Most people probably associate grieving when a loved one sadly passes away but I think grief can be when you experience the loss of someone and that can be a friendship, a marriage or even when a family member or friend moves away which is when I first experienced it.

I remember the day when we dropped my brother at University nearly 20 years ago and it dawned on me that I would be the last one at home (I am the youngest of four siblings) and I feared being lonely. I felt such a loss and my parents had to listen to me sob all the way home for two whole hours. You might be thinking, how pathetic, that isn’t grief! but the feelings felt similar to how I have felt more recently after going through four miscarriages and then losing my father last year. The real grief I have felt and still feel has been much more intensified including strong feelings of loneliness, sadness, disappointment, isolation, frustration, guilt, resentment, and emptiness.

Grief is an ongoing process. In my view, you don’t just stop grieving. Yes, time definitely helps make the symptoms feel less severe, but I feel as though it is always with you in some way or another. At times, I have felt the weight of it so much that I have felt like I have been carrying around a large suitcase just filled with all that comes with grief. That feeling of heaviness can sometimes feel suffocating.

I know there is no one size fits all, but this blog is about sharing some of the methods I have used over the last few years to help ease the feelings of grief.

MINDFULNESS & MEDITATION:

I know I bang on about this a lot, but discovering mindfulness and meditation has helped me enormously cope with grief. Why?

Firstly, it has provided me with the ability to connect my mind with my body. You might be thinking, what do I mean? I mean, it has made me notice when these feeling of sadness or loss arrives and how my body responds to it. It basically has helped me notice and be curious about how the emotion of grief shows up in the body.

Secondly, it has given me the option to make choices. Yes, I know you can always make choices, but before I practiced mindfulness, some of the ways I chose to react to things were unnecessary and wasted energy and often made the situation worse. I will have days when I get upset or sad or often I get angry (I used to get angry at the world and say over and over again “why me?”). Now in response to this, I have learnt to PAUSE and BREATHE and then make a choice about my reaction. I have noticed this has improved the more I formally practice mindfulness through meditation.

Overall, mindfulness has reduced my anxiety levels by a long way, so in my opinion, it is worth holding onto.

If you are not into just sitting still and being alone with your thoughts, then I find yoga is a form of moving meditation. It is a great way to think about your breathing and at the same time build some strength in those muscles.

READING 

Ok, so I am a big reader anyway, but even if you don’t read, I strongly suggest you try it because the feeling of curling up with a book is such a good way to unwind, de-stress and can bring an immense inner peace.

How has reading helped me with grief? Reading a good book (usually a novel or a self-help book), has given me something to look forward to and a true escapism when I don’t have to think or deal with anything. It is just me, my kindle and a very comfy spot. However, not always a comfy a spot. I remember many times sitting in hospital next to my dad as I kept him company. He would often drift off to sleep and this is when I would read. Hospitals aren’t my favourite places, so by reading I was able to block out what was going on around me.

I plan to write a blog very soon on some of my favourite books, so watch this space

If you are not into reading books, try finding a magazine you like. I read Psychologies Magazine. Again, this is something I look forward to every month (nowadays, I try and read in peace and quiet with a cup of tea, ahhh bliss). The magazine is filled with inspiring quotes, stories, mindfulness, advice, ideas, motivation, coaching, but most importantly for me it is full of real-life stories which I can relate to. I started reading the magazine about 3 years ago, around the time when I found life pretty tough, therefore reading about other people’s struggles and often how they have overcome personal struggles made me feel less alone. To hear that you are not the only one struggling made me feel more at ease.

TALKING 

This may seem an obvious one, but I know for some people, talking about how you feel is hard. Personally, I didn’t find talking that hard as I found sharing my struggles often made me feel better. However, what I would say is, choose who you talk to. You will know within your circle of friends and family who is going to make you feel better, so go to those people. You are looking for people who have compassion and can empathise. You may need to be prepared that people you do choose to talk to might not say the right thing, as so often people don’t know right thing to say. I definitely went through this (and wrote a blog on it). If you can, say to people what you need and what you don’t need i.e. tell people if you want to talk about what you are going through, or just say up front “I don’t want to talk about it”, this prevents you from getting upset when you least expect it.

