WHAT GRIEF WORK IS NOT :
Looking Over Clients’ Avoidance Lists

After months have passed since the loss of a beloved, many survivors tackle life with the mental mind set of wanting to keep things as normal as possible.  Here is just a sampling of some of the statements clients have made to me over the years regarding, what I’ve come to call, their avoidance list: all the things that are reminders of just how much their lives have changed and will never be the same again:

‘Why do I have to talk about something that brings up so much pain? It’s not like I’ve forgotten, I’d just rather not talk about it.’  Resisting any conversations and questions that lead survivors back into the murky waters of past pain-filled imprints, is not the grief work many want to undertake.

‘I refuse to give in to tears, what’s the point? Nothing’s gonna bring back my beloved. So I do whatever I can to shut off the water faucet of tears. It just makes me a mess for too long!’  Mental chatter.  Not grief work.

‘I keep the door to my child’s bedroom closed. It’s easier that way.’ OR  ‘I stay out of certain areas in the house that have too many memories of my beloved and me.’ OR  ‘I have a closet full of clothes and drawers filled with stuff that I won’t touch….too tough to face just yet.’  Large and small areas in one’s home [especially small] where things are frozen in time, or mummified – meaning as their beloved last left it, often called a shrine – is not doing one’s grief work.

‘When I laugh or experience a moment of joy, even for a split second, that lapse from feeling the pain makes me feel so guilty, like I’ve forgotten my beloved. How can I be so shallow?’  Such Survivor Guilt is one of the greatest challenges to finishing one’s grief work.

‘It became easier once I found other routes to avoid driving by the…’ [insert here such places as, cemetery, neighborhood, site of the accident, hospital or work site].  OR  ‘There are certain restaurants, certain foods, my beloved and I enjoyed.  Can’t bring myself to go there again.  What’s the point in stirring up that pain?’  Re-visiting pain-filled memories from places, people and things, is never an option for survivors avoiding their grief work.

‘Returning to old habits, like watching TV or even resuming other chores such as yard work or playing in the dirt – something I’ve always enjoyed – is hard for me now that my beloved’s passed.  I don’t understand.’  The first time a routine is resumed, a jolt of realization occurs – ‘haven’t done this since the death!’ – creating a BEFORE vs. AFTER in the timeline of one’s life.  It’s simply easier to instead avoid creating such an emotional distinction, for as long as possible, in one’s timeline.

‘I change the channel on the radio when a song comes on that brings up a painful reminder of what I’ve lost.’  OR  ‘There are some TV programs that I just can’t watch, too reminiscent of stuff I don’t want to think about.’  Avoiding songs and TV programs that challenge the false narrative that the daily fabric of one’s life is intact, is not grief work.

‘Busy, busy, busy. My schedule is crazy but I kinda like it that way. Keeps painful memories from blind-sighting me.’  [See Leslie’s Blog, ‘I Don’t Want to Talk About IT,’ August, 2017]

Mental Chatter, with its seeming ‘logic,’ is very adept at helping survivors postpone, avoid, distract and discredit natural responses to devastating loss.  Instead, a push is needed to do one’s grief work.  Grief counseling provides not only that needed push, but it also provides the necessary support and understanding to finish it.  Without finishing one’s grief work, there is no healthy healing…. Period.