Let’s just get this out of the way: grief absolutely sucks. It is isolating, and consumes you. It is the weight that bears down on you, and is the feeling in your chest when holidays come along, and you look over and see that empty chair that your loved one used to sit.
My mom passed away two and a half months ago. Before my mom died, my dog Maggie passed away in October.
Losing a parent and losing a pet are very different, of course. Losing them in a six month time span? Well, that’s just a double whammy.
Now, everyone grieves differently. Everyone grieves at different speeds, and at different speeds.
Unfortunately, there is one truth to grief — you will never get over it. You will eventually move on from it, but you’ll never be the same that you were before everything happened.
When my mother died, someone gave me the best advice possible, which has served as guidance. That is let yourself do what it feels right for you to do. If you want to lie in bed all day, then go ahead and do so. If you want to clean out some of their stuff, then you go ahead and do so. That advice, which was given to me by someone who had lost her daughter, has been the single way that I’ve gotten through grief.
But, let’s be honest: losing someone you love sucks, whether it was instantly or years in the making. Saying goodbye is awful — that is, if you have the chance to.
Therefore, grief is a normal thing that our body goes through to cope with that loss.
To all of you grieving out there, I hope you know that despite how it may feel like it, you are truly not alone. I hope that you know that you will have some good days, and you will have some bad ones too. And, finally, I hope that you know that you do what’s best for you. It is not a race to get better. Feel what you need to feel.
I may not be a therapist or a counselor, but I can at least offer you that food for thought.
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