Posts Tagged ‘loss’

We’re designed to heal

Sunday, March 6th, 2011

I was talking to a professor of neurological psychology today, and I mentioned that  I tended to be very present focused, in the context of our recent loss.  She mentioned that our brains, like our bodies, are designed to heal and recover from loss, and that this was key part of humans ability to survive and evolve.  I thought this was an fascinating piece of information.  I wonder whether it will give comfort to others who have suffered or be bereaved…?

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Grieving

Sunday, July 18th, 2010

Grieving is a process that happens when you lose something or someone.  I leant about the stages of this when I trained as a change facilitator as people do grieve for the things they left behind in a the course of Change.  Dr. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross described it as a five stage process:-

  1. Denial
  2. Anger
  3. Bargaining
  4. Depression
  5. Acceptance

Well regular readers know that I know have personal experience of loss and I have to tell you that after 5 months and a little reflection that the real experience is much messier than this (or any other) models suggest. 

After my holiday I feel further back along this road in terms of emotions although the model might suggest I’m making progress.    It feels these stages are more like a piano keyboard that you wander up and down, sometimes going through several steps in a day.

I learnt today that bereavement comes from old English and means literally to be robbed.  I felt that this original meaning gives much insight into the reality of the experience.  You feel robbed of your dreams, your expectations, your future… 

I feel we have all coped ever so well with our loss but I have a friend who reminds me that the stone on top of a wall is referred to as the coping stone and its job is to cover the wall and protect the base.  Some times coping gets in the way of healing.

Whether you are dealing with loss of a job, or a role or a loved one, it is a complex and lonely path one walks, no matter what help is offered.  Accepting help is not easy or simple and it has to be offered at the right time, in the right way by the right person to be acceptable.

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Posted in Business Change, Hints, Tips & Techniques, Personal Blog, Personal Change | 4 Comments »

I’m different…

Saturday, May 15th, 2010

I was thinking this morning about my blog and some of the responses that I got to it, and I realised that there are some experiences that just change you in ways that alter your DNA.   People who have not shared those experiences can never understand those who have.  My father’s generation went to war; at 18 he was serving in the army, and fighting for his country.  He knew what it was to lose friends, to see homes go up in smoke, to have the very fabric of his world threatened by something alien.  Despite being brought up on countless war movies and comics depicting these themes, I have no idea what it was to live through that.  There are other similarly defining experiences and loss is a key one, whether it is loss of a loved one, loss of a limb or faculty, loss of wealth or health. 

We all take for granted those things that are ever present in our lives.  I can truly say that we knew my wife was a special presence in our lives, but like the oxygen you breath, you do expect it to be there.  I don’t think this is something that you ever get over; it is merely something that you get used to.  My children have said this.  They know that they have somehow been deprived of something that has defined them, and this event too will fundamentally alter their views and lives.  They will never again be able to believe that those you love can not suddenly vanish from your world.

One person shared with me that that they too had lost their mother at 25 and I knew that she knew what my children were feeling; another kind soul said that she had no such experience.  I’m glad of this but it is gap that cannot be spanned by empathy. 

We seem to believe that that talking makes everything better somehow, but I have to tell you that the experience thus far in this home is that it changes nothing and is pretty pointless.  In the end you are left with the same reality and simply have to adapt.

We all believe that we are different, and of course we are, but I am coming to believe that it is our experiences, and how we interpret them that define us…

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Posted in Personal Blog, Personal Change | 4 Comments »