Why is it that our aging process sometimes truncates our ability to grieve? Because we are also in a stage of loss and endings. Losing friends, family, pets, way of life… we also lose the illusions that kept us trapped if we are lucky. I watch my husband, who suffers from a chronic condition that is very painful, slowly come undone. He cries every day now. Not over his pain, but over the loss of a dog he had years ago that he never got to grieve, a tv show that brings up a memories, friends, family, dreams he had for himself. And I grieve with him and tell him it’s ok. He is softening. He is embracing that deep sensitivity than he had to bury to survive. And I see this process of grieving as a weaving his parts together. It is a terrible beauty, and sometimes I want to run from it as much as I want to run to it. And in witnessing, it weaves me together too. The most powerful response to another’s grief is to just stand with it. Just being there as a compassionate, loving witness. Those moments of just being willing to breathe it in and hold space allows the process to come full circle. And this is one of the great wisdoms I have learned as an elder. To just be present to the best of my ability. It is one of the areas in my life that growth finds me every day. And it is good. Grief is the greatest leveler when embraced as one of our sacred ceremonies. No one lives fully without grief in one’s life.
I don’t cry. My body does. Several months ago, I noticed an unusual, repeated occurrence. I would become aware that a single tear had rolled down my cheek. This was at a time when, for the first time in my life, I was suffering a severe depression. I didn’t know that’s what it was, even though I am a clinical therapist.
At 79 and for the first time in my life I sought therapy. In providing biographical information, I noted a traumatic event of some 40 years ago. Obviously something significant but something I had not thought about consciously in a very long time. Detailing it made me cry. My mind had made me “forget” it but now it was out of the box. I began sensing a profound sense of sorrow, as if sorrow was a body of water, filling me up and overflowing at eye level, one drop at a time. There is a tear at my eye just now as I write this.
It is as if I can’t or wont cry my sorrow out so my body does what it can.
Oh Elise thank you for posting this. First of all, I live in Austin, TX and the devastation here so close to home of people we know consumed me this weekend too. Along with the bill passing and knowing the implications of that, I found my heart so heavy. My 12 year old daughter went to a camp in East Texas at the beginning of the summer and they had a HUGE storm that first day where they lost power, had to bring in generators and didn't have water for two days. She has storm anxiety but we got through it and honestly I was like, well this is just immersion therapy for you! But now, even though her camp isn't by a river with all this I don't know if she will ever go back which is heartbreaking because camp is SO good for her soul. Your son will love it, I promise.
The crying for me comes in waves like a monsoon. And I feel so relieved when I have a good cortiosl dump through my tears. I quit drinking alcohol four years (with alot of help from @HollyWhitakers work so I was thrilled to see you on her new pod!) and it was about year two I started to really be able to thaw out and feel my feelings.
I also love the Jewish ritual of a shiva, 7 days of intense mourning where you literally are expected to do nothing else. Like BRILLIANT. And one of my best friends is Jewish and I told her the next time something big happens (I have already lost my dad and both my brothers, I didn't cry for any of them at the time) I am having one of these.
Thanks for your work. I am a huge, mega fan and your voice is truly getting me and so many others through this unprecendent time we find ourselves in.
So beautifully written Elise. I can't cry either - it's literally verging on decades. Am ready to go the psychadelic supported therapy route to release the valve.
As an Adult Child of alcoholic parents, I wasn't allowed to cry. When I was violated at 30 I didn't cry. I stuffed it and it sat for a year or so until the trigger got pull and I had a PTSD episode. Then I cried enough to have my therapist try to get me into a psych ward. That stopped that. And I have been in therapy on and off since then.
When my marriage broke up last year I didn't cry. I walk around numb for about 9 months until the divorce was finalized last month. The tears started as anger response, have begun to morph into mourning with a bit of fear added for flavor.
Such a deep invitation to what we all are missing and in desperate need of…that connection to and communion with what is foundational about and within life, right? So many little griefs we endure too and sleep away camp has def felt like one for me with my kids. I’m in Maine and it’s gorgeous here. We have wonderful camps too. Hoping your son enjoys his days here 💗
I was just rewatching Six Feet Under the other day and paused for a moment on the scene where Nate talks about the suppression and sanitizing of grief, so this has been on my mind for a bit. Sometimes I think our nervous systems aren’t built to handle the constant influx of suffering we see 24/7, and so we have to be selective about what we can grieve. And then when we do allow ourselves to head into the wilderness of grief, there’s often no village there to hold it with us, as you said. I love your inclusion of the study, as well. Will have to read.
So well said. It is impossible to fathom what these parents are going through in Texas. I have been feeling so sad lately, and I appreciate that you covered this topic. A general heaviness.
"We can’t work with what we refuse to see." Absolutely beautiful, Elise. In my own experiences with grief, sharing them in community as stories or mutual support has been the most healing.
