Grief has no timeline

One August 17, I was  in my Downtown 6th floor office  working on  social media posting.

Humming along to my music coming through my headphones, I started placing events into the computer calendar. Suddenly sadness hit me. By “hit”, I mean I was body slammed by grief so thick and heavy I could not breathe.

I began to cry silent, thick tears.

Embarrassed, and wanting to escape before somebody noticed, I ducked out of my cubicle, took the back stairs to the main level and walked until I could duck down an alley where I sobbed and sobbed.

My husband, John, had  died eleven years before.

He was a charming, intelligent, chronic alcoholic with a congenital heart defect and a liver full of cirrhosis. He was sardonic and witty, kind and generous, and, ironically, avidly athletic. He could never outrun his demons, but I didn’t know that on August 17,   when we married, in an enchanting little park, surrounded by family and friends.

John and I lived in our home state for the first 363 days of our marriage. Then, on the day before our first anniversary, I moved to the Pacific Northwest to take a teaching position. He would stay behind and come after, essentially supporting us both with his work until I had an income.

Three years later, we moved to the Great Lakes area.

We spent our time away from work camping and fishing in the state parks. When I fully understood John’s alcoholism, it was too late to save the damage to his body. Rehabilitation never really worked for him, although he tried time and again. His body gave out before the disease did, almost six years later. 

Tired of being so far away from my family, I decided to return to my home state and my college town.

So, there I was, on August 17,  entering dates into the computer when I realized it was my 20th wedding anniversary and the first time I was in the city where we’d married since our wedding day. It was also hard to realize that I’d now been separated from him the length of time we’d been married. So, I sobbed and sobbed in that shaded alley, just steps away from the people coming and going on the hot sidewalk.

We’re all wired differently.

We process grief differently, but somehow, there’s always a part of us that wants to put a time limit on things. We want rules and structure because it forces this tremendous burden into little check-boxes we can manage.

Unfortunately, grief is what it is and it won’t always play by our rules.

The Five Stages of Grief Model is often cited to grieving families: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. However, the author of this model, Dr. Kubler-Ross, clearly explains that not everybody experiences every step and you may not experience them in any particular order. There is certainly no timeline attached, and steps can repeat themselves over the years.

I did not handle the death of my husband well at all.

I did not allow myself time to grieve or even to feel. I worked compulsively non-stop, had a kazillion hobbies and activities, and threw myself into “living”. Too many times, I heard the messages that I was too young to be a widow, that time heals all, and that life moves on. 

After work that day, I drove by the park where John and I were married and the apartment where we’d lived. I remembered riding bikes through downtown to the university and out to the mall. I remembered the night he proposed and the tears he cried when I earned my degree. It took me almost eleven years after his death to let myself actually feel his loss and to think about the passage of time since he died.

In the years since that day of grief, I’ve moved again, changed jobs, and remarried.

I don’t feel the same grief that I did, but I remember well the pain of that grief. I’ve talked with friends and colleagues who have shared similar experiences–most especially that there is no timeline on the grieving process. 

Whether you have lost a spouse, a parent, a child, or anyone close to you, you will find that grief grabs you when you least expect it.

Familiar scents, music, places, a certain phrase can trigger a memory that can trigger grief even years after your loss.  The question then becomes what to do when this happens.

I’m not an expert. Talk to your doctor or talk to a therapist. I can only share what I’ve found for my non-medical professional self and what my fellow grievers have said.

Here are some things that have helped us:

• Talk. Talk about your loved one to others. Talk about what you’re feeling. Get it out of your head. Maybe you don’t have someone you feel you can talk to directly. Write.
• Allow yourself a good cry. Put it in your schedule if needed. 
• Allow yourself a moment of melancholy. Look at old pictures, drive by old places. Visit a gravesite and share with your loved one what is happening in your life now.
• Find a grief group. There’s a lot of social media groups out there that provide forums for people who are grieving to share experiences.

Most importantly, allow the grief to run its course.

Accept what you are feeling and don’t be angry with yourself for not being able to “get over it already”.

I don’t live daily in grief anymore. I’m too busy.

I have a husband, a teenage son, a dog, a house, and more obligations than fit on the To-Do list. Most days I feel like this is my second or third life.

However, I do actually still schedule my grief days.

My mother’s Death Day is July 2. My husband John’s Death Day was April 28. My grandmother’s Death Day was November 3. On each of those days, I set aside time to think about them, to “catch them up” on things, and to be sad. By giving my grief a place, I’m able to better keep it out of where I don’t want it to be. I can focus on being present for the people that need me now.

Max Porter, author of “Grief is the Thing With Feathers” wrote, “Moving on, as a concept, is for stupid people. Because any sensible person knows grief is a long-term project. I refuse to rush. Let no man slow, speed, or fix.”

 For me, understanding that grief has its own timeline actually made it more manageable.

My grief, like my memories, will be with me for years to come.   Every now and then, I’ll take it out, as one does with precious things, and hold it fast to me then, ever so gently, tuck it away again.

—–-written by Stephanie Call Boettger-—-