Saturday, July 9, 2011

Sometimes Healing Hurts

When a friend is sick you hope they will get well soon. If you know someone who has cancer, you might pray fervently for them to be cured. After you've had surgery, a friend might call to tell you they hope you will heal quickly, but what about when someone dies. What do we wish then?

After Phil's death I feared getting better. I didn't want to get over it, move on, allow time to heal me, or be grateful that Phil was in a better place. Frankly, getting better sounded like forgetting, getting over it was impossible, moving on implied leaving a time when Phil was a part of my world, time as a concept wasn't doing much for me, and I couldn't think of a better place for Phil than in my arms. None of the things people said to me about healing or recovery were in any way comforting. In fact, they were horrifying. I will confess...I was afraid everyone around me would assume I didn't love Phil all that much if I could recover from losing him.

So I quietly wallowed in sorrow. I found all the tender spots on my heart and poked them regularly. I covered my office in photos of Phil, using them like wallpaper. I was always on the look out for signs, and would cry on the way home from a run if Phil didn't visit me. I avoided expanding my world, because I didn't want to leave behind the one Phil occupied with me. Often I wondered if I was doing this widow thing right.

What would it mean if I laughed? How could I enjoy a party? Why should I be merry? God forbid I should go on a date. In my mind all these things screamed, "Over it!". But there were a few things I didn't know. All the nights of crying myself to sleep, going home alone from a family gathering, grocery shopping solo, climbing into my empty bed, eating by myself in a restaurant, and finding my way in the world of single parenting have taught me that pain is actually an agent of healing. Grief drops us into the burning inferno of shattering loss, and day-by-day the fuel for the fire burns down. Each painful experience is the burning of another piece of timber, until we have lived through one more thing we thought might kill us. And it didn't, again. Bit by painful bit, we blaze through the hurt, the anger, the loss, the fear until we find that we aren't afraid of healing anymore. Because healing doesn't mean forgetting. Instead true recovery from a loss as life altering as this creates embers that light our hearts...an illumination that only grows brighter with time.

And so the dreaded phrase, "Time heals all wounds," actually does mean something. It just doesn't mean what I thought it meant. I expected that the passing of time would facilitate healing, that each day would be a little less painful than the last. Following this logic, we might even expect to be healed by a certain date. Of course you are all laughing at me right now and telling your computer that I am crazy, because it just doesn't work like that. And you are right, it doesn't. But time gives us the opportunity to burn our personal grief fuel. One experience at a time the timber of grief pops and blazes, and each day we emerge from the fire. Burned perhaps, raw for sure, dazed on occasion...but walking through the smoky haze to begin again tomorrow nonetheless. At the end of each haze filled day it doesn't matter what anyone else thinks about how you heal or when. There is no right way to be a widow. Instead there are just survivors who face the flames of loss armed with the shield of love, and hope for the day when the embers that remain when grief has burned its seemingly endless fuel provide the light through which they see the rest of the world.

12 comments:

  1. Michele... your words touched the very core of my feelings. I have been experiencing survivor victories... small steps but I get up every morning and face this new life. I pray alot and I fall alot but I always get up, brush myself off and keep going. Grief is the most painful feeling I have ever experienced but I lean into it and just feel it. As you said, "there is no right way to be a widow." Thank you for your posts... for expressing what so many of us are feeling and for letting us know.. we are not alone. God bless you.

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  2. "Time heals all wounds," is the one phrase I have not been able to bear to hear. I try to gently tell people that the ticking of the clock alone does nothing; we have to do the WORK of grief each moment whether we want to or not. I love the elegance of your analogy that "time gives us the opportunity to burn our personal grief fuel." That is it exactly and gives me a much better way to express the reality of grief. Thank you!

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  3. Thank you so much for your words. I lost my fiancé 14 months ago and I have felt time as an enemy. I felt that time was taking my memories of the man I loved away. I agree with Tamara…. The expression that time heals all wounds felt like a knife in my heart. I love the way you phrased it and from now on I will try to look at it from your perspective. In the midst of my devastation my fiancé’s brother passed away unexpectedly in June and now his fiancé is hurting just like me and I wish I could help her. Everyone looks to me because I have been through this. I want to be there for her. It is just hard when I am still hurting so much and can’t even seem to help myself. I just don’t want to let her down. I have heard loved ones talk about time and even some have come to me and said, “time helps, doesn’t it.” Not a question, but a statement… Time Helps. I just politely agree and move on, while inside I am thinking no it does not. I know for me my timeline will be slow… and that is ok, it has to be. We all have our own unique timeline and that is ok. Long story short… I want to thank you for your words. I think they will help me and I think they will help the woman that I look to as a sister-in-law. They will help me to help her. I hope.
    Thank you!

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  4. Danneice said:

    Thank you Michele for those beautifully written words, and another document to read to my therapist! She sometimes doesn't "get me" until I read something to her from this blog.

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  5. Oh, my friend .... so very beautiful.
    And so very spot on.
    I love you.
    :)

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  6. What a simply awesome post, Michele. I am printing this one out for my 'treasures' folder. Your final sentence says it all. Thank you.

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  7. "I will confess...I was afraid everyone around me would assume I didn't love Phil all that much if I could recover from losing him."

    Wow. I have had this exact same thought about losing my Dan. That if I was able to be happy or content or to move forward, that people would think that I must not have loved him very much after all.

    I still feel that way sometimes. I've made a lot of changes in my life in the past 19 months. I'm eating better, exercising, losing weight, and overall doing the best I can with what I have left. But there's always a shadow in the back of my head wondering "do others think I didn't love him because I'm finding things to enjoy without him?"

    Does there ever come a point where it doesn't matter what others think?

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  8. I am awed by this insightful blog. WOW. I've read many of your posts but I must say you have absolutely outdone yourself. I have found that the longer time goes on, the more clarity I have about the years of illness and my early feelings, and you have described it all beautifully. There is light ahead, and it is impossible to fathom in the beginning. And no, we don't want to, because any change we make feels like letting go of the person and the life we loved. But eventually, life will move us forward kicking and screaming, until we find acceptance. Only then can our loving memories of the past and our life in the present coexist. And that is the goal. EXCELLENT writing, Michele.

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  9. Michele,
    I am writing this through tears...you touched every deep place of knowing and loving and feeling and healing. YOUR LIGHT helps us move on beyond despair in hope for the future whatever it may bring. You are a gifted writer, insightful person and an inspirational healer to us all. I so look forward to meeting you at Camp Widow!

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  10. this is one of the most beautiful pieces I have read on this blog.
    It is exactly how it feels, to question how to move forward.
    This piece One experience at a time the timber of grief pops and blazes, and each day we emerge from the fire. Burned perhaps, raw for sure, dazed on occasion...but walking through the smoky haze to begin again tomorrow nonetheless. At the end of each haze filled day it doesn't matter what anyone else thinks about how you heal or when. "
    I am going to print and carry with me.
    Thank you so much.

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  11. Thank you all for your kind words, I am so glad this post spoke to you. I love the analogy of burning pain for fuel, and have met so many widowed people whose inner light is amazingly bright...I am convinced that loss and love walk hand in hand.

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  12. i love this. ty for your words. i agree with anonmyus. i was thinking of printing this out myself! LOL.

    <3 u Michele!

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