Because Love is EVERYTHING, Love can NEVER be Smaller than One's Grief
I took off almost 4 months from writing.
To be transparent, I’ve taken off the past 4 months from many things. The holidays offer a brilliant excuse to trudge through and just “do” regardless of how one is feeling or experiencing the world around him/her. And I did just that.
As a psychotherapist who specializes in chronic health/cancer/pain/trauma, helping people process difficult emotions including grief and loss issues is not grief unfamiliar to me. While I feel competent and honored to hold space for others who are experiencing loss and grief, I’ve realized over the past couple of years how much I struggle to process my own grief. It has quite honestly surprised me and humbled me.
I came across the quote I chose to use as the title of this blog post somewhere and in my very distracted mind, I cannot find where or who to attribute it to, so I apologize for that error. It resonates with me as this reminder: grief is the price for living and choosing to love. There is no way to escape grief in one’s human existence. Even if one chooses never to love another human or living being, that decision in and of itself leaves one grieving for never having loved at all….
So, how do we allow ourselves to grieve, with all the messiness that accompanies this inevitable path for us as humans?
As a child, I attended funerals of elderly great-aunts/uncles and periphery people often. As an adult, I worked in a cancer support community for over a decade and attended more funerals than I could even count. On the surface, my vast experiences with grief appear to have adequately prepared me for more intimate or personal losses into my adulthood. Still, I’ve learned my intellectual and empathic ability to hold space for others did nothing to prepare me for my own sorrow. Looking back at my response, part of me feels a twinge of guilt for my intense reactions this past year, and yet looking at it now, I understand a little more about my emotional expression of my grief and hope I can explain what it has felt like for me, so it might help others in your own journeys if it resonates.
On grief, it has been said it’s the loneliest journey one can take. It does not mean we are meant to grieve, alone.
My attachment and guilt wounds made it difficult for others to support me during the early days of my grief. I was actively pushing people away from me, not only with my words but with my intense and dare I now say extreme emotional reaction to my grief. I have since realized this: I didn’t know how to allow others to help me grieve. I didn’t even know what I needed, so why would I think others would know if I didn’t even know myself?
I’ve had a lifetime of grief building up inside me, largely left un-felt/unprocessed and residing just below the surface of my consciousness. This past year, I felt it all bubble up into my consciousness, like a tsunami of all emotions I had spent my lifetime attempting to push down and no longer could do so.
Grief is not the same as depression. While one who is actively in the process of grief may appear to be depressed and can exhibit similar symptoms, they are not the same. Grief is very specific to the loss and how that loss shapes one’s life moving forward, while depression doesn’t have to be attached to anything specific, and therapy and medications can be very effective in helping one’s depression lift.
Grief, however, you cannot medicate away or have an end date in sight to be over the loss.
I had this amazing experience with psychedelic-assisted therapy this past fall that helped me in a way that I did not intend or prepare it would. While my intention was to “let go of what no longer serves me” ….. the imagery and messaging I received were beyond this humble intention. What I learned in these very powerful medicine sessions can be best summed up in these simple concepts:
Death is not the end, rather it is the “next” in this magical and spiritual journey for us as sentient beings.
Energy can not be created or destroyed, therefore our beloved human family/friends and fur-family are always with us, maybe in even more intentional ways as our protectors or advocates from wherever “next” is.
There are no shortcuts in grief, and we are not meant to grieve alone so don’t do what I did, let people in to help you and support you!
Be patient with yourself, with the process, with the unknowns, and with others around you.
Lean into the spiritual part of yourself; through meditation, nature, religious practice, or whatever serves to ground and center your displaced energy.
Be open to love and light and laughter, again.
I am seeking the light again. I finally see a glimmer through my own darkness and believe my family and I deserve to embrace the good and the beauty that is in this world, fully realizing in a moment it all can change and be dark and tragic once again. But for now, there is beauty.
For now, there is hope and joy and love and…chaos and biting and seemingly endless attempt to house-train our newest addition….Luna. Luna means “moon” and in Roman Mythology Luna was the personification of the moon. While there is darkness associated with the moon, it also serves as the brilliant ball of reflected light in our sky, filling our nights with a glowing, comforting light.
That is our Luna. She came to all of us when we needed her most. She is one of our many lights helping me/us see through our darkness, finding my/our way through this universal experience of grief.
May your hearts be filled with love and your minds with joy! And when grief comes, as it will for us all, may you learn to allow it to be your next teacher, your next chapter, your next in this beautiful journey we know as being FULLY human.
Peace….
