What i wish you knew about grief

MARYANNE

Grief can also be a time of joy. Dad had Alzheimer’s and was deteriorating. In his last year he was 80 years old, but felt more like a teenager. He had an overwhelming love affair with my mum – he would call her “my queen” and serenade her and stare at her with doe eyes. He was a little confused and would forget our names, but was always so appreciative and beautiful. He passed away before the disease took his autonomy, and we were able to spend time together as a family, playing music and sharing photos and stories right to the end.

TANIA

As a funeral celebrant, I’ve learnt that the annoying clichés are true: everyone grieves differently, but you will get through it. A funeral can often bring comfort and joy. It’s like permission to grieve – everyone understands in that moment. But make sure you keep in contact after the flowers have died, even if the person says no. The ‘no’ is more of a ‘not now’ than a ‘not ever’, so keep gently trying.

MICHELLE

When someone has a close bond to their pet, they’ll experience real and deep loss and grief when it dies. Losing them can have a big impact on their life, so don’t say, “Oh well, it was old anyway,” or, “So, are you going to get a replacement?” Instead, say something kind that demonstrates that you understand the loss is important to them.

STEPH

You can grieve for someone while they’re still alive. I grieved for my mum for the 27 years she had multiple sclerosis – for what she was ‘before’ she got sick. People say it gets better with time, but I disagree. The more time that passes, the further away Mum gets – I fear she’ll get fuzzier and I’ll lose the ‘closeness’ of her.

EMMA

It’s a really strange feeling to lose someone who helped raise you, but who you couldn’t hold a conversation with. There was a part of me that questioned whether I was even entitled to grieve if I didn’t know my Vietnamese grandma intimately. I felt a lot of guilt after she died, especially for how little I visited her towards the end, and for losing my first language and the ability to know her fully. I think I carry the guilt as a motivator to not make the same mistakes again.

EMILY

You can’t ever be truly prepared. Grief impacts you differently across a month, a week, a day. The impact has such a long tail, and it touches every area of your life. You’re changed by it; your relationships are changed by it. It affects your ability to focus and messes with your memory. The admin is never-ending and relentless and awful. And it can’t be fixed. One of my favourite condolence messages I received after my husband died basically just said, “This is fucked”. It was perfect, because it was, and is.

CHLOE

I wish someone had warned me how exhausted I would be all the time. Before grief entered my life, I would have classified myself as an extrovert. I gained so much energy in a crowded room and would always choose busy-ness over being alone. Now, even just the thought of being in a social setting is overwhelming. Everyday tasks like getting ready for the day or interacting with people require a huge amount of effort, and sometimes need a period of rest to recover.

JESS

Being able to tell stories about the people I’ve grieved for has really helped. My boyfriend wasn’t able to meet them, so having him listen (and be even remotely engaged) while I reminisced was really lovely. Losing someone who was full of joy and kindness can prompt you to remember the impact their attitude has had on you and everyone around them. I’ve taken it as a chance to reflect on the good times, but also try to carry that attitude forward with me.

EMILY

Grief has no set time limit or order to it. I didn’t really start the grieving process until months after my father’s passing. I thought there was something wrong with me – I even went so far as to accuse myself of not loving him enough because I wasn’t in tears every day. Then, right when everyone else in my family had picked themselves back up, it slapped me in the face and I fell to pieces.

OSMAN

“It will get better” is probably the best thing I’ve heard anyone say. Not “it will pass” or “you’ll get over it”, because that’s very unlikely to be true. But hearing people who’ve gone through something similar tell you it isn’t always this bad can be pretty reassuring. It’s about reaching a point where the negative feelings aren’t so constant, and you’re able to live a healthy life without grief swamping you.

PATRICK

Grief is an overwhelming feature ingredient in the soup of loss, but the other emotions do make their presence known. I’m not someone who experiences anger a lot, but certain things – people my friend detested jumping on the grief bandwagon, or comments making assumptions about their death, or just days of the week occurring – managed to send me into a spiralling rage. I keep telling myself to be kind when grief leads me down weird roads, to strange thoughts and odd reactions. It’s not something you can really get ‘good’ at.

STEPHANIE

There are both selfless and selfish aspects of grieving. The selfless ones centre on the person who’s been lost and the hole they’ve left. The selfish ones are around our own mortality and how we each spend our time here. There are few more dramatic reality checks than losing someone your own age or younger. I now assess my major life decisions in a very different way, with a new consciousness that it will all end – perhaps suddenly. I want to make the biggest and best impact I can with whatever time I’m given.