Grief to Gratitude

By Sherrie Cassel

There is no rhyme or reason for how a person grieves the loss of a significant person in her life. Some light candles and leave them in their windows to let their loved one know they’re still thought about every second of every day. Some people sob for months and months. Some people are stoic, stiff upper-lipped, and sober. There’s no template for how one should grieve. We do. We just do. Here’s a weird effect of grief for me: I have loved the music group Bread since I was a kid. My son was into Korn and hard rock from the nineties and two thousands. After he died, I was sitting in my home office numb and deeply despaired. A song by Bread began to play, and it took only the first two notes to have me weeping inconsolably. My son would have hated Bread. He would have found it sappy and saccharine, and yet, there I was, a weeping mess over two notes of a song.

I’ve had the gift of healing from my son’s death. I’m grateful for the healing that came from the hardest work I’ve ever done in my entire sixty-one years. I miss my son more than there are words in the English language with which to describe just how much. Tonight, I’m aching in my heart. My mother is in a nursing home and not getting better. I started an exciting internship which will prepare me for working with people who are struggling with spirituality and tremendous grief. I don’t know when I’ve been so tired, exhausted really. When I’m tired, (HALT), I feel things viscerally. Tonight, I’m deep in thought about the ache that is at the center of my heart.

My mom’s name is Stella, and I’m listening to “Stella Blue” by the Grateful Dead. I’m keenly aware of how little time I have left with my mom. I have some time to love her this side of heaven. I had time to love my son on this side of heaven because a momma knows when she’s going to lose a child from addiction, and I had time to make amends, to let him know he was the best thing that ever happened to me.

Surely, there are victory from addiction stories; my son did not have one. If you’re a parent, you love your child to the ends of the earth. When one of them dies, or like us, an only child dies, grief is profound, a howling, cavernous pain. Some days I wonder how I’m still standing, how I’m still moving forward in my life, and how I’m having days filled with joy and laughter. How are those things possible when I’m constantly missing my son? His absence is felt deeply.

I’ve read so much about grief I could write several volumes on my experience, which although different from others, is relatable to so many who’ve also incurred significant losses. Some of us had time to prepare, as much as one can, ourselves for the long goodbye. Some of us had no notice and were shocked, had the rug pulled out from underneath us, and sucker punched by the loss. How is it possible that we could live in this world without a piece of our heart? In grief that is healthy, we learn to adjust, and it’s a lifetime of adjustment. The thing is, we can overcome, not get rid of, but we can get to a place where grief does not command our lives, but is an emotion that can be tamed, like fear, anger, etc.

I recommend a grief group, particularly one that addresses your specific grief, i.e., I reach out to those who’ve lost a child to addiction. Additionally, I reach out to anyone who grieves any type of loss, from any area of one’s life. Death will have an impact on every area of your life; it just will. How will you normalize your grief enough to stay with the living where joy can still be found? In the beginning, as you reclaim your life, the work is grueling, and despair will creep up on you when you least expect it. Despair keeps us from acceptance, and acceptance is the place where we begin to heal. I remember saying early in grief, that I would never accept my son’s death. How wrong I was to think I could heal without accepting the reality that my son had died. I’ve since accepted that I will not see my son again in this life, but I have confidence that I will see him in the next. At the very least, he is no longer in pain, and I find great comfort in this fact. He was so dreadfully sick from addiction in his last few months of life. He was lost and I could not save him.

I know many of you have watched your loved one(s) physical bodies degrade as they transition from this life to the next, whatever you believe this means. We find ways to comfort ourselves. Some of us turn to religion, therapy, deep grief work, and all manner of things. We must find a way to heal ourselves if we are to return to a life of purpose. To what end will our healing take us? Will we use our losses to infuse life with love, compassion, and purpose? I hope so. I know, for me, it took a bit of time to discover a new purpose in my life. Everything about me changed because of my son’s death. I was shattered, and then, I began to ask myself if darkness and despair were the things that would heal or hurt me. Did I want to stay stuck in the darkness and despair? Did I not want to heal and move forward in my life? If you’re asking yourself these questions, in my opinion, you’re at the precipice of healing and loosening your grip on constant sorrow. We can let go and think of the love that still exists for your loved one(s).

Rikki is gone. He will not return to me in this life. I miss him more than I can express in words. But life waits for no one to get his or her heart together. We love. We lose. We love still. Love is forever. I love my son in the present tense, not in the past. To love my son in the past tense will never happen. You love your person with all your heart, and when they die, you love them still. I remember after my son died; I bought all sorts of cremation jewelry to put some of his ashes in. I took some of his ashes to various places that were special to him and to us and sprinkled them in those places. I wanted to cling to him and never let him go, even in death. I wanted to see him in every beautiful place I visited. I slept in the sweatshirt he was wearing the day he died; I wore it for months. I have the last fork he used to eat with before he died. I have the last cup he drank from on the day he died. Is it ridiculous to have done these things? No. We each grieve and hold on to those things which are meaningful to us, and which were meaningful to our loved one(s).

I’ve learned so much from grieving people, parents, lovers, friends, siblings, strangers, ad infinitum. I hope I’m helping people who are currently navigating the grief process. Hopefully those of you who are healing in great leaps and bounds will help those who are not. Everyone grieves something or someone at some point in his or her life. As we grow in grace after our traumatic losses, we learn to be compassionate with ourselves and with others. I’m sorry for anyone who is hurting today because you’re grieving the loss of a loved one. I hope you have the support of people who will love you through it. Certainly, there are people from whom you will steer clear. Emotionally stunted people do not have the emotional resources to be there for anyone else; they may be in survival mode from their own traumatizing experiences. Gravitate to those who are emotionally well enough to be able to help you as you navigate your process. I know it’s easy to say, but difficult to do, but you can get through this; it just takes a lot of self-love and a lot of work toward healing. Healing is possible, and in some cases, it is inevitable.

I find my strength in the GOMU, in those members of my family who are emotionally resourceful enough to love me through it, in friends, in music, in writing, in seminary, etc. What are you finding helps you to heal? Leave a comment and share your experience, strength and hope with others who are grieving. I find that helping others helps me to heal. We all hurt from time to time after the loss of a person, place, or thing. But the goal is to live fully, and once you’re able to tame your grief to where you are in control of it, you can.

By Sherrie Cassel

So, here I am, working through my mom’s recent admission to a skilled nursing facility, for what I hope will be a short stay, just for physical therapy and physical rehabilitation. I’ve been staying in her apartment since Thursday, and I’m surrounded by all her things: pictures of family, many of my son, Rikki, her only grandchild. There are art projects my son made throughout the years that line her walls. I’m in the town where I raised him, and it is bittersweet. Hurricane Hilary has me homebound and I return home to my husband on Tuesday.

I recall storms, weather, and emotional ones, Rikki and I experienced together. We would put two chairs by our front door and sit and watch the lightning, and hoot and holler for the thunder, and appreciate the rain together. Mother Nature’s mothering of a single mother and her beautiful son. I miss him even more, if that is possible, in our hometown, with the art his little fingers made, art from the love of a grandchild who loved his grandparents and his family so much. I miss that love.

Some friends and I were chatting today, three single moms relating to one another how our kids worry about us. Two of them have daughters and they called on their mothers to see if they were okay in this now tropical storm. I remember when Rikki used to worry about me. Once I was volunteering at a youth center in San Diego. The groups were filled with angry teenagers, some gang members, who were court ordered to be in anger management sessions every Thursday. One Thursday evening a group of rival gang members were fighting in the street as I was trying to turn into the parking lot of the center, and they surrounded my car, and started fighting on the hood of my car!

When they proceeded to a safe distance, I turned around and drove home. This experience startled me very much. I spoke with my husband and son about the event, and they both suggested I quit, not because I couldn’t handle myself with this group, because I was loving working with the groups. I was being trained to have my own group of angry teenage girls. My son was most concerned. He was an adult already, married, with a child, and he was concerned because he said I didn’t consult the “family” when I decided to put myself in danger. He was so adorable being so concerned about his momma.

I suppose to comfort myself, when I’m in a good space, I think about good things; I pull up good memories from the annals of my brain, memories that are always bittersweet. When I used to think about my son early in my grief process, I would just sob until I couldn’t breathe, even with the really happy memories of our times together. I wish I could remember at what point things began to turn around for me, when I began to allow life to embrace me and imbue it with joy and purpose – again.

