Relationship Joy and Pain

I spend a great deal of time in the car driving to and from work.  I started listening to books through my local library which is really great.  Sometimes I am terribly distracted by the book and I miss my exit, but for the most part it has been a joy.  Right now I am on a John Grisham kick.  This past week, I was looking through the library list and the book Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury leaped out at me.

I remember reading this book in high school, and I remembered the ending very clearly.  This book stuck with me my whole life even though it has been more than 30 years since I read it.  However, I thought it would be fun to refresh my mind with this great book.

While reading, I was familiar with the context that in the timeframe of the book, firemen no longer put out fires, but set them.  They burned books, people with books, and the homes where the books were found.  The hound with the lethal injection was actually a robotic device with programming to kill anyone the state deemed a problem.

What stunned me about the book this time was the relationships (or lack thereof) in the book.  The main character, Guy Montag, was married, but couldn't remember where he met his wife.  His wife was a surreal woman whose life was wrapped up in a 3 wall (she wanted 4...) television system in their parlor.  Her life was spent engaged with actors (her "family") and not her husband.  She was constantly suicidal.

Other players in the book were similar to Guy's wife.  They were void of relationship.  They had no grief, at least outwardly.  They operated as robots without any purpose.  One woman had had many husbands that all died in one way or another, yet she was devoid of emotion about it.

The book also focuses on commercialism. Commercialism teaches us that happiness is most important.  Happiness is socially acceptable and socially expected.  Yet, like Guy's wife, secretly we are miserable.  We are lonely in a crowded room.

Some people live superficial lives.  Having the trendy clothes, handbags, cars, and dinner invitations are what are important.  We isolate ourselves from others through social media which gives us the illusion of having close relationships.  Don't get me wrong here.  Social media has reconnected me to old friends and family that I had lost track of through the years.  Social media has its place.

Relationships, real relationships, have emotional exposure.  Relationships intertwine others around our hearts and makes us have deep feelings one another.  During stressful times, relationships are strained.  During quiet times, relationships grow closer.  The best relationships have more good and less bad.  The worst have more bad and less good.  Even the worst relationships have something good involved.  Otherwise there would be no relationship.

Relationships are truly the core of society.  Without relationships we are all zombies, or robots going through the motions.  Relationships heal and relationships hurt.  They bring joy and they bring pain.  The pain is especially bad when the relationship is lost through death or estrangement.  The more intertwined we are in each others' hearts, the deeper the pain associated with the loss.

Recently I was on an extended business trip out of the country.  It hurt to be away from my wife.  Because of the time difference, we had very little time to talk, but each day we both strove to talk for a few minutes every morning and evening via Facebook video chat.  My wife and I have a wonderful relationship but we still cause each other pain from time to time. I'm glad my wife is a loving and forgiving person.

Sometimes, relationships continue even when one member of the relationship fails to keep up their end.  Parents with wayward adult children, children with addicted parents, and spouses who are unfaithful are just some of these kinds of relationships.  In these cases, pain is caused because of what should or could have been.

So, are relationships worth it?  Ask Guy Montag and his wife from the book I mentioned. Relationships bring us flavor and spice.  They modify our thinking and temper our impulses.  Relationships bring us love and joy, yet also pain and frustration.  Can we isolate ourselves from others and protect our hearts?  Perhaps, but we lose in the long run.

Garth Brooks wrote and sang a wonderful song about taking the chance on relationships even though life has a way of bringing pain.  I will close by copying it below.

I encourage us all to pour ourselves into our relationships and lap up the benefits.  Yes, there will be pain, but don't miss the dance...

"The Dance" by Garth Brooks

Looking back on the memory of
The dance we shared 'neath the stars above
For a moment all the world was right
How could I have known that you'd ever say goodbye

And now I'm glad I didn't know
The way it all would end the way it all would go
Our lives are better left to chance I could have missed the pain
But I'd have had to miss the dance

Holding you I held everything
For a moment wasn't I a king
But if I'd only known how the king would fall
Hey who's to say you know I might have changed it all

And now I'm glad I didn't know
The way it all would end the way it all would go
Our lives are better left to chance I could have missed the pain
But I'd have had to miss the dance

Yes my life is better left to chance
I could have missed the pain but I'd have had to miss the dance

Grief Recovery Group starts Jan 8, 2017

There's a new Grief Recovery Group starting on January 8 at 4PM at Spring Creek Church of Christ.

