Monday, April 19, 2010

A Grief Timeline?

The day Phil died I had no idea what kind of roller coaster ride I was about to board. In many ways I felt I was shuffled onto the first outgoing cart marked "grief," and told to put my lap belt on low and tight. Maybe I would have managed the twists and turns of the journey better if someone handed me a grief timeline that mapped out the course that lay ahead. I would have appreciated having my grief start date clearly noted in red, the days when getting out of bed was going to be a challenge highlighted in yellow, all anniversaries/birthdays/holidays circled in green, and the most important thing of all...the grief end date...circled in bright orange highlighter so that I would know when my grief had officially come to an end.

Not only was there no mourning road map forthcoming, but grief kept me on a circular roller coaster ride. Riding through the dips and surprise upside down flips might have been worth it if I felt I was going somewhere, but to end up right where I started and still suffer a case of nausea from the experience was completely infuriating. I remember very clearly after the one year anniversary of Phil's death feeling that I should have arrived somewhere by then, shouldn't I have moved to a new level of grief? I desperately wanted to graduate already!

Yesterday one of my widowed friends told me that her counselor said you can expect to grieve one year for every five years that you were married. She wondered what I thought of this idea. The first thing that came to mind was that since I was married to Phil for five years and two months, then I should have been done grieving his loss three and a half years ago. There have been so many times over the past nearly five years I have wished someone could tell me how long this whole healing process would take. I do understand the desire to calculate the effects of the death of a loved one on our lives, and even the desire to create some kind of measuring stick for healing. But if someone had provided me with a grief end date, I am sure I would have focused on nothing but getting to that day. If graduating from widowhood were possible, I would have taken whatever extra courses were needed to meet the early graduation deadline. And I think that I would have missed the whole point.

The brutal nature of grief forced me to live one day at a time. As a person who tends to jump ahead to the next thing, or tries to figure out how extra effort on my part can bring about a desired goal sooner than expected, the unpredictability of grief made living outside of the moment impossible. No other life experience has so firmly placed me in the present. When my babies were born I wasted precious time thinking about their next milestone, instead of reveling in the current one. When Phil and I were happily married I wouldn't take the time to sit on the couch and watch a TV show with him if the laundry wasn't finished. Accomplishments tended to be put aside as I reached for the next goal, because living in the moment was not enough. I was always focused on taking the next step.


In the aftermath of Phil's death, the inability to go back in time paired with the lack of desire to move forward into the future without him bought me some much needed time. Time to allow the reality of his physical absence to sink into my shell shocked brain; time to figure out who I was without him; and time to slowly discover that I was strong enough to weather this devastating storm. If I'd known that I was only expected to grieve Phil's death for one year I would have located the end date and run full speed ahead to get to the finish line. Flying past the lessons I needed to learn, the healing effects of camaraderie, the small blooming of the first flower in spring...all in order to say I was finished.


So, no, I don't think there is a measuring stick or a formula that can predict how long a person will mourn the death of a person they love. But I do think the small markers on our own personal measuring sticks are much more important than we might suspect. I think healing happens in centimeters, and each small dash is a triumph.

21 comments:

  1. thank you for this, especially that last paragraph. i have been struggling in these 2 months since the first year anniversary. i have been missing him terribly. each day comes and the realization that he is not here for it brings me sorrow. it is nice to know that i can think of each one of my tiny steps, each quilt i make, each pair of jeans i embellish for the children of other widows(ers) as progress. because i am putting one foot in front of the other. the option of not taking those steps is no option at all.

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  2. I have struggled with this same desire to know when I would be done grieving. As I approach the one year anniversary of my husband's death, the thought that my grief will have no end is difficult to bear. A friend and fellow widow told me that 13 years later she still grieves, but she has also happily remarried and celebrated her oldest son's graduation from high school. I cling desparately to the hope that I, too, can learn to simultaneously grieve and live a fulfilled life.

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  3. Healing, though I think that is an odd term, happens when you are not thinking about doing it. There is no way to grieve faster or harder or more thoroughly. It bothers me that the idea there is a process for doing so or a set of exercises one can do is promoted at all.

    Grieving is a natural process that occurs over and over in our lives in reaction to a multitude of events. The less angst and fixed focus, the better in my experience.

    And yes, you can grieve a loss and still live a happy fulfilled life.

