Healing and grief medicine ....

Grief is one of those taboo topics that we all experience, yet we struggle to always talk about it because it feels uncomfortable.

In the western world we tend to try and get grief over with as quick as possible and whereas in other cultures it’s more ritualised and honoured.

To heal with grief it needs to be processed felt and recognised that it’s not a linear process but one that will come in waves and have different layers to it. We can let it be painful or medicine, grief can be a powerful experience to heal our shadow and fears if we allow this and to address the thing we hate the most as humans is loss.

Do grief your way, be guided by what you feel the outside will often give us so much advice but the key is to listen to your inner self. Don’t get me wrong, support is of course very much needed and my goodness helped me so much, but its the fine balance between the two.

Here’s the thing grief is not just death, if you go through a huge loss experience we have to grieve and this isn’t something we always talk about either. When I became seriously unwell and my life changed forever, it felt like a death because the old me had totally gone. I couldn’t put my finger on why I was feeling the depth of loss I was feeling at the time and why I was crying so much. Till a Dr said you have to grieve and feel all of this fully to move through the other side. It felt like a revelation at the time being told this and a relief because no one else had said this to me.

Before being told this I just felt I had to accept this new place I was in, but this allowed me to feel and heal and was a real turning point for me. Don’t get me wrong it was hard and felt dark, but once I had done this I did move forward in a new way and in a place of positive acceptance. The gift of learning this at a young age allowed me over the years to recognise the times I needed to grieve and I was able to always then honour this. I suggest reflecting and sitting with this and think about where you’ve experienced this in your life too.

When we experience the loss through death what I came to realise after the loss of a beloved friend that difference experiences impact and affect you differently. That loss hit me in a way I’d never experienced before but was expansive when I sat in and with it and trusted the waves that came. The importance of honouring this is where the healing occurs, when we do this we can begin to feel the happier memories too which are so good to feel.

Death may feel like the end and for many people this is almost too difficult to comprehend, and the reality is the medicine to heal, is to feel.

A friend said to me recently she couldn’t shake the idea that death broke some of her trust in life, working and repairing this is key. I thought this perspective is interesting too because we never think of all the facets that come with this.

Listen to what you need, understand this is your path and although we can learn from the outside, ultimately it’s honouring yourself on this journey.

There often isn’t a right thing to say, sometimes its just being kind enough to recognise we don’t always have the answer.

Talking to someone and sharing in a space that feels safe is a positive aspect of the medicine cupboard with this topic.

Trusting we can heal is the key, trusting that it’s not just about time (which of course can help but everyone views even this differently) it’s more about perspective and ultimately this is how we find grace.

Healing takes love, which is a big but small sentence and that fine balance of the love we are willing to give to ourselves and the love we allow ourselves to receive.

This is a huge topic, that is an open conversation where we have to move beyond right and wrong.

All my love

Hannah X