I am starting this on May 10th, and it is my best friend’s birthday… however, he died a few years ago. In fact, I am now older than he ever
was.
His birthday (and the fact that I talked about grief and stress on TV this morning and with clients today) has brought to my mind a lot
of thoughts on grief, death, mid-life crises, and more. Seeing as how I am not the first nor only person facing these universal issues, I thought it might be helpful to someone to write an article about these things.
In regards to grief, I am always interested by the way that people talk about grief as something that we “get over.” People always want to know if they “should be over it by now” or they want to know if they are “normal” since they are still thinking, dreaming, or struggling through something that they grieve.
First, let me offer my non-technical and non-official definition of grief…
I believe that grief is an unavoidable experience of any intelligent and self-aware creature that moves only one direction in time. As humans, we seem to move pretty regularly forward in time at the rate of about 1 second per second.
There is no way to dial backwards.
For this reason, I have an hourglass in my office.
(everything in my office has a story or therapeutic point connected to it, as I am sure you can imagine, but that is another blog that might be fun).
Clocks really create an illusion for us that time is cyclical and repeatable in nature. It is 3 o’clock now but not to worry, it will be 3 o’clock again tomorrow!
It won’t.
The truth is that it will be a totally different 3 o’clock. As Heraclitus allegedly said, “You can never step into the same river twice.”
Instead, the hourglass reminds us that as each small grain of sand drops from the top to the bottom, it is gone and can never be gotten back.
The truth of that is the root of grief, I think.
I might reference this again when I talk about Mid-life crises.
So, back to the definition of grieving. Grieving is the emotional effect of having an event (decision, relationship, etc.) behind us… in the past… and we are wishing something about it had been different.
Notice that one might even predict that things were not going to go well, and we might not be surprised that they did, but they did, and we are feeling the truth of that.
There are small grief (when your lunch partner ordered something you wish you had ordered instead of what you did) and there are massive grief (the death of a beloved family member or friend) and there are even transcendent or ideological grief (a trust broken, a faith doubted, or a cherished life-rule challenged… I also think that our feelings of injustice or of having been cheated are really strongly connected to grief.).
A personal, and I think common, example of transcendent grief is the grief that comes when we perceive a seriously lost potential, especially when we feel that someone is cheated out of an opportunity.
One of times I experienced a strong feeling of grief was when our family pet died a few years ago, on Christmas day. Bummer, I know.
However, here is the thought that really brought out the emotion in me: Montana (the dog’s name) had been adopted by our family about the time our first child was born and he had been with us through the infancy and toddlerhood years. I should say that he had suffered thought them; there is little harder on a dog than a toddler. Toddlers like to poke eyes, jump on backs and step on tails, all in fun, of course.
Montana had put up with all of that and was just embarking on that time which is fun for dogs – growing up with a kid to play with, pay attention to them, slip them food, etc. And then he died on Christmas day out jogging with me, hit by the only car we saw on the road that evening.
Though I was sad at his death, it was the injustice of it all, the sense of this dog being cheated out of his reward for putting up with the tough times, that triggered the grieving.
Now, when we imagine a person we loved dying, we must often multiply that emotion a thousand times… especially to the degree we have feelings of them (or us) being cheated of something.
My grandfather never met the great-grandson named after him.
A friend’s parents will not be at his graduation, wedding, etc.
My best friend is not here to build a tree-house with my kids – something he and I built dozens of.
How would we ever “get over it?”
Personally, I don’t think we do.
I think we just get used to it.
More to follow…
No, there really is no “getting over it”. I never hear widow/ers say it that way but we have the outside ask that “are we getting over it”. Which I would suggest people never say that to a widow/er. We don’t view our spouses death as something to get over. As for getting use to it…hmm, not sure I exactly see it that way but more like one develops and learns better ways of dealing with the loss. I guess kind of like being a boat captain managing the waves. Some waves are worse than others but over time you get better and better at maneuvering the waves. Also the understanding the wave is going to come, it might crash into us but we will keep going. The water will calm at some point and we can take a breather before the next storm of waves kicks up. I totally agree grief is unavoidable. One can try to avoid but it is just sitting there waiting for us. 4+ years later I can still be sent back to the beginning of my grief if I encounter something I had not faced. Like lets say one threw their spouses wallet into a draw because it was too painful to deal with, then years later you find that wallet. All those first are going to be faced one way or another even if we try to hide it away. I recently went into a story in Houston that Jason and I use to enjoy and it was instant pain when I walked in the door….years later. But it was the first time I had been back since his death. But these days I am better prepared, I understand it is going to hurt, accept it and just move through it. Not fun but knowing relief does come is a comfort. Only this year have I come to understand widowhood is a permanent condition that will never be “gotten over” only better dealt with. I do suffer from some regret like you speak of but I think in that I have learned to life more fully and appreciate more of what is around me. As horrible as grief is I do believe it can have some positive learning experiences. One being learning of the regret and not repeating it. I get a second chance to live life more fully and I am going to take it. God uses pain in a good way to build us into better people.
If I had it all to do over again, the option to never meet him and never to endure this pain….I would still marry him all over again. Jason was an amazing person that had a huge impact on my life and even in death still touches me. He gave me the tools to endure this and made me a better person. I will always feel blessed I had him to call mine. Love you Jason always 🙂
Brotherhood of the Rose
What about it? One of the greatest brotherhood books of all time – have you read much more Morrell?
Yes, I’ve read most of his stuff, none of the new though. After reading this post it made me think of Chris & Saul, two extremely talented people that life took two completely different directions.
Thanks for your writings.
Jason and I ALWAYS related ourselves to Chris and Saul – though he was probably more like Chris in some ways, ironically. He would be proud to have that comparison made.
“’The will of God will never take you where the Grace of God will not protect you.”. I don’t know the source of this wisdom, but I have turned to it several times in my life.
I love the picture of you with your best friend.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts.
Now I’m crying…
I hope they were/are the redemptive kind of tears.