Why is no one talking about grief?

If there is one thing I know for sure, it's that we are all going to lose someone we love in this lifetime. So why is no one talking about it?

I like to think of myself as a "glass half full" kind of girl, always leaving people happier than I found them. In doing so, what I've realised, is that this can often mean I avoid having conversations that may make people feel “awkward” or “uncomfortable”. Often these are the types of conversations that have the greatest impact, because these are the topics people need to be educated on and perhaps even have guidelines for.

Since losing my mum to breast cancer six months ago, I have been unable to stop thinking about one thing: why is acknowledging someone’s death so difficult for people? To some, this may seem like a very morbid conversation, one that may not necessarily leave you “feeling good”, but I stand to disagree. What doesn’t feel good is not having your grief acknowledged. What does feel good, is knowing that you handled a situation better today than what you would have in the past.

One of the first things that someone said to me when my mum passed away was that “grief isn’t linear”. Maybe it’s because people were shocked about how “fine” I looked, how I was holding it together and how high functioning I was (and still am). Maybe some people were waiting for me to have a mental breakdown. Maybe they’re still waiting. Maybe I’m still waiting. Whilst there isn’t one linear way to deal with grief, there is definitely a clear way to acknowledge someone’s grief and loss.

This is what I’ve learnt about grief.

Grief is private, at least for me. My grief hits me the hardest when I am alone or when I am with someone I am incredibly close and familiar with. You may think that people are okay because they seem okay. You may see them kicking goals in their work, going to events with friends, but I can almost assure you, in every moment, they are carrying their grief with them and they are fragile.

I think after experiencing such immense grief, I am able to fully appreciate the concept of Yin and Yang. There will always be elements of sadness in your happiest moments, and positives in your saddest moments. By that, what I mean is that in times where I am so present and experience something magical, my element of sadness is knowing I will never be able to share this experience with my mum. It’s knowing that there was so much life she was meant to live. But in my saddest moments, I’m reminded that these hard life lessons have allowed me to gain more from life. I am more compassionate. I feel people’s pain. I show people I love them and that I care. I am kind. I’m not afraid of anything or hurting myself anymore, because I have survived my worst fear. I am vulnerable. I have a new lease on life. That is the Yin and Yang.

You can survive your grief. When I was told my mum only had a few months to live and I had to accept her death, I thought I wasn’t going to survive. The thought of losing my mum was so crippling. I thought for the first time in my life, I would experience severe depression and wouldn’t be able to get out of bed. I thought I would take time off work, go on an extended vacation, be in solitude and sell our family home.

What I’ve learnt, is that you can survive, but you want to keep busy. A few days after my mum’s funeral, I started a new project because I needed to keep my mind occupied with something I was excited about. In my experience, if you’re not busy with work, you’re busy in your mind. This can be exhausting and in my experience, has done more harm than good. It’s necessary to process and feel your emotions, but you don’t want to live in your head.

Grief feels lighter when you have people alongside supporting you. As I mentioned, I was overwhelmed at the thought of being surrounded by people and receiving an influx of messages when my mum would eventually pass away. When people asked me to catch up, I felt like I was about to explode. I couldn’t have one more person asking something from me, even if it was someone I love who had the best of intentions.

What I can tell you now, is that those friends that were at my house every single day, supporting me, bringing food for my family, taking care of the visitors in my home who were paying their respects, providing me with an understanding, compassionate ear, listening to me without trying to give me advice, giving me space to feel my emotions, they were my pillars of strength. It was the first time in my life I allowed myself to rely on someone who wasn’t my family, without offering something back in that moment. Those friends are my family and I will never forget the peace they gifted me.

When you have friends with you, feeling your pain, comforting you with their presence, the burden and weight of the loss feels lighter. Seeing how moved and heartbroken my friends were over my mum’s death also made it somewhat easier to carry the load, because I knew my mum had touched so many people and the loss of her presence was going to be felt beyond my family. It’s acknowledging that all of our lives won’t be the same and we have all been moved. It’s acknowledging that my mum had an impact in this world.

