I mentioned in an earlier post that I had ordered the Healing Grief Cd from healingjourneys.com. As I was researching which CD to order, I searched the archives and found a letter about grief that I felt Belleruth answered with the utmost caring and wisdom. I will be posting a little more about the actual CD later on and my experience with it. I felt that everyone dealing with grief could benefit from reading the letter. Here it is:

Most of the trite sayings about loss are true, so if I sound sickeningly prosaic, please bear with me.
First of all, if you can identify all these feelings of disbelief, sadness, anger, guilt and relief, you are way ahead of the curve and doing extremely well in the grief department, even if you are feeling horrible. Feeling horrible in this case is weirdly appropriate and healthy.

So the first thing I have to say is: expect more of the same. In fact, expect a whole paradoxical collection of feelings. Sometimes you will be oddly energized and revved up about all the opened up possibilities – after all, this is a huge loss that leaves a lot of space and energy for you to re-deploy, so to speak. Especially because so much of your energy had been taken up in caring for him and worrying about him. It’s all yours again now.

Other times you’ll feel hollow and empty, numb and dead. Heavy limbs and heavy brain. You just have to breathe through it. Every phase shifts and changes, thank heavens. Those meditation teachers knew what they were talking about when they got us to watch the comings and goings of our thoughts and feelings. They surely do come and go.

Some days you’ll wake up forgetting he’s gone, and it will strike you with a fresh pang that’s so sharp it will take your breath away. You might be stunned by how deep sadness can go. Breathe through that, too.

Friends will surprise you – some with their incredible sensitivity, generosity and kindness; others with their colossal stupidity and ignorance. Breathe through that, too. Understand that your friendships are likely to shift, preferences change, during this period of grieving and after, too, as your new status as a non-married person falls into place.

Your mind will be playing catch-up, even with the two years preparation and warning you had that this was coming. You’ll have to realize all sorts of things… Oh, we won’t be going on that trip…. I’ll have to prepare the taxes by myself…. I can’t talk to him about our daughter’s difficulties with her husband… and so forth. Each realization gets you closer to acceptance, but it’s hard.

What to do?

That breathing, of course, eases all the constriction around the heart during grief. Keep breathing. You’ll find yourself holding your breath a lot. When you notice, take a deep one!

Talk to friends who’ve been there or who are wise. Avoid extended conversations with people who don’t get it, or who expect you to be over it after 6 months, or who are so uncomfortable with your pain that they can’t look you in the eye.

Take extra good care of yourself. Get massages. Eat tasty stuff. Get good aromas around you and play nourishing music.

Try to get out when you’ve got the energy for it. Escape movies might be just the ticket. A yoga class or Qigong might be perfect. A meditation class or CD might be very good.

The Ease Grief imagery is good for most people, if I do say so myself.

This might be a perfect time for journaling. Keep identifying and accepting your feelings, whatever they are. You are already great at this, so just keep doing it.

Be patient with yourself. This takes a long time.

Understand that you can stand this degree of pain, and that one day, when it’s softened, you’ll have a very different understanding of your own strength.

Maintain the prayer, the wish, the understanding, the possibility that there is a level of being where nothing and no one is really lost.

I hope this helps