I have been well read on the stages of grieving since my mid-twenties when my father died. With his death, I waited for the stage of sadness to come visit me, but it hid, probably somewhere deep under my anger. After he died, I stayed in the stage of anger for many years and was stuck, like a deer that jumped too far into a muddy swamp. I did not venture into denial or acceptance, but I did step one foot in and out of the bargaining stage, which I also did when he was alive. I often thought of different scenarios where our past together had changed and we had a healthy, father, son relationship. I tried like hell to see him in a different light than the abusive man he was. His abuse was the worst kind because one moment it could be a snow shovel across the back and the next he was sharing stories about his army days, making him a false mentor, and leaving a young man confused as to which man stood before him. There would be many times when my mother would show up with black eyes and dried blood in each nostril, and other times I would witness him embrace her with a gentle hug and kiss. So, when death came for him, the stage of anger stayed with me. I was happy when he died. It was like a weight had been lifted because I no longer felt the need to protect myself or my mother. Our adversary was gone. I believe that some would flinch and grimace at such a statement as being relieved when your father died. I envy you if that’s the case.
I studied the stages of grief as I waltzed further into my twenties and then when death entered my world again, this time my best friend killing himself when I was thirty-four, the stages started slapping me in the face one after another: denial and isolation, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. It took me six years to finally understand that there was not anything I could have done to stop him. It took me that long to accept what had happened. It is when I realized that there is no timeline on grief. Our grieving is perpetual. We then have to take a lighted stage, become a well versed actor, and figure out how to live a life without the person who died.
When I was forty my sister, Charlotte, died suddenly. I wanted to place myself in the isolation stage and avoid the truth, but I couldn’t. My mother had just lost a child and I needed to be there for her, so there was no time for denial. There was no time for any of the stages of grief because I was overwhelmed with worry at how my mom was responding to Charlotte’s death. One could say I hid my grief until I was alone in a dark room with my head on a soft pillow. I ran a trail marathon a couple of weeks after she died. In the 26.2 miles around Grand Island in Lake Superior, I entered and left each stage of grieving. I cried at mile twelve, depressed as hell, at mile fifteen I was in complete denial that she had died, and I became angry at mile twenty-one. My legs were not quite ready for this run since death interrupted my training, so the emotion of anger carried me through until mile twenty-five, and that is when something remarkable happened on my run. It is something I have never shared, but Charlotte’s voice was in my head, telling her baby brother that she was proud of him, and then as I approached the finish her laughter, that addicting mischievous chuckle, rang out and drove a shot of adrenaline through my body allowing me to finish with a smile. After the race, I walked out into Lake Superior and said goodbye to her. I was able to reach acceptance quickly because she was with me during my race. The woods have always helped me work through my emotions.
A couple of months after Charlotte died, my friend and former brother-in-law, who I had this strange connection with, one that I have thought about often over the years, died after being shot by the police. Richard was nineteen years older than me, Sicilian, from the streets of New York City; and here I was, a midwestern boy with southern roots, and somehow we understood one another, meeting somewhere in the middle. It was like a visual of what compromise would look like if it could be acted out by humans. Our friendship was glued together for a while, walking the hills of North Beach in San Francisco and riding on a motorcycle through the hills of Marin. It splintered after He and my sister-in-law divorced because I struggled with his constant blaming while sitting at Cafe Trieste drinking a familiar cappuccino. It was when I told him to back off and therefore exit my life. Our relationship was mended a couple of years later and then he disappeared. As he used to say, “I might be clean but I am still a fuckin’ addict. I want to get high every day.” He became despondent one day and pulled a knife on a cop who was trying to talk him down. A rookie officer, several yards away, shot my friend with a rifle. The last I saw of Richard’s body was in a news clipping laying underneath a tarp, a pool of blood filtering out of his limp body onto the pavement. I skipped the denial stage of grieving. How could I deny his lifeless body? It was right there in front of my eyes. I did fall into the anger stage quickly. I was angry at the cops because the officer who was closer to him thought it best to simply tase my friend, but the rookie decided to shoot him in the head. It’s still something I struggle with, wondering if it could have been handled better. I was also angry at myself for not being there for my friend and helping him. And, I was angry at Richard for not getting the help he needed earlier. He took what the stoics call the “Open door.” No one can prove it and they want to make it sound like Richard was going to hurt the cops, but I knew him. He once trained the police in self-defense and how to handle hand to hand situations with criminals. Richard killed himself that day by provoking a young officer to shoot him. I did enter the depression stage quite often with Richard’s death. It is something I did not talk about for many reasons. Mostly, his death just makes me sad. I miss my friend and our talks. In a single walk, we would talk about everything from martial arts and philosophy, to The Beatles and literature. We shared the gift of gab and challenged one another intellectually and developed our thoughts with each step. I miss that type of connection! I have accepted he is gone because it is difficult to deny the shape of his dead body from underneath a tarp on the hard pavement.