The group is free.  The book is $15.

Our Grief Support Groups provide a safe environment for you to look at your old beliefs about dealing with loss, which losses have affected your life, and take actions that will lead you to complete unresolved emotions that may still be causing you pain.

We take a series of small correct steps to understand our own beliefs about grief.  Then we explore our lifetime of grief experiences and choose one to work on specifically.  We seek to eliminate the pain associated with loss.

Join us!

Lance Decker

To register, you can go to https://www.meetup.com/Houston-Area-Grief-Recovery/events/234863819/

or http://lancedecker.com

or call me at 832-534-0730

or email me at lance@lancedecker.com

Grief is the NORMAL and NATURAL reaction to loss

My wonderful sister-in-law sent me a link to an article in The Atlantic magazine that I found quite interesting partially because it confirmed many things I already knew about grief, and partially because of its main premise. The key question is "is grief a disease?"  Now before we get too started here, let me give you the link to the original article which was taken from Mosaic Science.  Note the title is "How Should You Grieve?" unlike The Atlantic's title, "Is Grief a Disease?"

https://mosaicscience.com/story/complicated-grief-bereavement-death-loss-CBT
http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/11/when-grief-never-ends/507752/?utm_source=eb

That completed now, let's talk about the elephant in the room with this article.  Is grief normal?  I think we would all say that grief is normal.  Is grief complicated?  Again, having been through it several times, I find some grief periods more complicated than others.  The most complicated is the death of my 29 year old son four summers ago.  Is having grief for an extended period of time that includes the inability to cope a disease? Well, we certainly know that grief can cause disease, like most extremely stressful and life altering events.  We don't gulp down Tums for nothing in corporate America.  But can grief really be classified as a disease, a mental illness, a sickness with distinct symptoms like the flu?

On the one hand, I am glad the question exists because many people do not seek help for grief events because grief is not technically an illness therefore the insurance companies will not pay for services from grief counselors or grief groups.  I would be more than happy if grief could be seen in a light that helped people into recovery programs through insurance payments.

On the other however, grief is completely natural and normal.  Normal does not equal disease.  Grief is the measure of love we had for the lost relationship (or whatever was lost - there are over 40 losses that can create a grief experience).  What is even more interesting is that every grief experience is unique.  That is because every relationship is unique.  If they are all unique, then they all have unique symptoms.  Some of those symptoms are learned behaviors based upon what was modeled to us as we watched others experience grief, and some are because of the nature of the relationship itself.  Two siblings that lose a parent will process the loss differently, have different "symptomatology" and grieve differently.

Grief is so very misunderstood by the common person.  I often hear from my clients "no one understands me", or "people expect me to be over this by now."  I have even heard people tell me that they cannot cry amongst the family because it make everyone "uncomfortable."  We are trained by this mixed up society to say the most harsh things to grievers. "At least you have two other children." or "Don't feel bad, at least you are young enough to marry again."  I wish it were required reading by all high schools in America and beyond to read the Grief Recovery Handbook in an attempt to retrain Americans for grief experiences.

As for the rest of the article, I found the research findings, in many cases, in tune with The Grief Recovery Institute.  Some of those findings are that people who go for extended periods in grief without help lose direction, lose hope, and lose their own way.  I was one of those people.  I also liked the idea of confronting grief head on and not shrinking away from it.  We do not like pain and we typically avoid situations that cause it.  I too avoided the hospitals my son was in. For grief, however, we need to lean into it much like walking into hurricane force winds.  We need to go on the journey set before us, even though it hurts and was thrust on us.  Grief is supposed to hurt.  As a friend of a friend Mar Feder says "Every loss deserves to be honored with grief."

