When I was little, my family seemed so average. So when I was 12, and my dad told us he was gay and my parents were getting divorced, instead of grief, I thought: “oh my family is actually different! This is interesting!” Then when I was 16, he told us he was HIV+ and I felt fear but not necessarily grief. Finally, when I was 22, he took his life (prefaced by years of pulling away). The heart wrenching Tim Rice lyric comes to mind, “You've even gone a bit too far to get the message home.” Could we start again, please?
I remember shock but I’ll tell you, rather than an instant, crash-to-your-knees wail, the grief became a 20-year ragged whimper bouncing around in a cave of my own making. Because this: “I once fell in love with my own woundedness, and I would keep the wounds fresh just to keep licking them.” I became 100% addicted to the puzzle, the why, and the complexity. And whenever a friend’s father passed, you better believe I’d crack open that book again and read it cover to cover, trying to compare notes, find loopholes, scratch that interminable itch. But what if I traveled back to the young wisdom of 12-year-old Katie? I think by “different than” I actually meant “the same as”… I felt like I finally *belonged* to the human race of suffering. I wish I had held on tighter to that insight.
The biggest paradox of humanity is that we all want so desperately to be unique and special because it means that we matter, we BELONG, we aren’t discarded into the bin of boring, we don’t fade into the background of the unnoticed. Yet then, by brandishing our suffering like a membership card, we stay stuck in our trauma. Addicted to the unique wound, we shun healing that could truly embrace us into the fold. We’re told it’s bad etiquette to bring up our own history of suffering when someone else is in it… but what if that’s exactly the hand we need to pull us out of our isolated echo pain chamber?
Per usual, you got me waxing poetic over here, but reading your insightful HIGHLY intelligent books and essays on grief have been pivotal in my healing my own “grief baby” over the past several years. So thank you for allowing me to get down on the ground, sprawl out with my notes and my string map, and work it out in the comment section ❤️
Thank you for your gorgeous reflection. Particularly the part about the desire to rank grief against others. I lost both of my beautiful parents while in my late 30’s/early 40’s and I won’t lie, I’m furious with friends that don’t grasp the depth of these losses/don’t check in/don’t get it. It feels so profoundly unfair but I am just alchemizing these losses earlier than most.
Thank you so much for this Mari. Last February I lost someone who the world knew as my “aunt” but was truly a third parent that raised me and was one of my biggest support systems in my life. I really resonate with the complicated grief feelings - and especially the frustration of feeling like others around you who haven’t lost someone of that magnitude just don’t get it. I want to scream from the mountains on a near daily basis that she wasn’t *just* an aunt, and feel like I almost need to justify my grief to people who don’t understand the extent or our relationship. It’s such a hard thing to navigate even now that I’m a year into it. Your illustrations really struck a chord. I so appreciate you sharing.
When my late husband Jay died in the our hospital I came home and immediately dropped to the ground in front of the angel canvas he had bought for our home. Supplication. Position of crying and release. May you find peace as you experience this heart rendering loss Mari.
Thank you for this, though I'm sorry you have to bear the pain. We can lose everything BUT the ground under us, and your words have helped me see that.
Mari, this is so beautiful and resonant. I have found my grief to be incredibly selfish and shameful at times and you so beautifully articulated that experience with grace and loving. Thank you. Also, if you haven’t read it, I highly recommend Martín Prechtel’s “The Smell of Rain on Dust.” It has helped me through the past several years of intense grief. I am so sorry about your friend. 🤍
Mari, you are wise beyond words. Thank you for having the courage to explore and share your journey into the hidden recesses of grief, a subject that often remains cloaked in silence but is nevertheless painfully endured in powerless solitude. In your sharing, you are helping others to see that they too can look down upon the grief they are experiencing in an enabling way.
I resonate with this, especially your grief "memories" basket drawing and your list of grief stages. Also Nick Cave's formulation, and yours, that we are born into grief, complete (incomplete) with a sense of lostness, of loss, of yearning.
This post has been sitting in my inbox, waiting for the right moment to read. it is so so so beautiful and so you and so true. So many losses over the years and the one consistent thread i've seen is the destructive power of playing the game of who hurts the most. It's so empty and pointless and hurtful and yet the game everyone tends to immediately jump into. I love thinking about the floor, where we all belong. Can't wait to listen to this nick cave interview. wish i had more time to write but i love you! thank you for sharing!!
Thank you for sharing your writing and your grief. It helps to read about other people's grief. My 10 year old daughter died last year and I suppose this should be a straightforward grief. The grief is mine to take, she is and was my child. Yet, even though this is true, it still feels complicated. She suffered a lot (she had a brain tumour) and there is an element of relief that she is no longer suffering. But this complicates my grief. How can I be sad that she has died, if the alternative, her being alive, meant so much sorrow and pain for her? It is complicated in different ways to the complicated grief that you write about, yet even so, it doesn't feel as simple as I might have once imagined that it would feel, to lose your child. I have been writing about my grief, trying to make sense of it all, though aware it is possible that I can't make sense of it. I expected to be on the floor and in fact, that would feel reassuring, to be on the floor with my grief and tears and sorrow. Yet I am not and somehow, this bothers me. Instead, I am just tired.
