Day 30: In grief, the unknown evolves Living during a pandemic has highlighted for me how much we humans don’t know, and how we have been stretched to sit in the unknown—and how what we don’t know seems to evolve. The unknown is already one of the most challenging parts of a grief process, coming up often in circular thought patterns such as, “what will the future be like without my person, if this could happen, then what other terrible things might shift in my life, an

Day 29: Grief Bursts What distinguishes grief from depression and anxiety (and truly any other experience) is the oscillating ups and downs of feeling ok, and then not ok at all. I have also come to observe grief as the confusing experience of feeling oddly functional amidst living in deep pain—which offers a surreal sheen to one’s life. One of the experiences within this surreal sheen that I see often is what I call “grief bursts.” Simply put, these are those moments w

Day 28: Grief and Trust In the book, About Grief, Ron Marasco and Brian Shuff, call out grief as “largely a crisis of trust.” This has always stuck with me as such truth. In the initial phase of grief, we are relearning our world, and a big part of this includes relearning what “trust” means to us. On a daily basis, most of us have some sense of trust in something—whether that is waking up, having our people nearby, a sense of something larger than ourselves, our own ab

Day 27: Grief Terminology When we have a have a name for something, it can help provide a sense of control, especially in a time of massive uncertainty and strife. Grief is derived from the Middle English word, Gref, which means weight. I came to learn about in one of my all time favorite grief books, About Grief by Ron Marasco and Brian Shuff. What I have learned from the people I sit with everyday is that grief is not one thing. At its core, it is a reaction to loss a

Day 26: We Don’t Get Over Grief While this may sound terrifying and pessimistic, the adage that we don’t get over grief is a truth I have learned and observed in my work. We don’t just get over what we have loved, and we are not supposed to. We don’t just get over what we have envisioned for ourselves, and we are not supposed to. We DO learn how to live with our grief. Our grief is not separate from us. It is part of our biological attachment bonds—to people, to our hopes,

Grief naturally places us in the rawness of life, begging us to reorient, reprioritize, and discern what fits and what does not. I encourage people to take advantage of the raw clarity that often comes with the depths of pain in grief. This clarity typically brings to light an opportunity for what I call “pruning.” What relationships no longer serve you? What habits have weighed you down? What modes of thinking are making your grief worse? What can you allow yourself to not

Fatigue in grief is like no other tiredness. It sits deep in the bones. I believe it is not the same as depression’s downward pull towards the ground. Instead, I have observed it more as an internal weightiness that emanates out into all directions of our bodies, our minds, and our hearts. The weightiness seems to be the ever-present buzz of living with what has always been unbelievable. And it is more draining than anyone might imagine who has never felt it. I also believe t

It’s a thing in grief. In fact, most people, no matter if they are atheist or deeply religious, ache to remain connected with the person they loved and lost. Finding a way to honor a continuing connection with someone who dies is one of the most healing phases of a grief journey. Doing so honors what I have come to believe—just because someone has died, doesn’t mean we stop loving them. In fact, our love lives on, and in my opinion, the relationship does as well. What the rel