My purpose had been raising a son, good, bad, or very challenging. No matter, we loved each other fiercely. Our loved ones left us with amazing memories, and of course, no one escapes tough times, especially tough times as a family. I want to think about good times. The tough times are over, and we learned from them, best-case scenario. I want to think about the wisdom gained from being Rikki’s mom. He taught me so much. We learned about life and love and pain and tough times together.

Think about the good times, sometimes with tears in your eyes and a lump in your throat – forever and a day.

I often wonder how I survived the death of my precious son. I scarcely remember the really tough days anymore. They seem to have passed and seven and a half years seem to have flown by — on some days, days when I’m fulfilling my life’s goals, developing my gifts, even at sixty-one.

Once someone close to me told me that my son’s death gave me the opportunity to concentrate on myself and on my dreams. I was wounded to the very core by the statement; it was said insensitively but with good intentions.

But I have always been driven. I’m sure those of you who come here to read about how to rekindle joy in your lives are driven to heal because you reach out to others who grieve to learn how to grieve and still be okay. Isn’t it the way it always is, to strive for healing and a reclamation of your lives? Unless we are in complicated grief, striving toward emotional health is an inevitability. As I’ve said before, however, the ability to heal is proportionate to the emotional healing you did before your loss.

I think about Jaycee Dugard, the young woman who was kidnapped, raped, and who gave birth to the rapist pedophile’s children, and how she had been so loved by her mother. She would look out the window from her prison and talk to her mom when she looked at the moon; it was something they had done together until she was kidnapped. Her rescue from that nightmare brought her home to her family who had waited for her for eighteen years. However, during her formative years, until her kidnapping when she was eleven, she had been loved by doting parents who gave her the resources that kept her safe inside her mind where the love of a family basically kept her alive. See, she was emotionally healthy before the kidnapping. She survived until she and her children were rescued.

I lost my son, but I had spent years in therapy prior to his death. I was gifted with the resources I needed to survive the loss of my only child –through years of therapy. I worked hard for them. Further, I’ve been gifted with the desire to share those gifts with others who are grieving, including the person reading this post. My greatest desire is to bring comfort, and then hope to those who are hurting and need to reconnect to life, a life where the pain is no longer acute, but manageable; in essence, I want to help them normalize their pain, so they can grab hold of a life that is immeasurably joyful in between sad memories and wonderful ones, in between chaos and calmness, and in between your life and your death. Life is fleeting, and as cliched as that sounds, and it does, I realize that, but as quickly as life flew by for our loved ones who have passed, ours is fleeting too. I’m sixty-one years old now. My son was able to live for thirty-two. He left behind a six-year-old son who is now fourteen and in high school. Where did the time go? How did we get through it? How are we managing now?

Hemingway said, “The sun also rises.” I waited and worked through my complicated grief for three and a half years before I began to see the light. In the interim, I read everything I could get my hands on about grief. I worked very hard to find the spark to live far beyond my chronic pain and despair. I despaired because acceptance of my son’s death, irrationally so, was too much to ask of me in the early days of grief.

We grievers have kind of compassionate disagreement about the ability to heal after losing a child. After I began to heal and discovered my purpose when my son died, when being a mom had been my purpose and joy for thirty-two years, I began to feel a bit of excitement about life – again. Before my son got sick with substance use disorder (addiction), my life was amazing. I had met the man of my dreams. We got married. I began work on my bachelor’s degree in psychology. I was on cloud nine and the world was my oyster. Once my son got sick and the descent to his death began to drag him down a destructive spiral where he was irretrievable, he was lost, and I lost my ability to enjoy life because I was so busy trying to save his.

Once I began to heal, I thought maybe I could heal completely, but you see, maybe you can’t. Maybe you won’t heal completely. Best-case scenario, you learn to allow grief to walk alongside you, but you take the lead. You’re in control of your life and of your emotions. We really can walk through the storms during the rocky high tide of life, and then we learn to dance across the water, instead of drowning in it. Maybe you can heal completely, and I’m just not there yet, and maybe I’m wrong, and there are some people who do. I know I’ve experienced a transformation from chronic heartbreak to a place where I am whole, even though a bit of angst and pain arise from time to time.

The loss of a loved one bores a hole in our hearts, and it is up to us to fill that hole with purpose. I read a meme that said that our tough experiences will one day be a guide for others who are experiencing tough times. I concur. We are here to be servants (not in a way that keeps us enmeshed with others) to one another. Prehistorically, our species learned to work cooperatively in groups. We learned to live in a system of balanced reciprocity. I think balanced reciprocity is a good system. Things certainly have changed, but we still have pockets of those who want to live their lives in service to others, and that brings us tremendous joy.

If you’re in a good space, write, draw, paint, sing, do your healing dance and invite others to join you. I miss my son. I feel his presence in all the places that were special for us. He was a remarkable and marvelous human being, just like the person(s) you all have lost. I’m looking at a butterfly he made for my mom when he was in kindergarten, and below his butterfly my mother has placed his son’s butterfly he made in kindergarten. Life insists on its continuance, and we see this in nature, the first cry of a baby robin, the sun rising, a newly born baby, a person who struggles with addiction entering rehab with all the hope of healing and kicking his or her compulsion to use, or a grieving parent who transcends grief and allows for its transformational power to change his or her life from one of despair to one of hope, to one that compels you to live fully.

You can. You must. My hope is for your healing, as far as you can take it.

Namaste.

By Sherrie Cassel

Grieving [g]od? What does that even mean? Does grief applied to a god mean that god is dead in the Nietzschean sense? Does my perception of the [G]od of my understanding mirror your own walk of faith, or does my title shock you? I’ve been a Christian, one whose theology holds faithful to a god with a capital G, for most of my sixty-one years. The rules of Christian engagement with the world were laid out in no uncertain terms. There was very little mercy between the god I was indoctrinated to believe in and myself. I no longer feel duped by the “Man”, the conservative, white male, earthly representation of the god of my former understanding. Did [G]od die to me? Or am I letting go of a worldview that was life-limiting, and finding a relationship with a [G]od of mercy, compassion, love, and unbelievable understanding of the human condition? I like to think the latter, even though letting go has been several decades in the making. I had to live and learn and ache and be in darkness for three decades before my eyes were opened to a God it felt right to allow into my consciousness. I had decades of religious trauma to shed and with each thing reason peeled from my clenched fists, there was the fear of being like a tightrope walker without a net. What would hold me up when the god I’d always known was shown to be a cruel amalgam born of two millennia of misinformation based on misinterpretation? An amalgam that crosses all cultures. How many wars? How many?

This was on a church sign at a Baptist Church.

I clung to my Southern Baptist/Roman Catholic faith traditions with a fervor and for a very long time. I learned to judge others very young, and I had the golden ticket for a ride up the spiritual hierarchy as one of god’s chosen. So many wars in the name of which is the “one true god” –…so many. I’ve been angry with the god of my childhood who was transmitted to me from the pulpit and in Sunday school, whose chief form of discipline was smiting people, entire villages, entire armies, entire countries. I’d toe the line too! And I did … or I tried. You see, my old-time religion enforced a perfection that even the church leaders cannot live up to. Seems I read that somewhere else too.

I’ve walked away from god a half-dozen or more times throughout the years. Raise a child in the way she should go, and when she is old she will not depart from it. (Proverbs 22:6) My mom’s consciousness was steeped deeply in Southern Baptist dogma and my father was a lapsed Roman Catholic. Both religions are punitive at their core. I learned all about hell and eternal damnation and how the tenants of hell will never acclimate to the flaming carnage at the hands of a loving god. I went to church because I was afraid not to, not just to prevent my parents assaults; I got used to those, but I went to church because my nightmares of a fiery end to my sin-laden life were seared into my little soul. There’s a scene in the movie, American Beauty, in which Annette Benning is unsuccessful at making a real estate sale, and she takes off her dress and goes into the closet and begins slapping herself across the face. One does not need to be a spiritual or psychological advisor to flesh out the parallels between Ms. Benning’s award-winning performance of modern-day self-flagellation, and two-thousand years of a doctrine that is the root, I would argue, of a plethora of phobias from an inability to achieve perfection, knowing what awaited you if you could not manage the straight path toward eternal reward.

Is god dead? The god I grew up with, the one I inculcated from the pulpit and from well-intentioned Sunday school teachers, is most assuredly dead. How could a seminarian reach such a controversial conclusion? I cut my teeth on the Hebrew and Christian Bibles, the King James’ Version, and I have loved the text my entire life. I’ve gone through several relationships with scripture. I have argued with it. I have let it sit on shelves for decades at a time. I have used it against people. I have loved its literary value, and I believe it still has purpose in our world today, not the ways in which it was taught to me and my contemporaries and those who came before me, but in the true sense that “God is love” (1 John 4:8).

