You do not need permission to grieve. You do not need to prove to anyone that your loss matters Welcome to another episode of the Growth After Loss podcast. I'm Dr. Mari Marquez. I'm a post-traumatic growth researcher, grief-informed educator, and the founder of Growth After Loss. And today, we're gonna be talking about assumptions after loss, making room for your own experience.
Assumptions about what grief should look like, assumptions about how long it should last, assumptions about what someone should be capable of by now after the loss of their loved one. Perhaps one of the hardest assumptions of all is that if someone is showing up for work, caring for their children, smiling, in another relationship, continuing with life, then they must be okay.
If you have ever felt pressure to explain your grief to someone just to make it easier for others, or appear like you're further along than you really are, then this episode is for you. We live in a world that often sees only a small part of someone's loss. We see a person return to work. We see them attend a school event, share something online, take a trip.
From the outside, people make assumptions. They think that, "They seem so strong. Look at them. They're okay. They look like they're doing a lot better," or they are moving on. But functioning is not the same as being affected. A person can make dinner, answer emails, go to work, take care of their children, while privately wishing they could return back to the life they once had.
This is not a contradiction, because that is part of what it means to love someone who is no longer physically here. And public grief can make this especially visible. I don't know if you've seen the news and everything online, but there's so much grief going on, and people having opinions about other people's grief.
And we sometimes watch people who are grieving in public, and form opinions, again, based on small pieces of what we see. We do not see the quiet mornings. We do not see the empty side of the bed. We do not see the moments a child asks about the parent who died. We definitely don't see the birthdays, the anniversaries, the traditions, or family moments that now feel very different.
And this is true for every person who has lost someone they love, not only for the people whose grief is visible to the public eye. There's always more to someone's story than we can see from the outside. I know many of us have heard, "You are so strong. You seem to be doing well. At least you're keeping busy."
I remember somebody very close to me when I first experienced the loss of my husband said to me, "Well, you just gotta move on with your life. Go back to work and just keep going." To me, it was such a shell shock because I could not believe that this person who I care about, who I love, who was very close to me, had said this to me when my entire world has changed.
And I want to remind everyone that there is no timeline for missing someone. There is no correct way to carry a relationship that still matters to you deeply. You may be grateful and heartbroken. You may be moving forward while also longing for the person who is no longer physically here. So when you notice those thoughts, I want to invite you to pause with kindness, because you do not need to criticize yourself for having them.
Many of us absorb these ideas about how we should be grieving, or how this all supposed to work, um, how life's supposed to work after a loss. But you can gently replace that word of should with a more compassionate question. So instead of asking, "What should I be feeling by now?" You might try asking, "What am I actually feeling today?"
Instead of asking, "Why am I not over this?" You might ask, "What is difficult about this moment?" Instead of asking, "What should I be able to handle?" You might ask, "What feels possible for me right now?" These questions create room for honesty, and often what we need is not more pressure. We don't need any more pressure.
We put that on ourselves already on top of grief, on top of handling life, but we may need more rest. We may need more understanding, more support, or even just permission to take one small step at a time. And I want to share three gentle ways to support yourself, that you can support yourself, um, when expectations, whether they come from other people or from within.
So you can use these next three things when things start to feel heavy for you, either, again, from other people or from within you. First, notice the assumptions you are carrying. So sometimes the loudest expectations are not spoken by anyone else. They are the messages that we have learned to say to ourselves, the way we talk to ourselves.
Maybe you believe you have to be strong for your children. Maybe you believe that you should not cry because you don't want to burden anyone. Maybe you believe that you should be further along because 10 years have passed, and you should be over it by now. But let me say, your grief does not need to follow someone else's timeline to be valid When you find yourself in this, you can try placing your hand over your heart and taking one steady breath and asking yourself, "What do I need today, right now?"
You are allowed to respond to your real experience, not to the experience other people expect of you, but to your own realistic experience with compassion and care. So second, you can choose one small act of care. That might be drinking a glass of water before the day begins. Maybe it's sitting outside for five or 10 minutes.
Maybe it's taking a short walk. They are a quiet way of saying, "I see that this is hard, and I am still here with myself," because that matters, too. The third thing that I wanna share is that let someone know what you need. This can be difficult. I know I struggle with this as well, and I've gotten better at it throughout the years, I will say that.
Um, but I know this can be difficult, especially if you are the person who usually takes care of everyone else. But you do not have to explain every part of your grief to ask for support. Some of the things that you might say when asking for support is, "I'm having a difficult day. Would you check in with me?"
Or, "I do not have the energy to talk, but I would appreciate company if you can just be here with me today." Or, you know, "This is, this is a hard day for me. Could you remember it with me and go have a cup of coffee together?" The point is, is that these words are not a burden to anyone else. They're actually, one, information to others about what you're needing and, two, an invitation for someone who cares to come closer, to show up for you.
There is a difference between moving forward and moving on. Moving forward can mean continuing to live, parent, work, create, and make decisions in a life that has changed. And it can mean also allowing joy to visit without believing that joy means you have forgotten about your loved one So this can include, you know, doing, creating new traditions while continuing to honor your loved ones.
It can mean carrying that person you love in the stories you tell, in your values that you carry out each and every day, in the ways that you care for your family, and in the tenderness you offer yourself. So if the world has been weighing in on your grief, whether directly, quietly, through expectations on social media, I hope that you can remember this.
You do not need permission to grieve. You do not need to prove to anyone that your loss matters. You do not need to make your experience understandable or comfortable for everyone else. You are allowed to have good days and hard days. You are allowed to feel joy and sorrow at the same time, and you're allowed to take your time and your pace.
Thank you for spending this time with me again on this episode of Growth After Loss. Thank you so much for being a supporter of the show. I'm so excited that our show is growing. So please feel free to send it to someone who may need to hear this. Before we go, I want to mention something really exciting, and that is that beginning this October, you will be able to actually work with me directly, um, through s- private support through Growth After Loss.
Currently, we have our membership where you can do self-paced workshops that were curated by me, leveraging research on how do people grow after loss. I've received your feedback. Many of you have reached out to want to work with me privately one-on-one. So starting in October, we'll be able to work together one-on-one.
These sessions, um, are a compassionate space to pause, be heard, reflect, and on what you are carrying, and to explore meaningful ways to support yourself as you continue to navigate a life that has been changed by loss. Go to growthafterloss.com to find out more information, and make sure that you join our newsletter as well.
I send out an article every Monday, and I talk about these things and give you these prompts for you to have in front of you and to put them into practice. Thank you so much for being a part of the show, and until next time, take care