Everyone experiences grief differently.
The way we react to difficult situations is deeply personal and often difficult to explain. There can be preconceptions about what is the 'right' way to show, or in some cases contain, emotions. The truth is, there is no right or wrong way.
I've been to a number of funerals over the last few years for a variety of people. Many were extended family members I'd had little to no relationship with. Attending these sorts of funerals is always an exercise in expectations - your own as well as those of others.
When everyone around me is clearly experiencing heightened emotions I tend to feel that I'll seem callous if I don't follow suit. This can be incredibly difficult when I don't have the same relationship with the person being remembered as those around me do.
I'm a cryer. I cry when I'm sad, I cry when I'm angry. I cry when a movie has any sort of negative emotion. I watched a film recently where I couldn't have cared less about the characters and in fact just wanted the story to end. Still, I cried along with them.
So I don't tend to have any trouble crying at funerals, whether I knew the deceased well or not. At one recent funeral I didn't know the man being farewelled and had never met his wife or children. But that didn't matter. Hearing the eulogies, watching the family - you can't help but feel some fraction of the grief these people are feeling. Funerals are about the living. They're about honouring the dead in a way that helps the living move on with their lives. And they are often deeply moving.
Funerals aren't the difficult part of grief for me as they're generally a celebration of life. At one recent funeral many of us were smiling as silent tears rolled down as faces as we listened to beautiful, heartwarming stories that we all had our own versions of. You know what emotions you're supposed to feel and display and if you're anything like me, they don't have to be forced.
It's before the funeral that is most difficult for me.
I'm never sure how to approach loss. Even before someone has died, when they become ill and true worry sets in, I often find it difficult to know how to feel. Or more accurately, I find it difficult to do the feeling.
I know that I'm supposed to be sad and I know that I am sad. I'm afraid for the person's safety and I'm deeply worried for their loved ones. I just don't know how to express these feelings.
Any other time, emotions are my thing. I am great at feeling and conveying emotions. In fact, I often get so emotional that I lose all control and the emotions just do their own thing. Let's just say that a poker face is not my forte.
But when a relative was admitted to hospital recently with a potentially life-threatening condition, I found it difficult to express the emotions I knew I should be feeling. I knew I was sad. I knew I was scared. I could see the faces of close family members in my head and I knew how terrified they must be. It hurt to know that they were suffering. But when confronted with these sort of situations it seems that a sort of automatic self-preservation tactic kicks in. I know I'm experiencing these emotions but it's as if I'm observing them from a distance. My emotional centre outsources and my brain attempts to focus on other far less important things.
Useless things. Things I can control.
When somebody dies and a funeral is announced, I focus on what I'm going to wear, whether it will interfere with work, whether people I haven't seen recently will be there. When someone falls ill I think about mundane activities coming up in my life. I become quiet and calm. I speak to people in a quietly cheery way. I observe proceedings as if from a completely disinterested standpoint. I separate.
This scares the hell out of me.
How can I be thinking about clothes at a time like this? How dare I think about dinner with friends when there's a family out there who will never have dinner all together again? What's wrong with me? Do I have no compassion? Will other people realise how heartless I am?
In my lucid moments I know that I am none of these things. I am compassionate. I am thoughtful and kind and selfless when need be. I just have a very specific coping mechanism.
By keeping my strongest feelings behind a veil I can stop myself from descending into the sort of hysteria which is always lurking at the back of my psyche. The only explanation I can come up with is that I focus on what I can control, no matter how unimportant it may be, to cope with the total breakdown I have the potential to experience. Because isn't death and grief the ultimate loss of control? We can prolong lives in the right situations but we haven't yet found a way to keep grief and loss at bay. Eventually, all are lost.
And I just don't know how to deal with that.
