Anxiety- The Missing Stage of Grief

by Claire Bidwell Smith

  When we lose someone significant, there is a gaping hole left. All the ways they supported our lives, emotionally, physically, and even financially, have a big impact on us after they are gone. It is only natural that we react to this loss either by seeking to quickly fill that hole with someone else or by feeling (sometimes unconscious) anger or frustration with other loved ones who cannot adequately fill it.

  I have seen people who lose a spouse attempt to quickly enter into new romantic relationships, only to cause more disruption within their lives as a result of choosing someone hastily and not doing the work to sit with the uncomfortable feelings of loss after their partner died.

  Others who have lost parents or siblings also attempt to replicate those relationships or fulfill those roles within romantic relationships, generally finding the same amount of discord as those who hastily chose new spouses.

  First of all, this is normal human behavior. We are social creatures. We enjoy being loved, nurtured, and attended to as well as providing those same qualities for another person. There is nothing wrong with desiring close, intimate relationships, and when we are feeling sad and vulnerable in the grief process the urge to seek solace in another human is understandable. And on the flip side, sometimes we desire intimacy but are so fearful of more loss that we do not allow ourselves to be close with others.

  But it is when we do not do the grief work, when we do not process all the feelings of loneliness and anger and abandonment that come with losing someone, before jumping into another relationship, that we find ourselves in these situations.

  Our unhealthy relationships can be with friends, coworkers, supervisors, our children, and, most often, our romantic partners. We see our loss play out within our romantic relationships because our partners become our closest attachment.

  We also may find ourselves experiencing a great deal of anger at our closest loved ones when we feel that they do not truly understand our experience of loss. I recently had a male client who lost his brother, and over the course of that first year my client found himself increasingly angry at his wife for not recognizing or acknowledging his grief process.

  And on a long-term loss level, I often see a lot of attachment and codependency issues play out within all kinds of relationships. We may develop an anxious attachment style after loss, finding ourselves having difficulty in relationships with friends and lovers because we are constantly preoccupied about the safety of the relationship. Will they leave us as we were once left by someone else (in death)? Will I face more loss and get hurt again if I open myself up to love or connection with someone?

  These fears are normal and understandable following a loss, recent or years out. They can serve either to paralyze us or to propel us into unhealthy codependent bonds with others. Doing the work to examine how our loss is playing out in our day-to-day relationships is essential to decreasing our anxiety and living a healthier emotional life. Find a therapist to talk through your relationships with, and free yourself of the anxiety that comes from knowing you are in an unhealthy dynamic.

  Susan Hannifin-MacNab, whose husband died in a car accident, explained that she now “only spends time with people I want to spend time with; I no longer feel the need to appease, placate or compromise in social situations. I have cleared my time, space and heart for nurturing deep, lasting friendships and relationships. I don’t feel anxious anymore in certain social situations because I don’t accept those invitations; nor do I feel guilty about my decision not to socialize with certain circles.”

  Hers is an example of some of the positive effects of grief and how it can help us to see what is important in our lives and how to make changes that benefit us in a healthy way.

  WHY DO WE RESIST CHANGE?

  I know I keep talking about how doing all this work is vital to making your way to the other side of grief and anxiety, but I also recognize that it’s not easy work. There are many points along the way where you may find yourself resisting making the changes suggested here.

  The main reasons we resist change, even when it is for our benefit, is because it’s hard. Change requires facing truths that are often uncomfortable—truths about unhealthy relationships or maladaptive behavior—but also truths about how much pain we are carrying. It can feel incredibly difficult to face the pain that lies behind the door of change.

  But according to someone like Susan, “Resilient people will reach out and get help to understand and tame the anxiety. Resilient people will not judge or berate themselves for being anxious—they instead will find resources and tools (people, classes, groups, experts, techniques) to help themselves cope.”

  I want to reassure you that the initial intensity of facing painful truths lessens with time. Do this work in increments, in baby steps, and reach out for support along the way. Do not expect to do it all at once or to succeed with each avenue you try. Be gentle with yourself, and find reassurance and encouragement in all of those who have walked this path before you.

  LEANING INTO CHANGE

  I believe that some of the most challenging work we do in the grief process comes with simply accepting that our life will never be the same now that our loved one is gone. This realization is something many of us resist initially. We do not want our lives to change, and we try to find ways to fight the changes. But leaning into them and truly accepting that we must live a new life now is part of the healing process.

  When we resist the changes or the impulses that arise to make even bigger changes, we end up feeling stuck and anxious, because deep down we know that in order to heal we must become someone new. It’s difficult, but one of the things to remember about working with anxiety is that anxiety is not always a negative emotion and that, in fact, it can serve as a motivating force. There are times and ways in which you can use anxiety to propel yourself forward. If something is waking you up in the middle of the night, or stopping you in your tracks in the middle of the day, don’t push it away. Pay attention to it. Stop and listen. Make the changes your soul is asking of you. Open yourself up to the idea that there are positive aspects to be found in this metamorphosis and that perhaps the person you will become as a result will be even better than who you were before.

