Grief is the price We Pay for an Enormous and Great Love

Grief, i’ve learned, is really just love. It’s all the love you want to give but cannot. All of that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go .

— Jamie Anderson

The night I cried twenty-six years worth of tears in a single, starless evening. I reach for a tissue, paper thin — life’s fragility I mean. Silenced and sombre, the world is still. A pain stabs my heart, but there are no words that follow. No ‘goodnight my pumpkin’ WhatsApp text arrives tonight. Yes, my eighty-three-year-old Grandmother, was in fact, ‘on the line’.

Cynthia, was, on-the-line. Cynthia was as warm as the summer-time. A true lighthouse, altruistic and steadfast. A pillar of strength that illuminated the darkness and welcomed me home. She didn’t look for people to save, she just stood there shining. Like moths to a flame, she drew them inward. She bore witness to more atrocities than anyone should ever have to, the scars of each storm etched onto her skin. This sadness made her kind, it softened her heart and strengthened her character. Her pain was masked behind a prison of humour, always able to discover positive meanings in undesirable events. Sarbin says that narrating stories is an important aspect of being human, and one traditional role of the grandparent is the ‘storyteller’. Cynthia told the best kind. Her mordant wit allowed her to strike up a conversation with just about anyone willing to listen, a true expert in human connection. A loss of this magnitude hits like three cumulative losses in one. These words are for me, and Fridays will never be the same again.

It’s true that we traverse life’s trajectory before we pass. I travelled alongside as she underwent her life-review — a true bildungsroman. Reliving the small stories, the nuclear episodes, unravelled through the sequence of living a life. Perhaps gaining a deeper understanding, through an alternate lens. These narrative connections are realized after the fact, once the dust has settled. Seemingly disjointed fragments weren’t understood by the people who didn’t matter. But to me, they reflected the shimmer of a faithfully authentic life. This Lifebook was packed to the brim with lengthy chapters and richly colourful experiences. There were lifetimes worth of lessons crammed into eighty-three years. Although these were silenced and guarded, with her life. Till her last breath, she was enveloped within a cocoon of silence. Her mind convinced her body that it was stronger than it was. Until one day, it wasn’t, and it came time to say good-bye.

It’s difficult to navigate the waves of grief, they’re seismic and unpredictable. Grief is a force of energy that cannot be controlled or predicted. Despite knowing this, my mind seeks to understand. I want answers, but there are none in sight. Only miles and mountains of articles available to dissect. But grief is fluid, it’s as unique to me as my relationship to my loved one. Grief is the price we pay for an enormous and great love. This process brings forth transformation and profound growth, unearthing the multitudes that lay dormant for years. There is no ‘best way’. The right way is the way that feels most right, whatever that may mean. All I know is that there are words that wish to be born and I need an outlet for this pain. Below is a brief glimpse into the lessons of living and loving through loss.

1. ‘I’m sorry for your loss’ is not a comforting response.

People become uncomfortable when it comes time to express their sympathy. Although it is a kind gesture to offer condolences during a difficult time, ‘I’m sorry for your loss’ is never a comforting response. It’s cold, automated and insincere. The loss of someone who has shaped my entire being requires more than just a generic text message. A loss of this magnitude requires more. More thought, empathy, humanness and heart. Give it some thought, judge the situation and the person, individually. A sincere and heartfelt handwritten card is always welcomed and encouraged, I wish there were more of these. Perhaps a bouquet of flowers to add some colour back to this now faded world. I can almost guarantee that anything else will be a more comforting response.

2. They were right about the tears:

Grief, when it comes, is nothing like we expect it to be. And when it does come, it unweaves the very fabric of our being. When love is lost, we lose the part of ourselves that did the loving — a part that, depending on the magnitude of the love, can come to approximate the whole of who we are

— Joan Didion.

They tell me that grief never lifts because love never leaves. Quick disclaimer: there will be boatloads of tears and the triggers are everywhere. A scent for me is especially salient. Acrid clusters of carbon-particles cling to my clothes — forever interwoven in my neural tapestry. The music and the memories are equally as powerful. That’s the thing about pain, it demands to be felt, through each of its slanted cycles. Often times, this journey needs to be travelled alone. It took a couple of days to even open up about my Grandmothers passing. There were no words. The whole thing was messy. Grief doesn’t come in five neatly-packaged-stages, it’s messy and confusing, it fluctuates. A myriad of emotions varying in intensity appears sporadically, often when least expected. I’ve felt untethered, angry, lost and confused. Numb, guilty and sleep deprived. The lesson here is that there is a time for everything. Time for calm and a time for chaos. Sometimes the waves are forgiving and sometimes they’re overwhelming. Find an outlet for the pain — write poetry, tend the garden, run a marathon. Find something meaningful, this will help the healing process. Recovery from a loss this large is a journey of hope, healing and peace.

