I celebrated 32 years around the sun last weekend. I consider it to be a massive blessing considering the state of the world and how many lives have been upended either due to the pandemic, increased natural disaster or political and economic turmoil over the past year.
Surviving feels like some sort of luck that we most often take for granted.
Until death comes close to us, we tend to move through life thinking it is not inevitable, self-assured that our time here on earthside is plentiful.
The loved ones I have lost to date were my godmother and my grandmother.
My godmother’s death was particularly difficult. It felt as if my heart was being bulldozed when I found out. Hopeless took me over and it was as if a piece of my body was being sliced off.
I never imagined a life without her. I thought I would have had her until the end of time. Why wouldn’t I? We made plans for everything and she never left her words or promises unmarked.
She was the closest person to me, so close that she was the one I entrusted to make the most personal of decisions for me when I was incapable of making them on my own. She was the one who held me together when everything fell apart and the one who was the happiest to see me happy.
To know love and to experience care like this changes you in the most profound of ways. It requires you to give it back tenfold because you know firsthand how healing such a love can be and how necessary it is for those who need it.
Her death in 2016 left me spiralling for some time. In her darkest hour she had shielded me and even after her death she showed her love in the most poetic of ways. Guilt consumed me day and night. She knew there were limits as to what I could be exposed to. She knew that even as she suffered silently, me knowing would most definitely make everything more stressful and chaotic. Before I left, she had given me a health booklet on breast cancer. I went through periods of feeling anger, denial and guilt. I felt relief that she no longer had to suffer, as well as resentment and fleeting moments of calmness.
Death is traumatic and even more traumatic if you have an untreated mental health illness at time of experiencing it. It is the equivalent to throwing gasoline on fire. I did not learn to grieve properly until my mind and body forced me to therapy. How can we grieve anyway with such a toxic culture of needing to stay strong when what you actually need to do is allow yourself to feel that pain?
I would come to the realization that it was so much more than her voice that I was missing, or her comforting smile on our Skype calls but rather the unwavering love she gave to me. I was grieving the scariness of not ever being able to feel that again.
I was grieving that I didn’t tell her enough how grateful I was for her transforming my life. I was grieving that I was not as strong for her as she was for me.
Grief is a difficult process. It is a long one and one that forces you to reflect on how you show up for people and vice versa. Some days sting harder than others.
We go through life avoiding thoughts of death when it is such a sure thing.
We avoid sitting with our grief because it is such a lonely and difficult place to be. But it is in grieving that we allow ourselves the gentleness of compassion, a new outlook on what we lost and a chance to honestly use that grief to become more reflective and thankful human beings.
Like the joy from birthdays, and other life milestone celebrations, grief, too, is worthy of us acknowledging it wholesomely.
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