On Anger

By Sherrie Ann Cassel

“I think it’s your own choice if you turn from an angry young man to a bitter old bastard.”
~Billie Joe Armstrong~

At the dawning of grief, the earth continues to spin, the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, babies are born, people go about their business, and no one waits for you to heal. You may want to lash out at those whose lives are going on without you because in the early days, you simply cannot participate in life, as a matter of fact, you can’t even force yourself to merge back into life.

After a time, you may become angry, and need something or someone to blame. If you were raised with a concept of a god who has been characterized as a healer, you may wonder why your god did not heal your child, and if that is the case, how can he/she heal you? I was angry at the god I had been conditioned to believe in. I yelled at him, told him exactly what was on my mind, even used expletives. I was hopping mad. If god was omnipotent, why, in the name of all that is holy, did he/she not work a miracle in my child’s life?

I think once you’ve been through the loss of a child, you develop a different concept of God. God, for you may become more prevalent in your healing process, and he/she may morph into what you need to move toward peace and acceptance. And for some, god becomes a myth. Your healing process is yours alone, and whatever you choose to be your rock is deeply personal.

I think it’s easier to blame an externality than it is to hold our children accountable for the choices they made. I contend, however, at some point those who struggle with addiction no longer have choices. Their bodies are prisoners to the disease, and they are irretrievably lost. A miracle, the one God didn’t work in your child’s life, did not happen, and it is the only thing that could have saved them; there was, however, the initial choice to use. I can’t blame the god of my understanding for that.

One of the most difficult, in my opinion, but necessary components of the healing process is to put some of the responsibility for your child’s death on him or her. To do this does not mean you don’t love them, or you have no empathy for their struggle with addiction that led to their death; it means you are willing to relinquish some of the blame you assign to yourself, and thus work toward your own healing.

I think being angry at ourselves, at God, at our child’s dealers, friends, your spouse, or society is so much easier than being mad at your child who has died from addiction. I know on the death certificates the cause of death is listed as “accidental”, and that is an accurate call, in my opinion. Did they mean to die? No, they did not. Their minds were so locked into using, not using was scarier than dying. I guess it is human nature to want someone to blame for when things go painfully wrong. I have blamed myself for nearly three years; perhaps it is time to accept that my son had some choice in the manner in which he died.

I have been angry with my son off and on for nearly the entirety of his departure from my life. He left behind a six-year-old son who will now grow up without a father, no male role model to teach him the ropes of life. I am angry about that. I am angry he left me to mourn his loss and to grieve for the rest of my natural life. I am angry because he had mad potential to be anything he wanted to be, but he died in his disease before he could bring his dreams to fruition. I am truly and honestly angry about that. He was beautiful and needs to be here with all of us who love him; but he is not.

Anger is not a place you want to stay, however. I think it’s healthy to allow anger toward your child to awaken you to the liberating truth that you are not wholly responsible for your son or daughter’s choice to use . As parents, it is natural to blame ourselves for not being able to save our children. But what it boils down to, in my opinion, is that we are angry with ourselves because we allowed our children to go out into the big, bad world without us holding their hands and leading them to safety. We think, “I had one job, to take care of my child, and I let him [her] down.” He or she is gone because we failed as parents, right? Nope.

Every grieving parent experiences the gamut of emotions differently, from rage to peace, and those emotions are unmercifully unpredictable. I’ve raged at the God of my understanding, because I didn’t want to be angry with my son. I raised my son up after his death to the status of a demigod, or at the very least, an angel. He was the love of my life, my only child. How could I possibly be angry with him? The painful reality is that he was human. He was beautiful, my shining star, but he was imperfect. He was moody, sometimes grumpy, often rude. He did not have the fortitude to say no to drugs. He was unkind during the eye of his storm. I was the reason he chose to use, he would say, and while I do assume some of the blame, it was he who chose to destroy himself with drugs and alcohol. Yes, of course, I have allowed my anger to be directed toward my demigod, my angel, my perfectly imperfect son, and that hurts, but if I am to heal, I must make absolutely certain that I not assume one-hundred percent of the blame.

