What do most people really know about grief… or how to grieve? Most people know very little. In our society, we most often shy away from the issue of death and most often don’t talk about the horrible pain that we feel when we grieve. We stuff it down, put on a “good face” and act like we’re okay. Inside, we feel confused, frightened, anxious and in emotional pain. The other option that happens is that people shut down, hide away and suffer in silence and aloneness. Neither of these options work very well. They just put grief on hold and cause more suffering.

“When we are brave enough to sit with our pain, it deepens our ability to sit with the pain of others. It shows us how to love them.” — Valarie Kaur

There is an ancient Inuit fable called Skeleton Woman, made popular by Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes, who wrote Women Who Run with the Wolves.

Here is a synopsis: A young woman is thrown into the ocean where she lives for decades as a skeleton. A fisherman casts his line and snags the skeleton. Thinking he has caught a huge fish he eagerly throws out a net and reels it in. The woman tries to disentangle herself from the net but quickly gets more entwined. When the bones emerge, the fisherman screams in terror, grabs his line and flees to his snow house not realizing the woman skeleton is still attached. Later, when he lights his whale-oil lamp, he is surprised to see her all tangled and crumpled on the snow floor. Perhaps the lamplight softens her features, or perhaps he is lonely, but somehow he now sees her in a new way. A feeling of kindness comes over him. Slowly, gently, like a mother toward a child, he untangles her from the fishing line and places the bones carefully back together, covering her with fur to keep her warm. He falls asleep and dreams something sad during the night. A tear falls from his eye. Wanting nothing more than to come back to life, and feeling very thirsty, she reaches over and drinks his tear while he sleeps. She holds his heart, gently beating it as a drum while softly singing. As she does so, her flesh returns and her body is restored. They wake the next morning wrapped around each other in a good and lasting way.

Inuit fables traditionally focus on the cycle of life, death and resurrection. This one also offers a powerful metaphor for what it means to stay with grief rather than flee from it. If we can allow ourselves to stay with difficult feelings like pain and sadness rather than dismiss them, if we can see our suffering and that of another in a warmer light, we can emerge from grief with a greater sense of connection to ourselves and others. 

“Grief, I’ve learned, is really just love. It’s all the love you want to give, but cannot. All that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go” ~ Jamie Anderson

Grief can be so confusing, so exhausting and so overwhelming! There are so many uncomfortable and difficult feelings that arise when your loved one dies.

Overwhelming does not even begin to describe how big it might feel. There is sometimes so much going on inside that our central nervous system gives us a natural anesthetic that helps us to just feel… numb. That numbness or shock is a normal first part of grieving that helps us negotiate our suddenly surreal situation.

Here we are. You got through Thanksgiving. Hanukkah and Christmas are here. And the New Year is days away. You might be saying… “Oh no, no more, please just let me stay under the covers till this is all over” and you wouldn’t be alone in feeling that. The holidays and the prospect of a new year can be complicated when your loved one is not here.  

There’s no place like “HOPE” for the Holidays.

The first time a loved one is absent for the holidays a griever may conclude that all of the progress and healing that has taken place has vanished.

Starting with Thanksgiving and through New Year’s are the days on which mourners are reminded of loss by the painful absence of their loved one. Feelings of longing and sadness are especially acute this time of year.

In our culture there is a strong expectation of a “Norman Rockwell” holiday with loved ones harmoniously gathered around the hearth. This expectation burdens many individuals, not just those who are mourning.

Grieving is so very hard. No one knows how to do it the first time they grieve, so they fumble their way through it. And it hardly gets any easier with each subsequent loss they sustain.

When we experience the death of someone we love, it’s difficult enough wrestling with the fact that they’re gone. One of the aspects we aren’t prepared for is the impact of some of the secondary losses: having to move (and thus losing a home), loss of identity or financial stability, loss or cancellation of future plans and — the loss of the physical presence of another. In fact, almost mysteriously, “absence” becomes a powerful physical force.

Often friends and family don’t know what to do to help you when you’re grieving. It’s hard to watch you struggle and not be the same. They feel helpless and don’t know what to do. They just want You back, the you and life that they have known. 

It may help to imagine writing a letter to them to try and explain your thoughts and feelings. It might go something like…

To my dear family and friends: