Friday, April 17, 2015

Full Circle

About 2 years ago, during a long and emotional session with Caitlin, my grief-therapist, she looked at me very seriously and she said:
"There is going to be a day when you no longer need to come and see me anymore. It will be gradual. Maybe you'll only come every other week for awhile. Maybe skip some weeks. And then, finally, you just won't need to see me anymore. Maybe once in awhile you will call or we will have an emergency session when grief-triggers happen, but mostly - you'll be able to figure it out on your own."
When she said this to me, I cried HARD. I didn't understand. I couldn't even SEE a day where that would even be possible, and at that time, knowing I had somewhere to go every Monday to process and express my pain, was what got me through the week and into the next one. I saw it as her rejecting me and not wanting to see ME anymore. I constantly feared that she would decide she no longer wanted to hear my bullshit about Don and loss and death and pain. I decided in my head that she was bored with me, or that she thought I was a whiny annoying repetitive dolt that she no longer cared to see. I FELT repetitive, but I was in SO MUCH PAIN, and it wasn't getting better. The only thing I could do was keep showing up to therapy, keep talking about and writing about the pain, and hope like hell that one day, it would turn into something else.
I sobbed and sobbed and told her: "Please don't say that to me. That will never happen. I will need this forever. I can't have anything else END. I can't have this just disappear on me, like Don did. Like my marriage did. Like my life did. You can't just leave me. I have nightmares about it."
"I won't ever leave you. It won't be my decision. YOU will be the one who decides when it is time for what we are doing here to change. It will be 100% you who makes that call. And notice I didn't use the word END. Nothing will end between us. Just like I've always told you about Don - the goal was never to "let go" of him, but to change your relationship with him. Once you have done that, and really GET what that means, the relationship between us will also change. Maybe we will become friends or even colleagues, but trust me on this, you won't NEED to see me every week in this way, forever. "

Fast-forward to the past few months. Without even realizing it, the exact things that she said are now coming true, but in even bigger ways than either of us probably imagined. There have been many weeks where one of us had to cancel due to crazy schedules, snow, or her taking care of her elderly mother, who has been slowly dying for the past year. If there is a cancellation, she always offers to call me. Sometimes I say yes, other times I say; "No, it's okay. I can wait until next week. It's nothing pressing." Two years ago, I couldn't even breathe most days if I were to miss a session. Now - there are more days than not when it's "nothing pressing."
In addition to that, she is writing the Foreword in my book, and creating the Arc of the story with her words about our time together in grief-counseling. Plus, she is the one who suggested long ago and put it in my head , that perhaps I should look into becoming a grief-coach myself. Now, over time, although still technically my therapist, she has become my friend and mentor. She is letting me assist facilitate with some grief-groups that she runs, and one of her private clients is letting me sit in on a few of their sessions. She is training me and walking me through the logistical parts of the grief world. 

Last night, she sent me an email asking if we could do our session via phone again this week, because she will be getting back late from her mom's house on Long Island. She ended the email by saying: "I'm pretty stressed out - I might need to talk to YOU! You can practice on me . Ill help you with your stuff and you can help me with my stuff. That's what I do with my friends who are colleagues in the grief- world. We unofficially use each other to keep us emotionally sane, so that we can be at our best for our clients. Welcome to the club. "

I can't tell you how amazing it feels to have come full-circle in this way. 

Back when I was in pain 24/7, I NEVER would have been able to see this coming. But I kept trying anyway. I just kept showing up to talk to her and process, even when it felt like it wasn't helping. And she kept trying too, even on the days when SHE felt truly powerless, and felt like maybe she couldn't help me. We both stuck with it, and we didn't give up on each other, or on ourselves, or on the process of hard, hard grief-work.
You HAVE to sit inside the pain and work through it and with it, if you ever want it to become something else. You have to understand where its coming from and what it wants and how to process the emotions you are having. That is what I did every single week for almost 3 years with Caitlin. We worked HARD at moving through my pain, and now that pain is evolving. FINALLY.
This is why I get angry whenever people say stuff like "Just decide to be happy. Happiness is a choice", and all that nonsense. When you have been through a trauma or huge life-changing loss in life, happiness is NOT a choice. Not for a long, long time. You are simply not capable of feeling joy - until you work through all the hurt and grief and pain that sits underneath it, buried. It is very hard work, which is why most people choose not to do it. They don't WANT to feel that kind of pain. So they deny it or suppress it or drink it or push it away or keep busy enough to ignore it completely or feed it with any number of unhealthy addictions or distractions.
But guess what? If you are willing to go there, and to ignore all the people who don't get it telling you to "move on' and "stop being sad" and you just keep working on YOU, what lies on the other side of that is joy. And purpose. And life. But you have to work for it. I have worked my ass off for every ounce of joy I now feel, in this post-loss life. But that's okay with me, because joy that you worked for is so much sweeter than regular joy. Joy that was earned feels so much more intense, and you feel it with every cell inside you. 
In my post-loss life, when I look at a sunset, I don't JUST see a sunset. I see beauty and death and loss and colors and brightness and love and meaning and nature and miracles and peace and wonder - and always, the soul of my husband. Every piece of joy I feel now carries his death, and carries his life in it. Everything is more intense now. Everything is turned all the way up.
Pain eventually evolves into something else entirely. If you mold it enough and sit inside it enough and shape it enough. It might take you 2 years or 3 years or 5 years or more, but it can happen. It happened to me. And the feeling is blissful.

