Don’t Let Grief Block the Sun
“Grief, I’ve learned, is really just love. It’s all the love you want to give, but cannot.” – Jamie Anderson
We experienced an unusual spectacle in northeast Ohio and many other parts of the country this week as people came together to celebrate a few minutes of darkness in the middle of the day during the total solar eclipse. While the idea of an eclipse can be used to symbolize many things, I couldn’t help thinking that it was a perfect metaphor for our topic this week – grief and loss.
When I think of my own journey through grief and loss, it has been filled with moments of darkness, followed by the return of the light. Yet, just like the moon in its orbit, grief is not something that ever “goes away.” It’s something that will always be with us, though it may block the sun sometimes.
And grief can be complicated. Caregivers experience a lot of complicated grief – long-term, unresolved, persistent grief. We also experience ambiguous grief or loss – the kind without closure or clear understanding, such as when our loved one is still living but not fully present.
If that sounds like your situation, I want to share with you this great blog post that discusses Pauline Boss’s thoughts on ambiguous loss. There are two types of ambiguous loss: one type involves physical absence with psychological presence, and the other occurs when there is physical presence and psychological absence. Because of this partial presence and partial absence, Boss refers to ambiguous loss as the most stressful type of loss. And she says overemphasis on closure and focusing on the past can hinder our progress.
Boss suggests the following six tools for dealing with such loss:
FINDING MEANING. Making sense of the event or situation by finding some positive meaning amidst the loss.
ADJUSTING MASTERY. Recognizing that you are in control of your life, your choices, and your efforts, but sadly, the world is not always fair.
RECONSTRUCTING IDENTITY. Understanding who you are and what role you play now, but leaving the door open for new possibilities that may emerge.
NORMALIZING AMBIVALENCE. Acknowledging the existence of mixed feelings or contradictory ideas about something or someone and that it’s normal to feel this way.
REVISING ATTACHMENT. Allowing yourself to “grieve and revise earlier hopes and dreams about the person and the relationship, and to do this without the extreme reactions of absolute enmeshment or absolute detachment.” (Loss, Trauma, and Resilience)
DISCOVERING HOPE. Finding hope through “something new and positive to look forward to – some other human connection and a cause beyond ourselves that has meaning.” Boss describes hope as “belief in a future good … with the expectation of fulfillment … that suffering can stop and that comfort is possible in the future.”
But above all, remember that there is no right way to grieve or feel loss. And you don’t have to grieve alone. You can reach out to family and friends, or you can rely on the skills you’ve developed through breathing meditation, coaching group sessions, or your own journey with support professionals. We’re all here for YOU.