A Grief Observed, My Own Version
On my yoga app there is a young woman who fell 100 feet while climbing in Yosemite and she is now a paraplegic. There are five or six short videos of how she has adjusted to this new reality-- the wheelchair, the special adaptations to her car, her capacities and incapacities, her determination to live fully. She is reminded of her accident and the loss of her legs every minute of every day yet that is more of a springboard than a grave.
I have not been physically incapacitated by the death of my son-- I still walk and dance and stretch in downward dog like I've done for decades. You can't see the amputation, the loss, the extreme altering of my life just by looking at me-- but the fact that you don't see the hole in my heart doesn't mean it isn't there. And there.... there lies the challenge for someone who is grieving. An obvious wound wrapped in gauze, blood oozing through the bandage, elicits a visceral response from friends and family. They want to know how it happened, they make sure to place a chair with a pillow so you can rest your battered leg more comfortably-- the very nature of it being visible gives them something to focus on and attend to. But grief is a mystery. It lives inside and rarely makes an appearance and when it does it's much like an awkward, raging teenager or a suicidal relative that no one knows how to handle.
There is a strange dance between desperately wanting people to see that I am a grieving mother-- to connect with me on the level of love and loss-- and at the same time not wanting to be defined by this loss. I don't want to be the mother who lost her only child any more than the paraplegic wants to be the woman in the wheelchair-- but as I write that I'm not sure I have it right.
I remember an incredible video that was circulating a few years ago. There is a scene of a man backing out of his driveway and almost hitting a little boy on his bike-- he screams at the boy then drives away in frustration. Then a woman is waiting impatiently in a long line for a barista to make her coffee-- she rudely snaps up her coffee, muttering under her breath about incompetence. There are other scenes like this and then the same scenes are played over again but this time we are given information about what is going on in the person's life. The little boy's father just died. The barista just found out her mother has cancer. It's stunning how knowing these tender truths about a stranger completely shifts our behavior and capacity for empathy and kindness.
I wish I had an arm band that universally meant that I was in mourning for my child. I wish I could look around the supermarket and recognize those that have lost a spouse or parent. I believe that if we had more of a window into the grief we all carry, we would show greater patience and love for each other.
I can imagine how this dance of wanting to be seen as a whole person-- one who is still whole while also being broken, is compounded when your loved one dies in police violence, a terrorist attack, suicide, war, or a plane crash that leaves no trace of the human you loved with all your heart.
I long for the day when we have found ways to recognize that when you breath in love, you exhale grief. It's natural and essential and cannot be avoided without dire consequences to your health and to your relationships. I envision a day when we are all given arm bands in different colors to represent that we have lost a sibling, a friend, our spouse, our child, our health, our career. I believe this would inspire a welling up of compassion and connection. We would be surprised-- You lost a child? I didn't know that. Your spouse died? When? I want to know about this time in your life. Your brother died? Your father? Ohhh.... wow. There is so much I don't know about the people in my life. This makes me want to sit in council, to hear the stories of the loves you've lost, of the love that shaped your heart. This is what I long for.