Who's That Girl?

There are many stages of grief and some or even all of them can be experienced at any point. Some happen before a person has passed, a person can begin experiencing them immediately following their passing and some might not even be experienced until years later. I’ve spoken previously about some of the stages I’ve personally gone through over the last 2 ½ years and as I work through each of them, I am learning a little bit more about myself, the love and relationship I had with my late husband, but I’ve also learned about grief from a very different perspective than I had previously. It has made me more compassionate, more sympathetic, and maybe even a bit stronger which sometimes can be perceived as cold or having a lack of feeling when it couldn’t be farther from that. It is just the reality and experience of losing something that meant everything to you and realizing that if you can survive that, you can survive many other things in life too.

One of the stages is anger. If you’ve lost a loved one you can find yourself wondering why it happened, you can become angry at yourself, you most definitely can express and feel anger with the world but the most common can be anger felt towards the person you lost and the circumstances itself. Apart from the loss of your loved one, you very well could experience grief and anger if you’ve lost other things that were meaningful to you. Things such as the relationship, a job, or anything that ties to your identity because as I’ve mentioned before, there is a ripple effect, and it impacts every single aspect of your life whether you want it to or not.

When I first started my grief journey, I thought anger was specifically to the person and immediately pushed it away because I was never angry at him. I saw the pain and suffering he felt so how selfish could I be to want him to stay here and suffer and endure that any longer. I immediately got protective of him and refused to let anyone else or even myself feel any anger about our loss. Through my healing journey as it changes from one moment to the next, little moments of anger started to creep in. I would push it away or deep down because again, I didn’t want to be selfish through my healing and hold anything that could be presumed as anger or anything negative towards him but more and more through my healing process and plenty of talks with my therapist I finally realize that my feelings, all of them, are allowed and valid and in order to heal you need to let each of those feelings come to the surface and you have to work through them.

So here I am, dealing with anger. As life and its challenges as a single parent come up daily there are days when the anger really shows up. It is the anger of feeling abandoned by my partner who I am supposed to be balancing all these daily pressures and struggles with as a pair, not alone. There is the anger of my life not being what it was supposed to be or what I was promised it would be. There can even be anger towards other people who have their families intact and whole and why couldn’t that be us? All these thoughts and feelings can very quickly bring about that feeling of anger so what do you do in that moment to get through it? Well, every person’s experience is different and what works for one person might not work for another. As always, I figured I would share what I am doing to help work through in hopes that it could give someone else some options when trying to navigate their anger stage as well.

One thing is that I allow myself the time to speak it out loud. I will say that I’m angry and validate that feeling. No more pushing it aside, no more hiding it. I have nothing to be ashamed about and I am completely justified in my anger. Release it! Say it out loud, cry if you need to, even throw a tantrum like a child privately if that helps you through in that heated moment. Feel it, let it out and release it once and for all. It is shitty to be a widow! It is shitty to have the financial burden all on one person’s shoulders and it is definitely shitty that your person left you! None of this is fair!

Recognize your underlying feelings that may be coming through as well. Feelings of sadness and being extremely overwhelmed can very easily manifest as irritability and anger too. It’s important to identify and address the root cause of those feelings to process them as best you can. Have you ever witnessed a little child throwing a fit in the middle of a mall? I’ve found myself saying “it’s coming from somewhere” as it normally does. That child could be overdue for a nap, or they could be hungry. A child doesn’t know how to express themselves verbally, so they act out. The same goes for adults. Anger is a defense mechanism that helps us feel in control in a situation where you feel extreme helplessness such as in grief. This is why it is so important to find ways to express yourself and to work on changing your cycle of thoughts and feelings. Some people need to do it physically through working out or playing a sport. Others through art such as painting, music or even writing. This blog has been a valuable outlet for me! Whatever your outlet is, you are allowing yourself the time to sit with those feelings and processing them so that they don’t stay with you permanently. I found the longer I pushed away any thoughts or feelings, the harder it got to function, but as soon as I let it out, I could start to breathe again. The racing heart, waves of panic or anxiety would lessen and that means you are doing something right.

Meditation has been another form of release for me. Finding the time to sit in silence and to focus on an affirmation or a positive intention has really helped me with reducing some of the negative emotions and with managing stress. Sometimes it can even bring about a new and positive perspective which helps release the anger as well. I recently had been gifted the opportunity to see Deepak Chopra live and when I walked out of that room, I had a whole new perspective on time and our existence and since walking out of that beautiful theatre that night I have found myself repeating some key messages he shared with us, daily. Obviously, some days it is easier for those messages to stick with you than other days, but as long as I keep trying and practicing there will be less of those not-so-good days or at the very least they will be much more manageable.

Ultimately, each person needs to find what works for them, but my main message here today is for anyone going through the grief process to feel each stage without guilt or shame especially when it comes to anger. Dig into your thoughts and feelings, work through them as best you can and release it when you are ready. Lastly, I will leave you with an important quote by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross and David Kessler: “Anger is a necessary stage of the healing process. Be willing to feel your anger, even though it may seem endless. The more you truly feel it, the more it will begin to dissipate and the more you will heal.”

Wishing you all healing, love, and peace. Always.

LM