Thoughts on The Outrageous Truths of Grief: Facts not melodrama

My life is over:

The life you had before is gone forever. You can never live that life again. However that doesn’t mean you cannot make a new life. It may be completely different or quite similar. From the outside it might even look the same but it won’t be. It’s your new life the old life is over.

When he died, I died:

The person you were before is also gone forever just as surely as your loved one. You are irrevocably changed. Like the phoenix from the flames though you can rise again. A new you will emerge, it’s up to you who he will be. In some way you will be the same but in others different, a whole new you.

I’ll never love anyone like that again:

Of course you won’t. Every time we love someone we love them for who and what they are. You are different so you will love differently. They will be different so they will be loved differently. No more, no less, just different.

I would do anything to have them back:

We never get to prove this one as on some level we know they are gone but the madness that comes with grief and the daft/stupid/illogical things we do during the early months especially I think shows that this statement is also true.

I don’t deserve this/It isn’t fair:

Of course you don’t and of course it’s not. No-one does but it happens to us all. LIFE isn’t fair. However knowing this doesn’t mean you can’t say it out loud once and a while, you are after all only human and well, it is not fair.

I can’t go on:

At some stage we all feel like this. Many times as we grieve we all need a time out to gather our defences in preparation for the next attack. Sometimes you might need help with this. Friends and family can help but if they are not enough then counselling and medication can be of use. With help you will usually find that after a short break you can start again and find a different path. I have yet to discover a time limit on this. Almost three years on I still need my time outs occasionally.

I can still feel his presence:

It is said that a person is not dead until they are forgotten. As long as you remember them, as long as you look at the world with their eyes as well as your own they will always be with you.

Hints:

Cry when you need to. Ask for help when you are strong enough to. Reach out when you are able to. Take it one day at a time, if that’s too much then one hour or one minute at a time. Eventually the time will pass. When all else fails and you are hanging on by only your finger tips remember you are hanging on and be proud.


These are just some of the more obvious thoughts that occurred to me one night in Perth when I couldn't sleep. Grief like all important life lessons is an ongoing class which I am sure still has lesson to teach me. The real truth is you never get over it and I'm not sure we ever really get through it but some how we can learn to live with it. We have to.