I liked that the researchers didn't agree with Dr. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross' 5 stages of grief when it comes to the griever, and that there are no defined stages that every person goes through.  I liked some of the methods that were developed for confronting grief.  These steps remind me of the steps in the programs of GRI where we examine our belief about grief, then we take small distinct steps towards an understanding of what is unsaid, undone, incomplete, and lost though the death or loss of a relationship.  A person needs to have two things to accomplish grief recovery, the will to do it (not everyone wants to get better), and the right steps/program.

I do appreciate the research done with grieving people and the efforts of wonderful people to find ways to help people in grief.  While this was a long article, it was quite interesting.  Is grief a disease?  No, it is natural.  Do grieving people need help?  Yes, many do and should seek it.  Are there existing programs that address many of the aspects of the research findings? Yes, please see the links above.  Is everyone worthy of help?  By all means.

Let me know what you think!

Are You Strong enough to be Weak?

As I work with grievers, I consistently realize that the subjects of strength and grief recovery are very confused.  In grief recovery, it is weakness that heals the broken heart, not strength.  It is the weakness that shows a person's strength, stamina, and courage.  I speak with people that fear weakness and loss of composure.  "I don't want to open that wound'" or "It hurts too much to go there," or even "I don't want to rehash the past" are common responses from those that fear weakness.

Recently I had rotator cuff surgery on my right (and dominate) shoulder.  I am still in those first weeks where I have been told not to use my right shoulder (hand, arm, elbow) at all.  My wonderful wife lovingly does so much for me.  I have to be weak, so my shoulder will heal properly.  Not only this, but twice a day, my wife exercises my shoulder to gain range of motion.  During these times the pain is unspeakable.  We both know the pain is necessary, although neither of us like to do this task. Again, I have to be weak and endure periods of pain for the proper healing to occur.

Recovering from loss is similar, even though society tells us otherwise.  Society tells us to "be strong" and "pull yourself together," but society has it all wrong.  I don't know when things changed, but grief was once acceptable.  Widows wore black for long periods.  Within the family circle, we surrounded our grieving loved ones, not just for a week, but for years.  I guess times were simpler then.  Now if you lose your spouse or child, your work might allow you to be away for three whole days.

Society these days does well when we are happy, but falls very short when sadness is overwhelming us.  Even back around 1900 it was a problem so Ella Wheeler Wilcox penned her famous lines in the poem Solitude:

Laugh, and the world laughs with you;
Weep, and you weep alone;

I would suggest you read the whole poem also at Solitude.  It is so sad that grief is not publically acceptable with in many cultures.

When a griever is told that their behavior is unacceptable, what choices do they have?  The two most common responses are faking recovery (e.g. acting strong even though they are crushed inside) or withdrawal.  One of my favorite books on the subject calls the first Academy Award Recovery.  The problem here is that we never recover and that lack of recovery saps our strength and sucks away our joy for life.  Our heart remains broken and our lives are skewed away from happiness.  Those that withdraw are lost in their own misery with feelings of hopelessness.  Neither of these responses sound that great to me...

There is a third option for grievers; a path rarely taken.  This path is to allow those feelings, those deep emotions, to well up anyway, even in public... even at work.  At first, reactions will be mixed. You might even hear that you are not "handling it well."  Explain to those around you that these episodes will pass in time.  Explain to your coworkers that it is normal, natural and healing.  Explain that their support during these times establishes an atmosphere that you need to ultimately feel better.

In a way, these "grieving moments" are like physical therapy for my shoulder.  We exercise emotions and muscles that need healing.  They hurt.  In my case I moan and grunt during exercise: for the griever, they weep and sob.  After my exercises I use ice to help.  After a grief moment, a hug helps.

Don't stop here though, seek a great program like the Grief Recovery Method.  Get focused on recovery.  Allow yourself to open up to others.  Explore the source of the pain and treat it using a proven method of small correct steps.  Like my shoulder will need physical therapy, a broken heart need emotional therapy.

So, as with my shoulder recovery, it isn't the strength of your demeanor that has the most value in grief recovery, it is the willingness to be weak, the boldness to not conform, the courage to go to those soft and very painful places seeking healing.  Your weakness is your strength.  Are you strong enough to be weak?

