The Quiet Work of Grief
Life-disrupting loss demands an extraordinary amount of energy to withstand. In the exhaustion, disorientation, isolation, and bewilderment of early grief, we wonder whether survival is even possible. And the messages we encounter about how to endure extreme emotional pain often add to the confusion.
On one end of the continuum is the stoic directive to pull ourselves up by the bootstraps — to set the pain aside and keep going. On the other end is the Buddhist invitation to sit with the pain. But when we are in the grip of excruciating loss, both can feel impossible.
Each approach carries wisdom, yet when applied globally, it leaves out important nuance. The stoic stance encourages us to focus on what we can do, which can be stabilizing. But as a side effect, it can push us to ignore or compartmentalize our pain. Functioning may return more quickly, but the pain remains unintegrated. We end up avoiding not only the source of the pain but everything that surrounds and reminds us of it.
The now-popular Buddhist notion of “being with the pain” offers a different kind of skillfulness — becoming aware of what is, noticing when fear or meaning-making intensifies our suffering. But in the midst of raw, overwhelming grief, “being with it” can be too big of an ask. It can feel like being told to sit still inside a burning building.
It has been over eight years since my daughter Deane died. Time has helped a great deal, but time is a tricky thing in grief. For a long stretch, time itself felt like the enemy. It moved too slowly, and enduring it was unbearable.
On the surface, I saw no signs of change, and most days, I didn’t identify anything that could be done against the beast of pain. And yet, something was happening on its own as time was painfully passing. My system was imperceptibly adjusting to devastation.
I began to relate to time differently, less resistant about having it. I had changed in ways I couldn’t yet know and needed to spend time trying to get to know the post-annihilation me.
I added simple things that helped make the passage of time become more helpful to me. Walks, writing, conversations with people who understood tragic loss. Things that gave space for the pain and countered the gravity of isolation. I became vigilant about not doing the many things that weren’t helpful.
What I know now is that this is the quiet work of grief. Not forcing ourselves to be stoic. Not demanding that we sit inside the burning building of our pain. But allowing time — slow, uneven, often brutal time — to show us who we are now, and what we need in order to stay alive inside a life we never wanted. It isn’t graceful, and it isn’t linear, but it is a kind of rebuilding. One that begins long before we recognize it is happening.