Especially in the early days, the pain of grief can be constant. Even many years after losing your mom or dad, the pain can still be intense and at times unbearable. You just want it to stop. When my mom died, I felt like I would never be cheerful again. I would never laugh. I would never enjoy myself or find beauty in a world that felt so desolate and bleak. But gradually, after quite a long time, my grief developed tiny cracks, and some small relief was able to seep in. Over time I started to notice a few things that ease the pain of grief.

Staring at the sky.

Almost wherever you are, you can look up at the sky. After my mom died, it hurt too much to look at the world around me, to see other people continuing to live their lives. I couldn’t look into my own heart. I couldn’t move forward. I couldn’t look back because the past hurt too much. And so I looked up. 

I looked at the clouds and through the treetops on sunny, blue days. I let the gray sky rain down on me. I stood outside and gazed at the moon or watched stars appearing. I felt small. Insignificant. Looking up into the sky made me feel like a tiny speck in a wide universe. It helped. When my utter sadness and grief felt so big inside of me, so tremendous and all consuming that I thought I might explode, looking up in the sky and feeling so small showed me that there was something larger out there. The atmosphere above and around me, the vastness of that expansive sky, somehow comforted me and let me know that when things were too much to bear, that there was something more powerful than myself out there, something so big with the ability to surround me and hold me up. Just give it a try. Look up and let it out. Don’t forget to breathe.

Feet on the grass.

Once when my children were little, and their energy, endless demands, and bickering overwhelmed me, a friend suggested I take off my shoes, go outside, and stand in the grass. At the time I remember thinking just how silly that sounded. But it’s true that connecting ourselves to the earth helps settle our minds and balance our souls. 

Give this a try, even if it seems ridiculous. Walk in the grass in your bare feet, even if you just stand in your own backyard. Touch nature. Take a walk where there are trees and green things. Be close to the earth. Breathe. Be near growing things.   

There is something about planting ourselves firmly on the earth, connecting to the energy of growing things, that eases the pain of grief for a moment.

Run to the water.

I grew up on freshwater island, on the deep blue river that divides the United States from Canada. We lived in the remains of a small, ramshackle house, which, when I was 8 years old, mostly burned down and was never fully repaired. My father was often angry or violent, and when I needed to escape the house, I would run barefoot through the knee high grass until I reached the river’s edge. I’m not sure why running to water that led to one of the world’s fastest moving waterfalls made me feel safe, but it did.

Water is powerful. Water is relentless. Water always finds a way through. It can move you, whether you want it to or not. That water was more powerful than my father’s rage, and now as an adult when I need something more powerful than my grief, more relentless, more enduring, I go to the water. 

The times I have been fortunate to see the ocean have been moments of relief for the immense grief I’ve carried since my mother’s death. My grief becomes part of that mass of water, powerful enough to drown us all, surging toward the shore, tugging at the moon. There’s something healing about watching those endless waves and feeling my heart go out into them, through the waves which fortify, lift, and hold me up. 

We can’t always have the ocean. But if you find yourself near a river, a lake, or even a creek nearby, sit there with your grief and see if that helps. Or run to the water even in the smallest ways. Take a bath. Take a shower. Let it wash over you. Grief can feel relentless, but water is stubbornly the same and can wash away some of the sting, maybe for a little while.

The company of real friends.

I am an introvert, and so leaning on others after my mom died was not my natural inclination. I struggle to set up playdates for my children. Adult friendships feel impossible to create and nurture. There are so many ways people can be socially shy or anxious or too isolated from others. And yet after those times when I have scraped up enough courage or have been pushed by persistent friends to be around other people, trusted people, since my mom died, I inevitably feel a lessening of pain and loneliness.

I know so well how hard it is to reach out to others when you are grieving, especially when they are not. They are the land of the living, a place that seemed so far away in my early days of raw grief. But go there, even just for a short time if you can. Seek out your friends who can sit near you and not expect you to entertain or to be any certain way. 

Someday you will be able to laugh again. We need others to briefly puncture the bubble of our grief. Grief and isolation is damaging. Reach out. If you can’t do it in person, do it in writing. Find a way to connect if you can.

Hold on tight to those you love.

After my mom died, my children kept me alive. I drank water for them. I fed myself for them. They needed their mama. I needed to keep going. They were my true loves, at the worst time in my life when I had lost the one person who had loved me the longest. 

I have met others struggling with grief who keep going because of a spouse, another family member, a friend, or even a beloved pet. Losing my mom amplified my awareness of what was important in my life. Her death put a spotlight on who and what I valued, and how fragile all of it is. We can lose it all in a blink, in an instant. 

Her death changed the way I live my life and forced me to value it and to show the people in my life how much they mean to me everyday. Even the average, boring days are important. I have a small black cat named Penelope, and if I hold her, cradled in my arms, she looks into my eyes and puts her paw on my nose. She must know she is helping me. 

Learning to be where you are.

I should warn you, or perhaps I should admit, that after these moments of relief, after the weight of grief is briefly lifted from your back, when it settles yet again into the place where it lives in your heart, you might feel a new and different surge of sadness. I remember feeling just a little bit better, just a little bit eased, and then the tears would flow again in full force. But often those tears were a purge, a letting go, offering up that grief and pain and letting it out. It left me with a familiar emptiness, but also a stillness. A little bit of balance. A tiny bit of strength and grace came in that great exhale of grief and breath. 

What helps you with the pain of grief? Talk to me in the comments below. I’d love to hear from you.