The Long Grief Journey

Father’s Day recently passed. It was my first Father’s Day without my dad, who died four months before. I have to say, I’ve been taken off guard by how hard that day was for me, and how tenderized I feel in the days since. I feel as though I am in a more intense part of grieving than I was in the initial aftermath, which was more about shock, as well as in the few months following, which were more about getting my bearings.

I feel as though a different part of my grieving process has started in earnest, and I am reminded of why many people don’t want to feel this way. I said to someone recently, I feel like my heart is actively bleeding. Tears come with no notice and little restraint. I long for quiet and for some sign that my dad can hear what I say to him. I had a moment when I thought I’d call what I was experiencing “delayed grief” but then I thought, why do I have to name this? Why does everything need a title? Is it to explain something to myself about what I am feeling? Is it so I can be helpful to others who talk to me about the surprises that come from their broken-hearted experiences? Is the grief actually delayed? I was certainly grieving before! Or am I simply in a place where I can let myself feel more?

As we in the Northern Hemisphere just tipped the scales back towards the incremental lessening of the light, and the Strawberry Moon graces us with her beauty, I am resolved to practice not getting my grief tidy and linear, neat and compact. I know better than that, technically, but I catch myself constantly trying to intellect my way out of my heartache. I also will continue to stretch into the spaces where light and dark intersect and dance with each other. Love and grief. Life and death. Abundance and scarcity. Justice and unfairness. It’s all around us, in some places infinitely out of balance to a devastating and world impactful way.

Staying with this is everything. I must let myself see, feel, and think and ultimately, be with what is. I know that when I do this with grace for myself, I can make choices that are informed by the whole of it all.

This is my ultimate wish for myself as I grieve.