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  4. So well said - so human to look for a 'result' and an end point when the process is the most necessary for healing...and graduating.
    You were married 5 years and so as you said, with the theory of 1 year of grieving for every 5 years of marriage - You're done...but I was married 33 years...widowed for 4 now - if my math is right - I'm not 'done' for another 3 years. Unsettling for us both. ahhhhhhhh

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  5. Great blog, Michele. So important for others to know that there isn't a timeline for grief. When we don't feel judged by people's expectations, we are free to swim through our own murky waters at whatever pace we feel capable.

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  6. When Greg died, and for the first time in my life, I paid no attention to time. The calendar meant nothing. The hour of the day just meant "awake" or "asleep." My worries were related to living and raising a baby without my Love. I didn't worry about little things.

    Oddly enough, I sometimes look back on those days with nostalgia. I would NEVER want to repeat them, but I would like to regain that sense of being in the moment.

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  7. Oh, and that person's math is ridiculous! haha...

    Everyone has their own timing. I've found that my patterns of grief have been pretty similar to my friends who were married for 20 and 30 years, and I was only married for 2.5.

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  8. Just beginning the grief process. Learned of daughter's murder day before thanksgiving 2010. She'd been gone 5 months. As a birth mother delay in communication is a constant. Just trying to get through Christmas and New Years without raging on anyone in public. When a person can't escape reality to grieve, or find a local support group to talk, no grave to visit, just a trial date. Now what? If I used the math of 1 to 5... she was to turn 20 in Nov. Don't think I can get away with grieving for four years. Any suggestions? POMC does not have a local chapter where I live, I wouldn't remember to be on time to anything anyway. The fog.

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  9. The timelines are about establishing some fictious baseline for social acceptability. Grieve until you are done.
    If someone had given me that formula, I would have left their office and never come back. What BS...unbelievable.
    Yes, I do believe that it is possible to simultaneously grieve and get on with the business of living. I'm doing it now at the three year mark.
    Newsflash to those not there...IT DOESN'T GO AWAY...EVER.

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  10. DharmaDog...thanks for that. I am coming up on 2 yrs April 30....I still cry every day, sometimes it seems like that is all I do. I know getting out would be good...I live in the country. I can't just walk to the local store. I would get out every day if I thought it would help, but it doesn't. I will be busy for a whole week, I don't feel any different. I don't have that many friends, but the ones I still have, I know think I should be over this...or at least better than I am. Thank you for the validation that it is social acceptability. I feel I cannot talk about Mike without crying most of the time, so I tend to stay home. Crying makes so many people uncomfortable..Sometimes it all seems so futile.

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  11. Michelle, this is so beautifully written. I too feel the bittersweet gifts that grief brought into my life. Living in the moment is one of those gifts. I used to preach that this was important, but never really understood and was really blissfully unaware of it until my life came to a screeching halt when my husband died. Thank you for writing.

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  12. My husband died 5 weeks ago. After about 3 weeks, I had several people asked me, "Are you feeling better now?" The answer was no - I sometimes feel worse than I did the day he died. But the question caused me to wonder if there was some universal timeline - should I be feeling better now? Am I doing something "wrong" in my grieving? I actually searched the internet for a grief timeline - when can I expect to feel better? After talking with my grief counselor, I realized there isn't a timeline that fits everyone. The people asking just don't understand. This website helps me to know I'm not alone in the way I feel.

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  13. It has been a year and a half for me...and I still have bad days...today was one. I struggle with the insensitive comments that people make...I tell myself that they just have no idea. After telling one of my closest friends that I still cry almost everyday, she said, "Have you figured out what triggers that?" As if it is one thing that I should know to avoid...I came very close to saying, "yes, I know what triggers it....waking up." I have to admit that after being told that someone made the comment that I had not grieved long over the loss of my husband...I too googled a 'grief timeline'....no luck finding one. Was just wondering what' those people' actually consider an acceptable time for me to grieve. I really don't know what they meant by that....Had I not lost enough weight? Did I smile too much? Was it because I wore makeup or fixed my hair? Why do I even care what they think?? So glad that I found this site.....

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  14. Michelle, I can so identify with what you are saying in your blog. My husband died on April 26th this year - only 7 weeks ago - we had been married for 36 years and I am heartbroken. He was only 55 years of age. I have found myself searching the internet for other widows in similar situations - trying to get insight into how others are coping - and yes, the timeline involved. I find myself coping well some days but other days I am a real mess. It is the agonising grief and sadness that is present even when the tears are absent and the whole pointlessness of life which partners with them. I am suffering terrible fatigue some days, panic attacks which seem to come randomly, and mood swings which can be brought about by the 'wise' comments of others who do not have a clue about the journey I am on. I am glad I have found this site too. It is real.