After many out-of-order and unexpected losses, performing 10 eulogies in fewer years. I just completed my first grief group for my latest loss. I won't expect myself to get over it this time. No stuffing and shoving it away and slamming the door this time. I want to talk about my loss and be witnessed in that. I am now allowing myself to be vulnerable with a group of kind strangers. I am accepting this is who I am now. Someone with many losses, and I am letting that shape me instead of trying to remain who I was before I was missing my people. Thank you for this topic. Always. I look forward to exploring more alongside you. Thanks for letting me set this here. Big group hug.
The genocide in Gaza ❤️🩹has broken my heart open, so much. One day feeling overwhelmed and hopeless I asked for guidance on what I could do ?
I heard organise a Vigil for Gaza in my local church. So I did and the support came easily.
Some in my community gathered in collective grief, to share words, poetry and music. It was intensively moving and emotional , with many telling me how much they needed it . I feel called to continue this work, so appreciate your encouragement and insights Eloise, thank you 🙏🏻
Well I cried throughout this whole piece, starting with a choked sob reading about the devastation of harm coming to your child at camp when you’re not close. The powerlessness seems so persistent currently. Though I may have the tears part down I’m far from being capable of successfully enduring yet another initiation individually. This was beautiful, thank you.
Sobonfu Somé did grief rituals while she was alive. I went to a couple of them and found them to be profoundly moving experiences. I too struggle to express my grief - even after doing grief work for years. Sometimes I cry in my therapist's office and sometimes tears leak from my eyes when I know I'm grieving, but only rarely do I really cry my eyes out. I wish I did. I wish I hadn' broken that reflex when I was young. I still remember the moment. I was 5 and late coming home from kindergarten. My mother's rule was that if I was late I got spanked. But that day, I had the sense that she got some kind of perverse pleasure out of spanking me so I stopped the tears. I refused to give her the pleasure of knowing it hurt me and I've never really reclaimed that capacity.
Yes, I think there is move afoot from the focus on individual healing to collective including earth cycles, elements, cosmology. To be held in the womb of the Mother, with or without others, heals on so many levels. Ive also been too busy to cry during passages. It almost feels easier to cry for people I don’t know.... hmm.
Why is it that our aging process sometimes truncates our ability to grieve? Because we are also in a stage of loss and endings. Losing friends, family, pets, way of life… we also lose the illusions that kept us trapped if we are lucky. I watch my husband, who suffers from a chronic condition that is very painful, slowly come undone. He cries every day now. Not over his pain, but over the loss of a dog he had years ago that he never got to grieve, a tv show that brings up a memories, friends, family, dreams he had for himself. And I grieve with him and tell him it’s ok. He is softening. He is embracing that deep sensitivity than he had to bury to survive. And I see this process of grieving as a weaving his parts together. It is a terrible beauty, and sometimes I want to run from it as much as I want to run to it. And in witnessing, it weaves me together too. The most powerful response to another’s grief is to just stand with it. Just being there as a compassionate, loving witness. Those moments of just being willing to breathe it in and hold space allows the process to come full circle. And this is one of the great wisdoms I have learned as an elder. To just be present to the best of my ability. It is one of the areas in my life that growth finds me every day. And it is good. Grief is the greatest leveler when embraced as one of our sacred ceremonies. No one lives fully without grief in one’s life.
love you
I don’t cry. My body does. Several months ago, I noticed an unusual, repeated occurrence. I would become aware that a single tear had rolled down my cheek. This was at a time when, for the first time in my life, I was suffering a severe depression. I didn’t know that’s what it was, even though I am a clinical therapist.
At 79 and for the first time in my life I sought therapy. In providing biographical information, I noted a traumatic event of some 40 years ago. Obviously something significant but something I had not thought about consciously in a very long time. Detailing it made me cry. My mind had made me “forget” it but now it was out of the box. I began sensing a profound sense of sorrow, as if sorrow was a body of water, filling me up and overflowing at eye level, one drop at a time. There is a tear at my eye just now as I write this.
It is as if I can’t or wont cry my sorrow out so my body does what it can.
Oh Elise thank you for posting this. First of all, I live in Austin, TX and the devastation here so close to home of people we know consumed me this weekend too. Along with the bill passing and knowing the implications of that, I found my heart so heavy. My 12 year old daughter went to a camp in East Texas at the beginning of the summer and they had a HUGE storm that first day where they lost power, had to bring in generators and didn't have water for two days. She has storm anxiety but we got through it and honestly I was like, well this is just immersion therapy for you! But now, even though her camp isn't by a river with all this I don't know if she will ever go back which is heartbreaking because camp is SO good for her soul. Your son will love it, I promise.
