Being near water to heal and reset/ a quick guide to grief
Hey this is a much longer suggestion that wouldn’t be covered in a link but to start find a healing body of water (if you are landlocked a bath ritual) and the article explains why that’s beneficial- after that 1. Let yourself feel it. I know it can be hard but it’s ok to feel any and everything that comes up for you. The five stages of grief (Kubler-Ross) were actually supposed to be for patients on hospice care who were dying not the people left behind and while those emotions are valid it doesn’t cover the experience in the slightest. The pressure to graduate those phases can be distressing to people who don’t know. 2. The grief is here to stay but the forms will change and it’s helpful to reframe the expectation it goes away and develop a relationship to your grief (its evidence love existed). 3. Continuing bonds coping skills (things you do that make you still feel close to them such as writing or talking to them, doing things they loved, doing things in their honor, carrying on traditions or creating ones inspired by them anything that continues that bond. 4. Meaning making- can’t give too much advice without knowing the specifics bc this is different for everyone and can be based on a lot of things like culture, beliefs around death and afterlife ect but look into meaning making 5. Being around people or talking to people (Reddit,support group, a friend doesn’t matter) grief is isolating because we are culturally prude about death and finding community helps (nobody makes a better quick friend than two people with the same dark humor) 6. Consider therapy not just saying that because I’m a therapist but seek a therapist who works with this population- the person who works with grief regularly can emotionally attune and is decidedly comfortable holding space for grief and death and that isn’t necessarily everyone. 7. I forget what psychologist (anyone chime in) but one I read in grad school pointed out the little deaths in life and constant grief that is inherent in the tragic and beautiful temporary nature of everything. Ex: you get married and even that’s happy but it’s the “death of your “bachelor life”, you have a baby and that’s great but you mourn the life you had where you didn’t have to keep someone alive all day and were more carefree. In all these mini deaths are mini births and loss can be pure tragedy at times but you are strong and can alchemize. 8. externalize that pain or whatever feeling it is it somehow, write, make music, make art, volunteer at a grief camp if you ever feel ready or able. 9. read about it, the human experience of loss, the way loss is handled in different cultures ect. can make you feel less alone in this. 10. Remember everyone is different, your experience with grief is highly nuanced and multifactoral and that can be heavy but hold space for that. No two losses are the same the way no two snowflakes are the same. That doesn’t mean there isn’t overlap to be found in moments of validation and comfort. 11. take it day by day and meet yourself where you are at- stay in bed if you need to, call a friend if you need to, go sit by the water, cry, eat, laugh. Know this experience means you are human and you loved 12. If your situation is complex in that there weren’t always warm feelings for the lost loved one-that’s ok. They were human and so are you, any feeling is a valid feeling. We pressure ourselves to memorialize people in a nice little bow and no human was ever put together in a nice little bow. Give yourself the gift of that realness. 13. People close to you may have different grieving needs if they were also experiencing this loss but finding ways to grieve communally where you can is helpful. 14. Pick a comfort ritual and engage in it on bad days (plan a whole day of things for a fun ritual and things that you can do also on a normal work day) 15. Remember to shower, eat and drink even if you don’t feel like it. 16. Think in cycles not in lines.(it takes as long as it takes) 17. Make a playlist that reminds you of the person/ keep helpful grief quotes on hand to feel less alone if nobody answers the phone or you can’t verbalize your feelings that day. 18. Grief is a transformative event in that there will always feel like a “before this happened” and an “after this happened” it may take time to feel okay with that but I tried to look at it as entering deeper into the depths of the human experience as we all do face it eventually as dreaded as it is. Part of this journey may include coming face to face with your own mortality for the first real sobering non purely conceptual time barring life events that have also done that. 19. (Keep on keeping on you got this!)
