Insight into Grief

elaine williams c. 2008

I read an article recently about loss and grief. As a widow of four years, I can offer some insight into the grief process. I am 51 years of age. I was 47 when my husband of 20 years died from esophagus cancer at age 59. I took care of him for 11 months while he fought his best to survive. All cancer is devastating, but esophagus felt doubly so, since you cannot eat. He survived as long as he did only because he had a stomach tube inserted. My book is about mine and my family’s experience during caretaking, my husband’s death, and the emotional and mental turmoil following his passing. Not only for myself but also for my children.

The first thing I would say, based on my experience, is don’t make any major changes in the first 12 months, and actually, for some people the time frame may be longer.

Grief is a constant up and down for many months and even years. Although I felt compelled to clear out my husband’s clothes within the first month of his passing, at four years I still have moments from time to time where the loneliness of being a widow hits me and brings me to my knees for an hour or two. I consider myself in good form emotionally, mentally and psychologically, but again, loss still bites from time to time. It comes in quite softly and nips at me, and then I move on.

My life has taken unexpected twists and turns. I love my life, but also know that keeping my heart and mind open to living is part of the solution of living a full live. It’s so easy to close down and be fearful, afraid to live or experience anything again. Many days in the beginning of loss, you operate in a numb state, where each day is an uninteresting series of events. I remember at one point being afraid that the numbness might never recede. I was afraid I would stay in that limbo. I had no interest in anything, except the wellbeing of my kids. I didn’t care about my health, I just wanted each day to be over.

Thankfully, I grew into who I am today. I’ve learned to live on my own, support myself and be happy for the person I am. I’ve made some mistakes along the way, but I also learned from them.

In the early days I thought I would get through the grief quickly. I wanted it to be over and resolved. Of course, that’s not how grief works. It takes its own time. Just when I thought I was doing okay, I’d get hit up the side of the head and emotional turmoil would take me on a ride.

One thing I did learn is “normal” is no longer what it used to feel like. I have created through trial and error a new normal, a new life. I have slid into it the last four years; sometimes with hurt and sometimes quite simply.

I never tried to break away from my past, afterall, my husband and I had 23 years together and three boys. But I came to realize for myself, I needed to redefine me, minus my husband. It’s not easy. But it is possible.

Grief is a Process That Can’t be Rushed

Sometimes you just want to rush through the grief process. There’s confusion, pain, fear and a pulling inside, wanting to hide. Just take it slow and let life unfold gently, doing the best you can without making yourself do anything new until you’re ready.

Living Fully

Sometimes there are other losses, such as divorce, that can mirror the pain and loss of a loved one through death. That’s not to say it’s the same, but it is filled with pain, all the same. Many of the same feelings, fears and situations arise out of both situations. Loss is a universal emptiness, and yes, we do learn to move on, if we keep ourselves open to life and living, as hard as it is at times.

Being four years into this process I have pretty much reinvented myself. Many times it was incredibly hard walking this road, but I write about my loss experience for others to see you’re not alone, and we can triumph and go on to a wonderful life, even after our loss.

You create new friendships, interests and sometimes it feels like a metamorphis taking place. At times I resisted change, afterall, change can be scary, but ultimately, I made myself step forward and experience what came to me. Good and bad.

I’ve come to learn that what shows up is there for a reason, so I can’t hide my head in the sand and ignore them. I take what I can from the experience and leave the rest. It’s called living. And I choose to live fully.

What to say to someone in Grief

Sometimes people aren’t sure what to say to someone who has suffered a bereavement. When you are the one who has suffered the loss of a loved one — at times you don’t know what will help to ease your pain either. Some days, there’s nothing that will help. Today I found a wonderful blog posting by Terry Rush, and I found his way of speaking to those who have suffered loss to be wonderfully caring and profound. The link is below.

http://terryrush.blogspot.com/2008/04/what-to-say-to-those-who-grieve.html

An Individual Grief Journey

At first the loss was a relief, and that sounds terrible, but my husband had been sick with esophagus cancer for almost 12 months, was in tremendous pain and had wasted away to nothing. I never knew for sure how much weight he lost, but I would estimate close to one hundred and ten pounds.

When he died, he took that last breath, I knew it was best for him, as terrible as his life and lack of quality of life had become. At about six months it really began to hit me, and my life became a deep, gaping hole of lonely, empty despair. I was afraid to talk about it, to voice my fear, my total numbness. I had three children I needed to keep on an even keel. At times I would cry, or stare blankly, and I thought perhaps this is going crazy, or at least I was losing whatever grip I had on life. This was the beginning of my grief experience.

Now, four years later I can see the tremendous growth I’ve gone through, allowed myself to move through, and I feel I have come out on the other side, a better, more compassionate person. But I still remember the time in between, the time of incredible loneliness, feeling wounded and hurt to be left alone. In truth, I don’t want to forget those years in between. It made me who I am today.