I guess at some point we all have a choice to make. Do I want to be at peace with my child’s memory or do I want to stay angry and grow bitter? Bitterness is a choice, and I know we can do better than that. I have bursts of anger toward my son, and I have bursts of idealism about him. I love him to the ends of the earth, but to not assign him some of the blame is to not allow myself the relief of letting go of the blame I hold for myself, and it will only serve to stifle my ability to grow from the death of my child.

I have made myself sick by taking on all the blame. There is nothing good about being, and in particular, staying angry with yourself. I suggest that we let go of the anger as often as we can. When we become angry with our children, do it quickly and then – let it go. Don’t worry if you find yourself doing this several times over the course of your life; it’s a natural part of the grieving process. The important thing is to acknowledge our emotions, examine them, ask ourselves if they are helpful or hurtful, and if the latter, release them. We will catapult our healing process; I guarantee it.

The Gift of Grief

I think grief is a gift we give to ourselves; it’s a time of deep reflection and for strategizing how we will emerge stronger, more insightful, and loving people.

I would be lying if I said I no longer have those grueling days of grief; I do. I don’t stay there as long as I used to, but I still have them. The holidays are difficult when a vital part of your celebration is no longer with you. How do you honor him or her when there is an empty chair at the holiday table? How does your heart handle it when, perhaps, the head of your table is no longer there to light the candles, carve the turkey, or pass out the presents underneath the tree? How does your heart feel when you are painfully aware that your child is no longer here to add to the laughter with his joyful presence?

It’s difficult, to say the least.

I have been in a funk for two days. My husband and I went out to buy our Christmas tree and wrapping paper for our grandson’s gifts. I was so happy when we set out on our holiday shopping trip. I am anxiously anticipating our grandson’s visit. He is the child of my son who passed away nearly three years ago. He looks like my son. He acts like my son. He is a piece of my son.

Christmas was a very special season for Rikki. He loved buying thoughtful gifts for everyone. He was very generous, and he was more excited about giving than he was about receiving. He loved making the holiday turkey which was always perfect. I got to celebrate the holidays with him for 32 years. I haven’t really had time to grieve properly during the holidays, and I think that grieving during this time is necessary. I’ve heard about people setting a place at the table for their deceased loved one. I’ve heard about creating new practices, some wildly different from the traditional ones they had spent with them.

I have a grandchild who is only nine years old. He was six when my son died. I have made the holidays special for our grandson, and I shed a few tears after he has gone to bed. I had nearly one year to prepare myself for the first Christmas without my son. He died in January of 2016. I have asked each member of my family to say one good memory about my son on the major holidays, and on his birthday. I no longer choose to do anything on the anniversary date of his passing; I choose to remember the beautiful memories instead, and I work hard to keep myself busy on that day. I may break down at some point during the day, and I never know how I’m going to respond in that 24-hour period. One minute at a time…

The three-year mark is coming up on January 22^nd. I find it very difficult on some days to believe three years have gone by, and I don’t tick away the days on the calendar, punctuated by the worst day of my life. I sometimes can comfort myself with the perspective of the liberation of his Soul from the oftentimes pain, drudgery, heartbreak, and illnesses in this world.

The grief process is lifelong, I suppose; mourning does not have to be. I have triggers that knock the wind out of me from time to time, but they don’t have to keep me breathless and defeated. Staying down is a choice we make. Grief surges and recedes without warning. Often, I hear a few notes of a song, and they pierce my heart and I clutch my chest and wait for the pang to subside. I always recover, thankfully.

Life is one long fluctuation of sadness and joy, and best-case scenario, an occasion of homeostasis, a time of supreme balance, a gift from your Higher Power, however you define that. I am limping toward the Light today, but I feel it on the horizon of my heart. In my world, healing takes work, and I want healing; I demand healing.

I know the metamorphosis analogy is a tired, old metaphor, as is the Phoenix rising, but rekindle them in your life, through the lens of a person who has been through the fire of rebirth, emerging from the rubble and the soot with a refined heart and a mind that is courageous with clarity. Sometimes those moments of clarity are flashes, and sometimes, after a tremendous amount of grief work, they are sustainable for longer periods of time. I want that clarity as often as I can bring it to the surface.

It’s a new day, and the sun is shining, warming the cool desert air. Tonight, we are expecting weather that is slightly below freezing, and for Californians, San Diegans in particular, that is brutal weather. But I will be inside my warm house, remembering my son and looking at pictures of him that make me happy, and having a soothing time of self-care and a hot cup of tea, embraced by the gift of a love that lasts forever.

