Words to help those with grief
REBEKAH BALLAGH is a qualified counsellor, mindfulness coach, author and illustrator, with almost 350,000 instagram followers. Her new book Words of Comfort explores the experience of grieving and the emotions and thoughts that may surface. It offers strategies to help you navigate through your grief, and takes a look at some of the things we can learn from the journey. We asked her some questions:
Why did you put together Words of Comfort? People often reach out to me when they are going through some kind of grief in their life. They ask if I have resources around it that I might be able to point them to. I realised I didn't have nearly as many as I would like… and then I was struck with my own grief journey after losing my dear Poppa and my fur-baby within a week of each other. I found myself, as many people do, searching for some kind of comfort in the pain, something to turn to. So I knew that I needed to create something that felt like a safe place, a tonic, offering words of comfort in a way that feels totally gentle and manageable to read.
Everyone deals with grief differently, what are the main ways we see grief manifest?
Every emotion that you can imagine, and every response and behaviour you can imagine, is normal.
From deep sadness, anger, a feeling of homesickness, anxiety or feelings of panic, to joy, relief, contentment… Grief moves through a wide range of responses and emotions, it ebbs and flows and often circles back on itself just when you felt like it was easing up. It's one of those experiences that cannot be rushed.
Grief can come in so many forms, what are some of the forms of grief which you have dealt with?
Personally (and with clients) I have experienced grief in various ways and intensities. I have grieved when losing family members, my beautiful dog of 11 years and break downs of relationships. I also believe that my experience of postnatal depression was a form of grief — we often grieve the life we had before our children, even thought we love them with every ounce of our being, parents go through the most tremendous life-alternating change, and grief is natural response.
There are some great tips in the book on how to cope with your grief, what is one of the tips that you have found most resonated with people?
One of the tips is a practice where you light a candle and take some time to sit, breathe deeply, be mindfully present with the flickering of the flame and use that time to intentionally sit with your feelings. The grief, the memories, whatever you need. It's a place to purposefully create and allow space.
What do you hope people will learn from their experiences with grief?
I hope they get what they need. I hope they find hope, compassion, some kind of peace. I hope they come to some content in finding and creating their new normal.
It has been a couple of years of tremendous change for everyone, have you found an increase in feelings of loss and grief over this time?
Yes I think so. Our bodies aren't really meant to sustain being in a stress response over such long periods of time. It's been exhausting for so many people and the amount of uncertainty and change has thrown many of us. So naturally there is grief in that, so so many different forms and experiences of it. But grief nonetheless.
You are a qualified counsellor and mindfulness coach, how did you become an author?
I feel like it was sheer, delightful luck! One of the amazing team members at Allen & Unwin (my publishers) followed my account on Instagram and brought it to the attention of Jenny, the publishing director. I still vividly remember seeing an email pop up in my inbox with the subject line “a book?” — I thought it couldn't possibly be real… and I'm beyond thankful it was!
I feel so so lucky and blessed to get to share my words and illustrations with people and it goes beyond my wildest dreams that they might impact people, change their lives or just make their day a little easier.