At the moment someone passes, those who care about them are on their own journey. It may be their first step after sudden and shocking news, or they may have begun walking on that pathway the moment a diagnosis was made. No matter when or where the journey starts, that moment of passing cements their presence on the highway of grief, and at that point there’s no way to leave it.
And that highway can be very lonely sometimes.
Yet sometimes, in the midst of that devastating combination of loss and longing, we take a detour onto a different kind of path. It’s an emotion that most of us have some familiarity with, and it seems to show up in the strangest of places, most of the time where it has no need to be. Somehow its presence is both comforting and painful at the same time, and it took me a long to figure out why.
Because why would feeling guilty ‘feel good’?
In my life as both a healthcare practitioner and a coach, I get to meet and talk to a lot of people. Sometimes at their best, but more often at a time when they are struggling, and I’ve seen how people can find refuge from what they feel by changing grief into guilt.
Often they are unaware of what they have done, unable to recognize why the change happened, and they are almost always undeserving of the pain they inflict upon themselves.
I have tried to understand why this is so, and I recently had a conversation that allowed me to figure it out. I think people choose guilt because it’s easier than grief.
True grief is something that we hate because it’s an emotion of helplessness, and helplessness is not a feeling that any of us enjoy. Almost 24 years ago I stood helpless in a neonatal intensive care unit where my son, just a few hours old, was being treated for a congenital heart condition that was doing its best to kill him. I was utterly, completely and unbelievably helpless… and I still struggle with the aftereffects of that feeling today.
I’ve listened to people weep through their helplessness at the loss of a relationship, the loss of a loved one, or the loss of a dream in the face of a changing situation. I’ve seen just how devastating and painful the sense of helplessness can be.
And sometimes the pain of helplessness from grief makes us look for any emotion so that we can feel something different.
Because like I said earlier, grief is an emotion that hurts us partly because there is no action to be taken. Grief kicks in where there is nothing else than can be done, and our inability to act leaves us powerless and painful. The pain we feel is instinctive, biological, inherent and often overwhelming so much that we might feel like we are going to die
In the face of overwhelming grief, we pivot to feeling guilt, because guilt always comes with it the understanding that we can do something different in the future.
And guilt also gives a sense that we are responsible in some part for what we are feeling, which allows us to feel that there is some balance in what otherwise can feel like a cold, uncaring universe.
The person who grieves not spending time with a loved one has the solace of knowing that they can spend more time with those around them, so they can avoid the intensity of the pain they feel right now. The person who grieves an angry last word with a now lost partner can take a sense of change by determining to treat people better, kinder and more gently.
So by the combination of giving us a sense of ‘rightness’ in the universe (I am guilty so I deserve to feel this way) and a concept of how to avoid feeling this way in the future, we transform our grief and helplessness in loss into guilt,
This makes the suffering easier, because suffering without cause disturbs our sense of certainty in the universe, but if we suffer because we deserve it… well, we can live with that, because that gives is a sense that there is order in the chaos; sense in the midst of that which often makes no sense at all.
The ability to act gives us hope against the helplessness of grief, and it helps us avoid the very thing that we actually need to do in order to feel better.
Guilt allows us to avoid feeling grief, and prevents us from feeling it until it runs it’s course.
I’ve met many people who have bandaged over the wound of grief with guilt, and who have never allowed that grief to fully be healed. Instead they take comfort in feeling bad about themselves, so that they can in some way hold onto those who have passed or moved on by committing to being different in the future.
And their guilt prevents them from truly finding peace in their future.
If that’s you, please know that your guilt is not serving you. Although it might be helping you get through today, I’m here to tell you that it’s poisoning your tomorrow. My wish for you is to give yourself the kindness that I’m sure you give others, and try to let your sense of guilt go. Yes it will hurt in the moment, but allowing yourself to grieve and heal will lift the weight of so many tomorrows.
May you find peace, and know that you are good.
— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings