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Let's talk about Grief & Loss

Unknown userMember15 Oct 2016, 7:10 pm AEDT

Let's talk about Grief & Loss

Creating a space here for us to share our Grief and Loss experiences. All kinds but mostly bereavement.
- Tell us about your loss?
- What 3 things you miss most?
- What would you like to tell friends to say, do or be - to lighten the load?
- What have you learned about loss that you didn't know before?
- Do you have any quotes, links, books, organisations etc, related to loss, that you'd like to pass onto others?
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WHAT IS GRIEF?
GRIEF: The normal process of reacting to a loss. Loss is subjective but usually the loss is: Physical Loss (such as a death), Social Loss (such as divorce), or Occupational Loss (such as a job or an established role & purpose). Emotions distress to Grief & Loss can include anger, guilt, anxiety, confusion, sadness, and despair.

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In response to: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

AppleblossomSenior Contributor29 Oct 2016, 4:08 pm AEDT

Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

Yes @Decadian so many different thoughts and experiences about grief ... that the sharing helps us all understand different aspects of or human condition.

@pip I think you can be proud of your journey and it is great to find calm. We can only come from our own eperience and try and be a bit open. I have sometimes been praised for being amazingly calm ... but then .. "out of the blue" something comes that rocks my boat.

2 words that I think are better than "venting" are:

catharsis - is feeling the pain/anger/frustration fully and consciously and being able to purify the painful emotion and reach some restoration or healing.

abreaction - more like venting where there is no mental processing of the causes and effects of situations.

The classical greeks seemed to have a few insights still relevant today.

@MoonGal Love that Tim Lawrence link. I actually rate platitudes as very destructive too ... best admit that words cannot take the pain away.

It is great when after we have struggled long with something and have come to a position of peace and made sense of a tragedy etc ... with hindsight we can sometimes look back and see how we have grown.

BUT thats hugely different ... from presuming .. there is always a reason ... in God's plan etc ... those platitudes are putting the cart before the horse ... often deeply insulting ... if they are offered in a spirit of offering hope and reassurance ... but then we should be humble enough to drop the "always"... but humans do like the safety of certainty.

I seek to understand the reasons for things ... but glad I did enough stats at uni not to presume as much as some .. I still go through my learning with little pet-topics or hobby-horses of the moment ...arising and changing. I have learned a lot from trying to reach out here on the forum and felt touched by so many stories.

In response to: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

espritSenior Contributor29 Oct 2016, 5:27 pm AEDT

Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

Easier said then done though but worth trying Just not human nature in my opinion.

In response to: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

Unknown userMember29 Oct 2016, 6:00 pm AEDT

Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

One idiot tried to comfort me by sayiing one reason for losing my 13yo is that God may gave wantef to spare her being pack raped or somerhong" it made d me boil on the inside - wanted to smash face. For me, I don't care if there IS or ISN'T a reason for my suffering - either way, it hurts. Any 'reason' for it, I think, is what we do with it. eg I try to learn from it, gain knowledge that might help the future or once person. To let it 'make or break' me, to grow from it. When I'm not floundering that is. Grief is very individual, personal and needs to respected in that light, free from judgement. "Anything Goes" I was once told by a social worker in hospital. xox

In response to: Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

MoonGalSenior Contributor30 Oct 2016, 6:26 am AEDT

Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

@Former-Member - OMG that is a terrible thing to say, I can understand while you boiled!

In response to: Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

DecadianSenior Contributor30 Oct 2016, 12:25 pm AEDT

Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

Hi @Appleblossom

I really like your mention of the Ancient Greeks confronting the human conditon and giving us so many examples of the Furies exacting so many difficulties up humans - eg Orestes and Oedipus - caught in an impossible dilemma and how they could possibly keep from falling to the traps set for them.

I remember struggling with essays or exam questions set for Classical Studies - a good place to start.

The main place is that they wanted a reason and the gods alas behaved like children while the heros fought each other and the sufferings of mankind were traps set to give us some idea of what caused human conditions for millenia to come

I hope we never lose them

There is no reason other than we all have to die at some time - and often a person is in the wrong place at the wrong time - or they make choices which have inevitable outcomes and we can weep and be angry and ask "Why" and yell at God and that's fine - he can take it.

