Grief

Grief is such a difficult emotion to witness. It has a life of its own that can overtake us and drown us in its pain.

In my womens group, the facilitator talks about holding space for other people. I love this idea of holding space. It is not fixing or doing or making things better, just being present. Being present to bear witness to grief. Give grief its due. Pay homage to those who are suffering and to love them and hold them tightly.

I have been a witness to unbearable grief. As painful as it was, it felt good to be there, quietly holding a hand and hearing the story.

It has been on my heart to talk about the need to teach our children to grieve. To be sad, to express pain and still carry on somehow.

Somewhere along the way in my life, I picked up the belief that to cry was to be weak. And I spent a better part of my teen years not crying. Until one day, I started to cry and found myself unable to stop. Those were very difficult times for me. I had no idea how to grieve and be sad and not be completely consumed, swallowed up in my own angst.

I used food to cope for a lot of years. Again, having no idea how to cope with feelings, any of them, I ate or didn't eat, as the case may be to drown it out. Feelings were all frightening. From my experience as a teenager of not being able to cry and then once starting, being unable to stop was so traumatic that I would do anything to not be in that place again.

I have since learned how to have feelings and still be ok. Feelings do not define the person I am, they come and go. No longer am I a hostage to them. Feelings are a signal that something needs attention. There is no need to panic or feel afraid of them, they are just the tinkling of my front door chime, letting me know to perk up and be aware of my surroundings and a situation that may or may not require any action on my part.

I pray that I am able to teach my children how to cope with feelings. See them as their tinkling door chime. It is ok for our children to see us on our knees in grief. It is ok, for them to see us wipe our eyes and get up and carry on through another day seeing us do the things that need to be done. Their lives will have pain and sadness and joy and hope and love and it is our job to teach them to savor and fully experience all of it without losing themselves.

Let me be a good teacher,

Gabbi