Before seminary I was still floundering in my beliefs. I signed up for the Christian track of a liberal seminary in Southern California. The five major religions are represented in this seminary. I chose the Christian track because I’m all about new wine in new wine skins. We can stay relevant. I believe in God, with a capital G without enhancements and without imposing my faith on you or others. I can’t explain why I’m a theist, but I am. Carrie Doehring said something to the effect that in some models of God, God can be seen as a transitional object, initially, like a teddy bear, then later, something else that offers a sense of security to a person. Is God a transitional object? Does God comfort me like my teddy bear, Pohleeta, did when I was a child? I admit, my early environment needed some type of relief, and Pohleeta offered me that tender comfort in my scary world. If I take a good look at the times I “clung to the LORD” – they were during dark nights of the soul. Psalm 34:18. The LORD is close to the brokenhearted and the crushed in spirit.

I went to a very conservative white church in Fallbrook California. My family, mom, and my siblings were the only people of color in the congregation for a very long time. No matter, except for a few cultural faux pas, we were treated very well. I attended a Church of God because it provided some cultural familiarity to my mother’s Southern Baptist roots. We were conservative fundamentalist Christians, very insular, very isolated, unstained by the world… (James 1:27).

I’m not spitting out scripture because I’m trying to convince or convert you to come to the world of agnostics, theists, or full on lovers of Jesus. I find the scriptures of the Judeo-Christian people to be awe-inspiring. No, I don’t advocate beating your children to keep them in line, and, no, I don’t think a woman should walk twenty paces behind her man. Nor do I think it is a sin for a woman to teach. I’ve had female Sunday school teachers, of both the conservative and the liberal bents who were far better teachers than many of the male pastors whose churches I have had either the pleasure or displeasure to sit in their pews.

No one is perfect and there are times when something, some cultural artifact stands the test of time, even when it is disadvantageous to our species, and yet, the human animal persists to make the impossible possible, and because of this bullheadedness our species has survived – for now.

How do you go from the fiery, angry, punishing god to the God of love, and how do you recondition your heart to not race when you think about walking away from a worldview that kept you safe in its bubble of isolation, in the world, not of it. I heard a pastor say, at a Southern Baptist service, no less, that some Christians are so heaven-bound that they’re no earthly good. Is that how people see us? We spend our time cherry picking our Bibles to support our sense of superiority, and that does not mean “white” – it means that as God’s chosen people through the blood of Jesus Christ, Christians elevate themselves to positions as judges and juries of those who do not believe as they do. Some, not all, lest I be sent off to the executioner!

I grew up steeped in fundamentalism. Roman Catholicism is such a small part of my spiritual journey. A sexual assault by clergy changes the relationship one has with a church or faith tradition. However, the rituals of the Catholic church still are very beautiful, mystifying, and evocative of the Holy Spirit for me. There are no rituals in the many, many fundamentalist churches I attended, save the ecstasy one feels during a worship song whose repetition is meant to awaken the passion for the LORD, and the eyes close, and hands go up and you get lost in the moment, the same way my husband felt at a Grateful Dead concert, the same way I feel when I hear an old gospel song, and I feel each note as the story is told again and again throughout the years, decades, centuries, millennia.

Doehring talks about how trauma changes ones perception of the god of his or her understanding, not just trauma from clergy, but trauma of any sort, but in particular, sexual assault. Did God die for me the days of my assaults? Not really. God has always existed, even when I said I didn’t believe in God. Everyone has a theology, because everyone has a thought about the concept of what or who God is.

Before seminary, I didn’t know, fully, and maybe I still won’t fully know until I meet my Maker, but I had no idea how I was still holding on to a god who abandoned me, who required that I judge my brothers and sisters, who held people over a fiery pit that never cools for even a second of relief. I’ve taken several classes now at my theological school, and each one has provided me with healing through understanding, and by helping me to answer the burning theodicy question: If the god of my indoctrination is so powerful, why is there suffering in the world? That is a question we must each answer for ourselves, those who choose to live theistically, anyhow.

I turn to other cultural artifacts for analogies, storytelling material, and I find fault with some of their stories too, but I’ve learned to do the legwork it takes to be intimate with a sacred text. I’ve learned to do research and put things in cultural context. I want a deeper and deeper understanding of one of the building blocks of my spiritual formation. So, is God dead to me? As Paul said, “May it never be!” There is a god being peddled out there. That god is a multi-billion-dollar industry. Be wary of those asking for money at the end of every show, or at least ask for an accounting of how the networks spend their money, what charities do they assist, do they assist any, etc.?

God is not dead to me. God is very much alive to me in between moments of darkness and doubt, and sometimes God is neglected when I’m on cloud nine and darkness cannot be seen for miles and miles. Gratitude and the admonition to be grateful are frequent reminders that we should be thankful for where we are, for what we have, for where we’ve been, and for where we’re headed. For every thing there is a season and a purpose under heaven (Ecclesiastes 3:1).

We were blessed and cursed with consciousness. We are sentient beings. Post-industrialization, our lives in America, have been getting easier and easier, and with ease and comfort – can emerge boredom. I believe that existential malaise is the offspring of boredom and boredom is a curse of consciousness. Perhaps curse is a bit too superstitious, and I really just mean it to be hyperbole, but boredom is pent up energy with no where to take it. Find your purpose. Find what you believe in and nurture that belief into a benefit in your life and in the lives of others.

Not everyone needs an anchor, perhaps. I do. I hitch my measure of faith (Romans 12:3) on to the God I understand today, as I and that God have pared away the traumatic god so I could discover God for myself.

I have grieved the god of my youth. The Nicene Creed has tied Christians hands behind their backs, much like our sacred Constitution has done in some cases. My husband is atheist (with a small a) – and he has followed false doctrines for research material his entire life. He likes to argue with the opposition. He listens to Christian news and reads Christian magazines. He is not interested in their doctrines. He is interested in seeing whether they are genuine in following Jesus’ two most important commandments. Do you remember what they are? If you’re a Christian who is reading this, do you know what they are? Matthew 22: 37-40. Is your heart overflowing with love for your fellow human being? The citizen? The foreigner? Those who can’t ever repay you? Are you God’s hands and feet to those who will always be on the margins? Are you a good representative of the love of God?

I hope this apologetic of my measure of faith does not chase you away from my blog. Faith is very important to me. Faith in what, you may ask? Romans (there she goes again) – says it best for me, “For we do not know how we ought to pray, but the Holy Spirit intercedes for us in groans too deep for words.” (8:26) I don’t have the words that can accurately define my relationship with my Creator God to my or anyone else’s satisfaction.

I celebrate the God I know today, and so, It is well , it is well– with my soul (Spafford and Bliss).

Namaste.

by Sherrie Cassel

Know your limits. Don’t overextend yourself to the point of exhaustion, ad nauseam. There is a meme floating around on Facebook that asks the question: “What was the thing that made you realize you’re old?” My friend commented: “The mirror.” True enough. Know your limits. I look in the mirror and realize I’ll never be thirty again. I’d like to do my thirties over with the knowledge and emotional wellness I have now. Hindsight is twenty-twenty. I’d do better next time. I’d learn from the first go-around. But, alas, I venture into unreality, something that will never be. As I look in the mirror, I say aloud to myself, “I will never be young again,” and subsequently, my bikini days are over. I’ve gotten a tad more modest in my sixties than I was in my thirties. I grieve that person, wild and carefree, manic beyond belief, and spinning out of control. She kept me safe while my brain did what chemically effected brains do: it tried to make sense of the world with unfocused energy. I’ve learned to love that person, the emotional wreck that she (I) was.

I got a lot accomplished in my thirties. I went hog wild, engaged in high-risk behavior, and was otherwise self-destructive, but I did a lot, including finally getting through algebra with a saint of a professor, Professor David Lowenkron, and my stats professor, Dr. Vernoy. I grieve the energy I had in my thirties, fueled by bipolar mania, which was not always unwelcome. I miss the productivity the mania brought with it. I miss that woman who physically could juggle one-hundred different things at once and have it not produce high levels of stress hormones that research has shown is detrimental to the biopsychosocial system(s) of the human organism, you and me. I find this research to be credible and remarkable. I find the biopsychosocial system(s) to be fascinating, and even comforting.