Grief starts before you lose someone, especially when they have an illness or disability. I remember when I first caught up with a friend after coming back from Greece last year and I broke the news to her that mum had been given a two month death sentence. She asked me how I felt and in that moment. I was calm, matter of fact and not showing how heartbroken I was. She said to me, I probably have started my grieving process and that is why I was so composed. She claimed that when you are faced with the decline of someone you love, especially to a vicious disease such as cancer, your grieving process starts before you lose the person you love. In that moment, I realised she was right. I had been grieving for three and a half years, before I even knew that I would lose my mum to cancer. I was grieving the loss of a mother that was able to be who she was before cancer. The mother that was able to go to restaurants, go on holidays, go for walks, spend time with me, make plans, go shopping, be carefree. I was grieving my mother because your role completely changes when you are sick.

My mother no longer looked, spoke, acted or thought the same. With each diagnosis (there were a lot over four years), she began morphing and changing into another version of herself. When I think about my mum now, I can’t have one clear picture of what she looked like because cancer ravaged her. That’s what diseases do. They make you not even recognise yourself. They make you feel like an alien in your own body and hate yourself because your body is betraying you. I know this because I saw my mum grappling with this. I know she is not the only one.

So many people I know and love have recently been treated for cancer and say the same to me. People start to avoid looking at you or don’t even recognise you. People are scared to address your illness. You feel ugly and invisible. It’s challenging enough feeling the changes in your body. Your physical appearance changing is just the evidence. I constantly reassured my mum how beautiful she was, even when she lost her hair and eyelashes. To me, her devotion to our family and health made her soul’s beauty shine so brightly. She was so thankful, but I know it wasn’t enough to compensate for how hurt she was at people looking at her like she was a shadow of herself. Please, don’t be scared of people with illnesses. This is the time they need more love, support and reassurance than ever.

Grief breaks you heart open. I recently was re-reading my favourite book of all time, Untamed by Glennon Doyle. This book changed my life! It was the first book that I felt brave enough to underline passages that resonated with me. Deep in my grief, I felt the urgency to reread Untamed and note which passages resonated with me two years after initially reading the book. This hit home for me;

“When heartbreak rings, answer the door… When we let ourselves be moved, we discover what moves us… Heartbreak delivers your purpose.”

I say that losing my mum is the worst heartbreak I have and probably ever will experience. I feel like I have surrendered, allowing my heart to break open to things that move me. I feel emotions with a new intensity. I experience the depth and magnitude of love, because grief stems from love. When you create space for this grief, you are listening to what has the power to emotionally move you and make you care deeply. This may bring you closer to your purpose. Lean into it.

For me, I know that I am more aligned everyday with my purpose. I am feeling confident and powerful in being vulnerable enough to share my experiences and approach to life so I can help people believe in themselves, love without inhibitions and make the most of the one precious life they have.

It’s the Yin in the Yang.

Now, that you have some insight into my experience with grief, I hope you can understand that saying you’re sorry for someone’s loss isn’t “awkward” or “uncomfortable”. It’s acknowledging our inevitable fate and not overlooking the impact we all have in this lifetime.

Not speaking about those that have left us is pretending that they never existed. When you’re close to death, you’re scared people will forget you existed. Sometimes, I fear that I am going to forget my mum. I’m scared I’ll forget what she looked like, what she felt like and what she sounded like. So now, I speak about my mum. Losing my mum isn’t something to be ashamed about, so I speak about her and her battle proudly. I have decided that I am no longer allowing other people’s feelings of “discomfort” to pacify me. These conversations are about being human and feeling a deeper connection between ourselves and others. If you want to grow, if you care, if you want to feel connected to others, offer your condolences, check in on someone going through a hard time or provide them with the space to listen. As Glennon Doyle says, “we can do hard things”.