3. Solace will be found in the most unlikely places:

Three things in human life are important: the first is to be kind; the second is to be kind; and the third is to be kind.
― Henry James

The world is in desperate need of more kindness, more compassion and more humanity, perhaps now so, more than ever. The pain from the loss of the person I loved more than anything in the world, is just one reminder of this fact. Well-meaning friends avoid discussing the subject due to their own discomfort with grief. This is perhaps the most surprising one of all, friends I believed would offer the most support and comfort during the hardest time of my life, did not. These individuals have not experienced insurmountable loss in their own lives, yet.

Seasonal friendships, like autumnal leaves, will fall. They’ve served their purpose. They will find their place. And I will find my peace, one day.

Then, there are the lifetime friends, although few and far between, these individuals resonate on the deepest level. They glisten and gleam, they rekindle the spark when our own light goes out. These friends understand the spaces between the words that are left unsaid. I sought solace from kindred-spirits, they offered an ear and some welcomed insight. These friends feel like sunshine for the soul, we share a common connection, a mutual understanding and a silent pain that we both carry in our hearts, the mark more indelible than ink. Flowers from a beautiful soul from across the oceans brought joy and vibrancy to my world, if only temporarily. They reminded me of beauty when it had faded from my world. Most people in life are just looking for a safe place to be themselves — a space to feel seen, heard and loved, unconditionally. What I most needed was someone who would just be there, not to lessen the pain but simply just to listen to it. A song dedication, a Pinterest quote, a movie recommendation, these acts meant the most. The tender loving care of human beings will never become obsolete.

4. Trust your intuition:

Whether it be around the unfavourable prognosis, or when it’s time to have difficult conversations, it’s necessary to trust the intuitive knowing. Despite being informed by a medical professional, the duration of my Grandmothers illness went from six months to six days. I knew that her passing would be quick. I felt it and she did, too. The day before she passed, I knew it was time to have a difficult conversation. So, I decorated her hospital ward with a small slice of paradise. Beautifully sentimental pieces, family photos, vibrantly colourful flowers. There was even a balloon with a pug on it that said ‘get-well-soon’ as if that were even a possibility. With all that in place, I made sure that nothing was left unsaid, I emptied my full-heart with all the thank you’s, I love you’s, and please don’t hold on for me. And the next day, she was gone.

In the weeks preceding her death, the universe unravelled itself in accumulative perfectly timed synchronicities. I followed this feeling, unasked out of my body and soul, I trusted where it would lead and I was never led astray.

Ask questions:

Death is a weird one in my family. Well, weirder than most. It’s been a large, unanswerable hazy mess-of-a-mystery for longer than I’ve been alive. I’ve chalked it up to complex intertwined webs of deceit, cocoons of silence and vicious cycles of resentment. So, I made the conscious choice that my Grandmother’s passing would be the exception because I grew weary of a life story so fragmented. There would be no missing puzzle pieces or lapse in memory here. This took significant work, multiple consults with the doctor and impossibly rude receptionists. But it was necessary, to find the closure and peace my heart ached for. I dug and unearthed as much as felt right, there were no unanswered questions in my heart. Trust me, re-examining this step at a later stage of life is far more difficult. Plus, there’s the impossible to overstate lapse in memory, that comes after a loss of this magnitude. In the end, I used voice notes to record conversations, typed memos and took many photos. I took as much of whatever was needed at the time and tried to be kind to myself during the process.

5. Gifts from grief:

I hope it is true that a man can die and yet not only
live in others but give them life,
and not only life, but that great consciousness of life.
– Jack Kerouac

Gratitude:

Out of the burning embers of the loss arises an ashen humility. Losing the person I love more than anything in the world, taught me lessons I never thought needed to be learnt. It’s true what they say, there’s no teacher quite like experience. Cynthia gave up a body that no longer served her, it gave up on her and so she let it go. Today, I’m grateful for the gift of her life and the indelible mark imprinted on my heart. Her passing has left a hole in my heart and in my life, but I choose to fill it with the love and light and the brightness of her being.

I discovered the horrible accuracy of all the overused clichés, they’re all true. Her passing left me with a renewed commitment to my own life and to enriching the lives of those around me. Gratitude is a fullness of heart that moves us from limitation and fear, to expansion and love. Cynthia spoke her ultimate truth in death and this served as a gentle reminder for me to:

Embrace more healthy yes’s and even healthier no’s. To speak the truth, no matter how hard. To tell people when they’re being unkind. To ask for forgiveness when needed, and say sorry when it counts.

The reality of ‘last times or ‘never again’ led to a greater appreciation for the endless sequence of could be’s. I afford each present moment with equal importance and gratitude. Her kindness continues, and her legacy lives on. With that said, speak kindly, tread gently and show up for what the situation demands. We’re all fighting battles — some more silently than others. Kindness and wisdom are a formidable combination. When needed, be wise. And always choose to be kind.

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

— E.E Cummings

1. ‘I’m sorry for your loss’ is not a comforting response.

2. They were right about the tears:

3. Solace will be found in the most unlikely places:

4. Trust your intuition:

5. Gifts from grief:

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