This Is Us - challenge

My wife and I watched the first episode of the new show on NBC called "This Is Us" on demand today.  The show seems very good from the pilot, and I was especially touched by a particular scene when a Dr tells a young man that his wife delivered two healthy children, however, the third was stillborn.  The scene is on youtube.



The Grief Recovery Institute defines grief as "the conflicting feelings caused by the end of or change in a familiar pattern of behavior."  This character has just lost a child, but gained two others. Talk about conflicting emotions!  Joy and grief mingling in the heart.  A heart that is swelling with pride, yet completely broken.  But this isn't the reason I'm writing today.

The good doctor sits down and tells his own personal grief story, not to wallow in sorrow with the young man, but to help him seek some good from an awful situation.  I was so touched by the way this was presented.  I'll let you see what happened in the show.

Challenge - (v) to summon to a contest of skill, strength, special effort, etc.; invite; arouse; stimulate. (adapted from Dictionary.com).  Challenges can also represent an awakening to a person.  A chance to open your broken-hearted eyes to new possibilities.  To expose your own suffering to let others know it's okay and that grief is normal.  To come alongside a person in deep pain and be broken with them. A challenge helped me, and I have written about it before in earlier blogs.

Can challenges like this really help in grief recovery?  Is this just TV drama or does it work?  Is it therapeutic for me to work with grievers?  I would like to hear your story.

Four Years... and Counting

Throughout our culture we celebrate special days constantly.  Some days like Christmas and Valentines Day have been hijacked by corporate greed, but still, many of us still look forward to time with family and friends.  We love to renew old relationships and find out the latest from our loved ones.

Some days, however, represent grief and loss.  These days are approached with pain and longing for special people and relationships we have lost.  We see the day approaching, and, as hard as we try to hold them off, they come anyway and invade us with deep memories of sometimes awful situations.

Yesterday my wife and I recognized... celebrated...  well, perhaps just "got through" the four year anniversary of the loss of our 29 year old son.  We did have the chance to think of fond memories and joys with Lance Jr.  We called him Lanny.  My mother called him LJ.  He was a loving person who didn't fit the mold of society.  He struggled in so many ways, yet had joy for life and people in his life.

Four years ago we lived through the great tragedy of turning off life support on our son and donating his kidneys to strangers.  We searched for meaning on that day and found a little comfort that his death would bring life to others.  It was an intellectual decision for my family of broken hearts.

The journey of a million miles started that day with a single step towards the exit of the hospital.  The depth of grief was so deep and overwhelming.  I was confused, disoriented, and lost.  Grief was so completely overwhelming, and I had never understood the depths that it could take me.

Four years later, I miss him dearly, and I see the same in my wife's eyes.

So, what lessons have I learned in four years?  What has this experience done to me?  Where has God used my grief to help others?  What was gained through this loss?  The last question is so strange, but I have learned that people are re-formed through trials.  Some are made into people that are better somehow and others are made worse.

One day shortly after my son's death, I called an acquaintance that had not heard about Lanny's death. He told me something that still sticks with me, and I have tried to achieve.  He told me that having known me for only a short time, he knew I would be in a position, someday, to help others because of what happened to my son.  I remember how amazed I was at this statement when it was said.

If you were to read some of my oldest blogs, you can see a bit of a progression.  At one point I ask something like, "It's been 18 months, why does it still hurt so badly."  Of course, I thought time would take care of the pain.  We know that is a myth.

The lessons of this are still coming slowly as I travel this road.  One thing I learned is that most everyone suffers, in their own way, grief for a lost loved one, relationship, pet, or whatever.  Another thing very closely related to this is that people very seldom tell anyone else about their pain.  When I introduce the subject of grief to others and tell my own story, there's usually an outpouring of emotion that has been kept inside under lock and key, now opened and flowing freely.  People want to feel better.  They want to be heard. However, they seldom feel safe enough with others to expose the deep feelings of their broken heart.

I have learned to be a better listener... a heart with ears.  I am surprised that sometimes that all it takes to help others.  Listen, nod, cry, laugh, and listen more.  For the person that finally feels at ease to tell their deep feelings, this is like pouring gasoline on a fire.  Feelings are the important thing for healing a broken heart, not facts.