The crying for me comes in waves like a monsoon. And I feel so relieved when I have a good cortiosl dump through my tears. I quit drinking alcohol four years (with alot of help from @HollyWhitakers work so I was thrilled to see you on her new pod!) and it was about year two I started to really be able to thaw out and feel my feelings.
I also love the Jewish ritual of a shiva, 7 days of intense mourning where you literally are expected to do nothing else. Like BRILLIANT. And one of my best friends is Jewish and I told her the next time something big happens (I have already lost my dad and both my brothers, I didn't cry for any of them at the time) I am having one of these.
Thanks for your work. I am a huge, mega fan and your voice is truly getting me and so many others through this unprecendent time we find ourselves in.
Yes, we all need to sit shiva!
So beautifully written Elise. I can't cry either - it's literally verging on decades. Am ready to go the psychadelic supported therapy route to release the valve.
I never thought I would lose this function...I know we're not the only ones. <3
As an Adult Child of alcoholic parents, I wasn't allowed to cry. When I was violated at 30 I didn't cry. I stuffed it and it sat for a year or so until the trigger got pull and I had a PTSD episode. Then I cried enough to have my therapist try to get me into a psych ward. That stopped that. And I have been in therapy on and off since then.
When my marriage broke up last year I didn't cry. I walk around numb for about 9 months until the divorce was finalized last month. The tears started as anger response, have begun to morph into mourning with a bit of fear added for flavor.
And the beat goes on
Such a deep invitation to what we all are missing and in desperate need of…that connection to and communion with what is foundational about and within life, right? So many little griefs we endure too and sleep away camp has def felt like one for me with my kids. I’m in Maine and it’s gorgeous here. We have wonderful camps too. Hoping your son enjoys his days here 💗
I was just rewatching Six Feet Under the other day and paused for a moment on the scene where Nate talks about the suppression and sanitizing of grief, so this has been on my mind for a bit. Sometimes I think our nervous systems aren’t built to handle the constant influx of suffering we see 24/7, and so we have to be selective about what we can grieve. And then when we do allow ourselves to head into the wilderness of grief, there’s often no village there to hold it with us, as you said. I love your inclusion of the study, as well. Will have to read.
Gordon Neufeld says “We will be saved in the ocean of our tears” -
So well said. It is impossible to fathom what these parents are going through in Texas. I have been feeling so sad lately, and I appreciate that you covered this topic. A general heaviness.
"We can’t work with what we refuse to see." Absolutely beautiful, Elise. In my own experiences with grief, sharing them in community as stories or mutual support has been the most healing.
Felt this is in my very battered heart and soul. For myself, for my child… it’s been a heartbreaking, godforsaken bunch of years…
After many out-of-order and unexpected losses, performing 10 eulogies in fewer years. I just completed my first grief group for my latest loss. I won't expect myself to get over it this time. No stuffing and shoving it away and slamming the door this time. I want to talk about my loss and be witnessed in that. I am now allowing myself to be vulnerable with a group of kind strangers. I am accepting this is who I am now. Someone with many losses, and I am letting that shape me instead of trying to remain who I was before I was missing my people. Thank you for this topic. Always. I look forward to exploring more alongside you. Thanks for letting me set this here. Big group hug.
Oh Elise, this is a beautiful call to community. Thank you ❤️
The genocide in Gaza ❤️🩹has broken my heart open, so much. One day feeling overwhelmed and hopeless I asked for guidance on what I could do ?
I heard organise a Vigil for Gaza in my local church. So I did and the support came easily.
Some in my community gathered in collective grief, to share words, poetry and music. It was intensively moving and emotional , with many telling me how much they needed it . I feel called to continue this work, so appreciate your encouragement and insights Eloise, thank you 🙏🏻
Well I cried throughout this whole piece, starting with a choked sob reading about the devastation of harm coming to your child at camp when you’re not close. The powerlessness seems so persistent currently. Though I may have the tears part down I’m far from being capable of successfully enduring yet another initiation individually. This was beautiful, thank you.
Sobonfu Somé did grief rituals while she was alive. I went to a couple of them and found them to be profoundly moving experiences. I too struggle to express my grief - even after doing grief work for years. Sometimes I cry in my therapist's office and sometimes tears leak from my eyes when I know I'm grieving, but only rarely do I really cry my eyes out. I wish I did. I wish I hadn' broken that reflex when I was young. I still remember the moment. I was 5 and late coming home from kindergarten. My mother's rule was that if I was late I got spanked. But that day, I had the sense that she got some kind of perverse pleasure out of spanking me so I stopped the tears. I refused to give her the pleasure of knowing it hurt me and I've never really reclaimed that capacity.
Yes, I think there is move afoot from the focus on individual healing to collective including earth cycles, elements, cosmology. To be held in the womb of the Mother, with or without others, heals on so many levels. Ive also been too busy to cry during passages. It almost feels easier to cry for people I don’t know.... hmm.