Your Loved One Died Too Young

Go ahead and grieve out loud.

The early death of a loved one can make you question everything you thought you knew about the world, yourself, and God. When a person close to us dies, a part of our heart gets buried or cremated with them. Our body walks away, but our spirit is left behind, wondering if we will ever breathe again.

More than two million people die each year in the United States. When one of them belongs to you, you feel alone. No words exist to resuscitate your heart. The world shows up to mourn with you one day, then leave you to live the rest of your life in a state of mourning. Your mind tries to help you get back to normal, but your normal has changed forever.

Losing a sibling and raising their children is not normal. Burying your child instead of the other way around, is abnormal. Living in a dream house alone and sleeping in a king-size bed without your queen will never make for an ordinary life. Saving a friend’s obituary as one last possession between you is definitely not normal when you haven’t reached the age of 40. You can spend a decade trying to recreate a sense of homeostasis. Grief has no expiration.

When love Expires

We count on our loved ones to live over the age of 70. When they don’t, we feel cheated. We know that children die, but we’re not supposed to know children who die. We understand the violence epidemic, but nothing prepares us for violence to touch our lives. Even when our loved one is ill, our heart lives and loves in the moment. We do not conceive of their death.

From the day you receive that heart-wrenching phone call, no phone ring ever sounds the same. After you sit in a hospital room and watch a loved one take their last breath, no hospital room ever feels the same. You live with permanent angst. Sometimes you relive the moment in your dreams, then wake to find your dreams have merged into your reality.

Emotions seesaw, and overwhelming feelings pass and then return. Moods wash in and out like the tide. Just when you think you are over it, a sound, smell, or image can send you back into emotional turmoil. This back- and-forth movement may occur over a period of months, or even years. Although varying from person to person, it’s not unusual for the active stages of grieving to last 1 to 2 full years or more. (Rich)

No Words

So far, I’ve used 420 words to describe the experience of grief. The description may feel long if the experience is unfamiliar. For people stuck in the cycle of grief, 10,000 words would not begin to describe the experience of their heart.

Part of the reason people’s lives stagnate after the death of a loved one is that environments don’t make room for grief. We want people around us to contribute to our livelihood, which doesn’t include talking about the dead.

For people stuck in the cycle of grief, 10,000 words would not begin to describe the experience of their heart.

Grief turns into high-functioning trauma when survivors hide it instead of healing it. Just because we don’t see a person cry doesn’t mean they aren’t hurting. If we mention something that brings tears to a mourning person, that doesn’t mean we have caused them pain. Their tears say that we have offered them a safe space to release the pain that is always there.

The Grieving Process

The grief counseling handbook identifies three stages of grief to normalize the healing process. When grievers can place themselves within a framework, they can return to homeostasis with less distress. They can grieve with the confidence they are still moving forward with their lives.

Stage 1: Acclimation and adjustment

Stage one is emotionally volatile, especially when the departed is young or the death was unexpected. The shock can prolong the trauma. The emotional exhaustion of planning final arrangements while deeply mourning loss can cause the mind to fragment. The bereaved must keep themselves together on the outside while falling apart on the inside.

The bereaved may internalize their grief, especially if they are responsible for keeping other family members together. A sibling of the deceased may have to take emotional care of the parents. Parents of the deceased may have to monitor their grandchildren’s grief instead of their own.

The emotional exhaustion of planning final arrangements while deeply mourning loss can cause the mind to fragment.

To avoid pain becoming lodged in the psyche, the griever must monitor their feelings with acceptance. If they can allow themselves to be in the role of the griever and not just the caregiver, healing can begin. They have to develop their support system so that they can process their emotions.

Stage 2: Emotional immersion and deconstruction

Once the survivor leans into the grieving process, healing can occur. They begin to accept that their life will not be the same. Acceptance is not a task; it happens over time. Little by little, the survivor releases their hopes and dreams of a life with their loved one. They slowly begin to restructure their physical and emotional experiences.

When the relationship with the person who died was a significant part of the survivor’s identity, placing themselves in the world without that identity requires considerable restructuring. This restructuring is intense emotional work. The bereaved can get stuck with survivor’s guilt, unprocessed emotions of conflict with the deceased, or enmeshed identity that prevents resolution.

Reconstructing life comes with the examination of oneself and the world. To get through this stage, the survivor will likely have to alter some of their beliefs about life. They may have to grapple with the beliefs that God answers prayers, and people get what they deserve in life. They may have to reclaim their identity as resilient and independent. Most importantly, they have to permit themselves to reimagine life without their loved one.

Stage 3: Reclamation and reconciliation

In the last stage, the bereaved reconciles with the death of their loved one. In the aftermath of significant loss, survivors rebuild their lives. Sometimes, circumstances may force survivors’ lives to change. They may have to relocate or sell their home. They may have to go back to work to earn an income or stay home to care for children.

These forced circumstances are not representative of stage 3. Stage three is about the active choices survivors make about their lives. They make conscious choices about their lives in recognition of their loss. They aren’t reacting to the loss in stage three.

If they have not adequately processed emotions in stage one, many survivors never complete this stage. People may try to force the survivor through this stage to get on with their lives. However, without supporting the survivor through stage one of grief, moving through this stage is unlikely.

Absence of Trauma

The healing process of grief resolves the trauma associated with loss. Death of a loved one is a permanent loss. But, the void doesn’t need to be filled; neither does the hurt need to be denied. However, the life of the survivor is no longer stifled because pain is permanently lodged in their psyche. Survivors are not reacting to life through the lens of lack and loss.

Over time, grievers return to a state of homeostasis. That doesn’t mean that they never cry again over their loss. Yet, survivors give themselves permission to honor their relationship with the deceased without pain being the signifier of their love.

References

Rosennab. (2020). The universe is looking out for your success. Illumination on Medium. https://readmedium.com/the-universe-is-looking-out-for-your-success-bdabf5b6ceea.

Destiny Femi. (2020). There’s always more to you than you think. Illumination on Medium. https://readmedium.com/theres-always-more-to-you-than-you-think-dca02b88c941.

https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db355.htm.

Rich, Phil. Grief Counseling Homework Planner, John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated, 2017. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/uccs/detail.action?docID=4857450.