Living Grief is the pain you experience for something you have to let go of before you feel ready....
Grief can feel like something we only experience with the loss of a loved one, but it goes so much deeper than that.
Grief is the loss of anything or anyone that was of great importance to you.
Such as a friendship, relationship, a job, a home, an opportunity and many more.
In this article I want to talk to you about living grief, which is something I have experienced personally many times.
As I share my experience, you may see that you too have experienced and continue to experience living grief.
Living Grief from our Daughter's Diagnosis with Epilepsy
My first experience with living grief and a imperative part of my healing journey was after my eldest daughter Gabby was diagnosed with Epilepsy at the age of 13 years old.
I remember it vividly; feeling like my whole world had just been turned upside down. I was driving home from the hospital after her first tonic clonic seizure and talking to my mum on the phone and saying “I can’t have a child with epilepsy”.
The raw truth was I did and do have a child with Epilepsy, but at the time just the thought of what that meant for me as her mum was unbearable.
There was so much that had to happen with her new diagnosis, all the physical steps we had to put in place to keep her safe and learn how to care for her with her seizures had to come first.
To learn more about that process for us, you can read an article I wrote “The day our life changed”
For this article I wanted to share with you about the side of it that was focused on living grief. We had received her diagnosis and now it was time to incorporate it into a new life and yes it was like a new life for us, pre-diagnosis and post-diagnosis.
I was at my daughters psychologist appointment and she mentioned about grieving and I remember saying, what do you mean, she is still with us. That is when I first learned about living grief, and I have to tell you it really was a big turning point for me.
I realised our life pre-diagnosis was gone and whilst I was accepting of our new life and my daughters diagnosis, I had not processed or healed the grief that comes along with this type of experience.
The grief for me was grieving for the life I thought she would have, you know as a parent you have dreams for your childrens lives and also grieving for the life I thought I would have.
So if we think about traditional description for grief, she didn’t die she is still with us, so that traditional idea doesn’t fit here. But living grief does, yes she is still with us, but her life has changed completely, a lot has been lost for both her and I.
She lost her innocence and the world felt very scary to her literally overnight, going out with her friends was so frightening to her, going to school was scary.
People started to look at her differently, treat her differently and that took so much from her. She learned at a very young age that these are the times where you see the truth of people.
Unfortunately she has experienced so much discrimination both at school and in society in her very short life, so she has experienced a lot of living grief in having to give up on dreams she once had for her life.
For her dad and I; we also lost a lot, it took a toll on our finances as I was unable to work and became her full time carer and I still am to this day.
I had to sell my previous business that I had built from scratch into a successful company and whilst it turned out to be a blessing in disguise, at the time it felt like a very big loss.
In this example living grief was healing and releasing the life we had prior to her diagnosis and accepting the new life that was ahead of us.
For me this was a big turning point in my emotional wellbeing, it allowed me to let go and release so much with EFT Tapping and gave me the freedom to be able to move forward.
Living Grief in Healing my Diagnosis of Fibromyalgia
Another example I can share with you is more recent and that is the process I have been through recently in being diagnosed with Fibromyalgia and having to take a break from my work as a Counsellor and Energy Healer.
As full time carer to my daughter and carer for my elderly parents I already had a lot on my plate, but my work as a Counsellor and Energy Healer was for me, so it was something that was very hard to walk away from.
Unfortunately my symptoms just continued to get worse and worse until I had to accept that I needed to what I thought at the time was walking away from my soul work for good.
So I closed my business down and I was left with what felt like nothing for me, I still had my caring duties of course but I had attached a lot of my personality and worth to my soul work.
Through this process I had to let go enough for healing to begin, to go through living grief of my work that meant so much to me. There were so many emotions that surfaced around this including feeling like I had abandoned my clients and future clients that were in need.
But I also knew without taking this time for myself to heal, I would be no good to anyone else and something I have told all my clients over the past 10 years.
So I took the time, each and every day I just allowed the feelings to surface and released them with love.
During this time I also was working on the healing of my Fibromyalgia, as an Energy Healer I know it is connected to trauma I have experienced with my medical marvels aka my two daughters.
Healing my nervous system was something I dedicated time to every day and through that I was able to release stored survival stress that my poor body and nervous system had been holding.
Can I say I am 100% healed from my Fibromyalgia, no I can’t, is it profoundly better, yes. It reminds me of something our daughters neurologist told us one day, “Epilepsy is a nasty monster, that can lay dormant and then surface when you aren’t watching”.
Fibromyalgia feels similar to me, I can support my body and nervous system but if I stop doing all the things then it too can rear its ugly head and it has.
As I say to my clients, healing is not linear, it is a spiral. It doesn’t mean I have gone backwards, it means I am going deeper.
"Healing is not Linear it is a Spiral"
In this example of living grief it was about letting go of everything I had thought and wanted in my professional life. I had all these ideas of how things should look and what should happen, but all my nervous system wanted was for me to stop and turn inward and truly see, feel and heal my pain.
My nervous system and body had been carrying so much for so long and needed me to stop and truly honour myself.
In this healing process I was able to honour my nervous system, my body and my spirit and truly see my worth whilst not attached to any external stimuli.
I have experienced so much healing not just through my nervous system but my mental health and my physical health as well. It all needed my attention I just couldn’t see the forest for the trees.
It can be so easy to focus our attention on others, but when it comes to our own needs, it is not so easy to focus inward.
This process has taught me that being a caring and nurturing soul doesn’t mean it has to be at my own detriment. I too get to feel cared for and nurtured both by myself and others.
As I let go of the control of what I thought it should all look like, it made space for so much more to enter.
A reminder that I don’t have to use my personal energy to care for others, I can tap into the universal energy field and call in my angels and God to support me to support others.
How you can start to process, heal and feel Living Grief....
As you can see there are many examples of living grief and it is different for each person. Another example that just came to mind is when caring for elderly parents as I do, when they are unwell you can experience living grief, they are still with you, but you know in the near future you will be experiencing their loss.
What comes to mind for you after reading my examples?
There would of been times in your life where you experienced living grief and you may still be experiencing that right now.
An important step is to give yourself grace, allow yourself the time and space to grieve. You may find yourself going through the traditional stages of grief by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross; denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.
What do the traditional stages of grief look like in living grief?
In a future article I will delve further into the stages of grief by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross
- Denial
- Anger
- Bargaining
- Depression
- Acceptance
For this article and focusing on living grief, let’s have a look at what these stages could look like…
Denial could look like you arguing with yourself about your feelings; I am not allowed to feel this way.
Anger could look like you being frustrated with yourself and being angry that you even feel that way.
Bargaining could look like you saying things like, “I am fine”, “this is no big deal”. “I don’t have the right to feel this way”.
Depression could show up in ways that cause you to have no energy, no get up and go and that can be directly correlated to ignoring your feelings.
Acceptance is where you will finally give yourself the grace I talked about earlier, and acknowledge that your feelings are valid and giving your feelings and emotions the time and space to be felt and healed.
Something I have always shared both with my Daughters and my private clients alike is….
Your feelings are to be honoured, you are experiencing them for a reason and no matter how trivial you might think they are, you are allowed to feel them.
I hope this article serves to lead the way for you into understanding what living grief is, acting as permission for you to feel and give yourself the time and space you deserve.
Thank you for being here.
My hope is that these reflections help you feel a little more seen, heard, and understood.
If you’d like to continue the conversation, I invite you to join Heart-to-Heart with Nicole and receive gentle insights, supportive guidance, and thoughtful reflections delivered to your inbox.
