Stages of grief

I believe I'm about to gain a better understanding of these up close and personal.  I'm angry.  Surprisingly the thing that I am angry about is people throwing away opportunities to grow.  I understand where my thoughts are coming from but the emotion is still there and very powerful.  I know one of the stages is anger.  Great, I arrived.  Not so great, I arrived.  Interesting thing is when I looked it up, the psychologist are not agreeing on stages of grief.  Some say 5 and some say 7 while others mention only 3.  I believe the one thing they all agree on is every person proceeds through the process of grieving differently.  I am not surprised that I proceeded to anger very quickly.  It is my go to reaction to stuff I don't understand.  Rather than outwardly chastising the entire World for not doing what I think they should do.  I am examining my own choice being in line with what I am feeling.  Am I taking the opportunities presented to me to improve my life.  Am I making healthy choices on how to address and feel my grief.  Today, I chose to stay home.  I tried going out and realized I am not in the state of mind conducive to being kind and tolerant of others or myself.  I took a long nap.  I feel more at peace now. 


My daughter shared this on Facebook and I am thinking a lot about what is in me when I get shook up. 

Anger is a part that is showing up right now.  Stayed home to protect those around me.  I need to go to school tomorrow.  Heavy sigh.  I will work at parking my unreasonable expectations out with my car when I go inside. 

One of the articles I read when I looked up the stages of grief gave a perspective that fits with my opinion.  I like finding someone that agrees with me:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/supersurvivors/201707/why-the-five-stages-grief-are-wrong

Emotional overload

Yesterday we buried our beautiful tiny granddaughter.  My sadness is deep.  Today I stayed home.  Tomorrow is a national holiday so I am going to go listen to my favorite musician, Cast In Bronze.  I am allowing myself time to feel what I feel.  Accept how I feel and give that feeling my utmost attention.  This is a life changing experience.  How do I want it to change me?  In what direction will I go?

I contemplated briefly anger and bitterness; I realized that those emotions have no place in my life.  Yes, things went not as planned for several things.  Yes, I felt hurt by some events but those things were side issues.  I foolishly thought when I reconnected with emotions they would walk on stage one at a time.  I had no idea that sometimes there is a symphony with a counterpoint and occasional crashing cymbals.  I experienced emotional flooding when I first started feeling again.  This feels similar in that I feel battered and worn.  No room for any more and certainly not wanting to explain to anyone why I feel what I am feeling.

I snuggled in a blanket, read a book, and played a few computer games, not to numb myself but to give my mind time to process so much.  Tomorrow, music and time to contemplate.  In today's fast pace World, people are expected to bounce back and behave like nothing is wrong.  It is like the whole World wants everyone to be numb and in denial.  Interesting for so long I worked at achieving such a state.  After counseling and reconnecting, I never want to go back to that bleak monotone state of not feeling anything.

Pain filled by Peace

For the last several months I knew that our newest little granddaughter was facing horrible odds.  Our doctor son let us know that her chances of living a day were slim to none.  He was right.  Our sweet tiny granddaughter lived less than an hour.  The weekend before I thought I came to terms with her brief stay on Earth.  Knowing what was coming my heart still shattered.  Unlike past experiences, I felt the pain.  I was devastated by the overwhelming effort to keep going with one foot in front of the other.  Allowing myself to mourn was part of my plan.  I cried.  Deep in mourning I felt the Comforter promised in the scriptures.  I felt the sweet whispering of peace while I felt the heartache of loss.  I ached for the sorrow of our son and daughter-in-law.  I had no words that could comfort.  I felt comforted but I don't know how to share that comfort.  I pray for them.  I weep at odd moments like finding a layette pattern for knitting baby out fits with a pink fluffy dress on the cover.  I put it away.  Again the peace promised by Christ soothed my aching heart.  I learned that peace does not deaden or numb the pain like disassociation does.  Instead it makes the pain bearable.  I am deeply thankful to those that offer support and prayers during our time of grief.  I am totally amazed the impact of one tiny life that lived less than one hour. 

Desolation

Wanna' Be a Bear

Years ago I saw a cute meme explaining why I wanna' be a bear.  Sleep all winter, people expect you to be grumpy when you wake up, don't need to shave, and when I wake up I can eat as much as I want because I need to get fat for next winter's sleep.  Works for me.  

Hearts break

and the heart keeps beating.  Lives shatter and the pieces are all about.  When do you put things all together and then everything falls apart again.  Its called living.  Living loud and clear and hurting and growing.  I lived a twilight life.  I prefer to be totally alive, pain mingled with joy. 

Different perspecitves

Every once in a while I am directed to videos that I feel come close to how I feel about emotions.  This time there were 2. 

Ideas about emotion. The gift and power of emotional courage.  https://www.ted.com/talks/susan_david_the_gift_and_power_of_emotional_courage?utm_source=newsletter_daily&utm_campaign=daily&utm_medium=email&utm_content=button__2018-01-30  
I did a search and ordered her book.  Emotional Agility, I'm looking forward to it coming later this month.   

This video followed the other one.  I enjoyed it too.
  https://www.ted.com/talks/heather_lanier_good_and_bad_are_incomplete_stories_we_tell_ourselves

Both videos touched on ideas that I feel connected to.  Spending most of my life without a connection to my emotions, makes emotions so much more precious to me. 

I learned that when I worry, I plan ahead.  If no one was worried why would the need to plan ahead or prepare for the future?

Without fear, there is no need for courage.  It is only in the darkness of fear that courage shines so brightly. 

Without discomfort people would settle and stay right where they are with little or no growth.  An uncomfortable person is looking for something different and is more open to invention and change. 

All those pesky emotions become the germinators for positive things in life, if I let them.

Wall I painted when there wasn't enough of any one color. I loved doing this at work.