Seasons of Grief

Mostly, I sat and listened; to their pain, to their loss, to finding their way back to life, to each figuring out who they are now.

I was moved and my own grief boiled up. I hadn’t lost a spouse, child or sister, but I witnessed the ravaging results of those deaths. Most had occurred within the past couple of years, one as recently as two months ago. Those mourning were in very different spaces. Participating in a grief group when some have lost children and others spouses, is difficult, I learned, because the types of grief are not the same. One woman who lost her husband last year doesn’t know how she gets up in the morning. Another, whose spouse died two months ago, said today in the woods was the best day since his death.

I attended this grief workshop to learn as a minister, and also as a human, how to better respond to others grieving. And, I now see personal lessons for me as I age and life gives way to death.

I was the unofficial grief expert when I worked for a global casket company. I engaged with noted thanotologist (one who studies death) Dr. Alan Wolfelt, the first counselor on the scene at Columbine. I wrote about grief during that time as I was dealing with my own from a miscarriage. I have long been interested in helping the bereaved. In some way, we are all bereaved.

As the longtime clerk of Cincinnati Friends Meeting’s Burial Committee, we help people plan burials ahead of or when a loved one dies. There’s not a time an outsider feels more inept than when another is mourning. This is why I called the Cincinnati Nature Center to get on a waiting list for the grief-and-nature-bathing session for which I had not registered, but knew I had to attend. Even Tad, my husband, said, “I can’t think of anything more up your alley than the nature center and a session on grief”. He wasn’t wrong.

A half an hour after being placed on the waitlist, I learned I was in, as I knew I would be.

I drove to the visitors center, noticing a fairly empty parking lot, then reviewed the small print on my e-ticket that stated the event was happening at the Groesbeck property. A wave of panic hit. I have been back walking the nature center fairly regularly since I was carried out on May 20 with a broken ankle. I fell near the Groesbeck house and I had not yet ventured back. I sucked in that fear and drove to the right location, where I was warmly welcomed. I shared that I had fallen nearby, so I would be careful walking any trails, signaled by my walking pole. One of the women said she’d been there that fateful day and understood.

I walked out onto the veranda under the shade of a tent and chose a table, the one that was not yet full. Tammie, Pat, Danielle, and Nick would be my companions for the day. I would listen to and learn from them. We’d hammer apart a terracotta pot, decorate its shards and then piece it back. Mine would be the most broken and the most colorful, they noted. Two of them had found each other through a mutual friend, who offered grief therapy to them as a pair. They have been lifesavers for each other, they said. Another, who lost a young adult son, has pursued a lot of therapy, even walking the El Camino from Portugal to Spain to heal. So had one of the pair of women. We found it remarkable that two of our table of five had made that pilgrimage. I met Geraldine, her daughter, and Barbara from another table when we forest bathed in a small group. Geraldine lost her husband very recently; Barbara’s sister, her “person,” has left her life with a huge void. They helped me remember my brother-in-law, Andy, and my parents who died in fairly quick succession, somewhat recently.

I listened and took a lot of notes as we explored the seasons of grief in the gentle care of the nature center. I want to capture some of this things I learned:

Fall – the newness and transformation of loss

  • If death was quick and unexpected, there is regret in not saying goodbye.
  • When a couple has felt like one person, the survivor feels they died, too.
  • Some feel lost or in hell.
  • Brain fog often accompanies grief.
  • Grief makes it hard to read and process.
  • Sometimes you struggle and need something to read.
  • Highlighting sections, then going back to them, eases reading.
  • Getting up and moving disrupts the frequent fatigue.
  • Lack of sleep contributes to emotional and mental deterioration.

 

Winter – the challenges of grief

  • The seasons, holidays, birthdays and anniversaries are triggers, but so are the less obvious reminders, like the date of diagnosis.
  • People don’t know how to handle crying – and sometimes you just have to sob – because it makes them uncomfortable.
  • Crying is a release.
  • Sobbing in public is scary.
  • A larger grief group can be difficult when limited to talking. Therapy is better when there is a purpose or goals, like a reading and then questions.
  • Animals are a great comfort.
  • Nature and walking in nature are healing.
  • Grieving is harder with kids present.
  • Just saying “reach out and let me know what you need” is empty when someone can’t reach out.
  • Showing up with dinner is helpful.
  • Sharing postcards of the person who died with family members each month for a year sparks good memories and serves as a creative outlet.
  • Grief is love without a place to go.
  • Some wonder if they are grieving right.
  • Joy exhausts those mourning.

 

Spring – balancing grief and life

  • Ancient cultures that gave people a year off just to grieve understood loss better.
  • Conversations are awkward, especially when someone automatically asks if you’re ok.
  • Others who have suffered a similar loss – where online or in person – are comforting.
  • Loving family and friends who have not experienced a loss of this magnitude are ready to return to normal when your world has blown up. They are not always supportive and may make suggestions too early. Don’t hold it against them.
  • Sometimes you have to tell people what you want, but even then they may not be able to provide it.
  • One-on-one accompaniment is most helpful.
  • Being alone, eating dinner alone, is hard.
  • A memorial plaque on a park bench, the nature center or a grave offer a physical place to mourn and remember.
  • Music soothes.
  • The grieving mother said she tells people that when something draws tears it’s love running down her cheek and thanks the person for sparking the memory to put them at ease.
  • She carries her son's ashes and  scatters them places he’ll never get to go.
  • A pilgrimage of walking, thinking, and being with others who have reasons for being there is a healing community.
  • Those in mourning should not let their journey end at the pilgrimage, but be open to more healing.
  • There’s a tension between mourning and getting on with life.
  • There is guilt in joy.

 

Summer – self care and looking ahead

  • Survivors are the voice of their deceased loved ones.
  • Writing your love story down is therapeutic.
  • You can write to your loved one in a grief journal.
  • Volunteering and getting out of the house and comfort zone helps.
  • Getting out each day is beneficial.
  • Survivors may eventually feel they owe it to their loved one to have new experiences.
  • Grandchildren teach those grieving to be present.
  • A brain rewired by grief and loss is the new reality.
  • Yoga and art classes help process grief.
  • Survivors must reinvent themselves.
  • They ask if they should be who their kids think they should be.
  • They wonder who they are supposed to be now.

These things I learned by listening, which pushed me to deal with some of my own recovery. At the conclusion of our event, I asked if anyone at the table would walk nearby with me to the spot where I’d fallen. I did not want to go alone, but felt compelled to visit the spot. Tammi and Pat cleared away the nuts and sticks ahead of me as we hiked to the spot. There it was, not imposing or threatening, just a place in the woods where I fell, then recovered, as a more grateful, stronger person.

 

This workshop was offered by the Goldstein Family Grief Center on the grounds of the Cincinnati Nature Center.

3 Comments

  1. Kate Waddell | | Reply

    Thank you for writing this Cathy. Many of the things learned remind me a lot of a great scene from the TV show WandaVision. Vision is comforting Wanda who has just lost her brother and who, as a child, lost both parents. He tells her “What is grief if not love persevering?” I think that’s such a helpful perspective on grief, that we are feeling it because we had love in our life.

  2. Megan Elizabeth Golden | | Reply

    Beautiful Story…and very timely.

  3. Donne Hayden | | Reply

    This is wonderful, Cathy. I love how deeply you experience all aspects of life.

    I recently came across these lines that may speak to you:

    “Grief is simply love in its most wild and painful form. It is a natural and sane response to loss . . . Grief no more needs a solution than love needs a solution.”

    (Megan Devine in her book It’s Okay That You’re Not Okay.)

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