One step forward, two steps back…

In the Interstices

https://centering.org/magazine-articles/article/2018/07/09/in-the-interstices-between-love-and-grief

From Trauma to Transformation

In the early to mid-eighties there was a counselor, educator, and motivational speaker named John Bradshaw. He wrote books that made claims which would later turn out to be quite controversial. I read, Healing the Shame that Binds You, when I was in my mid-twenties. To be honest, I never really got caught up in the controversy. Bradshaw’s words for me were acknowledgment that my childhood was rife with domestic violence. His words affirmed for me that I wasn’t crazy or that I was to blame for the abuses.

I will forever be grateful for his books,and in particular, that one. Later, around the same time, Melody Beattie’s books about codependency came out; Susan Forward wrote a book called, Toxic Parenting, and Ellen Bass wrote a book called, Courage to Heal: A Guide for Women Survivors of Sexual Abuse. I was hoppin’ mad, and I was fully armed.

In light of my newfound knowledge, I was very angry for a very long time. I was cynical and had an extremely caustic tongue. I chased potential suitors away because I was “tired of taking shit” — and “no one would ever hurt me again.” I was avenging my childhood and I was, even though I didn’t realize it until much later, in grief, and that grief would last many years; it lasted until I was ready to let go of the anger enough to move forward and away from the pain.

How is this analogous to the grief when you lose a loved one? I lost the child I was supposed to be at the time I was supposed to be her. I have gaps in my memory, especially the good ones I hear about from my siblings. “Do you remember…?” is a painfully difficult question to answer, because the answer is almost always, “No.”

I remember the abuse, but I don’t remember the laughter, the tender moments, the adventures, bonding in a healthy way with my parents. I never got to be a child, and as a result, the joy of “acting like a kid again” is not a finely tuned social skill I developed.

How do you grieve an apparition? I am a strong proponent of therapy. As a psychology major and person who has spent a significant number of years in therapy, I am hyper-aware of its benefits.

Spirituality, not religion, has helped guide me through my grief process. There’s a still small voice in each of us that has only our best interests at heart. Listen to it. Call it God or Spirit, or whatever name summons the Sacred in your life. Give it the opportunity to help you heal. I have vacillated all 56 years of my life about God/No God/Maybe a God. I have a fair amount of agnosticism, but I do believe there is something holy that animates each of us. Is it the need to survive? I wouldn’t argue against that point.

Walter Bradford Cannon brilliantly named the process of survival modes during stress: fight, flight, or freeze. I am working toward my B.S. degree, and I have one class left before it will be conferred upon me, so what I’ve learned is rudimentary, at best, and I learned it in undergraduate psych classes and from books for which I have a voracious appetite. The best insight I have is into myself , borne of the various and painful experiences that have brought me to this very moment.

My current hypothesis is this: Although with each advance we make in the behavioral sciences, change is certainly a given, but perhaps grief is the freeze part of the triad that keeps us safe until we are able to deal with the loss of a loved one, even if the loved one is you. The freeze mode is a time when we are unable to move because of deep emotional distress. We are in stasis until such a time as we find our way back to life again. In essence, we are lost to ourselves, to others, and to life.

There are all kinds of ways to be lost, however, lost in a marriage, lost in motherhood, lost in your work, losing a part of your body. When I had my hysterectomy years ago, I couldn’t even look at dolls in department stores afterward, because the loss of being able to have another baby was difficult to adapt to in my utter grief.

Grief is not specific to one type of loss, and whether it is because you lost a loved one, or a very important part of your life, grief is there, in my opinion, and in my experience, to hold you in a safe place until you can move forward. Losing a person, an ideal, one’s reputation, a body part, ad infinitum makes it difficult to move forward. You have lost an aspect of yourself you believe was what gave you your identity, and how do you go on without that person or thing that you believe made you who you are?

When the convulsive sobs subside, when the social isolation is no longer necessary, you can choose to plunge into life, find interests that help you to rebuild your identity, to enhance your former self, and to embrace the new one.