I remember in one of my academic iterations, reading in an anthropology class with the world-renowned Dr. Philip Debarros at Palomar College in San Marcos, California, the line: it is the duty of every living organism to survive. As a veteran survivor, I’ve learned to push myself to be a thriver. But I’m grateful for the veteran survivor who made sure I wasn’t destroyed by the harsh environment I was born into. There are other aspects of my dysfunctional coping mechanisms I really had a hard time letting go. When safety is not a norm for you, you will fight to keep safe, and if you can’t keep your body safe, then you keep your mind and your soul locked away until you get to a place in your life where you feel safe.

I also had walls I deluded myself into believing were invisible; the healed and insightful safe people could see the terrified mess I was. There was one who saw me during my crazy thirties, and then I married the second sage and the kindest, most compassionate, wonderful man. My second husband and a lot of therapy have given me grace, not just to forgive others, but also to forgive myself for mistakes made in ignorance and dysfunction. Know your limits. I’ve been in fight mode for so long, and I lived a life of fear and scarcity, that I missed out on a lot of the wonders of the universe, and I’ve let go of people who are amazing because I was afraid I’d get hurt. And so, some seasons have passed never to return.

There are big holes in my wall now where I’ve let people in, those who helped me to chip away at the concretized heart and help me know my tender heart is safe with them. I couldn’t give that spiritual intimacy to anyone until I could embrace it for myself. There are times when I am frightened, and sometimes irrationally, sometimes, not. I put another brick in the wall when I’m feeling threatened, or if I’m about to have some kind of emotional or physical pain, and I can sense it coming. Insane? I don’t know. I like the Shakespearean quote from Hamlet that says something to the effect that there are more things that are dreamt than in Horatio’s (a container for humanity) philosophies.

Those philosophies, ideologies, theologies, etc., are what keep us safe in an uncertain world. They keep us safe by providing us with the tools to make meaning in our lives. The ability to reframe from the survivor system to the thriver system takes time and practice to acquire. It took me decades to build resiliency in an atrophied muscle. I need to be tough enough to defend myself, but still hold compassion for the wounded child in every human being.

I grieved when I let go of the toughness. I began to surround myself with people who were fine individuals, and one by one, the friends who spent a season in my life began to drop out of my life, and I grieve their loss from my life. So many reasons to grieve. At what season are you? I love the fall, just before it gets too cold for this San Diego girl. The winds of change are blowing, and the time of contemplative hibernation promises productivity. I do my best work when the skies are gray and sedentation feels right – for a bit.

I have an imaginary friend/mentor, Dr. B.G., who told me that I “give a lot to my readers.” Yes, I suppose some might not have the emotional resources to share so vulnerably. Years ago, at the Metropolitan Community Church of San Diego, the church where I found God, I co-facilitated with J.L., using Brene Brown’s POWER OF VULNERABILITY audio presentation. There was a time when I was too terrified to be known, but through therapy, through the grace of the God of my understanding, through self-insight, and through self-actualization, I’ve managed to pull through to the other side of conditioned dysfunction, self-loathing, and self-destruction and find joy, compassion, the ability to be vulnerable and known by people who are worthy of my time and my love. I keep those people close by and I’m now in a place where I can help others find their way to a place of emotional peace and self-love that will extend into every relationship from here on end.

I’ve lived one hundred different lives in one hundred different worlds, and I can be only grateful for where the celebrations and the tragedies have brought me. Life will never be perfect, but I have my grandson, my adoring husband, my younger brother, my two cats, and my family of choice. I’m in a program that fulfills my heart and feeds my soul. I’ve never felt more alive academically and spiritually – at the same time. The fusion of knowledge and wisdom is a mind-blowing experience. I love the story in Acts where Saul of Tarsus, after participating in the stoning of Stephen heads off down the road to Damascus and is struck blind while he hears God’s voice asking Saul why he is persecuting God. Saul spent three days and nights in blindness and then his eyes were opened as what were like scales fell from his eyes. He became a new person with a new vision and a new mission — a new worldview. Seminary has been my salvation. I thought I’d die after my son died. I looked forward to every single day when my son would call me to tell me about his life and something cute our grandson said. I miss his voice. I miss his hugs. I miss his laughter and his hunger for knowledge. He was my best friend, my only child, my first love. I’m blessed to have found my husband, Ben. He has walked with me through hell and high water. He married into a Mexican American family, and we have several times housed various family members throughout our eighteen years together.

I grieve the old times, the good and the bad, not so much the addiction years when his life was spiraling out of control, faster than I could reasonably hold on to him. I held on until my fingers bled, to no avail. I’m grateful for the thirty-two years I got to have him in my life. The bad times were such a short time in proportion to the rest of his life. We had a lot of joy and oh so much laughter. I grieve those times. I grieve the parts of me that kept me safe for my early pre-therapy days, and the parts I had to let go to grow toward self- and inclusive love and internal peace that will take us to the top of the pyramid of self-actualization, whatever that means to you.

We must grieve our losses before we can move forward, and some of those things we grieve are losses that may not be significant to anyone but you; that’s okay. You matter. Grieve. Share with a safe and significant other in your life. Process. Find your purpose. Share your experience, strength, and hope with those who are where you were five or ten years ago, or even if you’re new at grieving. We still contribute to the discussion. What you have to say in your deepest angst or at the apex of the parabola where everything works is important to move the discussion along.

People are afraid of grief. We must normalize grief in the public perception. Sadness over the loss of a significant person in our lives is absolutely normal. So, why then do we race to get to a place where it doesn’t hurt anymore? I’ve learned grief is a necessary process throughout life. I’m beginning to grieve a childhood rife with domestic violence. I’m grieving the fact that I will never have a childhood in which love, encouragement, safe limits (Know your limits – and by extension, set them for others too), or compassion for self and others.

It’s time to remove the veil of mystery from grief. Grief is an emotion like love or sadness; it is nothing to fear. Every experience we have ever had or will ever have changes us. Change can be good. Navigating painful experiences gives us greater perspective.

My son’s birthday was on Monday; it was a difficult day. His son’s birthday is on the same day, and our grandson went to an amusement park with his mother for a mom and son date. This is the first time I didn’t have Louie on his birthday, but we met up later that evening. I grieved for my son and all the lost potential in his death’s wake. I grieve that he did not get to start over and have a victory story. My strong warrior was here with me for a season. I’ve been here for myself in many manifestations, the bipolar spaz, the bitter woman, the terrified child in a woman’s body, and the hand reaching upward for another through the rubble of my rough beginnings. I both grieve and celebrate each person I was required to be to get through those rough beginnings.

I grieve the necessary losses; I let go of them so I can grow and self-actualize into the woman the Creator God of my Understanding created me to be. When you begin to let go of survival traits that no longer serve you, make sure to give them a proper burial. They kept you alive all these years, like they kept me alive. Namaste.

By Sherrie Kolb-Cassel

Dedicated to Timmy Craddock

There are few times in life when total self-absorption is understood; grief provides us with such an opportunity, for the most part, by compassionate friends, family, clergy, and those who are in the mental health professions. There are some people who won’t get it, but at the end of the day, grief is a very unique, unpredictable, and often times, lengthy process. Seven years and seven months have passed since I lost my son, and in the early days of grief I didn’t even know there was a world outside of my grief. I mourned heavily, and for a painfully long time. I get it.

I sometimes go off track on this page, and grief is put aside for something that I just must get off my chest, but I try to keep this page about grief, and about issues surrounding the grief process, including my own emotional topography. I pray that I reach some and am able to offer comfort and hope. I’m going to be completely selfish this morning as I begin grieving for one of my son’s childhood friends: Timmy. He and my son were best friends from the time they were seven-years-old, and as life would have it, they didn’t see much of each other once they married and had children.

Timmy died on Friday. In my heart, and because I need to, I believe that Rikki and Timmy have found each other again. I find some comfort in that. I know Timmy’s mom might not feel that comfort for a while, but one day, she may find comfort through some other belief she may hold. I don’t know. There were four to whom I referred as the Fab Four: Rikki, Timmy, RJ, and Bobby V. They were little boys together, and now there are only two of them. I think my son was the only one who would be forty this summer, in a few days, actually. I don’t think the other boys (men) are going to be forty until next year. Timmy, like my Rikki, didn’t make it to forty, and they both left children, Tim, an adorable little girl, and my Rikki, left us a beautiful grandson.

I have learned in seven years and seven months that life is neither fair nor unfair; it is neutral. Certainly, there are causes of death, for example, my son struggled with addiction, and congestive heart failure from years of substance use disorder was his cause of death. Addiction was just minutiae. Many people struggle with addiction, and some make it alive, and some don’t. My son was one of those who did not, as the outcome of random chance. As an optimist, I try to find things for which to be grateful in every circumstance, and in the beginning, I was just one giant ball of misery, and there was nothing that would bring me comfort, and so my ability to be grateful didn’t happen until much, much later in my grief process. I’m talking three and a half years of despair over the loss of my son.