  A NXIETY C HECK-I N

  Let’s check in with your level of anxiety. In this most recent chapter, we’ve discussed how grief and loss can often serve as a wake-up call, reminding us of all the ways we’d like to be living our lives but perhaps haven’t yet begun.

  Remember that one of the reasons we fear death so much is out of a feeling of not having lived the life we meant to. Taking steps to change this and embrace our lives and our goals can greatly reduce the fear of death and the anxiety that come as a result.

  Rate your current anxiety level on a scale of 1–10 (with 10 being the highest).

  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

  Check the symptom boxes that currently apply:

  Panic attacks

  Insomnia

  Nausea

  Dizziness

  Heart racing/palpitating

  Obsessive worry

  Hypochondria

  Hopefully by now, you’ve gained a lot of knowledge about your grief process and various ways to face it. If you are continuing to experience regular panic attacks or obsessive worry, skip to Chapters 8 and 9 to begin learning how to calm your anxious thoughts. The next chapter is a powerful one, all about how writing through your grief process is instrumental to both processing the intense emotions and also creating a way to stay connected to your loved one.

  7 | The Power of Writing

  I can shake off everything as I write; my sorrows disappear, my courage is reborn.

  —A NAÏS N IN

  I FEEL STRONGLY FEEL THAT GRIEF IS A LIVING, BREATHING THING inside of us. As mentioned earlier, we must find ways to let it out in order to alleviate our suffering and anxiety. Writing out your grief can be a powerful tool.

  I understand that the idea of writing terrifies many people. You may feel that it’s
hard or that you won’t be any good at it. For the purposes of relieving anxiety using the tool of writing, you need not be Hemingway, nor do you need to worry about it being hard.

  Writing through our grief is instrumental to clearing out all the weight we carry with us in the aftermath of a significant loss, six months or even sixteen years later. Putting pen to paper or fingers to keys is a direct way to relieve tension and stress and find a way to reconnect to your loved one. You are anxious because you don’t have an outlet for all that you’re holding within you, and in this chapter I’m going to show you how to release it.

  I use writing tools and exercises with each and every one of my clients at some point or another during our work together. The writing assignments I give them vary from person to person, always tailored to a specific need directly related to their process.

  For some of them, writing letters to their loved ones is a significant part of the healing process. For others, it is daily journaling to release tension. And for some, it becomes a therapeutic part of the process to simply write about their memories of their loved one. And for my clients who respond strongly to writing, they often do all of these and more.

  At some point or another, I always recommend that each and every one of my clients write their loved one a letter. Thinking about doing this usually brings tears to their eyes, just as it may be doing for you right now reading this. That’s because writing this letter gives you the opportunity to reconnect with your loved one in a way you probably haven’t felt since they died.

  Sometimes my clients need to write a letter resolving something. Perhaps they weren’t there when their loved one died, or they didn’t get the chance to say good-bye in the way they wanted. Or perhaps there was unresolved anger or they weren’t on good terms or some other issue for which resolution was not reached before the death. Either way, giving yourself the opportunity to sit down and say these things to your loved one in a letter can be incredibly cathartic and can lift a heavy burden that is weighing you down and causing you anxiety.

  Others simply miss their loved one so much that the last months or years of not speaking to them have felt like a form of suffocation. Allowing themselves to talk to their loved one through a letter, to tell them about their life or just tell them they love them, can feel like opening a window to let a breeze into a stagnant room. Just because your person is gone does not mean that your relationship is over.

  One of my clients, James, who you’ll hear more from in Chapter 9, found that writing letters to his dad was a huge part of working through his grief and anxiety.

  When I interviewed him for this book about our experience working together six years ago, he told me, “Letter writing helped with the grief, which helped with the anxiety. I spoke to my dad every day, so having that gone after he died was such a loss. Writing to him helped restore that connection a great deal. It just helped with that impulse and that old desire to communicate.”

  When I asked James if he felt he needed to believe in anything in particular in order to write the letters, he told me, “I don’t think I had to believe in an afterlife. But I definitely dabbled with it more than ever. I found myself slightly more agnostic than on an average day. Writing to my dad felt like sending a message in a bottle. I put it out there, and it felt so good to write it, such a relief to write it.”

  This is an important distinction to keep in mind when opening yourself up to the idea of writing letters to your loved one. In this book you’ve learned that anxiety is the fear of a thought, not of an actual physical threat in front of you. When you have that fear in your mind about something, your body and emotions respond to it. The same is true for letter writing—when you allow your mind to connect to your loved one again in this way, to talk to them, your body and emotions feel soothed by the action, whether you are “actually” talking to them or not.

  I want to add that the act of physically writing the letters (either by hand or on your computer) is important. Writing is different from talking to your loved one in your head or even out loud. There is a deeper intention behind it that has a direct impact on your brain and your experience of connection. Even if it seems like it might be scary or emotional, I want to ask you to try it anyway. Cry while you write the letter if you have to, and take your time. If you need to stretch out the writing of the letter over the course of several days or weeks—if you need to take breaks and come back to it—that’s just fine. Be kind and compassionate with yourself as you go through this process.