I don’t adhere to the “fake it ’til you make it” approach. I think you do what scares you even if it hurts. Life waits for no one, and in between the willful need to hold on to your anger, pain, grief, and your inevitable wild transformation, is stagnation. Stagnating is not how I want to spend the rest of my life.

I am 56 years old and I spent the first 39 years of my life enraged about the abuse, about the loss of my childhood, about all of the ways I had allowed myself to remain a victim. I walked out of that calloused shell of a human being and allowed my radiant light to shine in me, through me, and toward others.

To sum up this post, there is no answer for why shit happens or to whom it happens. In my experience, it is just the luck of the draw. I was not and am not a victim. I was not at the whim of a punitive god. None of us is. We live in a rough and tumble world, and bad things happen, and once you are fortunate enough to have that epiphany, you get tired of every little thing being a trigger that holds you prisoner to the past. It is we who control our thoughts; they don’t control us. Once I discovered that I am the only one who can change me, I softened a bit. My mind opened up and I have been filling it with edifying things ever since.

I have learned to love my little girl self. She kept me safe and locked herself away until I got healthy enough to bring her into the sunlight. I love the angry teenager and woman who kept me safe as I learned to allow transformation to take place. Anger at life, and not taking shit from anyone is not equal to courage; it serves only to mummify our spirits as they rot in the layers of hypervigilance.

I want to live. I want to thrive. I want to work though the stages of transformation, even when it hurts. I want to get to the other side of my grief, and be the kind of person who loves with my whole heart and helps others find his or her purpose — just as I have found mine.

Not Choking Down the Turkey

**Some people see a weed; some, a million possibilities.**

My son made the best turkey. He had his own recipe that included lemons and a lot of garlic. He would keep a watchful eye over it until it was ready to serve to the family. I taught him to make his first turkey when he was 11-years-old, but every time he’d tell the story about the origin of his culinary prowess, he got younger and younger, until I finally said to him. “Actually, you came out of the womb with a turkey in your arms.” He was not amused.

If you had asked me how I was going to spend my Thanksgiving day three years ago, I would have excused myself and found a place to sob. Holidays are tough the first year, and the second year, and depending on your emotional resources, holidays either get better or they get worse.

A couple of years ago, I would not have been able to tell any stories about Rikki; it was just too painful. I would avoid all social gatherings, even those with loving and supportive friends and family. I was irretrievably lost in my pain. My eyes were swollen from crying daily. I just wanted to sleep and shut the world out. It’s what you do when you lose a child. What else is there, right?

I couldn’t entertain the possibility that I might actually be able to enjoy an American holiday and not choke down the turkey. It is the right course of action to grieve the loss of a loved one. It is natural to go into a time of mourning, when there is truly nothing that will comfort you. I remember.

I was well-supported by friends, but I still felt alone. Who can comfort a person whose heart has been shattered? I know the heart and the brokenness are just metaphors, so why then does it hurt in your chest? Because pain affects our physiology as much as it affects our metaphors. Breathing through pain is very helpful. Breathing is also necessary to life, a burgeoning and thriving life.

I can’t pinpoint a date when I started to come out of my abysmal grief. I remember saying to myself and to others that I would never get over losing my son, and that I would never accept that he was gone. I held on with all my might, until I realized I was hurting myself, and pushing people away. To be honest, I was glad when the casseroles stopped coming. I didn’t want to have to deal with anyone. I did not navigate grief very well the first year. I didn’t think I was going to make it…but I have.

One day and 104 weeks later I woke up, in more ways than the literal sense, and I asked myself, “What happens next?” I had finally accepted that my son had died and he wasn’t, like Lazarus, going to be miraculously resurrected. Trust me, when your heart is in excruciating pain, you bargain for unrealities, but then one day, the intensity of your pain begins to lessen, and you notice the smile on your husband’s, wife’s, and children’s faces again and you want to share in their joy, and you feel like you finally can. The sunrise, the sliver of moon in the sky is analogous to the first inkling of light you see after being in the dark for a long time, because you really thought you’d never see that light again.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving in America. It’s a day we count our blessings and allow gratitude to be the spirit of the day. I thought I’d never be able to be grateful again. Grateful for what? My son, my only child is gone. What do I have to celebrate now? Three years ago I might have answered that with a big, fat nothing. It’s been an arduous journey, to walk out of a life of visceral pain and into one where joy is still a possibility.