I come from a Christian/Roman Catholic background and have always tried to gain my strength from my faith tradition. Sometimes I manage, and sometimes I flail because I forget I have an anchor. I was drowning in grief, and I just didn’t think I’d make it one more day; losing Rikki was more than I could bear at the time. I froze during that time, and I stopped growing; I stopped living. I know what a parent goes through when he or she loses a child. I don’t, gratefully, know what it’s like to lose a spouse. I don’t know, again, gratefully, what it’s like to lose a sibling. I’ve lost friends. I lost my father nearly twenty years ago. I don’t know if grief is grief is accurate and we cannot truly compare one type of grief against another. I’ve learned that too.

My heart is heavy over losing a kid I’ve known since he was just a little tyke. I have so many fond memories of Timmy and Rikki. They were a pair. Timmy loved my sopa de fideo (a Mexican soup) – and he loved to come over when he knew I was making it. We started having sopa parties just for Timmy. He loved comic books and loved to spend ALL of his money at Bubba’s Comic Store in Fallbrook.

No one made my son laugh harder when they were kids, only Timmy and I. Timmy spent a lot of time in our home, and I missed their friendship when their lives changed so much they no longer spent time together, and when Rikki’s addiction spiraled out of control, they lost touch with each other completely. Timmy went to Rikki’s celebration of life, and he was just distraught. How do you lose a childhood friend with whom you were as close as brothers?

I’m really hurting this morning. My heart grieves with Timmy’s family, especially his mother. There is no elegant way to enter the grief process; it is the ugly cry, the snotty nose from sobbing, the guttural moans when the sobs get as heavy as they can without you losing your mind. It’s not pretty. The only people I’ve ever seen escape the initial despair are stoic in their psychological composition. I’ve also seen them lose it years later because death creates an absence that is felt so deeply the pain will rise to be recognized and worked through. I wanted to race through the grief process, but I kept stumbling and crawling around on bloodied knees from begging God to take my pain away. Well, I carry it still. The intensity has lessened, but I will always feel a pang of pain when the realization that, even after seven years and seven months, Rikki is not here, and he’s not coming back to me in this lifetime.

Timmy’s death brings back all the early days of grief for me. I want to hug Timmy’s mom and assure her that one day, she will find her way out of the darkness of hardcore grief, but those of us who grieve know there are no words that will comfort one into peace in the beginning. I’m conflicted by my heartbreak over Timmy, and the memories of when I was a newly bereaved parent. Triggers arise from time to time, but they no longer level me; Timmy’s death has. I remember Louie, at six-years-old, losing his daddy, and the confusion and utter pain he experienced. I know Timmy’s daughter will miss her doting father. He was so proud of her.

I didn’t get to know his wife, but they were together for a very long time, and I pray for her heart too. I am grieving alongside his family. He was a wonderful friend to my son. I have missed him for years, but there was always the possibility we might plan a gathering to which he would come; there is no longer a possibility for that to happen.

Life is so short, and sometimes things happen that level us for a time, but we can’t stay there. Life insists on its continuance, through the promise of new life, babies being born, buds on flowers, seeds falling to the ground and growing in the uncanniest places. Yes, life insists on being lived. Tim’s family will carry on his legacy. I understand he suffered for a couple years with his diagnosis. I hate knowing that he suffered. I thank you for letting me begin processing the loss of another loved one.

Pieces of my son’s childhood passing on into the mystic are difficult for me; the losses take me back to the most significant loss of my life. I just read that Peewee Herman died, Paul Rubens. He was a part of Rikki and Timmy’s childhood. Life speeds ahead whether we participate or not.

Please participate in your life; it’s so short.

By Sherrie Cassel

The year my Rikki died we lost four other people within five months of his death. A dear friend, Jose, Ben’s sweet mom, a former student of Ben’s, and our dear brother, Russell. It was a shitty year, to be sure. I don’t believe in the fates, or maybe I do. I don’t believe that shit befalls us because of some giant white guy in the sky playing with our circumstances willy nilly, or that the god in whom I placed my trust as a child, out of terror, has it out for me. People die, and often those are people we love with all our might.

I just lost two friends over the past couple months, and one just a few days ago. I told Louie, and he said, “Wow, *Grandmammy, do you realize you had a lot of people die over the past year?” And I assured him that we are not “cursed” – I told him that shit happens, and I’m at the age when people die, those who raised me or watched me grow up, and random chance is no respecter of persons. We lose people we love, and then we’re left to pick up the pieces of our shattered hearts.

Trust me, you all have watched me over the years grieve the loss of my beautiful and tortured son. You’ve seen, read, or heard me purge my pain as I’ve learned to live without him. Death is one of those inevitabilities we will each face, and as much apprehension as that certainty carries with it, that certainty is also a call to reach for the stars, and grab hold of whatever time we have left to traipse in the GOMU’s miraculous universe. Whatever you believe or don’t believe, this universe is wonderful, and I’m filled with awe when I “consider the lilies of the field” …and the quivering particles that make up our universe.

I’ve always been a nerd about nature and, in fact, being in the desert for nearly five years, after living in Fallbrook for forty-four years, and National City for 16 years, and after losing my precious boy, I needed to get away from places that were special to Rikki. I’ve been able to heal in the freezing winters and the blistering summers. I was dead inside after Rikki died. I was numb. I was apathetic. The desert has been the AED paddles I needed to restore me to wholeness.

I know there are some years when death just occurs far too frequently in our lives. Depending upon what we call our social/spiritual location, or how much we’ve learned to love ourselves, is relative to how quickly and how wholly we will heal. I know. I was a wreck after Rikki died, and actually, I was a wreck for the last four years of his life. When he died, I was still shell-shocked from the addiction years.

I love what a friend said today after losing someone remarkably close to him, “He’s home with his ancestors.” I like that. My father said that he would know it was his time to go when his parents came to get him. The night he died he said his parents were in the room and he called out for his father. Indeed, my grandfather, and Daddy’s grandfather, mother, friends, the grandmother with whom he was closest were all present.

I’ve tried since my own healing began to be a comfort to others who’ve lost a loved one, or who are losing a loved one. Death may be final for some, and they may even find comfort in the cessation of pain, emotional, physical, spiritual as the Ultimate and final experience. Some of us need the certainty of a “place” – a sacred space where we’re reunited with the loves of our lives who have gone ahead of us.

When Junior Seau died, a bunch of his fans and family members did a paddle out because it held significance for the family. I had my son cremated, and I’ve had a few pieces of cremation jewelry given to me so I can carry his ashes close to my heart or in a beautiful ring I wear on my middle finger…on the left hand, because he was left-handed. See, we each find ways to comfort ourselves. Rituals are necessary during the grief process. I used to spark up one of Rikki’s favorite flavored wine cigars and I’d take a couple of puffs in memoriam.

In the Twelve Step programs, the advocacy toward sharing our experience, strength, and hope is encouraged. If you’ve got it, share it. Brené Brown said that one day, our tragedy would provide a roadmap for someone else to navigate her tragedy. I hope that’s what I do with my Grief to Gratitude blog. After the Storm is the blog for a very specific loss. Grief to Gratitude is for any type of loss and my goal for the page is to show that the recovery of joy after a tremendous loss is possible.

A friend of mine lost her life partner a few months ago and we lost a longtime friend to COVID a couple of months ago, and Soco, my bud, and sweet Sabina. We are born and we die. After taking for granted that Rikki and I would always have time to fix things in our life together, I don’t take anything for granted now. I almost lost my mom, yo. She’s 81-years-old, and she wasn’t ready to go. I’m glad she doesn’t have to – yet.

My father, as you know, what an abusive and broken person he was, but there were rare occasions when he tried to be a father; he gave me some compassionate and kind advice once. Rikki’s best friend, Louie Minjares, who he named our Louie after, had died when he was thirteen. The loss was devastating to Rikki, Louie’s family, of course, and his entire church family. I tried to be strong for Rikki who was absolutely crushed. But I have an expressive face. You know what I’m thinking the second I’ve thought it. It’s a curse. I cried all day while Rikki was at my parents’ house. My dad picked me up and saw how distraught I was, and he said, “**Shesh, when Momma and Daddy died, I thought I’d never be happy again, but then one day I woke up and even though it hurt, it didn’t hurt as bad, and even though I miss them every day, life goes on and it won’t hurt forever.” Whoa, who is this person and what has he done with my father?!

