Grief is Complex
Grief is a funny thing..and I don’t mean funny in the ‘haha’ type of way. I mean its strange, weird, ironic and complex.
Most of all grief is complex and hard to understand. It’s never the same for everyone and even for the one person grief looks different depending on the loss.
Grief is a normal part of life. We all eventually go through it; so why do we never talk about it. We box people into a picture of what grieving should look like or give healing time-frames?
This is not a blog about the how-to of grief; I am simply going to tell you about my journey of grief and its complexities.
My Personal Grief
I lost my Dad on October 16th 2017. Its funny how we remember dates of death, this date is burned into my memory. I cant escape it and I am very aware of when it is coming up, my feelings shift as it approaches.
My Dad died very suddenly; while I will spare you the details, he died in a truck accident at work.
Some background context; I never met my father until I was 9 yrs old, he simply wasn’t around growing up. As a 9 yr old you wonder why other kids have 2 parents, which led to many question and then suddenly he came back for good.
Wonderful story right? You would think so. Except it was clear that we didn’t get along – in fact that is a giant understatement.
Growing up with him in my life was difficult and involved 95% arguing and 5% of civil or good conversation. Looking back it is clear that I was hurt. Hurt that he left when I was a baby, that he didn’t care enough to stay and that he treated me differently to my 2 eldest half-sisters.
The next bit of background – with my dad came 2 half sisters..you will get a better picture of them later.
16.10.2017
So flash forward to 16/10/17 where I was living on the other side of the country. Half way through my work day, I get a call from my Mum – this was unusual. I answered and all I could hear was crying – I knew something was wrong. Then she told me – Dad was dead.
Initially I was shocked, I didn’t know what to feel – should I cry or not cry. But somehow my body did what it needed to do – it cried. Not a lot but enough and so I went home for the rest of the day. I thought I could just go back to work – why do I need time off, I’ll be fine. In the end I travelled back to NSW mainly for my Mum, soon realising that I needed that too.
Naturally I am a strong person – and this was again evident when coming back home. Mum needed me and I was there to be strong, make phone calls and help make decisions. But it was late at night, in the shower or when alone that I allowed myself to really feel the sorrow that I had inside. I cried more tears than I thought I ever could or would.
Messy Grief
I am going to spare you a bunch of details but the 18 months after Dad’s death were messy. It was something I thought I would only ever see in a movie. My 2 half sisters (who I would not consider family now) turned on my Mum and I. It involved lawyers before the funeral had even happened – it was clear all they wanted was money. We also found out that my Dad had been cheating on my Mum for several years and had another child. He kept that under wraps well; she also in search of money.
The funeral was heartbreaking, a complete blur and probably more traumatising than I had expected. Then came countless emails and appointments with lawyers, defending and proving not only my mother’s relationship with my Dad but also having to try and prove that Dad was in fact my Dad. All because these women were money hungry and they didn’t care who they needed to attack to get it.
Healing
As you can imagine this all makes it very difficult to grieve. Not only am I having feelings of sadness but I am having intense feelings of anger, whilst also not being surprised that he did any of those horrible things. A complex and mixed bag of emotions to handle.
Its been just a month now since his 2 yr anniversary. Whilst all the hatred being thrown at my Mum and I has slowed down; there is still so much emotion. Ironic really, because Dad not being here only impacts my life in a minor way, we weren’t close after all.
Somehow I miss him – I miss his smart arse comments, his love of football and car racing. I miss our banter over who will win, and I miss his laugh. Its the little things that you miss in the end.
Grief Triggers
Though I can be triggered at any moment. The sight of a truck, the Bulldogs NRL team, Holden car racing, XXXX Beer, and songs from his funeral are top of the list. The emotion comes flooding in; and so it’s hard.
Grief is hard and you can never be on top of it all of the time.
I want to show how you can love someone and really dislike them; how you can be sad that they are gone but still be furious about the life they lived. How after 2 years, you can still cry at the drop of hat.
The photo on this post is from my Dad’s funeral. We let go of blue and white balloons and my best friend took this photo and I just love it!
There is no right or wrong way to grieve, there is no right and wrong feelings to have. Relationships are complex; and there is no time-frame to grieve within.
Own your grief – whatever that looks like.
Support
There is no shame in reaching out for help, if you need someone to talk to about your grief; contact me here.