As already alluded to, safety is a key also.  Knowing that there is confidential communication that won't be repeated around the water cooler is vital for the griever.  In my grief support groups, this is repeatedly noted as an important factor in being able to "release the dogs" of emotions.

As for helping others, this one eluded me for some time.  First, I knew that I needed help myself.  How could I help others when I was so broken?  I read some books and even taught a grief support group with a religious ties, but in the end, I still hurt.  I needed a program that had steps, that had an outcome.  I needed a program with an end.  About six or seven months ago, when I read about the Grief Recovery Institute, I was pretty excited and convinced my wife that I needed to do this program and become a certified teacher of it.  Until this program, the terms "grief" and "recovery" really didn't make sense to me.  I was told that the loss of a child is impossible to recover from... another myth.

Since that time, I have been able to help a number of people formally and many others informally by just listening and providing a free book to them.  Often on airplanes as a I travel, I find someone dealing with loss and give them a card.  I gain great personal joy in listening as people feel comfortable enough with me to let their emotions flow.  I encourage people often to read the Grief Recovery Handbook and participate in a program.  I enjoy giving hope to people that feel that there's no recovery from loss.

So, after four years, you might ask if it still hurts.  The answer is yes.  But the pain is just from missing someone that I held so dear.  I miss Lanny and that leaves a hole.  Still others may ask if I'm better now.  The answer is also yes.  I have worked through my relationship with Lanny and resolved many incomplete hopes, dreams and expectations.  I get better also through helping others.  You may be asking about anniversaries, birthdays, holidays and how we deal with them.  The best answer I can give you is that we approach each as it is.  We cry, we talk, we remember.  We are always shocked with the speed in which time flies by.  It seems like just yesterday.  We try not to distract.  We seek to memorialize in some small way the life now gone.

Let me know if this helps.  Please reply to the post or send me a message.  I would love to hear from you.

Lance Decker
Certified Grief Recovery Specialist
http://lancedecker.com

Anniversaries

Today, I feel a bit melancholy about the loss of my mother-in-law one year ago today.  Her name was Dorothy and she was part of our daily lives for seven years prior to her death.  My wife, being the youngest of seven children, was chosen to "take care of mom" by her older siblings, but we really didn't mind because for the most part, she was a lovely woman.

When she came to live with us she was mobile (could walk) and would even cook for us on occasion. She was self sufficient except for a few minor things.  As the years passed her health deteriorated and she had many setbacks, as is common for a person in the ninth decade of life.  For the most part, my wife became her nurse although there was limited help from Medicare.  The burden of care became quite heavy on my wife and to a lesser extent for me as I attempted to do what I could to help Dorothy and to support my wife.

In the early Spring of last year, we had to move to a new home almost four hours south near Houston so I could take a new job.  We arranged medical transport for Dorothy and did our best to make the trip comfortable for her.  It was expensive, yet needed.  The transition seemed to go quite well expect for some motion sickness on the way.  Her doctor suggested that during the transition we transfer her to Hospice care.  This was an inevitable transition, but still hard to do.  The hospice people were great caregivers and helped us in so many ways.

In late May, Dorothy started to take a turn for the worst and things ramped up a bit for her care.  New meds were introduced and more attention was provided by visiting nurses.  My sweet wife was on guard 24x7 for her mother at this point.  In early July we called in the family and mid morning on July 7, 2015, Dorothy took her last breath of sweet air surrounded by most of her children.

What followed was odd for my wife and me.  We were familiar with grief having lost our 29 year old son just three years prior.  The grief was (and is) still heavy on our hearts.  In this case however, we were flush with relief and sadness all at the same time.  We had full scale "mixed emotions" as the result of losing Dorothy.  Our lives were suddenly simpler, yet there was an emptiness - a missing part of our hearts.  We both commented that losing mom was quite different than losing our son.  It didn't seem to eclipse the pain we still felt for our son.

Yet today, I sit in front of the keyboard reflecting on Dorothy and how she added to our home.  Her laugh, her love for chocolate covered cherries (really anything chocolate), and her love for the birds outside her window all flood into my mind today.  Life is different for us now.  On the one hand we embrace the freedom we have now, while on the other we miss her presence in our life.