For the past five years, I have been in a stage of grief.

I remember life before this string of foundation-rocking earthquakes. Even having those moments of quiet, almost boredom, as I stayed at home and raised my two girls. That “calm before the storm” feeling you can’t really explain or put into words.

And then it happened.

After 43 years of marriage, my parents divorced. Within that same year, my marriage began to unravel and both of my beloved 11-year-old dogs passed away. For the next year or so, the unraveling of my marriage continued until there was nothing left, and it ended. Five months later, my father was diagnosed with stage four bladder cancer. Six months later, I had a horrible career divorce from the workplace I had loved for seven years, and lost friends in the aftermath.

Just as I was finally feeling as if I were on my feet again, my father left the earth.

Maybe part of my reason for writing is making myself recognize how incredibly hard these past five years have been. Maybe part of it is making others feel less damn alone. Maybe part of it is making me feel better.

Whatever it is, it has been calling to me: write your story. Whispering in my dreams. Shouting at me in the day.

Do you understand the sh*t you have been trudging through?

Do you know how bad it has reeked?

Can you give yourself a break?

Grief is a powerful animal. Some days, it lashes out at you like a bear with its sharp claws and slashes at your throat so you feel like you will die. Some days, it wraps itself around you like a boa constrictor and makes simply breathing seem impossible. Some days it is more like a bird you glimpse as it flies past in the sky and then disappears to let you go about your day.

As human beings, we aren’t prepared for grief. It isn’t a required class in high school. There is no three-credit course you must take to get a college degree. But each and every one of us will have to deal with it, navigating our way through it like the sailor on their first journey who sails right into a hurricane.

My offering to you comes as the teacher and professor of the imaginary high school and college course. The old salty sailor who lived through the storm. Although I know there is much more grief that lies ahead in this lifetime, I now believe I know what to expect a bit more—so I can offer my story, and perhaps make the storm less brutal.

But know this. There is no answer to avoid the storm. There is no way around grief. There is only through.

I should clarify. I am still in the storm. Perhaps right now the waves aren’t thrashing me. I have a moment of calm to gather my thoughts and touch a keyboard. I have to be fast before it begins to thunder again.

You see, we can all be masters of perception. Post some happy pictures on social media? Everyone thinks your life is perfect—envies you, even. (“Wow, her dad just died, but look at her having fun!”)

We are victims of our own game. Would it be better if we posted on social media how we really feel?

“Today, I think everyone around me is an idiot.”

“Today, I feel like the stupidest person in the world.”

“Today, I don’t belong.”

Grief is a process. And unfortunately, it doesn’t work like college courses. Grief 201 doesn’t give a sh*t if you have completed Grief 101 yet. Hell, it will sweep into the first few weeks of class—before the first exam—and then your backpack is twice as full. God forbid Grief 301 catches wind and sweeps in. Your shoulders may never be the same.

The point is, we have no control over what kind of grief comes our way. Or when. All we can do is try not to drown. I find solace in the words of Rumi, possibly my favorite poem of all time:

The Guest House

“This being human is a guest house.

Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,

some momentary awareness comes

As an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!

Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,

who violently sweep your house

empty of its furniture,

still treat each guest honorably.

He may be clearing you out

for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,

meet them at the door laughing,

and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,

because each has been sent

as a guide from beyond.”

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If you have a loss and grief sweeps into your house, don’t try to hold the door closed.

It has to come in. You have to feel it. You have to eat it. Breathe it. Live it. Even when you are certain it will pull you under the waves. Because if you don’t sit with it—if you don’t honor it—it will come back again.

The forest is thick and deep. You can try to go around it, but the center will gradually pull you in and make you feel. And just as Rumi says, know that you will be cleaned out and better for it.

And as I continue at varying distances into each of my grieving processes, I want to touch upon anger. And guess what? It is okay to be mad.

It is okay to be a stark raving awful b*tch full of venom and poison.

But it is not okay to not recognize it. Don’t think you can burn your forest down with fire.

And that ugly anger comes and smacks you across the face a lot. Leaves some pretty fierce marks. Look in the mirror at those marks, and let them remind you that the anger is okay—necessary, even.

But the more you let anger smack you across the face, the more banged up you are going to get. Find what it is that helps you deal with the anger. Meditate, cook, walk, run, yell at the moon, scream at the waves—whatever it is that helps you release it, you must find it. Because the ashes from that fire fall to the earth like seeds and plant some pretty ugly trees that you will have to harvest.

Let the anger in. But know when to show it the door.

Please be kind to yourself. Don’t punish yourself when you have a bad day and snap at your kids or have an argument with a friend. Apologize and move forward. Learn from this process, and make space in your heart to understand when your friend or loved one is in the wicked storm of grief.

Be a lighthouse, not lightning. Be their beacon, not the search party that misses the S.O.S written on the beach by the lone survivor.

They need you.

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Relephant read:

How I Became Acquainted with Grief.

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Author: Jennifer Bluestone

Apprentice Editor: Lois Person / Editor: Toby Israel

Image: Jem Yoshioka/Flickr

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