Spirit Coaching

Am I Grieving Wrong?

Here’s a silly question: “How do I grieve?” Is it really that silly? Don’t you just cry a lot, miss our loved one a lot and then someday be ok again? Generally. From the outside looking in at grief, that’s basically how it looks. But once it becomes a reality for you, and you must delve into all the messiness and mystery of it, you can become lost and wonder: “What am I doing here?” or “How do I get out of this?” “Am I crying too much?” “Am I not crying enough?” “Am I going crazy?”

There were many times I would walk away from a counseling session or grief group and feel newly depressed or sad and I didn’t really know why, at first. Soon I realized I felt like I didn’t get how to grieve. Other people would say just how I felt about the loss of their child and I would sit there and nod my head. Everyone else seemed to get it, but I didn’t know what to say. This frustration lead to me thinking that I was letting my daughter, McKaila down. I wasn’t honoring her with words of wisdom that everyone else seemed to get. So I felt they were grieving better than me. I really did feel like I was going crazy! “How did these people get ahold of the secret grief book that had all the calming ideas and words of wisdom that I couldn’t grasp?!” I felt like a failure to my daughter, again. I was failing at grieving.

Nobody teaches you. We get all of our grief information from family and friends from the time we were very young. Were they experts on grief? Did the things they told you about death make any sense to you? “She’s in a better place now.” “Heaven needed another angel.” “You’ll feel better in a year or two.” Intellectually, these words might have helped, but my heart wasn’t getting it. My heart and my head never connected during my grief to help me move forward in a positive way.

I learned I wasn’t failing at grief. I just didn’t know how to do it because I’d never grieved over a child before. My close friends and family had never lost a child, so how would they know what to tell me.

People were talking to my head and not my heart. And that is hard for people to do because they just want you to be “better”. Therefore, I was left with myself - trying to make sense of my daughter’s death and wondering how in the world am I supposed to go on without her. “I can’t do this! I’ll fail!” (Again!)

I tried many different things that I was taught in my counseling: Journaling helped a little. Planting a garden, helped a bit. I started a foundation and helping others was also good. I read books, I scrapbooked, I got outside in nature, I meditated and prayed. But what I think helped me the most, was when I was done being mad at God, I was able to just see me and I could see what I finally needed to be taken care of. I - took care of my heart!

Failure was no longer an option for me. I wanted my daughter to be proud of me and happy that I was going to be ok. Nothing happened overnight, but as I continued to journal, plant, read, walk - and everything else, with a different perspective, I could see what I needed to take care of me.

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