No more writing about grief?
“Please! No more writing about grief”, her friend said. But what else does she know?
“I want my daddy! I want my daddy!”, her mother had wailed 90 years before. Except she probably hadn’t, because,
“Be a good girl”, they will have said to her, aged 5. “Help your mother now and look after your little sister.”
“I want my daddy! I want my daddy!”, she will have cried inside. “Daddy, come home. Was I naughty? Was I bad? Daddy, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, only please come home.”
But her daddy never came home and her grandad must have gone to look for him and her grandmother too, because pretty soon it was just her, her mother and her sister. She was a good girl.
Years later, a baby in her arms, she thought of joy; dared to hope she might at last be happy. But the baby knew, knew the inside cry her mother had swallowed all those years before. And when the baby cried, her mother couldn’t stand it.
“Be quiet or I’ll give you something to cry about!” she said.
And later still, the baby grown with babies and grandbabies of her own, she carries a basket full of grief, as if bread and apples and laundry liquid have no place in her basket. She remembers her mother’s desperation to be good, her grandmother’s brittle cheerfulness and black moods of self pity. She remembers her own baby who cried and cried, now dead.
When her husband died, she was good, she was quiet. She wanted to wail but no sound came out, no sound, however much she wished it, ever came out.
“No more writing about grief,” the friend had said.
“No-one will ever have to carry this for me,” she answered. “Not my remaining child or her’s.”
And so she carries her basket and looking though the contents, writes of grief, weeping quietly.
Reflection
I wrote this piece the other day as part of a writing practice. It is – with a little poetic licence – autobiographical. I thought about sending it out just as it is, but as it’s quite short, I didn’t want you to feel cheated (!) and I decided that perhaps it was worth adding a little context.
Advice
The first thing is, that I think however well meaning we are, giving advice to our friends and family who are grieving, is rarely helpful.
Transgenerational
Secondly, in my experience grief is trans-generational. I came to understand this over 20 years ago when I began working with death and grief. I realised I already knew the territory even though it wasn’t my personal experience but my mother’s (and her mother’s and her mother’s). Some of you are no doubt familiar with the constellation work of Bert Hellinger – The Bonds of Love. He posits that a family is a system across time, and that when some shameful or painful event happens within the system, such as an illegitimate child, a murder, insanity, abortion or grief for example, if it is unresolved or unacknowledged, it remains there until someone, through affinity and love, picks it up. I picked up grief.
Where’s the wail?
And thirdly, yes, thirdly, this is the painful one for me: what happened to the wailing, the “sound that never came out”? There had been months of arduous, loving, efficient care, while my beloved man ‘untethered’ from life (during which time my son died), and for all of that time I had felt I needed to ‘keep it together’.
When it was over, I didn’t know how to fall apart. Did anyone invite me in to my grief, lead me into the territory of unabashed expression of my pain? Strange question? In traditional Irish wakes, professional ‘keeners’ invited mourners, through their lamenting songs, to find the emotions that need expression. For hours they would sing, their voices holding, allowing, inviting. But, as is the case for most people who lose their nearest and dearest, I had a funeral to arrange, things to see to, people to host, more keeping together to be done. When silence returned, and I was alone, it seemed to me that the door to the wailing was closed and I had lost the key.
These days I am tired and I have realised just how much energy is not available to me because it is tied up in un-shed tears. I wish it were not so. I wish I knew how to unlock them, how to find the primal, animal expression of pain I know is living within my body. So I write. I sing. I don’t so much work with grief as let grief work with me. And I think something is rising, I think it is coming close, and I think when it arrives, I will need all my courage to scream out my fury, disbelief and bereftness, to the gods who robbed me of my soulmate.
With my love
Nickie
PS If anything I have written about today resonates with you, then I should love to hear from you. You can contact me here.
NEWS
A bit of a round up this week:
DAY OF THE DEAD– November 1st 7pm – midnight. Totnes, Civic Hall.
If your grief has been locked away, or you need an opportunity to honour the ones who have gone before, do please join us for this beautifully held, ritual and interactive event.
This is a ticketed event. Please buy your tickets in advance from: www.dyingwithgrace.co.uk/events
More details here.
MOVING FORWARD WITH LOSS AND GRIEF– retreat on Dartmoor, 21st to 24th November
The itinerary is ready and it is a generous mix of creativity, reflection, movement, walking, ritual, one on one sessions, and fantastic, nourishing food. To view the itinerary click here.
To enquire or to book, please go to: www.sallypotterhypnotherapyandretreats.com/about-retreats/moving-forward-loss-grief
CREATIVELY WRITING THROUGH LOSS – I would like to hold a second of these online courses but as yet, I don’t have a date.
This will be a small, safely held group, using writing as a way to understand and bring solace to our grief. You do not need to be a writer to attend this group.
PLEASE WRITE TO ME HERE IF YOU ARE INTERESTED. When enough of you have shown an interest, I will put some dates out for you to book. I’m thinking New Year.
WALKING WITH LOSS, TOGETHER – Emma Capper and I have completed the second of these groups. It was very different to last year but equally moving. We looked at themes within the grief process and then, using nature as our guide and resource, we participated in creative practices outside.
We are contemplating an ONLINE version for early 2025, so that what we offer is open to you wherever you are – and whatever the weather. We will spend some time together online and give you invitations to complete practices in nature in your own time over the coming week.
PLEASE WRITE TO ME HERE IF YOU ARE INTERESTED.
MY BOOK – And finally, thank you to those of you who have offered to read a draft of my book “Not Another Day – getting through the 1st, 2nd, 3rd…… year of grief”. It’s nearly there!! Just putting it all into one document which I can send out to you. If you haven’t already offered to read it and think you would like to (in return for a little feedback), please get in touch with me here.
BUY ME A COFFEE
I gift this blog and in fact much of my work, including spiritual care in the hospice and running the threshold singing group. Some of you have expressed a desire to gift me back. Thank you so much. For those of you who would like support what I do, you can, if you wish, buy me a coffee here. Thank you xx
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