One thing that has surprised me about grief is its publicness. I feel somewhat conspicuous now, like when I run into an acquaintance while walking in my neighborhood and they give me these sad puppy eyes, like they expect me to burst into tears any second. And sure, maybe I’ve earned that reputation as someone who tears up during Michael Bublé songs and certain Wendy’s commercials, but it’s still a strange feeling to be seen not first as someone capable but someone wounded. And despite what others may imagine, I’m not walking through life in a fog of tears now. My grief isn’t acute or sharp, it’s a dull heaviness. It feels like my chest has become an ironing board, grief passing back and forth over my sternum, a heavy flattening of life. Instead of sobbing like people expect, I find myself lethargic and snappy.
I’ve grieved aspects of my relationship with my brother for years, privately. But there is no hiding anymore. He’s dead and it’s like a machine has kicked on. People know what to say when your loved one dies: sorry and how awful and can I help? I didn’t often tell people, “My brother is an alcoholic;” enough awkward conversations taught me most people don’t know what to do with that. The last thing I wanted when discussing my brother’s addiction was to leave a conversation feeling even more isolated, so I stopped talking about it. I told myself that it was just too much for “normies” to handle. Really, I think I worried that others would implicate me in his inability to overcome his addiction, like if I had just loved him enough or cared for him the right way, he could’ve found the strength to quit.
And that’s a lie, I know that. In the Judeo-Christian tradition, the devil is “Satan”—one translation of which is “the accuser.” While I don’t believe in things like bad spirits or little red men with horns, I do know this accusing voice in my head, and its favorite thing to say is that absolutely everything is my fault. So it’s not surprising that one of my reactions to my brother’s death is to wonder whether I could’ve prevented it.
The thing about this accusing voice is that it’s actually meant to protect us. Feeling guilty and neurotic keeps me monitoring my own behavior so closely that (hopefully!) there’s no room for anyone else to find fault with me—I’ve already uncovered it all!
The counterpoint to the accuser is the voice of the inner loving parent. Maybe this is what some people call God. Imagine speaking to yourself like you would your best friend or a beloved child. And that can be hard to do if you’re used to controlling yourself via the harsh inner critic, but it can be learned. Bit by bit, even in my deepest grief, I’m learning self-compassion.
My brother’s death has marked one of the few times in my life that it’s been hard to read. I typically read two or three books at a time, maybe sixty a year. This isn’t a brag so much as to say that I have a highly specific sleep routine that involves reading until I basically can’t keep my eyes open. Since Karl died, I’ve tried and put down several books; even my long-awaited library holds couldn’t keep my attention. Then I found poet Maggie Smith’s memoir, You Could Make This Place Beautiful. Smith’s account of her divorce is a good companion in grief; our experiences are different enough in scope but similar in feeling.
Towards the middle of the book, while Smith is negotiating a tough divorce settlement, the pandemic hits. She starts posting the phrase “keep moving” on her social media, along with encouraging notes for her followers. People were surprised by how viral these tweets were, but perhaps many of us were craving this kind of compassion. Smith eventually collected these notes into a book, which is next in my TBR pile.
Father Richard Rohr says that there are two engines of enlightenment: great love and great suffering. He adds that great love generally leads to great suffering. There’s something comforting in embracing the inevitability of suffering, in just letting it transform you in all the ways that it will—be it sobbing or snappy. Here’s the good bad news: you will suffer and lose, and so will everyone else. May our suffering remind us that we aren’t alone.
BONUS MATERIALS:
Kristen Neff’s quick video on the 3 elements of self-compassion
Maggie Smith’s gorgeous poem, Good Bones
links are a bit buggy, but here are 12 urban legends about Bill Murray
"Really, I think I worried that others would implicate me in his inability to overcome his addiction, like if I had just loved him enough or cared for him the right way, he could’ve found the strength to quit."
Feeling this. ❤️ Shaking my fist at our inner critics / Bill Murrays!
Thanks so much for sharing this perspective, Katy! My dad died from poor health assisted suicide (as I call when I like to make people squirm) three months into us resuming contact after having years of silence. I’d been mourning and grieving the loss of our relationship for such a long time, that when he passed I wondered if something was wrong with me for not grieving in the way I thought people expected now that my loss was truly visible.
By the by, having experienced both death and divorce I can say the parallels in grieving are strong. Adding the book to my reading list.