Good Grief...

It's a topic I've written about a few times prior, with good reason. Some people who read my blog described it in an online group as "you mean that blog that's really deep and sort of sad at times, yeah I don't read it. It's not funny enough". Yes, that is my blog at times, but there's more, just not today.

I like Grey's Anatomy, it's far more than just another hospital soap opera, if you take in nothing else, the voiceovers the actors do at the beginning and/or ending of every episode are deep, thoughtful and extremely spot on. In this season they mourn the death of someone they all loved, he was a colleague, a friend, a lover.. they cover it over the course of 40 days. Think of that, 40 days. How long is the right time to mourn? What is the right way? Trust me, with real mourning, people will judge how, how long, where, when, why... I encourage those who put a style or timeline on grief to read the voiceover script below. As usual, Grey's captures the essence of the human spirit, the raw honest one that too many people gloss over, are quite frankly afraid of and undervalue.

According to Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, when we're dying or have suffered a catastrophic loss, we all move through five distinct stages of grief. We go into denial because the loss is so unthinkable we can’t imagine it’s true. We become angry with everyone, angry with survivors, angry with ourselves. Then we bargain. We beg. We plead. We offer everything we have, we offer our souls in exchange for just one more day. When the bargaining has failed and the anger is too hard to maintain, we fall into depression, despair, until finally we have to accept that we’ve done everything we can. We let go. We let go and move into acceptance.

The dictionary defines grief as keen mental suffering or distress over affliction or a loss. Sharp sorrow, painful regret. As surgeons, as scientists, we're taught to learn from and rely on books, on definitions, on definitives, but in real life strict definitions rarely apply. In life, grief can look like a lot of things that bear little resemblance to sharp sorrow.

Grief may be a thing we all have in common, but it looks different on everyone.

It isn't just death we have to grieve, it's life, it's loss, it's change. And when we wonder why it has to suck so much sometimes, has to hurt so bad, the thing we've got to try to remember is that it can turn on a dime.

That's how you stay alive. When it hurts so much you can't breathe, that's how you survive, By remembering that one day, somehow, impossibly, you won't feel this way, it won't hurt this much.

Grief comes in it's own time for everyone, in it's own way. So the best we can do, the best anyone can do, is try for honesty.

The really crappy thing, the very worst part of grief, is that you can't control it. The best we can do is try to let ourselves feel it when it comes and let it go when we can. The very worst part is that the minute you think you're past it, it starts all over again.

And always, every time, it takes your breath away.

There are 5 stages of grief, they look different on all of us, but there are always five.

denial
anger
bargaining
depression
acceptance

So think about this voiceover, take just a few minutes out of your busy day to think it over. I, like almost all of us, have experienced some horrible life altering events that I've grieved over. And in each one, a few weeks later or a few months later, there was always at least one person who judged me for how I processed my grief.

Processing grief is as unique as a fingerprint. And different does not mean wrong, different means they know what they need, we should celebrate that. Pressuring or rushing someone through stages faster than they need to, or in different ways than they need to, well you may be robbing the people you love of healing. And some day, that grief will inevitably come back to bite them in the ass.

We should all be more careful about how we influence the grieving process of others, as we may contribute to a nightmare later on in life for them. I know I was rushed through Sophia's death, I know people judged openly to me the how, the how long, everything. And in that fragile state I succumbed to these judgements. But those individuals were wrong in their actions. Period. They had no right to influence that process, their only right, no, their only privilege, was to support and stand beside me through the process and save their judgements for their own grief.

Even as recent as this summer, I found I still had people in my life trying, though not succeeding this time, to influence the how, the how long and the why of grieving some recent losses. For some reason they felt they had the right to judge my process of grieving. But I am stronger and recognize that the grieving process, as I learned with Sophia, if not done completely will come back to be finished later on. So those who judge, who don't listen to what's needed when asked, those who try to influence a different path, those who didn't listen when I clearly took risk and let them know what I really needed, well, sadly, they are not surrounding me right now. That is as much my choice as it is theirs. In many ways it's its own loss, one to work through later on.

And I hope, the ones I value most will be there on the other side. The best outcome regardless? Perhaps someday they realize influence on others grief is just as wrong as others influence on their grief.

So I ask you now the same question as in the beginning. Is 40 days too long or too short? I hope in your mind is the answer "depends on what that person needs".