17 comments:

  1. Wow, I am so looking forward to your book!

    Teresa

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    1. Thank you Teresa!!! Hopefully it will be done and self-published sometime this year. I will certainly be shouting from rooftops and letting everyone know when its done!!!

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  2. I thought I was done with therapy as well. But then I had two more significant losses, that triggered back to my original loss.

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    1. I hear ya. Im not saying Im DONE with therapy though. Just that Im at the place where I dont need it every single week, and where I can also be on the other end of things too - by beginning my new adventure into grief coaching. I will always need to see Caitlin, but the relationship changes and shifts, just like she said it would.

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  3. What you said made a big impact on me. You need to go through all the pain and grief to get to the other side. I am so happy to hear hat you have ben able to feel joy again. I think that you would make a superb grief counselor. You would be so empathetic and have such way with words.

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    1. Thank you so much for saying that. It is truly appreciated.

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  4. A beautiful testament to what good and effective grief counseling can do, not only by a qualified therapist, but also by a client who's willing to do the work. It is indeed a two-way street. Good for you, Kelley. Good for you!

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  5. O.M.G. Thank you Kelley Lynn! The dgi's (as we in our group called those that just Didn't Get It)! Those things people say about choosing happiness - you are right, there isn't a choice when you sit in that grief - you have to work THROUGH it. It will be part of the fabric of your life forever, so there isn't any "getting over it". Those statements, while probably not meant to harm, really do sit heavily with all of us who have had such deep intense loss.
    Thank you for giving us hope to look forward, do what we need to do to take those steps, however small they may feel, to get closer to feeling that joy again. Yes, earned joy has it rewards. I will forever love my husband and miss him intensely, but it is my reality and I must do something to move in that positive forward direction. Living life looking in the rearview mirror is so painful. I want to be present and be grateful and look forward to my tomorrows. Thanks again Kelley Lynn.
    Jill

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  6. "In my post-loss life, when I look at a sunset, I don't JUST see a sunset. I see beauty and death and loss and colors and brightness and love and meaning and nature and miracles and peace and wonder - and always, the soul of my husband. Every piece of joy I feel now carries his death, and carries his life in it."

    This is one of the most inspiring things I've ever read. At 3-1/2 years post-loss, I am a-l-m-o-s-t there. Thanks for writing this one -- it gave me so much hope.

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    1. I cant even tell you how happy that makes me to hear you say that. I am also at around that same time table. It will be 4 years in July. I am so glad that my words resonated with you and helped in some way. xoxo

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  7. Kelley - thank you so much for this posting. I am going through a time (4 months out) that I can't imagine a life not dominated by pain and a lack of joy. You give me hope for better days to come sometime in the future. Sincerely, Jane

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    1. Jane, 4 months out is excruciating. Nothing even feels real at that point. If you can get up each day and shower and simply function at 4 months - you are pretty much my hero. Two things you should know. One - it WILL get easier / the pain will NOT always be this awful. And two - that will take a lot longer than most people will tell you. Its different for everyone, but I was in massive and intense pain for the first 2 years, before it finally began to subside and lessen, and that happened gradually, and also all of a sudden. It sounds like forever, I know. But please hang in there. Your timeline could be a lot shorter than mine, we are all different. Just dont give up. If you are processing and FEELING emotions, they CANT stay the same forever. They have to shift eventually. So you wont be in pain forever. I promise.

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  8. dear Kelley:

    YES!!! THIS!!! your post today is, dare I say it, one of the very best I have ever read. I hope you are filled to the brim with feeling such enormous joy, that it filters deep down into every fiber of your being. I feel positively giddy for you! but I also treasure your story because it is so personal, and yet in many ways, a universal theme of the struggle, the god-awful nightmare of losing the love of one's life, the ensuing and unrelenting loneliness, the confusion, the exhaustion, the feeling of being so lost and broken, and the epic conflict of always wondering why having so many opposite feelings at the same time is such a big part of grieving. you have given me such hope with your insights, those that you have labored over for so long. and today as I struggle with such pain, such confusion I am so encouraged by what you have spoken and shared about trusting in the process of grieving.

    and what a win/win outcome with your marvelous therapist! both all of your hard work, along with her caring and loving and skillful guidance has now given you both such rich rewards. I am beyond thrilled for you both! sometimes it is only HOPE that provides the will to go on, it is only hope that someday we will be able look back and actually see progress where there seems to have been so little made, and it is hope that all of the emotional and visceral pain of our loss, and what we put into the work of grief, will open our eyes and hearts and minds to new possibilities for joy and meaning in our "after" lives. I have that hope, now more than ever...and I am holding it close to my heart right along with you, Kelley...

    with love and gratitude,

    Karen

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    1. You are such a gem Karen. THank you for always commenting and being such a pillar of support Im so glad that this post was so encouraging for people. I didnt even realize it would be, honestly. But Im glad that it is ......

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  9. I love this so much, just shared it with my Aussie widows group. It can be so hard to understand the importance sitting with our pain rather than giving in to the desire to run from it. You word it perfectly and will help give hope to so many people. I love you!! xoxo

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    1. I love you too Rebecca!!! And thank you for sharing this with your Aussies!! And yes, sitting inside the pain is NOT FUN. It sucks. And I would love nothing more than to run away from it, but I cant. Because if I do, it will still be there when I get back, at the same level of intensity - because I havent sat with it or felt it or processed it. Once I do that, it starts to shift, and then healing begins.

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