Map Your Healing Journey

We are afraid of grief.

I said what I said. We are afraid of grief. And I mean “we,” me included.

I spent many years shut down, avoiding grief. Living in survival mode, long after it was necessary for survival. Denying my feelings. Suffering in silence. Stuck. Circling over and over again, tromping through the same old muck as always, not getting anywhere.

I had good reasons, don’t get me wrong. For a long time, it wasn’t safe for me to grieve, to talk about grief, share my feelings, to move forward.

How We Try to Escape

And I had nobody to show me how to grieve in a healthy way. I didn’t even know that moving through grief was possible.

As humans, it is very popular to approach anything unpleasant by escaping in a variety of ways: food, drugs, alcohol, shopping, working – there are many ways to attempt escape.

It’s only been in the last couple of years that I have seen my own efforts to escape grieving. Through the pandemic, I realized that not only were my escape efforts not working, they were stealing from my life. Stealing my time, energy, resources, and – at the risk of sounding trite – happiness.

We attempt to avoid and escape because grief is labor. Grief is painful. But the truth is that going through a little pain now (I know that it doesn’t feel little, bear with me) – Going through a little pain now will prevent A LOT of pain later.

So how can we conquer our fear of grief and get going? Here are a few secrets to moving through grief.

Three Secrets to Moving Through Grief | Map Your Healing Journey

Acknowledge the Myths

There are many grief myths swirling around out there, many of them well-meaning while others are just plain dumb. These myths are often things that people say that may make you want to punch them in the face.

I’m sure that you’ve heard many grief myths. Some examples:

“They’re in a better place”
“Time heals all wounds”
“Be strong”
“I know how you feel”

And, my personal non-favorite: “Everything happens for a reason.”

It is easy to think and say these things when we’re not in the middle of the labor of grief. It’s easy to think and say these things to others when life is good or neutral or boring. It’s easy to think and say these things when everyone else is saying them and we’ve heard them over and over again.

I’ve said some of them myself. As a child, I was told over and over again that crying was for “weak” people, and to not cry is to be strong. This was so wrong as to be damaging – it took me several years to learn how to allow myself to cry. What snapped me out of it was not wanting to tell my own children that it was wrong to cry. How could expressing your pain be “wrong”?

Acknowledging the myths around grief can help us move forward.

Express Your Feelings

Ah, feelings. I have feelings about feelings. In fact, I used to say, “F*ck Feelings.” (I’m a big believer in cursing when needed to relieve pain).

The thing about feelings is that they happen regardless of whether or not we acknowledge and express them. They hide in our bodies, in our muscles and connective tissue. Grief hides in our bones. Trauma lives in our bodies. We can express them and let them go, or ignore them and they will make us sick.

Part of my job as a Trauma Recovery Coach and a Grief Recovery Specialist is to allow people space to feel and express their feelings. I’ve had people yell at me, walk out of the room, have panic attacks, curse, scream, cry, wail, tell jokes, giggle, and talk without stopping. And that’s just off the top of my head.

Now that I think about it, I’ve *done* all of those things in my own therapy and coaching experiences while moving through grief. The body’s responses to grief and pain are meant to help us move through the process of grieving. Allowing ourselves to express our feelings is a gift. Our feelings will not kill us or last forever, especially when expressed with a witness.

Choose a Witness

Trauma happens when we don’t have a witness, when our pain isn’t expressed and witnessed.

What does it mean to have a witness to grief (and trauma)?

It means to have another human see our pain without judgement, without taking it on or taking it personally. It’s another person being with us, being present, and holding out their hands and arms and saying, “I’ll carry this with you” or walking with us through the waves of pain.

This is my best explanation. Quite frankly, I think processing grief with a witness is a miracle. I’ve done it, I’ve seen it, I can’t explain it, and over and over again, I’ve seen people move through grief, letting go of pain.

Moving Through Grief

We are afraid of grief. That fear is wasted. I’m here to tell you that – even though it’s a little bit of work – there’s more peace and happiness on the other side.

Want to know more? The easiest way is through a free 30-minute Discovery Call. Let’s talk.