Euthanasia, Dying with Dignity

I read a post today about Washington state trying to pass a law so the terminally ill can die with dignity. I know if something like this had been available in New York State, my husband would have taken advantage of this means of dying with dignity. The State of Oregon already has this type of help available for terminally ill patients, as do a few European countries. Perhaps this is something no one thinks about until it strikes home, I know I never gave it a thought, I had no occasion to until my husband became ill and suffered so much. There are of course people on both sides of the argument, but again, it is a deeply personal decision, and not one that should be made by a court or strangers at the end of life. You can decide for yourself. http://www.yeson1000.org

Is Grief Ever Good…the Aftermath

A thought. Have you ever considered grief good in any way, shape or form? For three and a half years you’re locked in combat with yourself, and the world around you as it changes. In time all things adapt, and somehow we open our eyes and learn something different, that you are indeed changed by your grief experience and you are therefore, different; newer, stronger, wiser and hopefully more loving and compassionate. Should we thank grief for allowing us to experience all that is different in our world? Have we in the grief process evolved into who we were meant to be? We got a push or a shove on this journey…has it turned out in any way more than you could ever have envisioned for yourself?

Caregiving and the Final Conclusion

Loss is devastating and we’re never prepared, even following caretaking over an extended period of illness. We need to talk about it more, to help bring each of us, the ill and the caretaker and family, to a more accepting, peaceful, loving and accepting conclusion. But it is difficult.

Giving Kids the Facts

I came upon an interesting post today at http://theviewfromhere.wordpress.com

It brought up the subject of funerals, death and dying….and being honest with kids. My thoughts on the matter are it’s thought provoking — trying to give kids information without giving them too much information to scare them, but be honest. I never wanted my kids to feel they’re prohibited from asking questions they need to be answered.

We all handle/filter the death process differently, but I tend to agree that kids need the truth, as hard as it is sometimes. At my mother-in-law’s funeral, my then 9 year old wanted to play one last song for his grandmother, and he did this while 3 tears dropped onto his fiddle at the gravesite. When his dad passed away a year later and we scattered his ashes, my son played another song, but up in our field behind our house. It was his way to say a final goodbye, but we all know know that is only the beginning of the grief process.

A Dream of Death

copyright 2008 

My husband was ill ten months with cancer when I had the dream. I had been taking care of his needs for almost eleven months, and even though some days there seemed to be progress, in hindsight I see it was really a steady progression on a downhill curve.

One night I had a dream I was upstairs in our two story house and looked out my youngest son’s window, which faces a large back field. I could see a large machine coming inexorably closer and closer toward the house. It made a terrible racket, almost like a threshing sound. With fear, I knew that it was going to come into the house through the back, into the kitchen and to the corner of the living room where my husband sat. I tried to call out and warn everyone, but I couldn’t speak. I ran downstairs, hearing it get closer and closer.

When I got down to the living room, my husband’s chair, where he always sat in the corner, was totally gone. The machine had come through the back of the house as I’d feared and swept him and his chair away. It continued around the front of the house and across the side yard.

I heard my youngest son talking out side to a friend of my husband’s, and the talk was normal, as if nothing had occurred. I wanted to cry out, but it was no use. When I awoke, I knew with certainty my husband was going to die.

I never told him about that dream. I couldn’t talk to him about it. I was afraid to acknowledge what I knew it meant. I was doing the best I could to keep my husband alive, but in my dreaming state, I knew he was going to die.

That day was the first time I acknowledged the truth of his impending death. That afternoon our regular hospice nurse arrived, and my husband asked her quietly, without fanfare, how much time she thought he had. I just stared at him, not saying a word. She said based on her experience, probably two or three weeks. I went into a numb state. I was not expecting him to confront his own death and mortality in this manner. And yet, it was only natural he would know the end was near. I had been denying it to myself.

When the nurse left, I walked outside with her. I told her of the dream I’d had. She put her arms around me in my distress. I faced the truth that he was going to die.

That week, my husband refused to let me put any of the protein rich formula I had been preparing for him, into the enteral pump, his only source of nutrition. I tried to argue with him, but he was quietly adamant. I still see the expression on his face. He simply said, “No more.” That was it. That was his way of telling me this is the end. Two weeks later he died. It wasn’t discussed, we didn’t’ tell the kids he no longer wished to receive the little sustenance his stomach could take. It was just done. Should we have discussed it with the kids? I don’t know. We talked with them about everything else. Most importantly, their father continually told him how much he loved them.

The last week is a mixed collection of jumbled memory. My husband didn’t sleep well, since he dozed on and off all day. He developed a bed sore that we were trying to cope with, but had to be incredibly sore. His focused turned inward. There was little verbal communication, and I stayed by his side most of the time. At night, he would be awake at two or three in the morning, and he’d drink cups of water at a time. It was amazing, considering he hadn’t been able to drink or eat in three months or more. He became incredibly weak, and I could no longer lift him to help him onto the commode, even as light as he had become. My heart cried inside, but there was nothing I could do, except love the man I had married twenty years before. I was exhausted, and knew I couldn’t take anymore. I wished for him to go to sleep and asked God to take him. His passing was relatively peaceful, but I always wondered if it would have been easier if we had talked more about him dying.