Distraught and running her fingers over weepy eyes, Jill related how her 29-year-old son died of a drug overdose and was found in a portable toilet in Los Angeles. A sheriff had visited her home to tell her what had happened.
“It’s about your son,” he started. “Don’t you tell me my son is dead!” Jill screamed. “Don’t you do it!” In tears, Jill described how she would have broken everything in her house and bolted out, had not the sheriff been there.
Jill’s terror, heartache and confusion capture the shock of grief. Unfortunately, as a society, we are not trained or educated to cope with devastating loss experiences. Some people simply stuff it and try to move through life. Others feel they’ve run out of tears.
Many have suffered so many losses they don’t remember why they hurt any more. “Loss on top of loss on top of loss, all wound up like a ball of yarn, says Jeff Zhorne, M.A., a Certified Grief Counselor in Santa Clarita. “Along comes another loss, and it’s one more wrap around a huge ball of hurt. Over time we can start to feel detached or numb. Life doesn’t touch us in the deepest places of our hearts.”
Some may wake up one day and discover they have shut off feelings completely. Others call someone like Zhorne and say, “I can’t get over my husband leaving me” or “My life stopped when she died.”
We get bewildered by not knowing what to do about unresolved pain. It sounds so overwhelming. Zhorne continued: “Some of the reasons we grieve poorly are that we want to put up a good front for others, to be strong for children or friends. Some think tears are evidence of weak faith so they go through the motions and try to act recovered. Others try to think themselves into feeling better, which will never work because you can’t fix your heart with your head.”
Grieving people often wind up faking it and acting like everything is all right. “We put on our happy face, our go-to-work face because society gives us about three days to grieve and you’d better be back to work on the fourth day,” said Zhorne. “Later, we hear things like, ‘It’s been a year, aren’t you over it by now?’”
Grieving people can continue to stuff their feelings, shove them away or numb themselves until the losses become an ever-growing weight being carried around. Zhorne said buried pain is very real, has energy and doesn’t go away on its own. Unresolved grief will make itself known when we least expect it. Reactions become disproportionate to circumstances. Our emotional, mental and physical well-being suffers.
A study from the Journal of Psychosomatic Research found a strong correlation between helpless stoic acceptance and a poor prognosis. If a person buries anger that he or she has a valid reason to express, the studies show it can actually increase the likelihood of premature death.
Healing opens the way to joy, peace of mind and health. Recovery starts by being able to freely express all the thoughts and emotions connected with loss. “Maybe it’s regret, which is often associated with loss,” Zhorne says, “or grieving the loss of unrealized hopes, dreams and expectations.”
“If you are tired of temporary pain relief, tired of quenching in, and want to expand your life and relationships, we can learn to finish unfinished emotional business and move beyond loss,” Zhorne added. Recovery provides the correct tools to be able to cherish fond memories of loved ones, risk intimacy again and find freedom to make healthy choices.
The Grief Program is offering a free community presentation on the tools and skills needed for working through significant emotional loss at 7 p.m., Thursday, February 9, at the Education Center, Christ Lutheran Church, 25816 N. Tournament Road. For more information, call The Grief Program at 661-733-0692 or visit www.TheGriefProgram.com.