[2022-04-15] How did you overcome grief?
I've been planning this post for a few months, but wasn't ready until today to write and publish it. It's about the grief we all experience at some point in our lives—often multiple times—when we lose a loved one. And it is about the peace that returns when our grief for what we lost is replaced by gratitude for what we gained—gratitude for the years we had with our loved one, the joy they brought to our lives, and the privilege of knowing them.
Back in February, in response to my post In your words: cancer's impact on loved ones, a friend wrote to me:
This certainly brought back memories (and some tears) of my own experience caring for my mother during her short-lived battle with cancer.... And for all the poignant words you quoted, I am aware that there are many people who could not find or articulate the words describing how they feel in losing a parent, a sibling, a child to cancer. Some suffer in silence and their thoughts and feelings remain trapped inside themselves, which is so unfortunate in a way.
I was extremely moved by my friend's words. I acknowledged that my post had probably brought back painful memories for people who had lost a loved one to cancer. I hoped that those individuals had taken solace in the words of a few people I had quoted. And I mused about doing a post in the future focusing on the stories of people who had been able to move on positively after losing a loved one. I wanted to know what had helped people to get through their sadness and to find joy again.
My friend responded that he thought a post on how people eventually got through their pain, grief and sense of loss (at least as much as is possible) was a good idea. He admitted that it was understandably and cumulatively difficult at times, dealing with all the oppressive feelings that a person experiences in trying to deal with the loss of a loved one to cancer. He welcomed a post expanding on the more positive and inspiring stories of how people had overcome their grief. He offered his own story as the first contribution.
In many ways, many if not most/all people will never really get over the loss and grief. There is always a "broken piece in the corner of one’s heart" as a particularly poignant contributor put it, and I can relate to that. Something about me was never quite the same after my mother passed away. For close family members, we only have one father, one mother, one or few brothers or sisters, and their untimely departure cannot but leave an ever-present void of different proportions as you well know. Something about me was never quite the same after my mother passed away. The cruelty of this disease, the frustrations of dealing with the medical system (in some cases, like yours, quite good, some much much worse), further exacerbate the feelings of anger, guilt, devastation, etc.
Obviously, time is a great healer, and it helps most of us deal with a great portion of the pain, and move on with our lives. Supporting each other and walking forward, trying to appreciate and enjoy all the wonderful moments with family members and friends, and the beautiful things that life has to offer, no matter how long life will end up being for any one of us.
For me, music was always a great balm during periods of loneliness and pain in my life. Not sure if I told you this, but as my mother lay dying in the hospital, I told my sister I needed a short break and went down the elevator one night, around 3am, to get a coffee from the little canteen that was open all night. The ground floor was eerily quiet, and dark. The hospital was as asleep and peaceful as it can be. I wandered with my coffee and heard a faint sound coming from a side corridor leading to a waiting room for patients getting casts put on broken limbs. It was empty of course, dimly lit, so I sat down in one of the chairs and just allowed myself a few moments of solitary peace and quiet, away from the floor of very ill patients, and from the bedside of my mother, where I sat in vigil with my sister during the long nights. After a few moments, I realized it wasn’t completely quiet, there was a faint musical muzak coming through the speakers in the ceiling. As I sat there, almost on cue, Eric Clapton came on with Tears in Heaven. The words and the feelings that he put into singing that song about his son who had died tragically, were instantly relevant to me in a very profound way. I closed my eyes, put my face in my hand, tears streamed down my cheeks, and I felt as if the universe was giving me a few minutes of calm and an opportunity to reflect on what I was going through. The song ended, I dried my eyes, got up and walked back to the elevator taking me to my mother’s floor and bedside, strangely strengthened by that solitary moment to face the remaining dark hours of that night. And that moment, and others like it (there are a few words in a particularly touching song by Jane Siberry - Love is Everything) helped carry me through the next few days and in the weeks and months after her death.... [T]he song is about a romantic breakup but these words always remind me of my feelings watching over my mother during those long dark nights, the life slipping away from her, when we would tell her we were there and loved her:
So take a lesson from the strangeness you feel
And know you'll never be the same
And find it in your heart to kneel down and say
I gave my love didn't I?
And I gave it big...sometimes
And I gave it in my own sweet time
I'm just leaving, I’m just lea-ving
Love is everything...
My friend's words reminded me of the solace I had taken in music after my brother's death. I channeled my grief into a Spotify playlist I called In memory of Greg... Mourning. I would listen to the songs and cry, feeling how awful it was to have lost him at such a young age. Eventually, though, the tears dried up. Rather than focus on what I had lost, I started focusing on what I had gained by having had Greg in my life. In a more hopeful frame of mind, I created a new playlist called In memory of Greg... Celebrating, a compilation of songs that he liked and that helped me remember him with a smile instead of tears.
My friend concluded his message with these soothing words:
[W]e all have memories good and bad about having the privilege to accompany a dear one through his/her days and hours of pain and suffering. In the end, it’s the lovely and heartening moments of joy amidst my mother’s agony that I hold onto and remember. Someone once wrote that God blessed us with an imperfect memory, such that in time the sad memories fade and the happy ones remain.
I believe in the power of stories to heal us and to lift us up—both the person telling the story and the person receiving it.
And so I turn to you, dear Jenesis readers, to share how you overcame your grief at losing a loved one and how you managed to go on living. I will compile your feedback and reflect it, anonymously, in a future post "In your words: overcoming grief."
The path you've walked before may be the same path someone else is walking today; the strategies you used may help someone navigate the path with a little less pain than they might otherwise have experienced.