The stages of grief are complex and overwhelming at times. They do not appear in any specific order, and frankly, there is no diagram or flowchart on how to grieve. Each stage is like a character in a play, and they all have a dialogue to present. The stages come and go, in and out of scenes, and deliver their best performance. Some stay a little longer on stage and their act is one you memorize, like depression is for me. It has become my little dark friend and I have rehearsed it well. Other times, grief is like a solo actor delivering a soliloquy. The other stages remove themselves and make room for the lone monologue.
What I do know about grief is that if you busy yourself with life and try to make your day-to-day a distraction, grief will lie right under the surface, ready to make itself known. It is not dormant and will eventually explode.
We live in a world that likes to distract ourselves. We see it daily when drivers speed and swerve down the road because they have to check and deliver a text from a device that has hindered mindfulness. We see it with quiet couples sitting in a restaurant, not communicating but scrolling on social media with a bored thumb. Distractions come in the form of mindless shows from a flat screen, and staff meetings that lead to nowhere and do not improve anything, especially the people listening to the gibberish speech unfolding before them. Distractions happen in liquid form, pouring from a glass bottle. We have become experts at subduing emotions and placing stigmas on one another so that we can deny our feelings out of fear and our insecurities to display them. However, when you lose someone you love, those emotions will come out, and sometimes without you even knowing it or expecting it. The stages of grief and all of the emotions that they hold, need a place to go and present themselves.
I believe reaching acceptance is healthy, but I would go further and say that we also need to add to the stages of grief. One is forgiveness. Often forgiveness may be for the person who died because of their actions while living, or more likely, forgiveness is for ourselves because when we lose someone, we start to have regrets. We feel we could have done more for them, spent more time with them and had more meaningful conversations. We might even think we could have saved them. This is when we need to enter the stage of forgiveness because it will help us heal. I also believe that we need to have a final stage of grieving where we find meaning, not only for the person’s death, but from their life. Chances are, if you are grieving deeply, that person had a great impact on you and therefore you miss them terribly, and you may wonder why they came in and out of your life. If it is a parent or sibling that died, you may wonder, “Why was I their son or sister/brother?” Finding meaning is important. For instance, I think about my friends, David and Richard. I met them at an early phase of my life, in my twenties, and they left me when I was still fairly young. Why? Why did they come to me and have such an impact on me? What was the purpose of them being in my life for such a short time? To find meaning, can help you heal and find understanding. I believe it can also help you become more self-aware. Our lives have meaning, and so does our death.
Every single person that I have had a connection with, whether it be a few days, several years, or a lifetime, has meaning. They have come into my circle, my sphere, for a reason. It’s when we need to be aware, in the present moment, of why we are in that place, with that person, at that specific time. This is why we should all be aware of how important each one of us is and why we are all connected in some way, trying to navigate through this human experiment we call life. It’s why I brush off the comments when people like to say things like, “I can’t keep track of where you are teaching now.” I have reflected on the moves I have made in my career and I have no regrets. Some have been better than others, but they are all meaningful and have had significance in shaping my life. By not letting the grass grow under my feet, I have gotten to meet some extraordinary, and not so extraordinary, people. Yet, all of them have had a great impact on my growth, development, and way of thinking. They have changed my trajectory.
That is the wonderful part of living. You never know who will come in and out of your life. They may leave this world before you, and you will grieve for them. Allow yourself to do so because your grief is showing respect. Your tears show their impact. Your agony has meaning, as did their life and death.
As many readers know, the ones who take the time to peruse the pages of my thoughts, I am in the midst of figuring out how to live in a world without my mother. The stages of grief started a couple of years ago with her cancer diagnosis, and the couple of months since she died. See, we can grieve for people while they are still alive. With my mom, the stages come and go like the wind. I allow myself to grieve and I am stubborn with protecting my emotions and giving myself the space to feel. I know the meaning of her life, for she was a mother and cherished that role. I am still searching for the meaning of her death and why she was seemingly picked to endure so much pain. With that, I am in constant search for my own meaning. Why am I here? Why did my mother and father give me this life to live? Am I doing enough with it and is my existence having an impact on those I have come across? As I have mentioned, everyone who I have met, including my loved ones and the love of my life, and all of my friends, students, coworkers, and acquaintances have impacted me in some way and helped me change and grow. Even one conversation has impacted me because it made me think in a different way. Even, and maybe especially, the negative interactions have forced me to grow and change.
The world will get heavy at times. You are not alone when that weight is too difficult to bear. Allow all of your emotions to visit and then sit with them in a dimly lit room or on a downed tree in the woods, and bring awareness and understanding to each one, and then breathe deeply respecting the life you have been given. Enjoy your pain and your grieving because it means you were fortunate enough to be loved and love someone in return. For me, that is how I find meaning in my grief and try to live the life that is ahead of me. One day, I hope through old, cloudy blue eyes, I will look back and smile at everyone who came before me because they helped shape the old man who is lying there, waiting for his last exhale to come.
For now, I will continue to ask, “What will I do with my time here on earth? How will I make it meaningful? How will I earn my place among the mortals?
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