Great equalizer

by A
(IL)

Grief shared is grief diminished -
I'm glad I found this article! Grief is a true equalizer and people who never met, and whose lives could not be more dissimilar all experience this spiral of overwhelming emotion.. Human beings are truely unbelievable!


I think the stages you so cleverly described are all true - and I agree in terms of the timeline..
I'd add to that that there is a certain spiraling which goes on and these stages intertwine, and that's where we all differ. Though each of the stages dominates at some point (and in terms of ordering and time that those take I do agree with you)the other ones are present as well and they ultimately bring you back to your base. That is you may be 'creating your healing' in your 'cave woman' period but if the time's not right back you go to being the 'cave woman' you really are.

It's the hardest journey you could ever take - mostly because you have lost your entitlement to be happy and to enjoy everything along the way...
Once you really deep down in your heart can believe that it's Ok to be happy - therein lies your foundation for a new normal.

Comments for Great equalizer

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Oct 07, 2010
 Great equalizer
by: Janelle

A,

Thanks for your comments. I'm so glad you found the article helpful. I've had others comment on it as well. We need to know there are some patterns that we can identify in order to help us understand what we are going through. And yet, the reality is that in spite of the patterns we all do this grief journey in our own way.

Your comments about spiraling are very true. We do move around from one phase to another. I like to think that each time we come back to a phase we had thought that we moved through that we are now doing it in a deeper more fuller way. So that it adds greater healing--not just back to the same old place we were before. I don't know if that makes sense.

I had a trauma healing professor us a Tibetan singing bowl to demonstrate. Each time the mallet goes around the bowl the sound gets richer, fuller, and more far reaching. So if we feel like we are spiraling aimlessly through phases, we can be reassured that each time through our healing can be deeper, richer and fuller like the singing bowl.

Thanks for your great and helpful comments. We all learn more about ourselves and our own journeys as we dialogue with others about theirs.

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