We have walked together for the more than seven years following the death of her daughter. The daughter was killed suddenly by a senseless act of another and the pain has been deeper than anyone could describe or explain. We moved from getting together to do grief work to just meeting as friends to enjoy the company we offer to one another.

One of our ongoing conversations has been whether or not the grief ever gets better. We long ago agreed that it never goes away, that we never “get well”, but her question has been does it ever even get better? It has taken a lot of conversations for us to get on the same page with that question. 

I would point out how much better she was handling the struggle, how she had faced and overcome the difficulty of being seen in public during the early days of her loss, and point out other things I thought she was doing well.

She would agree with the growth but point out that the loss seemed to still be right under the surface and even after the passage of several years, she could be reduced to tears on a moments notice and sometimes for no known reason at all. This left her thinking there was something wrong with her and feeling hopeless about ever being any better. 

During a speech to Compassionate Friends a few days ago, I made a statement I had made more times than I can count but somehow really grasped the real meaning of what I was saying for the first time. I said “The bottom line to grief is your loved one is not here. All the other stuff we talk about, all the explanations we offer, and all of the helps we try to give cannot take away that one major fact. They are not here.”

I could hardly wait to see my friend. I reminded her of all the conversations we have had about the subject over the years and said I had finally realized what she was actually saying or asking. We talked about the bottom line being that her daughter was not here and if that really is the bottom line then she was right, her grief would never go away. There would never be a time when she could say she was well. The “Not here” was never going to change. Her daughter would always be “Not here”.

The grief does not go away, nor even lessen. The grief journey is the process of learning to cope with our loved one not being here. She has made some real and rather remarkable progress in the coping, and the continuing presence of the pain means she is normal and not weak or weird. 

I have a tree in my back yard with a steel rod piercing its trunk. I have no idea how the rod got there but it is evident it has been there since the tree was quite small. The tree has no way of removing the rod and it would damage the tree if I tried to do so. The rod stays, but the tree has found a way to grow around the rod and cope with its constant presence. I think that is how it is with grief. We cannot change the situation, but we can learn to grow around it and cope.

That seemed to gel in her mind and I could almost see her relax. She no longer had to fight herself trying to get to some level that is impossible to achieve. She could concentrate on learning to cope and give herself credit for the progress she has made without feeling like she is somehow falling short.

One thing we were in full agreement about was that since the basis for the grief does not go away, we never outgrow our need for a safe place and safe people to talk with. She, like almost everyone else, quit talking about the loss with her friends several years ago. She felt like they were tired of hearing about it and wanted her relationship with them to be closer to what is was. She did not want to be treated like the poor mother whose daughter died, so she put on a good face and hid the times of recurring pain behind a smile. Since we had continued our visits, she had one place where it was safe to still hurt after all these years. She could function and not burden her friends or even her husband, because she had a place where it was all right to still cry if she needed to do so. I wish everyone had such a place and would use it. If not try me at doug977@gmail.com

__________

Doug invites you to log in and post comments at the end of each blog entry. He looks forward to hearing from you. Any of Doug's books, CDs or DVDs are available at www.InSightBooks.com.