the chronicles of grief
the chronicles of grief
is there a cheat code to grief?
You would think as a writer I would have a better idea of how to swallow and spit up pain in a metaphorical, beautiful way. Or that I would have at least gotten comfortable with inviting you in to sit with my suffering.
Yet, I find neither of these to be true.
I still find it uncomfortable to make space for the world to witness my pain. I try to arrange it in a way that minimizes the breaks, I try to glue together the pieces and present it to you with a smile, saying: yes this hurts, but look how pretty I can make it.
But, to be a writer means to invite you in, even when I want to lock the door and throw away the key. I guess my only hope is that someone, somewhere, finds comfort in my words. That they see my pain and think oh, yes, how nice is it to know I am not alone.
I try my best to provide wisdom and lessons in my monthly newsletter. This isn’t that. Consider this more of a diary entry, a scream out into the void. All I am asking for is that you witness my grief.
I am not looking for solace today, just a familiar shoulder to lean on. I hope you don’t mind.
At the beginning of this year, I lost my childhood dog, Tanner. And to be entirely truthful, I’ve had a rather hard time accepting this. It’s brought a lot of uncomfortable feelings of grief to the surface, feelings that I’ve struggled to properly navigate.
His passing feels like the end of a chapter I didn’t realise was still being written: it’s marked the end of any childhood innocence I was still clinging onto.
I’ve been through the grief of death before. I’m familiar with the way it sneaks its way up on you when you least expect it, yet, this sudden loss has pushed me down an unexpected rabbit hole, one I wasn’t prepared for.
It’s opened up Pandora’s box. My brain has begun a victory lap of reflection, bringing up old grief I thought I had buried long ago. For whatever reason, it’s pushed me to truly deal with (and not just shove away) the death of my grandparents, whom I never truly got the chance to be close to, but whose love for me is hardwired into my DNA.
We visited them infrequently: holidays, school breaks, during the summers. But I can still remember the way their house smelt and the way the stairs creaked as my brother and I ran up and down them.
Our relationship was gatekept by a language barrier that neither of us really knew how to cross. They both spoke English but preferred to speak in Portuguese, finding comfort in their mother tongue. So they would plop us in front of the TV to watch hours of novellas, hoping we would pick up the language, but the most we ever got was a few stray words.
Every time we visited them, my grandmother would sit and scratch my back for hours, and my brother and I always fought over whose turn it was. Her nails were always perfectly manicured and sharp, and I would lay on their old piling sofa, the novellas playing at full volume on the TV, her hands absentmindedly going up and down my back.
There are many times when I long for the comfort of that specific moment, for the silence between us as her nails ran up and down my back. When I remember those moments it feels like a dagger to my heart because I realise I’ll never get to experience them again. They exist only in my memory now.
Sometimes though, when the world feels too heavy and I’m curled up in a ball under my bedsheets, I can still feel her nails going up and down my back, calming me down.
Then there was my grandfather, who was only ever gentle around my brother and me. A man hardened by violence forced to live in a country far away from home. His anger could erupt volcanos. Yet, every time he saw me he kissed the top of my head, murmuring, meu anjo.
I was still young when they passed, both within a couple of years of one another, so I don’t think I got the chance to truly appreciate them, or the tiny gestures of love they gave me. Or at least I didn’t understand how much I would miss them when they were gone.
I think I would give up quite a lot to hear my grandfather call me meu anjo just one more time.
The only way I knew how to deal with grief as a child was by writing; it was the only way I could even begin to understand what I was feeling. I would spend hours combing through the thesaurus and dictionary, trying to find the perfect words, often searching across various languages to try to capture the feelings that were going on inside my body.
It still is the only way I know how to handle these emotions. Most of the time I don’t have a clue how I feel until I can put it into words, though I’m trying to learn to let my feelings exist without always needing to put a description to them.
If I’ve learned one thing in my 25 years, it’s that there’s no beautiful way to digest grief, there are no fancy words one can string together to make the experience easier; it hits you years later just when you think you’ve finally let go of it all.
And yet, when I think about it, grief is really just all the lingering love in your body that has nowhere to go now, and Tanner’s passing stirred up a lot of unresolved grief inside me. Grief that I thought I had buried a long time ago.
It reminded me that it was still right here, bubbling in my throat, begging for release.
Tanner and I had almost 15 years together, yet I still wish we had more time: I wish I could be 12 years old again curled up on the sofa with him and my mum watching movies every Friday night. His passing has reminded me of all the versions of myself that I’ve been and buried in the last 14 and a half years.
I believe in something after death, whatever that is, I don’t know. But I know everyone I’ve ever loved and lost has stayed with me, I know Death never takes them fully away.
Not to quote myself but: “Death reminds her [Life] that he does not take them far: he lets them play as butterflies landing on children's noses, allows them to embody the sunlight on a warm summer's day, and he always makes sure that when their loved ones call for them, they answer back, in tiny gestures and evocative air” (Life and Death (as i understand it), Growing Pains).
My grief for Tanner, my grandparents, and all those I have lost, is a constant reminder of the love I had, and still have, for them. It’s a reminder of the long-ago moments I cling to, and of their memory that I get to honour every day.
I hope to carry this grief with me for the rest of my life, but I hope to find a way to carry it without it weighing me down. I’ll let you know if I find the cheat code to grief. Until then, I might just be a fraction heavier.
Words have always helped me digest the feelings in my body that I don’t really understand, and often times we have to look outside our mother tongue, so here are some words I’ve collected over the years that resonate with this grief that I’m feeling.
Many of these don’t have direct English translations, they carry the weight of feeling not words. I hope they can bring you some comfort.
Weltschmerz (German): A feeling of melancholy and world-weariness.
Sielvartas (Lithuanian): This term means deep sorrow, or “soul tumbling,” for example caused by someone’s death. It can also simply be a state of seemingly endless grief or emotional turmoil.
Saudade (Portuguese): A vague, constant desire for something that does not, and probably can not, exist; a nostalgic longing for someone loved and then lost.
Ya'aburnee (Arabic): Literally translates to "You bury me" meaning that the speaker hopes to die before someone else does as they realize how difficult it would be to live without that person
Hiraeth (Welsh): The feeling of homesickness combined with grief and sadness for your homeland or a romanticized past.
Toska (Russian): A mixture of pining, restlessness, yearning, nostalgia, melancholy, and depression
Commuovere (Italian): To have been moved or touched, or had your heart warmed, by someone. Specifically, it’s a story that has stirred your heart or moved you to tears.
Mágoa (Portuguese): A heart-breaking feeling—usually by being hurt by someone—that leaves long-lasting traces, visible in gestures and facial expressions.
Litost (Czech): A state of agony or humiliation caused by a sudden glimpse of one’s own misery.