We all make mistakes, some tiny and some monumental, and best-case scenario is that we have an opportunity to make amends, even when the rejection of your apology might be your takeaway. I never could get my ex to get that. He said he was afraid to reach out to Rikki after a lifetime of absence from his life. I still think he should have tried, but that’s on him now. We all pay for the way we hurt each other. Live your life deliberately. Let the loss of your loved one be cause to awaken you to the brevity of life and how vitally important it is to celebrate the beauty in your life, and in the people who you share your life with.

My heart is broken for a friend who’s had some loss in his life today. There are no words with which to comfort someone who is in deep grief. The greatest strength comes from deep inside us, and it takes work to find ourselves on solid ground again. But – you can do it. Find a reason to get up every morning. Find your purpose, your calling, and go for it. Make your dreams happen. Life is so painfully short. Rikki was only thirty-two. Some of his friends who OD’d were even younger.

Death pulls the rug out from underneath us, and we are disoriented by grief for however long it takes us to get through the acute period. Once we stabilize and can see clearly through the tears, we can begin to rebuild.

We must rebuild. We must.

*Grandmammy is Louie’s new moniker for this old grandmother. (Teenage boys)

** Childhood nickname

By Sherrie Cassel

Last week, I discussed the book TOUCHED WITH FIRE by Kay Redfield Jamison, about mental illness and the artist’s psyche. Which came first, the penchant for creativity, the events preceding your creative streak, or some pathology in the brain In light of Sinead O’Connor’s death, I’m prompted to discuss my own creativity and my own mental illness. Suffice it to say, my creativity was born from terror, inappropriate sexual behavior, parentification, and just garden variety dysfunction; I’ve read of some families who make my family look like the Mexican Brady Bunch. No, really.

Writing has been my salvation. I had no voice when I was a child in the home of my family of origin. I’ve had some awful experiences in my sixty-one years, and as far as my faith tradition, well, let’s just say I’m one of those who was assaulted by clergy early in my life. I am a hybrid agnostic, which is to say, I both believe and doubt the existence of a god, but I really want to believe. Belief is in concert with the guiding light that kept my mother sane, despite the insanity in our home, and the abuse she took at the hands of my father. No one was exempt from his alcoholic wrath.

I wrote poetry about all manner of things. I read deep and dark books from the time I was very young. My sixth-grade teacher called my mom in for a conference. During the conference he told her I was reading books that were not age appropriate. I shudder when I see what kids are reading today. Information was only as quick as I could rifle through the card catalog, and hope the book wasn’t checked out. Today, they have information at the touch of their Smartphones. (And fewer parents monitoring what their children are inculcating).

I wrote darkly about many topics, and I spent more time reading Poe as a teenager than was emotionally healthy. I read about the desecration of our world and the depravity of humans. I read about psychology when I was a kid, trying to make sense of my chaotic and insane family. I read about the holocaust and the Vietnam War. I was just a kid dodging the shrapnel of my own childhood and finding that there were people, communities, countries that had it worse than I did.

I chose to not read books about child abuse until I was in my late twenties. I nearly had a psychotic break when I began to read my own story in the stories of others. I’m forever grateful for psychologists, which is why I earned my second degree in psychology, and my first one in Liberal Arts in the Social and Behavioral Sciences. We’ll get to what I’m doing now a bit later. Making meaning is the first step of healing. Giving your experiences narrative, bringing them to your conscious awareness, and sharing your experiences with a safe other, are vital, if you want to move forward and grab hold of that life you dreamed about your whole childhood, or during a dysfunctional marriage, or as you were engaged in high risk behavior and finding ways to hurt yourself.

I hope that Sinead left a note or a manuscript so we can learn from her own tortured mind. She lost her son eighteen months ago to suicide. I wonder if she also committed suicide because of her devastating grief. I get it. When I lost my son and only child, I seriously thought I would lose my mind. My heart physically hurt. I had no words with which to explain myself. I have been in and out of therapy since I was twenty-eight. I’m sixty-one now, so for a very long time. I am grateful for four of the several therapists I’ve seen over the years. I credit them with saving my life.

I read a book by Susan Forward called TOXIC PARENTING when I was twenty-eight; it left me raw, unnerved, and suicidal. I called a therapist I had met at a party who gave me her phone number, and I told her I wanted to kill myself. She reminded me that I had a sleeping child who would find me and be forever traumatized, and then she asked, “Can you hold on for one more night and meet me at nine a.m. tomorrow?” She threw out a lifeline, and I grabbed hold. When you grow up in a crazy and abusive household rife with domestic violence, it’s all you know. I spent the night at friends’ homes when I was a kid, and I was so terrified that the fathers of my friends would suddenly become enraged and hurt us, and when they didn’t, I wanted to run away from my family and find a family like some of my friends, a place where I’d be safe.

I still get a little tongue-tied when I’m stressed out, which is why my writing is so much clearer than my presentation skills. I write so I can express what’s going on in my head. What else do you do with a manic brain full of knowledge? I was emotionally unhealthy for many years. I couldn’t truly create until I healed from the abuses in my home, including the things I saw happen to other members of my family. As I said earlier, no one escaped my father’s wrath as he avenged his own abusive childhood by exacting his rage on us.

I’m grateful for the work that I and the four therapists who guided me did. I wouldn’t have had the emotional resources to navigate grief over losing my son to addiction and his broken heart if not for all the exhausting work we did together. my son suffered a great deal too. I think that Sinead, with all her mad creativity and talent, was grieving a relationship she never had with her mother, which she talked at some length about during interviews. She often seemed distant and disoriented during her later interviews. I followed her career since she first started performing and marketing herself. She was painfully shy, which is probably what fueled her public persona, the woman who tore up a picture of the Pope on national television. She was young, but I don’t think the Catholics or many other people, ever forgave her for it.

I honestly believe that a person can die of a broken heart, which is why it is essential after a major or catastrophic loss, including one’s childhood, to get counseling and to write, sing, paint, or dance away your pain. Put it out there on whatever medium your canvas is. Pour the contents of your childhood experience, the sexual assault, the domestic violence, and pour it out on your muslin … nuts, bolts, screws, and various other tools, and pore through them. Take out what you need. Take out what will benefit you toward an emotionally healthy and happy life.

When we are self-aware, we become cognizant of the choices we have. I don’t say, because I think it’s hurtful, that we get to choose to be happy. I’ve had it said to me when I’ve been in the depths of despair, and it just wasn’t helpful at the time. Michael J. Fox in his recent biopic, STILL, made a statement that really resonates with me. In short, he said, “Optimism is sustainable.” Optimism is vastly different from happiness. One can be in dire straits and still remain optimistic; it is from optimism that our creativity emerges because we begin to envision better circumstances, and dependent upon how healed we are, hope floats.

When we begin to be creative in our thoughts, in many cases, we can change our circumstances, no matter how scary doing so is because – we must if our lives are going to get better. There is a phenomenon called “learned helplessness” – and many of us who’ve grown up in violent and abusive homes learned well how to shut up and take it…it’s a behavior that will follow us until we get the help we need.

After Sinead tore up the picture of the Pope, she was ostracized in the industry. Kris Kristofferson took her under his wing and gave her venues in which to perform. If you want to see a life that began in a war-torn country, a relationship with a dysfunctional mother, creativity that was off the chart, someone who was challenged by mental illness, watch the interviews of Sinead through the years. They are quite telling as she began to mentally decline. She lost her baby … to suicide. It has been argued that addiction is suicide; I disagree. When coroners list a death as “accidental,” that assumes that it was not an intentional death. A suicide might even be more devastating, if that is possible, than to lose a child to other types of deaths. How do you cross the chasm from a tortured mind to the willful death of your loved one? What in someone’s life is so untenable that he or she would choose to end their life, dragging down everyone who loves them into the pit of a lifetime of grief.

Perhaps Sinead died of a broken heart.

I say frequently that one heals in proportion to one’s emotional health. Are you suffering from behavior you can’t stop or explain? Are you hurting yourself or others? Is someone hurting you? There’s help out there. 988 is the crisis hotline for suicidal ideation, or just to talk through a crisis with someone. If you have insurance, see a therapist asap. There are also free to low-cost counseling centers. I am so sad about Sinead. I have been dealing with grief since my son died seven years and seven months ago. I knew I could never kill myself, but I wanted to fall asleep and never wake up. My broken heart, at the time, was unbearable, and it seemed as if the pain was infinite.