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  15. My partner died June 18th of this year. Well, actually I should say my second partner died on June 18th; I lost another partner in February 2007. Both to cancer. It's been interesting and horrible, comparing experiences, and I even had to resist the urge to actually create a timeline in a notebook with "where I was at six months last time" etc. Each death is different, each relationship is different so obviously there is no "one fits all" timeline.

    I actually don't think the intensity of sorrow seems to change, what changes is how often you feel it. At least in my experience. Thanks for sharing your stories with us.

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  16. Tommorrow will be 5 years he passed suddenly at 45 from a heart attack and as I approached the anniversary of another year I was stunned at myself a couple of weeks ago when I felt like humpty dumpty I fell off that wall again into the emotional grief that I felt the first year.

    The five year milestone flattened me as I came to grasp the reality that my husband has been gone now five years and my boys are growing up without him and the reality hit that he is never coming back and that they will never be able to share with their Father who would be so proud in their new found accomplishments of growing up to become young men. His older children have struggled without him he missed their wedding, he missed his grandchildren being born and they are growing up never knowing him.

    The five year mark has been a milestone of reality check and sadness of loss that life goes on but the pain of loss remains.

    So in consensus there is no timeline to loss it like the ocean tide comes in and out sometimes with ease and sometimes in surges

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    1. aptly said, thanks for your words. you've captured exactly how i feel. know matter how many years pass, "the pain of loss remains."

      it's been 2.5 years for me as a widow, and i'm very sad for my husband who will miss so many upcoming life events....the imminent birth of our 4th grandchild, the wedding of our youngest daughter, and the remarriage of our son.

      i'm very sorry and sad for my husband that he's missing out on so much, and i miss him every moment of the day....still trying to take it day by day without him.

      (married 36 years, together 39 years since i was 14 years old...trying to adjust to the many changes in this new life, trying to accept god's master plan.)

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  17. This is what I have been saying. My husband, Jim, passed away on 8-4-11 unexpectedly at the age of 56 and he was on a business trip in Ireland. I've lost 63 lbs. I have had many men that my husband and I both knew ask me out. I keep telling them that I am not ready. I had one of them tell me that the grieving period in the 1800's was one year and in the 1960's it was 6 months so now he said it would be less. Some of these guys are comparing Jim dying to their wives divorcing them...not even close!!! I keep telling these men that grieving is an individual thing and that no one is going to tell me how long I should or should not grieve. Jim and I were married for 16 of the best years of our lives. We were extremely close. There is a song by Kenney Chesney called "someday I might get over you" and one of the lines is "but it may not be until my life is through". It's exactly how I feel. If, and that's a big if, I should find someone again, he still won't be Jim, but if I should find someone, it will be on my time and not someone trying to push me into a relationship.

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  18. Its about a year since my wife of 37 years passed away. Not a day went by without me crying. Mere thought of her, kitchen, chores drive me to despair. My friends suggested counseling and therapy-no use. Most of them are religion based and my busy work schedule doesn't permit me to attend these sessions regular;y. Evenings and weekends are dreadful. For a lonely 64 year old asian widower who griefs after a year, the loneliness and despair with little social outlet is a major risk factor for every chronic disease. That's the good news for me as I am praying everyday that I would join her as early as possible.

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    1. Dear Anonymous,

      There is help available to you through the programs of this blogs host organization, the Soaring Spirits Loss Foundation. Sometimes it really helps to know that you are not alone. Our Widowed Village program might work for your busy work schedule, you can interact with, get support from, and even provide support to other widowed people 24 hours a day/ 7 days a week. You will find that program at www.widowedvillage.org. Please do check in. And just take this journey one step at a time, slowly things really do get better. But the love, that never dies.

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  19. Its been 5 yrs now for me and its the trigger events that scare me when they come from nowhere I was marred for 36 wonderful yrs and loved my wife till the day she died suddenly not even ill..... I miss her lots especially when we have any family occations then she is missing in a big way my youngest son and his girlfriend have just had a baby girl and her after my wife sometimes I feel as if I am just muddling thro life without her but with the new baby its just another of those little set backs good luck to you all its all a dedication to our beloved partners xxxxxxxxxxxxx

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