  WHY IS WRITING SO EFFECTIVE?

  As we learned in Chapter 3, it is important to honor the stories we carry within us and to find ways to let them out. Writing is an excellent way to do this. I believe anyone can be a writer. And I believe that writing through grief is an innate reflex.

  I’ve been a writer since a very young age. It was a medium I was drawn to as a way of expressing myself and understanding the world around me. Early on I found that I was often unaware of how I felt about something until I had taken time to write about it, surprising myself with some of the thoughts and feelings that would emerge and always grateful for the relief it provided.

  Because my writing inclination was already developed by the time I was a teenager when my parents both got sick, writing became a natural outlet for all of my fear, sadness, and anger. I wrote poems about my mother’s cancer and about my feelings of loneliness. And later, after she was gone, I felt compelled to write her many letters expressing all the guilt I had over not being able to say good-bye. Doing so was instrumental to my ability to finally forgive myself. To this day I still write letters to my parents on certain anniversaries or around big life events or even if I’m just missing them a lot.

  When my father got sick in my twenties, I started a blog, and I wrote about being a young caregiver. I was awestruck by the response and the community I found as a result. Every time I wrote about my grief, I felt a little less alone. That’s another beautiful thing about writing—you can share it, and often it can become a way of really helping others understand your experience, especially when it is the isolating experience of grieving.

  Writing about grief has been popular for a long time. From C. S. Lewis’s A Grief Observed, about the death of his wife, in the 1960s to the proliferation of grief memoirs in the twenty-first century, both writers and readers alike have been drawn to stories of loss. It’s not just that the writers of these stories feel catharsis in sharing their stories but that we as the readers feel the same in reading them.

  At age eighteen I didn’t know anyone who had lost a mother, and I didn’t even really have anyone around me who’d been through a major life hardship. I felt incredibly isolated in my experience, and so I did what I’d always done—I turned to books. I read every memoir I could get my hands on. Some were about horrible accidents, or illness, or alcoholism, or betrayal, but no matter the subject, I found it comforting to read a tale in which someone was thrust into a difficult experience and came out the other side.

  In this chapter, we’re going to explore a lot of different ways that you can utilize writing in order to alleviate your grief anxiety, from journaling and letter writing to more specific storytelling and simple reading. Please try to set aside any insecurities or resistance, and remember that this kind of writing isn’t for the purposes of publishing (even if that does become something you want to consider later) but instead for the purpose of healing.

  Before we get into actual exercises you can begin to do, I want to share with you some thoughts and advice from another author. For a really in-depth look at what it’s like to write about loss, I reached out to Cheryl Strayed, author of the 2012 best-selling memoir Wild. This book, about the loss of Cheryl’s mother, was an Oprah 2.0 Book Club pick, translated into dozens of languages around the world, and made into a film starring Reese Witherspoon. But before all of this fame and glory, Cheryl had always been a writer at heart, and, as such, she felt called to write this book about her experience of loss.

  CHERY
L STRAYED: MY GRIEF IS THE LENS THROUGH WHICH I VIEW THE WORLD

  I didn’t make a conscious choice to write about my mother’s death or my grief. I simply had to write about it. There was nothing else to say. My sorrow is the story I had to tell. I had to bring my mother back to life on the page. I had to use writing to make sense of that tremendous, life-altering loss. My grief is the lens through which I’ve viewed the world since I was twenty-two, and it’s everywhere in my writing. It seeps into every story I’ve written, even those that aren’t directly about grief or my mom.

  I think that writing has been the most healing thing in my life. I used to deny that because I was afraid that by admitting that writing was cathartic for me meant that I was less of an artist. I’ve come to realize the opposite is true: that I find writing so healing speaks to how deeply I’m called to write. My writing is the very heart of me, and so of course it’s the conduit through which I’ll process my life—and yes my grief. Writing is the way I come to most deeply understand both beauty and pain. There are whole swaths of things I didn’t know—and never would have known—had I not written about them.

  In my first book, a novel called Torch, I wrote about a family over the course of a year during which the mother of the family dies young of cancer. It’s fiction—it truly is—and yet it’s very much at root about the experience my family went through when my mom died at forty-five. I had to write it because when I lost my mom, I also lost my family. My stepfather couldn’t—and didn’t—continue to be a father to me and my siblings. My siblings and I also drifted apart. Our family dissolved and not just temporarily. It was over. It never came back.

  That loss was so painful to me, but I know it’s a common one. Lots of families fall apart after the mother dies. I’ve learned that by talking to so many people who’ve had that experience. In Torch, I told the story of that hard year through the perspectives of four characters, and it was enormously healing for me to do that because I was forced to have compassion for other perspectives. I was made to understand why a stepfather who said he loved his wife’s kids like his own stopped loving them that way after she died. It didn’t solve all my sorrows, but it helped me grow and it also helped me grieve.