If you don’t have any close family or friends to share your struggles with, try finding professional help. I have had A LOT of professional help and if I am honest it didn’t help that much. I think I just didn’t find the right person and I had so much I needed to deal with, I didn’t know what I was going to counselling for. I do know people who have found the right person so don’t be afraid to stop counselling with someone who isn’t the right fit for you.

FIND A FOCUS 

After my first miscarriage, I decided to immerse myself in my job. Some days, waking up each morning I just wanted to stay in bed and hide under the covers, but knowing I had to get up and go to work I think was a perfect survival for me. I found solace in my job and I was lucky to have a job that I enjoyed at the time. Also, most people at work didn’t know I had a miscarriage so I found comfort that I could go to work and no one would talk to me about my loss and therefore I was relaxed and able to just be me.

By the time I had my fourth miscarriage, my job just wasn’t enough for me. It wasn’t the solace it used to be, so I needed another focus. I was lucky enough to be able to afford a trip to climb Kilimanjaro. It had always been a dream of mine and so the training, the fundraising and the anticipation was a good opportunity to distract me when times were tough.

Now, I am not saying climbing one of the tallest mountains in the world is one way to overcome grief but finding something to plunge into, really worked for me.

FRIENDSHIP

This is very hard subject for me as during my very painful times of grief, I abandoned my longest and dearest friends. In truth, I wanted what they had and felt like I was losing connection with them. However, I look back now and realise that my behaviour only intensified my grief as it added to my loss and increased my feeling of loneliness.

Over time, I built additional friendships. New friends can bring a new energy to your soul and I found that happened to me. So, my advice here, is to hold onto old friendships if these friendships are worth holding onto but always be willing to make new friendships as you never know what they will lead to.

EXERCISE

I completed Red January this year, albeit I did miss a couple of days due to illness, but I felt so much better for doing just half an hour of exercise every day.

Doing exercise increases levels of endorphins and serotonin in the brain which are the “feel good” chemicals which improves our mood. I know this isn’t ground breaking news, but I have found exercise really helps deal with grief and clearly there is proof there is a connection between the two.

I know a lot of people struggle to exercise due to ill-health, finding the time (especially if caring for others) or financially, so it’s finding the right thing for you. These days there are so many things you can do at home like yoga, fitness videos or even hula-hooping (which I have just discovered).

GO ON A RETREAT 

If this is something you can afford, I highly recommend finding a retreat you can go on. The retreat I found was through Psychologies Magazine and was called “Moving Forward” Retreat which was perfectly apt for me at the time. You can read Here about the retreat but in summary, the location, the people, the activities, the reflection time and the food was a totally refreshing weekend and exactly what I needed and I came away feeling energised and inspired.

Finding a retreat that is right for you can be a minefield therefore this website might be of some help to get started.

WRITING

Well here I am, writing as a form of combating grief. I started this blog to share ways in which I have managed to stay sane over the last 5 years and it turns out one of those ways is to write. I have found writing to be a perfect space for me to download my thoughts and if by writing this blog I have managed to help just one other person out there also stay sane, then to me this blog is worthwhile.

Writing can come in many forms. I also have a little notebook that I keep close to me to jot down thoughts and feelings. I don’t do regularly journaling but Morning Pages, invented by Julia Cameron has been proven to have many psychological benefits and is something that I am keen to learn more about.

Going through grief can be a long process and can often change you, I know I am not the same person I used to be having been through a fair bit of grief already but there are ways to make it easier. I hope you enjoyed reading and you have found something in this blog useful. I find grief now hits me very unexpectedly, so I find using some of the methods I have talked about often helps me through.

 

Sarah