The loss of a loved one can cause substantial grief, especially if the loved one was a spouse or significant support person. Substantial grief can also be caused by the loss of a child, parent, sibling or close friend. It can even be caused by the loss of a job, business or lifestyle, end of a long close friendship, as well as a divorce, separation or move. Substantial grief can seem overwhelming. It can can feel like we are in an abyss, a sink hole, a pit, a dark place that we can’t see any way out of. The loss feels like an amputation, but what has been amputated is part of our heart, our spirit, our essence. Grief is caused by a part of us being gone and our missing that part and longing for it to be back so we can be whole again. But the truth is, the loss occurred, the amputation happened, that part of us is gone as we knew it, and we can not get it back. No matter how much we want it back or wish for it, we can not have it back.
So, what do we do????
Let’s picture for a moment that this amputation was our leg, instead of our heart. If we lost a leg, we would be devastated. If we lost a leg, we could sit down, debilitated by the loss of our leg, mourn for the loss of our leg and stay down, unable to recover from the loss of our leg. That is certainly one option that would be available to us. Another option would be to try to stand up on our other leg and learn to hop on that leg. We would notice our missing leg and never forget that it is missing, but we could figure out how to hop without it and maybe even hop forward. Maybe as we’re hopping, we find something to help us move forward better, like a cane, a crutch, a walker, a wheelchair or even a scooter. Maybe we use some of these tools to move forward easier than just hopping on our one remaining leg. These tools can’t really replace the missing leg, but they help us move forward more easily without our missing leg. We don’t forget our missing leg. We don’t forget what it felt like to have it. We don’t forget what it looked like. We don’t forget anything about our missing leg, but we keep moving forward a little easier with the new tools. Maybe in time we get a prosthetic leg and move forward with that. It is very similar in some ways to our missing leg, but it is still not the same. It is not a replacement for our missing leg because nothing can really replace our missing leg, but it is a good substitute and helps us move forward even easier. We never forget our missing leg or what it felt like to have it, but in time we are walking just fine with our new prosthetic leg and feel whole again, even though we will never be the same as we once were.
This is my concept of hopping. Substantial loss is devastating. Substantial grief is deep. We can sit down and let the loss and grief overwhelm us, or we can get up and hop.
I am not a medical professional, educator, therapist, psychiatrist or psychologist. I am merely a person who has experienced substantial grief as the result of the loss of my spouse. I have created this site to share my experiences in hopes it might help someone else suffering from substantial grief. This site is written from the perspective of the loss of a spouse, since that is my perspective as I create the site, but some of the feelings and ideas could be applicable to other causes of substantial grief. I hope this website is helpful.
I hope you will hop… please hop… and keep hopping!