Hellobee Boards

I hope you don't mind my posting here, since I am not grieving the loss of a pregnancy/child. I clicked because it was in general loss and read the article and it really resonated with me. My grandmother died 4 months ago and I'm still really struggling. I've thought a lot about how hard it is because it feels like people treat the death of grandparents as expected. Old people die. But that doesn't mean it isn't heartbreaking. And I'd hoped her funeral would bring some closure. I wanted (needed?) to reminisce and cry with my family. And almost no one even talked about her. We made small talk and caught up and did anything to avoid the fact that she was in a box at the head of the room. Since her funeral, she is mentioned only in passing and no one has really talked about still grieving her. It's just so bizarre to me. Like we're all supposed to cry the day it happens and maybe at the burial and then be over it. But then I wondered if maybe I'm just more emotional about these things than most.

I really love this interview.

The culture we live in oppresses acknowledgment of and the acceptance of the "other half" of life. There's such an obsessive focus on the image of happiness, success, being better, doing better, and rising to the top. Of course we all want to be happy, but our expectations of what that means are so skewed and when life inevitably presents difficulty, sorrow, and loss, we have no idea how to move through it. Especially in a culture that refuses to recognize or validate the feelings we have with the general expectation to get back to work, pull yourself together, move on, get over it.

Thanks for posting this, a good Friday read.

"To let grief work its alchemy on you yields gravitas, by which I mean the ability to be present with the bittersweet reality of life, which always includes loss. There’s no way to be spared sorrow. I wouldn’t even wish that upon someone. But we shouldn’t get stuck in our grief; it’s not a permanent address but a companion that walks beside us. Everything I love, I will lose. That’s the harsh truth. You either have to shut down your heart — and miss the love that is around you — or wrestle with that truth and come out the other end. There is indeed such a thing as joyful sorrow."