Four Things You Might Not Know Yet About Grief.
1. You Might Be Under Pressure.
It can be hard to watch someone grieve. Of course, it is the hardest for you, dear reader, as the one who has lost your mom or dad. But people are humans, and sometimes they can’t help but want to fix your pain or make things the way they were before. They might pressure you to act like everything is fine. They might want so badly to be helpful that they try to draw you into conversation when you need to be quiet and stay inside yourself.
Of course you won’t want to hurt or offend your friends or family, but you also need to protect your heart and hold space for your grief. You don’t owe anyone anything. You don’t need to react or act a certain way to please them. You don’t need to talk if you aren’t ready. It is okay to simply be where you are.
2. It’s Not Only Kids Who Say The Darnedest Things.
When my mother died almost four years ago, some people around me must have lost their minds. Questions and statements from others came at me from people who clearly had bypassed their internal appropriateness filter when they spoke.
You’ll be over it soon. (Uh, no, I honestly don’t think I will, and that’s okay.)
At least it was she didn’t suffer. (Actually, she did, for a long time, and it hurts more than you know to think about it.)
How exactly did she die?? (No, I’m not giving you “juicy details” about my mother’s final moments. Sorry, not sorry.)
It can feel like a deep injury or a betrayal if these words come from people you care about.
I think my grief and exhaustion enabled me to withstand staring at people who said things like “God wanted her to be with Him” or “I’m praying for you” or “At least her pain is over.” (She’s not here. My pain is not over. It’s only increasing as you keep talking!)
Perhaps the most common offender is one that doesn’t seem so bad on the surface: I’m so sorry for your loss. It sounds like the right thing. And yet, when it’s your parent who died and you hear this phrase dozens of times, you hit a wall.
My own overwhelming grief and feelings kept pouring in and surging. The only other feelings I had room to accommodate were those of my children. My brain couldn’t hear repeatedly that someone else was sorry for me. Oh, YOU are sorry? YOU?? I’m the one with the dead mother.
It was a mix of sarcasm, jealousy that they weren’t the one in true pain, and annoyance that this was the best they could do. You sitting over there feeling sorry isn’t helping. Nothing helps. I would rather hear nothing than hear I’m so sorry for your loss. Perhaps that makes me an ungrateful jerk, but when you are the one grieving at the center of the circle, it’s not your job to care about other people’s feelings.
3. It’s Constant. Until It’s Not.
In the beginning, immediately after my mom died, grief was constant. It hung on my body as if I had zipped myself into a weighted down grief suit. I couldn’t go anywhere without it. Every aspect of life was seen through the lens of grief, loss, and death. My only purpose then was to try to rearrange my life to live without her.
Normal was gone. It was constant. The fact that my mother died seeped into everything I did, from the most mundane grocery shopping to dropping kids off at school to major life decisions.
Until one day it wasn’t there.
At some point I caught myself, realizing I’d had a conversation with a friend or ran an errand without once thinking about my mother or my grief. Without crying or feeling pain. I felt shame. Flushed with guilt. Was I forgetting her? How could I go on and live and be fine without her here? It felt like a betrayal. I felt like a horrible person.
Oh, but the grief comes back. The grief ball may bounce away at some point, giving you time to relax and enjoy time with friends or sit through an entire movie without thinking of your lost person, but it always comes back, and you might not know when it will hit. It simply hits a pain point and ricochets backs with a sharp sting, lodging hard in your chest. Mine never leaves me alone for very long.
We talked before about what happens when grief pops up in unexpected places. (You can read more about that here!) In a way, it was almost easier in the beginning when life was simply grief, all day, all the time. The agenda was grieving, and that’s all there was to do. It was expected. Knowing where you are is a comfort.
And so when the lulls started happening, when life crept back in and tiny moments felt okay, when I could breathe and exist without flinching or crying, I began to tentatively stretch my aching wings. Maybe there was some small hope of stepping back into the world. Maybe it would be okay.
I was blindsided when the despair came thundering back and hit me like a train. I wasn’t ready to be pulled back into deep grief. Life began to jerk me around when I least expected it. Grief was in charge, and I was helpless, following it, standing under my personal black cloud while it drenched me. All I could do was withstand it and stay in it when it decided it wanted me.
This made me a somewhat unpredictable mother and friend. It showed me who my people were, who would stand by me and love me even when I was a mess and couldn’t control my heart or my head.
4. It Might Get Awkward.
My mother’s death created some awkward family moments, and this might happen to you, too. Death can bring out the unfortunate, the weird, or the negative aspects of people. My own family had no lack of drama.
Literally at my mother’s funeral my father, who had been divorced from my mom for over 17 years, relentlessly talked on and on about her lamps and what I was going to do with them. What is the plan for the lamps?! He wanted to know in the room at the back of the church.
My mother’s remains were nearby in a rosewood box, and he seemed to suddenly care deeply about the lamps they bought together in the early 1970s.
He whispered-hissed to me as only a 70-year-old with hearing loss can. (That is, as louder or louder than most people talk regularly.) I think they’re still in her living room. She didn’t get rid of them, did she? His extremely raspy voice grated in my ear, and I wanted to absolutely throttle him for caring about something so inconsequential.
Your family drama may vary, but be prepared for negative comments. It feels unfair that you should have to weather your grief while steeling yourself against a potential onslaught of thoughtlessness from your family and friends. Maybe they mean well. Maybe they just aren’t thinking. (Maybe you won’t take it as personally as I did.)
What else surprised you about grief in the beginning?
Please consider subscribing below and leaving me a comment, and stay tuned for PART TWO of this post, with even more things you may not know yet about grief.
Discover more from To Bounce Not Break
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.