The Lighthouse, and Beyond — Doing the Work and Looking Back: Part 3 of the Holiday Journey

Looking at the lighthouse on Bracelet Bay, I opened my heart to the path ahead. I can now look at my life heading into a new path. To move forward, it is also necessary to look back, and understand why you stand at the present waypoint.

It was after the ashes had been freed that I began to take note of a nagging feeling that I’d mentioned in the first post. Something wasn’t feeling right, and I didn’t know what it was. I didn’t ignore it, and I didn’t explore it either. I let it sit in my head, and let it work on me until I returned home.

Grief is a challenging process. We face it in death, divorce, a breakup, or a loss of a friend because one of you has taken a different life path and the friendship or partnership no longer meets someone’s needs. People’s values change. Our life focus changes. There are so many other things that happen to us in life that can bring grief into our midst. Pets must be set free from suffering, and we’re faced with the goodbye. What happens in the grief process is hopefully healing. First, it gets ugly: it must get ugly.

To get to the healing, we need to allow life to do its thing. I had made the decision within days of Jon’s death that I would avoid making any major life decisions that did not have to be made during the first year of the grief process. This turned out to be the best thing I could have done for myself.

For the first year I did nothing. I let the trauma of it all surface. The crying was awful, and as the tears came, the pain of it all surfaced. At the end of that first year (2017), I took a trip to visit family and friends. I returned home and faced years two and three.

In September of 2018, I made a major life change that involved a decade-long faith journey I had been on: I joined a new faith tradition and church. At the end of year three (2019), in the fall, I applied to the spiritual direction program at San Francisco Theological Seminary/Redlands University, was accepted, and I began to plan a new phase of my life. I noticed that things were changing for me. Four years later in 2020, it felt safe enough to return to the work I loved. I was stable and things felt right. I’d done enough healing. What is that healing like? 

The Beginning Stage of Healing

In the beginning it might be a numbing to the world, to ourselves, to others, and we might seem detached. We sleep at weird times, eat nothing or too much, and we might not engage in normal, routine things. We can be caught gazing into nothingness. We can curl up into balls and sob. We rage at the unjust death of a loved one. We rejoice that someone is free from their body that has only been a source of pain. We mourn what wasn’t, rage at what might or should have been, and throughout all of it we want you to speak their name. Please, speak their name, don’t forget them. I won’t, and at times it seems as if their presence will always be around. Surely, they will walk through the door with a cheerful greeting, lighting up the space, being who they uniquely are. They are gone and it is a crushing pain. How can I possibly move on from this? Slowly, sometimes gently, and at other times violently, we begin to move forward.

Present Time

As I moved forward from the spreading of the ashes, I came to realize that after six years of making peace in my heart, I made peace on the beaches. I had moved beyond grief. I came to realize that the work of the past was done, released to the sea, and that the work of a new life stood ready to embrace. I let the rest of the holiday run and allowed this realization to greet me as I opened my front door. 

One of the most common questions that newbies to grief get asked is when will the crazy erratic tears will end. Will they ever end? The answer we give to others is yes, and they change in texture and quality. With time, the tears slowly diminish to a softer cry. Slowly, and with time, it changes. We can’t say when the tears will change for you, but they will change. I never asked the “when” question. I let it happen. I listened to the community and those who had more “time in the process.”

Middle Stage Grief Resolution

For me, it took a full three years to cross from the full-body crying to a gentler form, and in year four there was nothing. This was a middle place. It can be a time of deep exploration. Doing good work means that you take your time and allow others to take their time as well. Good work is about looking in the mirror and not tolerating dishonesty from yourself about the “what” of the relationship, the “who” you were in the relationship, and the “why” the relationship was as it was. Honesty takes guts, and grief isn’t for wimps. Asking yourself the hard questions and being able to sit with the discomfort for however long it takes characterizes that middle stage of work that we do after the loss of a relationship. Whether it is death, a breakup, divorce, or another type of loss, in order to heal and resolve our portion of the relationship, we must visit the relationship fully, see it fully, and not forget what we’ve seen. All of this takes a great deal of time and effort to get it into proper focus, and to move forward. 

Resolving the Process 

Six years later it was time to see beaches, visit friends, and new places. It was time to look back on the land behind me and face a new sea. It was time to say goodbye to the past and hello to the new life ahead. Bracelet Bay served as a point of closure as well as a new beginning.

Moving forward no longer feels or seems scary. I’m on my timeline. I’ve done the work. I don’t know what’s ahead. There is a sense of freedom and peace in all of this.  

Jon used to want me to send him a song, and I’d sing to him, and so I’ll end this journey with Lisa Kelly sending a song that works for both of us. Love you, Jon.