And people say idiotic and terrible things to the bereaved that mean nothing and can cut to the quick because they are helpless yet for some reason need to fill in the silence - and in truth - words so often get in the way - and the time spent in silence with a bereaved person will allow a silent scream to be heard - and the silent solace given - for there are not words to help - there is no comfort in thoughtless words

Words - there is a time for words and a time for no words

And @Former-Member

I am enraged that someone could say something as terrible as they did to you about your daughter - on the threshold of her life - being taken to avoid the pack rape that is likely to never have happened. As a bereaved parent myself I have had my share - but that one has to take the cake, I am so sorry -

Decadian

In response to: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

Unknown userMember30 Oct 2016, 1:53 pm AEDT

Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

Thanks @Appleblossom, @Moongirl, @Decadian & other contributors.
The minister told me "we have to try find the good that is on it or come out of it" and another time he said to me - "there are worse things than death" - "perhaps sometbing more terrorable was foing to happen" Yes, now its over 5 years I can explore different why's and wherefores of death, loss & dying. BUT at the time, all I could think was
"SHE WAS TOO YOUNG MAN TO DIE" "WHY DID I HAVE TO BURY MY CHILD?"
"WHY WADN'T THE AMBOS QUICKER"
"AN INVISIBLE VITAL ORGAN WITHIN ME HAS BEEN TAWN FROM ME WITHOUT PERMISSION"
"NOBODY HAS MY CIRCUMSTANCES"
"STOP SAYING IT! SHE IS NOT DEAD!!!"
"SOMEBODY HOLD ME"

- can't talk about this more right now -

In response to: Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

DecadianSenior Contributor30 Oct 2016, 2:03 pm AEDT

Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

The scar in my heart is light-years across and millenia deep

The reason is he chose to die and nothing could stop him

Nothing can ever fill the hole that is left now his has gone

No foolish words can help the broken hearted - those bereaved of a young life

In response to: Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

AppleblossomSenior Contributor30 Oct 2016, 6:43 pm AEDT

Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

Hi @Former-Member @Decadian

Cant say anything at the moment. Just agree with you both. My lips are pressed firm together.

I am ok have been in the garden a lot today. I often call the part in the court ... my grief garden. In it I learn about the cycles of life & death and reflect on aspects that help me understand what happened in my family. I can do it and not be too far away from the living.

Not sure what is happening on the son front ... just keeping going...

On Friday I received the Coroners papers for my sister, but it might be a while before I am up to reading them. Put them in the cupboard, cos I am still delicato.

It has meant a great deal that we have been able to share our grief ... different things come up .. over time and I think that is good .. but we dont want to upset ourselves unnecessarily ..

take care

Apple

In response to: Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

DecadianSenior Contributor01 Nov 2016, 8:22 am AEDT

Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

Hi @Appleblossom

The stages of grief do not come in any particular order - nor are they easily processed

I am glad you have your Grief Garden - I could perhaps set up my own - but then - I do not visit anyone's resting place either - or as it says in St. John's Gospel - "(They) are not there"

TS went an purchased the stone for our parents' plaque with her daughter - I was not consulted - and I never heard when my mother's ashes were interred - I am not at all sure whereabouts in a huge lawn cemetery of small plots I would find it either and it would bring me no ease - or indicate the lack of need for it - but that's me -

I joined SANES at the end of March Apple - and you were getting your sister's Inquest about then - I don't know how long you have had them - I have had my son's for years - and read them a few times - and it is a quick trip to pass some time on a bad day - but with the occasional readings it gets just that little bit easier.

When we grieve those we have lost we also have to deal with other's bad behaviour which is really hard for those of us who do not have nasty minds - how can they behave that way and justify it? I guess that has to be a rhetorical question

I did say I would help you read those papers Apple - I don't know how we can do this physically because we cannot share personal info here - but I am sure there is a way to uphold you emotionally while you do.

Thinking of you - this is a hard part of life I know - what will fly out of Pandora's Box when you read those papers?

Lots of hugs

Dec

In response to: Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

pipSenior Contributor01 Nov 2016, 8:42 am AEDT

Re: Let's talk about Grief & Loss

@Decadian. Pardon the interruption here. I too am not in apposition where I can visit my parents plaque where it is. their ashes were scattered. I have their wedding photo and memories, some good, some not so good. Having a 'grief garden' works for some. No matter where you are, if you feel like you need time out, that too is a form of grieving. Grieving does have several emotional release outlets, there is anger (how dare they/you die), guilt because of the anger. There is denial, refusal to accept the passing. You know they have passed, you simply can't process or believe you will never see them again. None of these have any particular order, they are emotions and emotions do not have any order. You can be walking/driving, see something or someone that triggers a memory. There is not time limit. My ex in-laws would often tell me, after ex amount of time, you should be 'over that'. I still grieve for my parents, my dad died the year before Elvis, mum went 21 years ago. My grief now takes the form of anger, lash out, defiance. My dad was only 56, mum was 75, to me, way too young. You're never prepared to lose parents/children. There is no way to prepare yourself. People often believe they are justified in saying cruel, hurtful things because, to them, they are only saying what, to them, is right. To someone who has no idea how to deal with depression, for instance, they will often tell someone who is suffering to 'snap out of it', 'get a job'. To the uneducated, they believe what they say, therefore one solution fits all. To these people I say 'put my shoes on'.

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