I have done the work to be healed. I have reconnected with the Divine who some people call God, or who I call the God of my Understanding, the GOMU. I miss my son more than there are words with which to explain, but thanks to counseling, the GOMU, my husband, certain members of my family, and a couple of fearless friends, I have discovered that life goes on, and…”optimism is sustainable” (Fox).

I am often accused of being a “morning person” – because I’m an early riser and I’m “up” with a mania, usually, thanks to bipolar disorder, and I’m unfocused, and it takes a couple of minutes for me to self-soothe. I eventually crash and sleep for a few hours, but since my son died, I have mad insomnia. I use that insomniac time to write.

Creativity came to me through pain and because I needed to be heard. I needed to know that it really was as bad as I thought it was during my childhood. I wonder if Sinead ever came to terms with her relationship with her mother. Shortly before her son committed suicide, I saw her in an interview with the BBC, during which she was way out in left field. My heart ached for her.

There was a time when I had no self-awareness. I behaved inappropriately. I raged at the world and myself. I hurt myself in ways that were it not for self-love and self-compassion, I’d still hate myself for. If you are creative, where did it come from? Out of a deep need to be seen and heard? We must be able to tell our stories, to speak of our pain, to share our joy, and to help us to make sense of the effects of random chance. I wish Sinead’s son, Shane, had found his voice.

I’m glad I finally did.

So, what am I doing now? I’m in seminary in a spiritually integrated psychotherapy program. I managed to earn my A.A., my B.S., and I’m in a master’s program now, one class and an internship away from graduating, and then I’ll be applying to a Ph.D. program. I was able, thanks to hard work with therapists, and research, to rise above my grief and remember that I had a dream too. So do you.

Make it real.

Artwork by Gottfried Helnwein

By Sherrie Cassel

Years ago, I read a book called, “Touched with Fire: Manic Depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament,” by Kay Redfield Jamison. I read this because I was interested in my misdiagnosis at the time of depression, and I mistakenly thought depression and manic-depressive illness were the same animal; they are not. When I was first misdiagnosed with clinical depression, I was having an episode of depression, ranging from barely functional to so high on life, without substances, that I could not concentrate on anything for any length of time.

So, I was in a slump when my GP told me I was suffering from clinical depression, so he prescribed desipramine, an anti-depressant which sent me into a full-blown manic episode that lasted for five years. I scarcely remember those years; it’s tragic. Bipolar disorder is the mental challenge I navigate these days, on great meds, and happy as a lark.

I don’t blame the doctor. I was seeing a marvelous therapist, an MFT, who could not prescribe medicine at the time, and she recommended I see my GP to see if he would prescribe something to take me out of my slump; it was pretty severe. Well, it took me far from myself in a different way. I had energy to spare. I exercised obsessively. I was hyper-sexual. I was happy, all the time, but I would crash some time down the road when I was taken off the medication. I did well for a while, but then I would crash and burn from pushing myself so hard because the medication had me so energized, I could not manage to be in control of my mind and body. Fortunately, the Spirit is willing.

Psychiatric appointments were a rarity for someone on state assistance (because my loser ex-husband never paid child support). I didn’t see a psychiatrist until only nine years ago, and I’m sixty-one! I’m forever grateful to Dr. K. Samson; she didn’t see me for only medication management. She spent time with me and was genuinely interested, and terribly sensitive when I went in to see her after Rikki died. Most psychiatrists see you for about fifteen minutes every three months; it’s difficult to build a therapeutic relationship when you see someone only four times a year for fifteen-minute stretches.

Before I found the right combination of psych meds, I was a mess, like the Tasmanian devil from the Bugs Bunny cartoons (for those old enough to remember him). Or I’d be like a sloth and sleep away most of the day. Bipolar disorder is no joke. I’m glad I know about it now. I’m grateful to be on the right medication to keep me sane and stable. I just wish we’d known more about the disorder before I hurt a lot of people I love.

I’ve always been a writer, ever since I learned how. I authored a story about a town made entirely of pickles. I wrote it when I was seven. I graduated to really bad poetry, and finally found my niche in the essay. I thought about the people in Redfield-Jamison’s book, the Shelleys, Van Goghs, Byrons, ad infinitum, who have contributed to art, and how they were challenged with mental illnesses that were not understood at the time. I shudder to think about being held underneath freezing water to cast out demons or to wash one clean of mental disease. We’ve come along way in biopsychosocial and spiritual understanding of mental illness and we are lessening the stigma surrounding taking medications.

Some artists are hesitant to take psych meds because they believe their mental illness is the muse who fuels their creativity. Maybe. I don’t know. I can’t have a margarita and write with any cohesion at all. When I used to smoke marijuana, I wrote really terrible poetry. So, I’ve never been fearful of stopping an activity because I thought it would mute my muse. I think of Kurt Cobain, Robin Williams, Amy Winehouse, and other wildly creative artists who may have benefited from legally prescribed psych meds rather than self-medicating with substances that render the self incapable of thinking clearly. Creativity is a conscious and deliberate strategy using one’s medium or media of choice to get a message across, either from a very personal point of view, or a very distant one.

My husband and I are both literary artists, which is to say, we write about all manner of topics. He’s more political than I am, and I’m more vulnerable than he is — publicly. When the spirit moves me, I find that I must write. I must have silence; and I must be clear-headed. I don’t even want background music. Part of my bipolar disorder makes me very sensitive to sound. I hate it. I believe my psych meds help me to be a better writer because I can focus now on whatever task lies before me. At the seminary I attend, there is a hardcore writing push. I had several papers to write simultaneously for each of my classes. I wrote and wrote and wrote.

I have topics I love to research and to write about. I love learning. When I was taking desipramine my mind was a tangled web of confused synapses. I feel almost amnesiac about those five years. Is it good to lose five years, especially if those five years are wrought with humiliating stories of salacious behavior and alcohol consumption?

If backseats could talk.

I gave myself all sorts of self-deprecating monikers and I wrote about things that hurt me, and I wrote about them a lot.

Is the artistic temperament different from those who are not “creative?” I wonder. I have a difficult time isolating the variables. Was it DV that caused me to be so compelled to speak to the darkness in the world, or is it an innate temperament? Is it nature – or is it nurture? I’ve been asking myself that question for 31 years, and I know this question has been asked by philosophers and fools alike.

Is the artistic brain prone to unsettledness? Do we roam in the dark and then traipse in the written word to share our experience and the insight gained from them? If we give in to modern medicine, do we deny our voices, or are they tempered to the point they no longer are representative of who we are? I strongly encourage those of you who are artists and straddle the fence about psych meds, check out the book; it’s essential reading for those who struggle with the mental illness and for those who don’t feel good about themselves because of their mental illness. We’re in great company.

My son and I were estranged for about ten months, but we reunited shortly before one of his last birthdays. I was a full-time student at a local university in San Diego, and even through the utter heartache of the separation between my son and my grandson, I had the best semester of my academic life, 4.0 and on the Dean’s List. My heart was breaking though. I saw a therapist, Kelsey N., who was just dynamite. She pushed me to face some harsh realities. “What if your son never comes back to you? Will you collapse, or will you proceed to create a life of purpose and meaning?,” she asked me one evening in session. I was crushed. I felt defeated by the question. “What do you mean, IF he never comes back?” I wasn’t prepared to accept that as a possibility.

My semester ended and I had the Winter break off and I stayed in bed for a solid week. I got up to use the restroom and then I went back to bed and just slept an entire week away. I thought it was exhaustion from a difficult semester academically, but it was more than exhaustion. I am mostly manic, and I love my manias. I get so much accomplished. I was conditioned to crave adrenaline. I do my best work in a crisis. Our bodies get old and less able to handle all the stress hormones that flood them when we are faced with a scary challenge over and over again.

Nadine Burke-Harris, in her outstanding TED Talk, discusses the damage about how too much flooding of stress hormones is detrimental to the individual throughout the lifespan. I believe psych medication can help to calm a person, to self-regulate, to soothe oneself in an emotionally sound and emotionally healthy way. I also think that some people can manage without medication using mindfulness techniques, meditation, exercise, creating. I’m not suggesting that medicine is the answer for everyone; it was the answer for me.

I’m not a Van Gogh, which is to say, my mental illness has never caused me to chop off my own ear. Oh, to be sure, I’ve been self-destructive in other ways; I mean I do have twelve tattoos, and before the tattoo numbing cream, I had them done in full pain and agony. Who’s to say that the intentional infliction of pain in getting inked is not destructive? The psych world calls the behavior masochistic.

