I have problems w the “standard models” we’re told we should be experiencing w certain events/tragedies/sadnesses in our lives. Those models leave so much out & create false expectations.
I’ve been open abt the last month of challenges w the loss of my grandmother…but waited till her actual loss, to share. 1) It didn’t seem right to share publicly as the struggle was happening, 2) I wasn’t ready earlier to put it out there.
One of my little cousins is abt the age (9), I was when I lost the 1st close person to me, whose funeral I can remember attending – my Poppy Ben. I watched as my cousin wept at the funeral for my grandmother this past wk. He’s an athlete, obsessed w sports, rarely shows emotion. But his weeping reminded me of how I experienced that loss at 9, as well.
At 9, personally I hadn’t yet gone thru the traumatic events w my brother that’d last the next 20yrs. My nervous system was a “blank slate.” I was able to FEEL the immense pain, sadness, loss, IN the moment at 9, just like I was watching w my little cousin.
But as we go thru life, & these tough experiences mount, no matter how much healing work we do, we have scars & walls. Our nervous system knows what capacity we have/don’t have, to feel. It’s why models like what’s on the next slide➡️ frustrate me so much. Who’s to say that’s “the order” we should experience things? That creates false expectations that just send us spinning even MORE when we don’t experience them the way the textbooks/“experts” say we “should.”
From my mom telling us my grandma was going to hospice, all the way to the burial, that model on the next page doesn’t resonate. I’ve felt: numb, disassociated, surreal, overwhelmed, sad, immense love, fear, frustration, comfort, all at diff times, for short bursts, throughout this month.
I share this so that you don’t feel alone. An older me would question: Why don’t I feel like I did at 9, all the time? Why don’t I follow that model on slide 2? And all those questions would do is make me spin, more. Be OK feeling/not, WHATEVER you can/can’t. Your body doesn’t just keep the score. It knows how to let you play the game.