Taboos Inside Grief
Yesterday, shame crept in. It crept in momentarily because I said something I wasn’t “supposed to say”.
It was so high sensation.
It’s wasn’t something grieving people are supposed to say let alone think.
But presently, it’s true.
So I shared it.
I’m finding these places inside of grief that are taboo.
Not an area that I ever expected to bump up against taboos.
Taboos are notoriously high sensation. Not just for me. For most people. That’s why they are taboo.
But, I’ve committed to be fully self expressed. So I expressed it. I’m not sure if I expressed it well. But I expressed it nonetheless.
I found out early on this path that I was going to have to blaze my own trail.
Not do it alone. That’s not what I’m saying. I mean lead my own experience.
For instance, right after he died, there were big hearted, well meaning, women who suggested that I join some groups.
And as soon as I did, what I heard honestly scared me. Parents telling other parents how long they will feel awful for.
Some voice inside me (maybe Tanner?) told me if I stayed, I’d end up believing them. And I’d have the experience they were having.
Not the experience that was for me.
I might feel awful for a long time. But there’s something about how open I am that leads me to believe I might also be suggestible. If I feel awful for a long time, I want it to be my pain, not the collective pain of all the grieving parents and the culture of their group. It just wasn’t aligned for me at that time.
I began to think about how society shapes us. And how even grief has it’s own culture represented by its own archetypes.
And if I didn’t lead this experience for myself, free from projections, free of binding myself to the archetype of “grieving mother”, I’d rope myself into a contract with suffering that isn’t my own.
Another time, there was an offhand comment from a friend who assumed I knew that people were judging me after I gave his Eulogy.
I had said something about “believing Tanner was at peace now”.
Apparently they felt that was cold.
It just told me, they didn’t know Tanner.
But it also put me on notice. “If you don’t play the mother in the movies, who is only ever in perpetual pain, people will judge you. Judge how you grieve. Judge how you hold his death”.
I had to decide then and there, which it would be.
Allow his death to carve me within the experience he and I are having.
Or allow myself to be carved by the way society sees grieving mothers.
Be shaped by life, or be shaped by culture.
I want to be shaped by the experiences I am here to have. By life itself.
On one hand, I do hope this is the worst thing that ever happens to me.
On the other hand, I don’t want to relinquish love joy and laughter, all because we think that’s what loosing a child means.
It can mean that. That’s a valid experience.
But I’ve found, for me, grieving is a mixed bag of so many things.
It’s immense pain, of course. But I’m not going to feel guilty for laughing with my daughter just because Tanner isn’t here. He wouldn’t want that. And even more, I feel him with us when we are laughing.
I saw a brilliant pink and purple sky this morning.
It was so beautiful it made me cry. And I felt him standing right beside me as I took that gorgeous sky all the way in. The beauty of it reminded me of him.
Then I was smiling through my tears. Wishing he were here to see it with me, crying because he wasn’t, Knowing that he was. It’s a lot.
In fact this is a weirdly common experience now… crying and laughing at once. Missing him and feeling him at once.
I’ve honestly felt him consistently since I went to Arizona.
Then, there’s the profound exploration of the underpinnings of reality. The whole spiritual dimension of grief and loss.
He and I used to probe the mysteries of the universe together. It interested him.
That’s part of this mixed bag too.
Mapping out how much I can allow this to open me. Expand me.
I’d become to nihilistic without the spiritual dimension.
And maybe it can open me to the point where I always feel him near. I welcome that if it’s on offer.
Parents in the parents group seemed to be in the most pain around the feeling of separation.
I get that. It’s where it hurts the most for me too.
But I think there has to be all of the paradoxes. The pain and joy, love and sadness, in order to be open enough to have contact.
My point with all this is, I’m going to try and say all of it. Even if it is high sensation. Even if it feels taboo.
Because I’d collapse if I kept it all inside.
I’d collapse if I allowed shame to fester.
And if my mind believes my thoughts are wrong…
If some part of me splits off and starts judging my experience on the level of “shoulds”
If I hold myself against the modern archetype of “grieving mother”.
I’m going to cause myself to suffer. Because it would be a contract with suffering that isn’t authentic to me.
Grieving is really complicated. And that’s honestly my point here.
It has its own culture, it’s own built in taboos. Ways that it is acceptable to talk about our loss. And ways that it’s not.
And I just don’t want to be claimed by that. That’s all.
Even if in the end I have the quintessential journey with grief. And mine perfectly follows the arch of everyone else. I still want to know I stayed with what was true for me. That I had my own experience with Tanner.
*As an aside, I noticed there’s an account on Instagram that allows grieving people to write their taboo thoughts and anonymously publishes them.
Reading some of those really got me thinking. Because they were so mundane. There were a few that really didn’t need to be anonymous.
It told me there were places they felt it was too high sensation to express themselves fully.
So I know I’m not alone in this.
Which is why all of this feels relevant to share.
