This blog post is brought to you by Graeme’s latest book: The Guilt Busters
When a child dies one of the most common factors that threatens to hi-jack the normal grieving process is the irrational guilt that invades the heart and mind of the parent. Marie, a key character in the newly released book The Guilt Busters reflects on her grief-guilt journey. It is almost three years since her husband, Vic and their twin daughters, Fiona and Grace had died in a horrific car accident. Their loss had been unbearable. Every moment of everyday had been like a horror movie. At night, she would sense that Vic was there lying beside her, and she would reach out to touch him and of course he wasn’t there, and his death would once again become a terrible reality. Some nights she would awake with a start and the three of them would be sitting on the edge of her bed smiling at her. In that moment she would be filled with joy and then they would be gone. Often during the day, she would hear the girls giggling in their bedroom and she would call them, but they would not come.
The pain was excruciating. She could not bring herself to leave the house. It was painful seeing other families together or to hear the laughter of children. She avoided meeting with her extended family. She ceased going to Church or meeting socially with friends. She was encased in a cocoon of loneliness and never-ending tears. And there was the guilt. The overwhelming and ever-present guilt. If only I had been there to protect my beautiful girls. If only I hadn’t insisted that Vic drive home that night instead of staying with his mother. The thought that she and not the drunk driver of the other car was responsible for that accident on that fateful night was, she knew, irrational and illogical but it was so powerful that it threatened to destroy her. This guilt stood at the intersection of healthy and unhealthy grief, preventing her from embracing the reality that all she had now were memories of her family and that one day those memories would sustain her and enable her to live her new normal. Instead, the memories tormented her with the insistent thought that she had failed to keep her girls safe.”
The guilt that had crippled Marie was false guilt not real guilt. The accusation that she had levelled at herself was a lie. The real guilt belonged to the driver of the other car who had caused the accident by her reckless and irresponsible behaviour. Why then did Marie and many, many, others choose to believe a lie, as their way of dealing with grief? There are two answers to that question. The first is that it is natural to carry the responsibility of keeping our children safe, and if something bad happens to them, to feel somehow responsible. The second is that the loss of a child leaves us with so many difficult questions and in a time of such overwhelming grief the parent does not have the energy to confront them. As painful and as debilitating as false guilt is it is simpler to give into that emotion than it is to traverse the more difficult pathway of grief. And the pathway of grief cannot be traversed without confronting a myriad of seemingly unanswerable questions. To do that takes enormous emotional energy, which the grieving parent often feels they do not have.
There are three very helpful steps for addressing grief. One is to embrace the truth that grief is painful and will frequently feel overwhelming, but it will not destroy us. Grief is a normal response to loss. We will almost always need people to walk this journey with us. There is a temptation to believe that unless the people who support us have been through grief themselves, they will not be able to understand what we are going through. The truth is that they do not need to understand our pain to be helpful. Their love and their presence give us the courage and strength to grieve.
The second important step is to embrace the truth that memories of the person that we have lost are all that we have but they will become increasingly important to our survival and healing. At first our memories will seem to increase the pain, and for that reason we might avoid them, but in the future they will be the very thing that will sustain us and even give us joy. Using the persons name, looking at photos and recalling stories are helpful strategies for growing through grief.
The third important step is to re-evaluate what things, in addition to the grief we feel, that are still an important part of our lives. Continuing relationships with others who we love and who love us. Sharing our lives with our friends. Continuing to do the things we enjoy like gardening or other hobbies and of course our faith in a God who loves us, understands our pain and has promised to give us comfort and strength. Taking this third step, helps us avoid harmful strategies like self-condemnation, social isolation, self-medication and anger. Above all it enables us to grow through grief rather than be diminished by it.
God Bless
Graeme
To dig deeper into the topics of guilt and grief, checkout Graeme’s latest Book, The Guilt Busters