few years before that really, the re-coupling fortifies the loss and can trigger secondary grief. These are just examples; grief is as individual as fingerprints.
The onset of grief comes in two main forms.
1. There is the sudden onset of grief. For example, Grandpa has a medical emergency and has to be admitted to residential care as a result. Although there is grief, there is also acceptance of the situation because Grandpa can't walk anymore. There is no choice, and the decision is usually made by a medic or a third party. Circumstances and necessity can mitigate grief.
2. Grief caused through one's own decision to admit grandpa to residential care is another matter. You knew the decision was coming. The earlier you make it, the better it is for grandpa. He can get used to care before he is too cooked. Yet he may not be too happy about it. You got him a nice place in June, but maybe you could have waited until September. Thats true, but you had to pull the trigger sometime. This grief is a bit different because you had a role in admitting grandpa. This may apply to any number of situations. Did you have a role in the action that caused the grief? When guilt and remorse are associated with grief it gets a bit complicated.
Grief can also occur before an event. When people suffer from illness, addiction, dementia - we often grieve from an early point. For example some people may grieve a parent with dementia for several years before the parent dies. Then when they die there is very little grief. In a way they lost the person years ago, bit by little bit. The trouble is that this sort of grief creeps up on you like a librarian. We don't always see it coming. But it is grief. It is a real thing.
So grief is unique, varied, and can occur before or after an event. It is as individual as you are, and as your circumstances may be.
We have not herein called grief a ‘feeling.’ Because grief is more than a feeling. Sometimes there may be no feelings at all. We might feel predominantly sad, or upset, and those things are feelings. But we also attempt to negotiate (usually with God or the Universe - or whatever you may like to call that), or we can just be empty, or lost, or confused, or alone in a sea of mad people. We may want space. We may become intolerant of trivial matters. We might need to rearrange our life or build a shrine. You’ve got to do what you’ve got to do.
Everyone experiences grief at some point. It is ok to do so. Don't let anyone tell you that you have grieved long enough. You grieve as long and as hard as you want. It is your loss.
Your friends in grief are those who will sit with you in silence and not offer you trite answers, or pressure you to get over it.
There is no such thing as closure. What is that supposed to be anyway, we wonder? There’s no forgetting. Life is never quite the same after a heavy loss. The best you can hope for is to get to a point (when you are ready), where you can manage your life in some way.
Some ideas to help you grieve well;
- Do no harm. You wont have regret as another layer on top of the grief.
There is no set time for which you ought grieve.
Symbols are powerful. Candles, rocks, trees, pictures, shrines. We are only limited by our imagination. Create a family crest, or have a drawing done. Anything to commemorate the life that was lost, or what was lost.
Donations of money to a charitable cause related to the person who died. Their death, while tragic, may take on some meaning not previously apparent.
Avoid euphemisms and phrases that sanitise what has occurred. For example we don't fight disease. We have disease. It is not a fight or a battle. It is really sad, and frightening to have disease. Keep it real.
In the case of death, people commonly make the mistake of polishing up the personality of the deceased person by making them out to have been an extraordinarily gifted person, which they probably weren't. They may have been wonderful, but I bet they were also faulty frail and difficult sometimes? Keep it real. Don't grieve that which never existed, because that wont help you. Grieve the human you lost. Death is not a moral phenomena to do with good and bad. It is a loss. We are mortal. You loved a human, both the good and bad. The point is that you are sad because you lost, through death or circumstance, a human (or pet) who you loved. So just be sad.
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