Brave Enough To Be Bliss

Chapter 9 — Feeling Grief Chapter Dedication: Thomas William Livingston, February 17, 1955-April 27, 2022 and Evelyn Melinda Grill, February 16, 1928-July 5, 2022 “One aspect of the anxious lives we’ve created for ourselves stems from our obsession with avoiding discomfort. With not wanting to feel bad. Or wanting to avoid the ugly cry or the hard conversation we know we need to have. We’ve made what’s uncomfortable the enemy. It is not. Stop avoiding and ignoring. Choose reality and invite discomfort in when necessary.” John Delony In the spring of 2021, I met one of the most impressive young men I have ever worked with while coordinating the renovation of an office suite we were expanding into. Through the summer we became better acquainted, talking about our families, philosophies on parenting, etc. I had sent him a text one day and since he had always been so responsive, it did seem strange that I hadn’t heard from him by early evening. I was out shopping for a few things for the office and really needed his guidance. About 9:30 p.m. he responded with the answers I needed and apologized for not responding sooner, explaining he had had to leave work for a family emergency earlier in the day. Even though we had talked a lot, I didn’t want to pry , so I replied saying I hoped everything was alright. If he wanted to tell me he would, and I left it at that. We were nearing the end of the renovation, and I didn’t see him in person the rest of that week , and I was leaving on vacation that Saturday. The evening before I left, I felt like I needed to send him a message thanking him for all his hard work and letting him know how impressed I had been with him as a human being. It was the sort of message I felt he could share with his parents, like my daughter would with me. I knew I would be working with him more in the future and the project wasn’t fully complete, so I tried to talk myself out of it , thinking the real end of the project would be the more appropriate time. The feeling continued so the last email I sent that night was to him. My daughter and I had a great vacation week and on the following Sunday when I was catching up on email before going back to work, I saw he had sent me a message thanking me for saying everything I had, because the family emergency he had left for that day was because his dad had died unexpectedly. Even though he wasn’t able to show his dad the email as I had thought about, he said it served as a reminder to him that his dad would have been so proud of him. If I hadn’t sent the email, he may have eventually told me about his dad, but my words had provided comfort to him at a time when he needed them, and I was so relieved I hadn’t been able to talk myself out of saying them. In my response to him that night, I said I was so sorry for his loss and that it would be my instinct to hug him when I saw him next, but in case he was uncomfortable with that and preferred not to talk about his loss, I would refrain and leave it up to him. He replied and said that he was doing much better than the week before, so I took that as permission and when I saw him when he returned to work, I gave him a big hug. We talked about his dad, and he showed me photos of him and told me about the memorial service that was being planned. It was very touching, and I was so glad that I had opened the door for the hug and conversation because I listened to that voice inside that was encouraging me. It was this situation that made me suddenly reflect on when John lost his mother. In the years since I had been working with Ginger, I had begun to be able to feel my real feelings and express them to others which is what allowed me to reach out to this young man with a hug, to simply listen and to let him express whatever he wanted to express. I wasn’t worrying about exactly what he would need or exactly what I would say or if I would say or do the wrong thing. I was simply looking forward to seeing him and giving him a hug to let him know I cared. That’s it.

“ One of the greatest barriers to empathy is the fear of saying the wrong thing or the need to make everything better. When someone has experienced something very traumatic - a significant loss - there’s nothing you can say to make it

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