Write to Empower Archives - Good Grief

Good Grief

Cry me a river, sing me a song, where have I been for so long,

my feet have walked through years while my body has held onto tears.

Today bonier toes are emerging out of a fog of grief, cramped hands  

open to release what’s past, a hungering soul more present at last.

Pulling out tomato plants that were dying before their season, I saw my own grief mirrored in this action. I have held onto my grief like an old bandage, gray with dirt, frayed from fingering, and crusty underneath from lack of air. For too long I have held as my lodestone the grief of losing so much of myself to Cancer. Grieving over female parts I had lost, over the pain I had known, of the past that might have been. What wasn’t there was more vital to me than what is still here now. While I was tearing the tomato plants from the earth, I was crying to myself. I saw my body having surgery. Then I began watering what was left, grieving again. This grieving was a familiar merry-go-round. And then there was this sweet voice that said, “Love what’s left more!” 

As a hospice counselor part of my job was to remind the people who were being left behind to hold onto each other more. Letting go of their loved one did not mean the end for them. Their own bodies were still here, and so was the rest of the family, and friends. While their focus was on the one who was passing they were in danger of losing themselves, and missing any new joys. Often they could not imagine nor hear anything about the future without their loved one present. Or they would be in the phase of being angry and not accepting reality, asking over and over again why. Or they were so numb they had no clue what they were feeling. Or they were racked with guilt and trying to find a way to negotiate with anyone who would listen. Grief truly does have its phases: shock, denial, bargaining, guilt, anger, depression, resignation and acceptance.  

While we go through the process of grief there is no timeline, only a process. Sometimes the emotions overlap and create an overwhelming swamp of emotions. Sometimes we don’t even want to find our way out of that swamp and are content with the gloomy light, fetid air and unstable ground. Even with these phases there is no linear process, and some emotions have to be ridden several times before we spiral through and out of their wild ride. Meanwhile grief is a double-edged sword one side keeps us bloody and hurting the other side can be a bright light to guide us through the swamps of our own evolution. We can choose to stay lost, or we can choose to ask for help, or we can choose to shift our beliefs. There truly is something called Good Grief. Grief can be deeply transformational, as well as open doors to new experiences we might have missed. When we allow ourselves to express that grief we know another side, the good grief of being able to share with others our experience, and the release of evolving our souls as we move towards real freedom.

Today I discovered I could love the surviving part of my garden. I can also choose to love the surviving part of my body, mind and soul. I never would have thought that I would grieve over losing my female parts for almost four years. If you had asked me if I was still grieving I would have said you were the crazy one. I thought I was moving on in life, and moving on being a new woman. In my heart of hearts, I felt the grief pinching, a sharp stab in my gut along with a voice that said I was no longer a desirable woman. That demon voice would be countered with quiet assurance that I was still whole even though I had lost so much to the surgeon’s knife and pathologist’s lab. That quiet assurance has been my north star keeping me on track while I ride a roller coaster to reclaiming my wholeness. I have been and still am grateful that I had such great medical care. I am grateful that I have had four years of being Cancer free. I am forever grateful that I had the love and support of my loving partner and caring friends to help me through. Today I am choosing to no longer focus on what I have lost or what could have been. I am recovering my sanity as I accept my authentic wholeness.    

This week’s exercise (if you are willing) is to examine your well of grief. What are you still grieving over; a lost 4-legged companion, a beloved partner, a parent, or your own surgeries? Where are you in that well? Are you dipping buckets in and sharing your experience? Are you going down for the third time, drowning in denial? Are you resigned but not accepting the grief as a fundamental tool that will shape your life for the better? My garden brought me the mirror of where I am with my grief. What in your life is mirroring your grieving process back to you? Write up your grief story as a step in claiming the bright light of Good Grief and its release into your life. One of the major tools in healing grief is expression of your grief in a creative form.

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Copyright September, 2010 Mari Selby