I have much for which to be be grateful. Some grievers and some spectators of my grief might find that difficult to believe. How can you go on without your loved one? You can, eventually. I like to think of grief as a place to germinate. I also have a greater appreciation for Frida Kahlo’s agonizing painting where she is giving birth to herself. It’s about as accurate and intimate an expression of someone coming out of mourning, and rediscovering his or herself, than I could ever possibly articulate in words. Transformation doesn’t come without some measure of pain, but, oh, the rewards when we ride it out to the other side where joy and peace abound.

I have been on cloud nine for several days now. No reason I can think of. Tomorrow is also the 34 month mark of my son’s passing, but instead of a dirge, I’ve been there long enough, I will join in the festivities, thankful for how my son touched my life, and for how much we loved each other. Tomorrow I will enjoy the company of friends. We will eat, drink, and be merry. I am looking forward to the celebration, and for that very reason, I am grateful.

Grief as Catharsis

“Feelings, and feelings, and feelings. Let me try thinking instead.”

― C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed

Grief is labyrinthine at best. There are twists and turns, highs and lows, abysses and moments when you are able to take flight and soar toward the light. On January 22nd, 2019, it will be three years since I lost my only child. He was 32. He was the love of my life, and my best friend. To say grief has been a difficult journey is, quite frankly, a devastating understatement.

There were days I could barely breathe from sobbing uncontrollably, and I cried for nearly an entire year after he died. I must say his name; doing so is important to me. His name is Rikki. Acknowledging my child’s name, life, and death are now adornments I wear like a string of fine pearls, originating from the irritation of a grain of sand, and culminating into a thing of beauty. If my pearls are admired and inquiries are made about them, I will share a bit about my son. If no one mentions them, I am now content to join the party and shelve the need to speak about my son until a more opportune time.

People think grief is something that dissipates after a time on its own. This could not be further from the truth. Grief does become less intense after time, but the grief journey is a process that requires a tremendous amount of work if one is to begin healing from the loss of a precious loved one. The work can be grueling, and there are days when the prospect of a sunny day seems inconceivable; it is exactly then the decision must be made: to heal or to continue hurting.

I miss my son more than there are words to convey from any lexicon. Please, don’t think I have chosen healing easily. I pushed that burdensome stone of grief up that mountain only to roll back to the bottom of it into the pit of despair, and I did so many times.

I decided one day that the fetal position does not accentuate my best side.

Grief is a journey that can be traveled alone, although I don’t recommend it, or it can be accompanied by others who have incurred life-shattering losses. I don’t presume to judge how one navigates his or her grief journey. I can tell you only how I have traveled through the muck and mire of the visceral effects of grief, into the promised land where true healing takes place.

I was told by some people early in my journey I would never heal, that it was impossible to heal from the loss of a child. I don’t accept that. I will never accept that. I am healing in great leaps and bounds, despite the triggers that still moisten my eyes and clutch at my heart from time to time.

It’s been a long time since I doubled over in pain, and I choose to not live my life in that manner.

I choose life. I choose joy. I choose peace. I choose me.

And so we begin.

Welcome to [from] Grief to Gratitude

Grief is ubiquitous. Like REM sings, “Everybody hurts — sometime.” I lost the most precious person in my life, in all my lifetimes: my son, only child, and best friend. I’ve been navigating the grief process for nine and a half years at the writing of this blurb. I write about the improvisational nature of grief; it’s a day-by-day thing.

Some days we soar and some days we sink. I write about the ways we manage our grief from the sunbeams to dark nights of the soul. I’ve managed to create purpose from my pain. I went back to college and earned three degrees. I help raise our grandson. We have cats who entertain us for hours at a time. I spend time reading, writing, and visiting with people I love. Life is short; my son was only 32 when he died from alcoholism and heroin addiction.

Life is very short. In the interim between the time of our birth and the time of departure from this earthly trip, we must grab hold of all the amazing things life has to offer.

I miss my son more than there are words to express, but life goes on; it must. There’s still so much beauty, beauty we shared with our loved ones. Beauty they left behind for us to remember them. Their beauty shines through our lives…let’s do them proudly.

#grief

#grieftogratitude#rediscovering joyafteraloss#death#

#joy