When I was little, my family seemed so average. So when I was 12, and my dad told us he was gay and my parents were getting divorced, instead of grief, I thought: “oh my family is actually different! This is interesting!” Then when I was 16, he told us he was HIV+ and I felt fear but not necessarily grief. Finally, when I was 22, he took his life (prefaced by years of pulling away). The heart wrenching Tim Rice lyric comes to mind, “You've even gone a bit too far to get the message home.” Could we start again, please?
I remember shock but I’ll tell you, rather than an instant, crash-to-your-knees wail, the grief became a 20-year ragged whimper bouncing around in a cave of my own making. Because this: “I once fell in love with my own woundedness, and I would keep the wounds fresh just to keep licking them.” I became 100% addicted to the puzzle, the why, and the complexity. And whenever a friend’s father passed, you better believe I’d crack open that book again and read it cover to cover, trying to compare notes, find loopholes, scratch that interminable itch. But what if I traveled back to the young wisdom of 12-year-old Katie? I think by “different than” I actually meant “the same as”… I felt like I finally *belonged* to the human race of suffering. I wish I had held on tighter to that insight.
The biggest paradox of humanity is that we all want so desperately to be unique and special because it means that we matter, we BELONG, we aren’t discarded into the bin of boring, we don’t fade into the background of the unnoticed. Yet then, by brandishing our suffering like a membership card, we stay stuck in our trauma. Addicted to the unique wound, we shun healing that could truly embrace us into the fold. We’re told it’s bad etiquette to bring up our own history of suffering when someone else is in it… but what if that’s exactly the hand we need to pull us out of our isolated echo pain chamber?
Per usual, you got me waxing poetic over here, but reading your insightful HIGHLY intelligent books and essays on grief have been pivotal in my healing my own “grief baby” over the past several years. So thank you for allowing me to get down on the ground, sprawl out with my notes and my string map, and work it out in the comment section ❤️
There is no should.
Love🌻💙
Thank you for your gorgeous reflection. Particularly the part about the desire to rank grief against others. I lost both of my beautiful parents while in my late 30’s/early 40’s and I won’t lie, I’m furious with friends that don’t grasp the depth of these losses/don’t check in/don’t get it. It feels so profoundly unfair but I am just alchemizing these losses earlier than most.
Thank you so much for this Mari. Last February I lost someone who the world knew as my “aunt” but was truly a third parent that raised me and was one of my biggest support systems in my life. I really resonate with the complicated grief feelings - and especially the frustration of feeling like others around you who haven’t lost someone of that magnitude just don’t get it. I want to scream from the mountains on a near daily basis that she wasn’t *just* an aunt, and feel like I almost need to justify my grief to people who don’t understand the extent or our relationship. It’s such a hard thing to navigate even now that I’m a year into it. Your illustrations really struck a chord. I so appreciate you sharing.
When my late husband Jay died in the our hospital I came home and immediately dropped to the ground in front of the angel canvas he had bought for our home. Supplication. Position of crying and release. May you find peace as you experience this heart rendering loss Mari.
Thank you for this, though I'm sorry you have to bear the pain. We can lose everything BUT the ground under us, and your words have helped me see that.
Mari, this is so beautiful and resonant. I have found my grief to be incredibly selfish and shameful at times and you so beautifully articulated that experience with grace and loving. Thank you. Also, if you haven’t read it, I highly recommend Martín Prechtel’s “The Smell of Rain on Dust.” It has helped me through the past several years of intense grief. I am so sorry about your friend. 🤍
This is beautifully written. Grief is not a one-size-fits-all experience, and it is something humanity lives with a whole. Both are true.
Mari, you are wise beyond words. Thank you for having the courage to explore and share your journey into the hidden recesses of grief, a subject that often remains cloaked in silence but is nevertheless painfully endured in powerless solitude. In your sharing, you are helping others to see that they too can look down upon the grief they are experiencing in an enabling way.
I resonate with this, especially your grief "memories" basket drawing and your list of grief stages. Also Nick Cave's formulation, and yours, that we are born into grief, complete (incomplete) with a sense of lostness, of loss, of yearning.
This post has been sitting in my inbox, waiting for the right moment to read. it is so so so beautiful and so you and so true. So many losses over the years and the one consistent thread i've seen is the destructive power of playing the game of who hurts the most. It's so empty and pointless and hurtful and yet the game everyone tends to immediately jump into. I love thinking about the floor, where we all belong. Can't wait to listen to this nick cave interview. wish i had more time to write but i love you! thank you for sharing!!
Thank you for sharing your writing and your grief. It helps to read about other people's grief. My 10 year old daughter died last year and I suppose this should be a straightforward grief. The grief is mine to take, she is and was my child. Yet, even though this is true, it still feels complicated. She suffered a lot (she had a brain tumour) and there is an element of relief that she is no longer suffering. But this complicates my grief. How can I be sad that she has died, if the alternative, her being alive, meant so much sorrow and pain for her? It is complicated in different ways to the complicated grief that you write about, yet even so, it doesn't feel as simple as I might have once imagined that it would feel, to lose your child. I have been writing about my grief, trying to make sense of it all, though aware it is possible that I can't make sense of it. I expected to be on the floor and in fact, that would feel reassuring, to be on the floor with my grief and tears and sorrow. Yet I am not and somehow, this bothers me. Instead, I am just tired.
This piece is stunning. Thank you 🤍
I’m so sorry you have lost your dear friend. Big hugs so
Thank you for your words. I have not yet known this kind of loss, but reading this brought tears to my eyes. Thank you thank you thank you.