Book of Sorrows

 

 

"You cannot prevent the birds of sorrow from flying over your head, but you can prevent them from building nests in your hair."
Old Chinese proverb

We know all about how grief can cause inflammation, joint pain, headaches, stomach problems, lower immune system, cause heart problems, sleep problems, coping negatives.  But the toll on body can be eclipsed by the toll emotionally.  We can get lost in the sorrow, stay at that grieving space, and wallow in it because it takes too much work to crawl out from under the weight of grief.  Sometimes we use the excuse that, with that perpetual sorrow, we are honoring that person we have lost.  There is no timeline to sorrow.  Each loss is different.  Each loss takes healing work.  If we do not do the work, we are, in some way, crippled.

It is said that research has found it takes about 12 months to stabilize after loss.  If it stays as excruciating, and disabling, either physically, intellectually, emotionally, or spiritually, then it becomes complicated grief.  We are left in no man’s land of persistent longing, withdrawn, unable to find who we are since that mighty blow and change of loss. 

There are so many levels of grief, so many kinds of grief, so many ways to react to grief.  But typically, grief runs its course but there are those who might stay stuck in unresolved grief where one is overwhelmed, at a lost with coping strategies, in denial, allowing oneself to get lost in the grief.  It is in the second year that the real work on grief begins and most people will begin that work in order to get relief from the side effects of loss. 

Ignoring it does not make it go away.  Denial does not make it go away.  Substituting comfort food, drugs, alcohol, behavior, does not make it go away.  We can become numb.  But as we stuff the sorrow, it grows exponentially, and we fall into more and more discomfort and we lose our balance and harmony of life.  We can go into Grief Fog.  I call it grief brain” where we stumble, drop things, put things in wrong places, knock things off, cannot think clearly or make decisions.  We can move into more and more isolation as we dwell on the past and then there is the anxiety.  The anxiety is all about losing another loved one. 

There are triggers that expound the anguish and anxiety surrounding the grief process.  Our grief gets complicated with past traumas right back to childhood, if we have not done any healing work for those times we have been traumatized. Those already afflicted with depression are in danger of sinking more deeply into it and it becomes complicated even further.   I did not want to go back home at first because I would have to face those who would speak of it, of her, and I had not dealt, yet, with being the mother of 6 not 7.  We can’t sleep, or sleep only small segments of time.  Our blood pressure and blood sugars can rise due to stress.  Our hearts are broken and vulnerable. We have to begin the work it takes to crawl out from under the heavy wet blanket of sorrow. 

We need to find a circle of friends who ‘get it’ and who know how to nurture and comfort for they too, know sorrow by its name.  Go get professional help by talking to a counsellor or taking meds that will help hold you for a short time until you can do the work.  Block any stress that comes from outside ourselves.  Try to eat right, relax, take long walks, keep busy at something but also rest.  There are many rites and ceremonies available.  Or, you could begin a new ceremony for self.  Find one or do one you know of, for yourself.  Keep telling yourself that this is not a loss, this is a change.  Life is constantly changing.  That is what life is… transformation, day by day, week by week, month by month ,,, even second by second.  Some changes are just more powerful than others. 

Grief is leaving us with an open book for our future.  We make of it what it will be.  “One day you will wake up and the anguish will be gone.” – unknown quote

Book Of Sorrows

Without you
I would not have had such sad poetry
And perhaps that
Would have been the saddest thing
Of all

You are the swallowed shard of glass
Striping lining from entry to exit

You, my beautiful blossom,
Unfolding hope
One pure petal at a time

And I watched you curl up your edges
While I fisted you with death grip
With one hand
And wrote poetry
With the other
For I had no words
To define this kind of dying

What silly stanzas would I have penned
Had not this hand held
The beat of your heart
In its palm?

Sadness winnows its way
From that hard nut
where love should have resided
And perennially produced
Such beautiful buds of words

Now, they are wept from places
That carry cell-deep memory
Of that last longing look
Of you
As you took my lovely potential
For sweet simple lines

I now write poetry
That is tear-shaped petals of Pitiful
And held
Pressed in a heavy book
Called
The Joy of Sorrow

©Carol Desjarlais 2015