I create more and ever so much more with a clear head since I’ve been on medication. I don’t regret it one bit. I love the fact that my brain is at homeostasis most of the time now. I’m balanced and happy as often as I and my meds can achieve that happy place, where I’m free to be me and free to create to the best of my ability.

Not all who struggle with mental illness are self-aware enough to know what is happening in their brain, and so they live unconsciously, with one crisis after another, and never see that they do have some control over their reactions to circumstances, at least they have control over what is taking place in their emotional landscape. We can normalize with external resources, i.e., counseling, a curandera, a good friend, clergy, our out-of-control emotions when we reach critical mass. I love that breathwork has become so popular; it’s necessary. There is nothing thar brings you right smack dab into the present moment. When you’re concentrating on your breath and breathing at a pace and with the depth that feeds your brain enough to handle your shit, you can’t help but find yourself present in your life during moments of crisis.

I look back at how far I’ve come from a family of origin rife with DV and addiction. I married a loser the first time around, someone as damaged (still is) as I was. I got therapy; he didn’t. Divorce is a trauma, and even though it was the best possible thing for me and my son, it was still an economically devastating time for me and Rikki, and it was the end of the dream that I had been rescued from the DV in my home by a handsome prince.

Well, life turned out so differently from what I dreamed.

I will always be grateful to the therapists and Dr. Samson, the lovers who briefly (and some VERY briefly) touched my life, my amazing son and teacher, parents who tried, siblings who tried, the GOMU, a song I heard when I was only 10, a book I read when I was 30, and the one I’m reading now, the mountains that cry out the name of my Creator, and all experiences in my life have shaped me into the person I am today.

I’m not ashamed of my mental challenge (illness sounds so stigmatizing). An estimated forty million people in the U.S. are on psych meds, and about forty million more would benefit from them, as would our country. Five-hundred and sixty-four thousand in the U.S. are homeless on any given night, many of them challenged with mental disorders that make it difficult for them to navigate life well.

I also recommend reading anything by Gabor Mate and Bessel van der Kolk. We are in trouble here where our brilliant minds are shrouded by mental illness. I knew a man named *Abraham who attended a church I went to for a number of years. He would often burst out into uncontrollable laughter during the service and be otherwise disruptive. I often had to stifle a laugh when he laughed because I was thrilled that someone could be so unabashedly himself in the scrutinizing public eye. I spoke with him later in Sunday school, and he was really quite brilliant and articulate. He could pull it together for a few minutes, and then he’d say something that bordered on truly scary, and I was grateful I was not alone with him. He was homeless, and he needed medical and psychological assistance. He was murdered on the street by another homeless and emotionally challenged man.

If you’re challenged by a mental disorder, no harm, no foul, and definitely nothing to be ashamed of. In a country that boasts of its hegemony and it’s place in the global food chain, we are woefully behind the times in providing mental health to its citizens. I recommend NAMI as a resource. SAMHSA is another good resource. If you’re fortunate to scrape enough to pay for health insurance, please try to schedule an appointment with a mental health provider. If you are so inclined, meds are available. If you are an artist, you will always be one. You will find that you’re still compelled to share your truth, like Monet, or like Goya, and many shades in between. Creativity is in your DNA; it just is.

*Fictitious name

By Sherrie Cassel

She had a mastectomy yesterday. Her comment to me when she was first diagnosed with cancer was, “I’m 81 and I know I don’t need them anymore, but…”, as she drifted off to consider the way her life would change, not just her body. After surgery, in the recovery room, the first thing she said to me was, “It’s over, Mija.” We’re hoping the surgeon was able to get all the cancer, but we’ll just have to wait to get her margins back before we’ll know for sure; it was a very aggressive cancer. Scary times for the mother of four adult children, grandmother to an angel grandson, and great-grandmother to a great grandson. I know my mother is 81 and we don’t get to keep our parents forever, and I suppose we’re never ready to lose them, but I’m hoping she lives to be a 100, at least, I hope, irrationally so.

I want to talk about the grief of losing a body part and how it is a similar experience to losing a loved one. I have a friend who lost a finger an eon ago, and she grieved her finger. I had a radical hysterectomy 30 years ago, and although my scar is pretty extensive, it’s in an area that is not visible to others. Along with the loss of my uterus came the loss of being able to reproduce. The loss of the miracle of childbearing was a tremendous loss. I was engaged at the time, and we wanted a baby together, but that didn’t happen. I couldn’t hold babies, not even toys for a couple of years after the loss of my uterus. The loss was a blow to my femininity, just as it is for my mother. When the physical loss is visible to others, it is particularly devastating. Breasts are important sex traits. We put a lot of stock in them. Not only are they instrumental in childrearing, but they identify us as women.

Another friend of mine had a cancerous leg amputated a few years ago. She lost a vital part of herself, and there are limitations she has now that affect every aspect of her life. Along with the phantom pain, which is quite severe, is the fact that the rest of her life she will be adjusting to those limitations as new ones crop up on the daily.

See, as much as those of us who’ve lost a loved one with whom we shared a primary relationship, there are many things for which to grieve. I don’t rank reasons to grieve; I just know there are more reasons to grieve than just my own greatest loss, the loss of my precious son. Those of us who know a thing or two about grief, with a big G, i.e., the loss of a child, spouse, etc., or the loss of a home, ad infinitum, understand like no other how lifechanging losses can be. I’ve lost friendships in which I was wounded, but the adjustment period to the loss was not significant. I have many friends and many relationships I nurture, so moving on was easy. I do not have another child in whom I can pour myself. Grief occurs in gradations, different levels of intensity, and depending on our ability to tolerate tragedy, it is long- or short-lived.

When we lose a part of ourselves, a body part, or a person, we will grieve. I can speak in terms of a cancerous uterus and how essential it was to remove it, despite the emotional cost. I can speak in terms of the most monumental loss for me, the loss of my son and only child. David Kessler’s book FINDING MEANING: THE SIXTH STAGE, was so helpful to me as I began to make meaning of my loss. I had to ask, “What now?” “How do I want the rest of my life to play out?” “Where do I go from here?” and finally, “How long must I grieve before I start to feel better?”

Each of these questions required the personal will to pull myself out of the deep grief I was in and find a way to normalize it, make it tolerable, and still maintain a wonderful life. I agree, it took herculean strength, or for my womenfolk, it took the courage of a Joan of Arc to reel in my out-of-control grief and tame it to a tolerable level. Grief can be hell, but it is not sustainable 24/7; I believe we would die both emotionally and physically to stay in that emotional space. I know from my own experience, the pain felt physical…and I responded physically. I know what it was like for Rachel, from the Hebrew Bible, to howl in grief; it is a grief felt around the world, in every culture. We may handle it differently from one another, but it’s a universal experience. I once read that elephants mourn the deaths of members of their parade (collective noun for elephants, one of three: herd and memory can also be used). I like the use of parade because it illustrates a celebration for life as our homeostasis, with a temporary period of mourning/imbalance. My own parade was temporarily halted, for about three and a half years before I was able to handle those existential questions I mentioned earlier.

My mother is returning home a changed woman, in every way a human can be changed. We grievers are forever changed by our losses, big and less big. Loss is a trauma to the soul and the body. I told my brother this morning, that the loss of an intimate loved one is a detonation to your soul; it rocks you, sometimes for a long time, sometimes for a lifetime. I didn’t want the latter for my life; I want to be happy and to enjoy life, but at some point, it is largely up to us the speed with which we heal.

I can’t emphasize enough the importance of educating yourself about the dynamics of grief; it helps to know that others have found transformation and transcendence after the loss of a loved one or a limb, or some other significant loss. I see the commercials with veterans and amputations from one of the many wars we’ve had in my lifetime. I see their courage, and the urgency they have to live a full life, in spite of the physical adjustments they must now navigate. I recommend reading victory stories from others who have incurred a similar loss to yours. Create a blog, write, paint, dance, sing, and weep as the need arises. The adage, “This too shall pass” is true. We’re not meant to mourn for a lifetime. We are here to enjoy life and to connect to the Sacred, whatever that means to you.

Find your medium/media and create beauty from your pain. I couldn’t sleep and was up reading the Book of Lamentations in the Hebrew Bible. Jeremiah (and other scribes) lamented the loss of the esteem his country had previously enjoyed. He grieved loudly and intensely. He asked the God of his understanding why he had turned his back on Judah. Maybe we all search for someone or something to blame when we incur a monumental loss, how could this be, we ask ourselves. We lament over the losses, and in my opinion, having an internal locus of control that emits courage and emotional resilience will create a post-traumatic growth that helps us to flourish in our lives.

May it be so.