3 Years and an Eternity

The stage theory of grief is very appealing to a linear and rational human mind. We are driven by processes and ceremony. a+b=c, no matter how much you think you don't like math, this concept is universal. We seek ways to control everything around us and our own emotional responses. The trouble is that this is entirely a fiction of our own making and we are bound to failure when we seek to control death. Our grief is driven not just by loss but also our inability to alter it. Everything else in our lives generally has actions that we can take to change our reality. Death doesn't care. It doesn't care how many candles you light, it doesn't care how many meaningful poems you read or photographs you look at. Now, that is not to discredit all of these actions. We are creatures bound in a physical and time bound world and we have to find ways to cope with a metaphysical and impossible change. These ceremonies give us some sense of reason and comfort in our limited way. In some ways grief is a path of faith, not a religious faith, but faith in our own ability to survive and live again.

Wild Geese

"You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body

love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain

are moving across the landscapes,

over the prairies and the deep trees,

the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,

are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting -over and over announcing your place

in the family of things."

~Mary Oliver

A British psychiatrist, Colin Murray Parkes, made the argument that the main focus of grieving was a frantic "searching." When we loss someone we are left searching not just for a place to focus that love but how to feel a sense of support when a major pillar has been removed. There is an acute sense of alarm because we fail over and over to find the person who died. Our brains are not well equipped to handle loss. When we lose something we are normally able to find it again so this suddenly impossible situation totally sends us reeling. I have found that in many ways the traditions of mourning and experiencing grief have been abandoned in Western society. You are allowed to be sad for a week or so, or until the people around you begin to feel uncomfortable and afraid that you might cry all over them. Jewish customs give a more structured period of mourning, 7 initial days of sitting shiva, with rituals and community based involvement. Then there is a formal month of mourning that follows and even that entire first year is dedicated to remembering and grieving that loss. I think at times that I missed some of that first year as I threw myself into work and moving and didn't sit still again until the pandemic hit. So like all things in my process, I am doing it my own way and if I feel times of sadness 3 years in, that's just the way it is.

The loss of traditions as a society when it comes to mourning is more of the issue that I see of the erasure of death in America. Formal mourning clothing went out of style with WWI and WWII, more people were working, especially women, and death began to be outsourced to hospitals and state run facilities. Dealing with death began to leave the communal space and was relegated to private, behind closed doors, individualism. Through sheer willpower and denial, people can avoid expressions of grief in public....tell that to the many wholefoods workers who experienced my very public meltdowns. As the advent of media and the internet took hold there was again a public space for communal mourning that had never happened before. Think of the mass grieving during the AIDS crisis, or when Princess Diana died. Some critics took offense at what they deemed "Crocodile tears", but in a way this return to public mourning allowed people to focus their own losses and pain through this socially acceptable icon or instance. I certainly don't have time to police people's grief and am glad that the era of social media and connections gives space for collective and communal emotions. However, the thoughts and prayers knee jerk reaction makes me want to brush my teeth with a loaded shotgun, but I digress.

Behind every tradition, ceremony, memorial, vigil etc... there is still the somber and painful truth that even a well planned, executed and memorialized death is seldom a true comfort to the survivors, and I do think that term is right in thinking of those still here. We become survivors, not just by the default of still breathing, but experiencing loss, fighting against the waves of grief and sorrow, somehow coming to the "other side" and being able to get up again and get dressed and move through the day. While I do think focusing on celebrating the life of the departed is a good tactic, I would caution against trying to ignore death, to not give its due. We too often try to paint over death with platitudes or faux-resilience.

There are peoplw that can still thrive after loss. They can go to work, they can move about their day and in many instances seem to be managing well, these people shouldn't be dismissed as not grieving, or even worse admonished for not grieving "correctly." There is so much pressure trying to dictate how to act and present your grief. That loss can take up all of your mental space, so living can become an auto pilot. Your body remembers how to brush your teeth and put on pants. You may still find yourself standing in the bathroom mindlessly squeezing toothpast into your hand. Autopilot isnt always foolproof. The mental energy that is required is immense because relationships take energy and grieving is the mental work of reclaiming and repurposing that energy that was tethered to the deceased.

The 5 stages do offer a decent road map and guide but as with all things in the subject of grief, are subject to change. Just because you have moved out of anger at one point, doesnt mean it wont happen again. There is the concept of re-grieving the loss of a parent as a loss of mile stones in life. You mourn the loss of not just the person but also their absence in life events that havent happened yet.

When I got engaged I was deeply aware of feeling sadness that my father would not be at my wedding. I hadn't spent time as a kid or young adult envisioning my wedding. For a long time I was actively against getting married, until I met Kienan and suddenly I became the marrying type. In hospice, in a rare moment of clarity my father said to me "I know I dont have to worry about you, because you have Kienan." He was right and we got engaged 2 years later.

Emily Dickinson, the ultimate poet of grief, says it best when describing the sense of loss and how we compare and evaluate our grief against others.

"I wonder if It weighs like Mine-

Or has an Easier size.

I wonder if They bore it long-

Or did it just begin-

I could not tell the Date of Mine-

It feels so old a pain-

I wonder if it hurts to live-

And if They have to try-

And whether - could They choose

between -

It would not be - to die"