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Between Judgment and Compassion: The Faces of Grief

 Just the other day I saw a Facebook post from someone celebrating their deceased loved one’s birthday. One statement that stood out to me was that they said they have not grieved or mourned their loved one’s death. The judgmental person in me said in my head, uhm yes you have. This person I know personally has been in multiple drunk stupors, drug binges, and Facebook crash outs over the years since the time of the death. Although my first thoughts were based on pure judgment, I quickly started to feel bad. Everyone’s grieving and mourning is different. It does not look the same on everyone. I am quite sure they were probably taught to believe that grief looks like sadness, isolation, and dark clouds. From my experience, it is a dark cloud, but the person under that cloud may be expressing it a different way.

When I lost my brother at 13, I acted out in many different ways, not realizing I was grieving and mourning. Now my grieving and mourning look different. I don’t have the space to stop, take days off, and sit. I can’t even see myself staying in bed for more than 30 minutes after I open my eyes in the morning. It doesn’t feel right. Me grieving and mourning my mother looks completely different from grieving my sister. Same with my dad’s death and my boyfriend’s death.

With my mother’s death, I chose to live. I decided to go to the party, go to the event, go outside. Why? Because my mother stayed in the bed and in the house for most of her later years. It was a tribute to her and my dad. My dad used to always tell me to go live my life. I decided to go live my life. I lived so much that others would consider me a party girl or “outside,” not knowing this was my way of following my dad’s wishes and living for my mom. Before my mom got sick, she threw the best parties and gatherings. When she was younger, she did not miss a day at the club. I remember her telling me stories about all the popular spots in LA during the 80s. She lived during her heyday, and I chose to live for her these past two years. It has been fun.

With my sister’s death, I am currently still mourning. I’m not quite sure how I feel. I stopped focusing on my business, which I had plans to grow this year. I just knew this was going to be my six-figure business year. But now, I don’t even have the energy to focus on it. I have solely been focusing on taking care of my mental health. This includes not doing things that would cause me stress and paying close attention to my triggers, alcohol, and food consumption. Now why would that be considered mourning? Well, because my sister struggled with mental health and died from substance abuse. I have been so scared about what made her decide one day to leave her apartment and go to the streets, literally. Although I have never done any drugs or had issues with alcohol, it still makes me wonder. I never was the type to drink when sad. In fact, I’ve been so scared of what made her the way she was that I take away all medications that could cause an accidental overdose, keeping them out of my eyesight, reach, or medicine cabinet. I am truly traumatized. My Aunty Sunday Kae (Aunty Kae Kae) death was labeled an accidental overdose, but we know it was intentional, and my sister died of an accidental overdose. This shit is scary. So, it may seem like a trauma response, but I am still navigating through what this may be.

Although I am a social drinker, on my last few outings I couldn’t even make myself drink because I was sad. I took a little sip and hated wasting a good drink. I’ve never had an addictive personality, but is addiction DNA or environment? To be honest, my biggest struggle is refraining from curse words, and that comes from the environment I was raised in. It has truly been a struggle, but that’s a topic for another occasion. Anyway, this is how I have been mourning.

I am having a hard time deciphering who I was before I was grieving my mom versus who I am now. After my mom’s death, I lived. After my sister’s death, I am trying to figure out who I am. Was I the person who enjoyed clubs, parties, events, or was that just me mourning? Who was I before that though? Before my mom’s death, I was inside and sad a lot of the time. The only time I would have fun was when I went out of town. That does not even sound like a person I want to be. I remember telling myself that I couldn’t wait to get back to myself, but you truly never get back to yourself after death. It’s like a metamorphosis, an evolving type of situation.

All in all, grieving and mourning look different on everyone. I learned not to be so judgmental, because we are all one death away from becoming a whole different person. I pray that we all have the strength not to fall into the destroying hands of addiction behind the death of a loved one.

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