What Does Grief Feel Like?

[grit]

^^Well, neither do I. I do not see grief or grieving as an emotion, except accompanied by a mix of emotions. To me it is a process. Like grieving the loss of a limb. And if you don't feel it, either that limb was useless to begin with, is incidental to your function and self-concept, is not missed, you are in denial it's a loss, or any other variety of explanations.



Abandonment to me would have nothing to bother returning to reach out for, as abandonment is just that- it's over. I don't think that's rejecting the feelings of abandonment, but accepting the lessons learned from abandonment. Though yes, it could or does contain sadness, emptiness, loneliness and despair. And fear. Or resolve. Nor do I find it as not caring, as @grit said. I don't think abandonment is an emotion, either. I think it's a learning experience. Infants can't conceptualize someone is simply not there, to the extent I understand it, they just know their pain and distress is not relived. So even infants stop crying. That is not the same thing as ambivalence, though.

I think by now we are splitting hair. abandonment is not an emotion but then what is the pain associated with it? death is not emotion then what is the emotion associated with it? we are mixing words and terms that are not particularly the same or helpful.

We can all describe love and no two people will ever say it is exactly the same thing at the same time in the same place in the body and in the same intensity but yet most of us know what love is.

abandonment to a child is probably one of the most painful experience ever! especially before 15 months old. It is so unbelievable, probably a lot of trauma,depression and other mental illness have a base in this experience. what happens to the body and how the body manifest and digests is up to the individual.

Grief is another thing. One person can process much easier but will collapse in abandonment why is that? who knows?

for me, I never felt what is the big fuss about abandonment in relationships. never gave it a second thought. all of sudden, I am feeling something when my therapist left for few weeks. the feeling started way before he left. The feelings were a bit global or became more global meaning I had them toward my husband, my work in general life. I am feeling so overwhelmed and dissociating way more. somewhere in my thinking part of the brain, the word abandonment pop in but I denied it cause that is not me. I am not the person who cares about abandonment. Then I started to read and post here and ALLOW in my system to see what this means FOR ME.Then I learned whatever abandonment I experienced back when I was in the bassinet was that I probably detach from my mother and even after she came back, psychologically speaking, I could not careless. I separated from my mother, my anchor, my lifeline my love....so what does mean in the body of a baby? dead but still alive so to me I put words I know and that felt detachment. I do not care. This is my feeling not yours or anyone else. I processed it and let it wash over me and I ended up feeling completely alone and unable to re-connect and I accepted that because then my body was like wow! all lose and integrated. Abandonment for me was that...the feeling of leaving my mother, the source of love and the questions I have to struggle now are can I love again? can I allow to let go and be OK? And this life long conquest and will never end but at least I am at peace feeling it and thinking about it and not dissociating or running away or crying about. I am in acceptance that I do not care yet I do.


What is grief for you? I can tell you mine all day but unless YOU allow it and digest it, no one can pinpoint and tell you what it is. I honestly think the mere fact you are exploring here is great cause it will show up in your deep psyche and your dreams and you will know. But try not to find a universal definition or you will end up in a deep well of nothingness.

Like I said before what is love? and you will be here until tomorrow to read everybody's input.

long winded thing but I do not want to distract you from finding your own feeling and truth while you explore others input but I felt I should own my own feeling about my experience.

 

[VioletButterfly]

Physically - exhaustion, heavy, frozen, stomach clenched, holding breath and signing, weakness, shakiness, nausea, visual disturbance, headache/neck ache, anxiety and panic, feelings of being overwhelmed

Mentally/Emotionally - fear, confusion, despair, depression, helplessness, shame, hopelessness, guilt, anger, feelings of being out of place, out of myself, out of my mind, broken

I'm sure there are more, but I think you get the idea that it's kind of expansive and probably specific to each individual. For me, it's difficult to separate grief from death out from the helplessness and hopeless, anxiety and depression I'm dealing with from complex trauma. The trauma piece involves grieving scenarios of its own. I guess, for me, I don't see a point in separating grief from death out from grief from complex trauma at this point because my mother and my family were/are key players in my complex trauma.

I hope that wasn't confusing. It's just the way I'm experiencing and understanding it right now. Peace be with you. VB

 

[frogthroat]

It seems I don't know how to identify the emotion grief.

When you reach that stage you'll know. Previous poor coping mechanisms are no longer comforting. Nothing tastes good. Nothing feels good. You live in a fog from 5 minutes to the next. Everything is a big black hole. You can feel the exhaustion and despair in your body. Sleep is restless. You don't want to talk to anyone and when you do it's like you're talking right through them. Nothing matters. No one matters. You don't even know why you should matter to you anymore. It's like you're living in a bad dream.
That's the best way I can think of describing grief.

 

[Justmehere]

I don’t think grief is one feeling, or one set of body sensations. I think the 5 stages of grief tries to get at this. I don’t think it’s a matter of getting through 5 stages in neat tidy order either, but going through them all, in various ways, various orders, perhaps numerous times, or several at once, and maybe other stages.

Grief turns out to be not a state but a process. Grief is like a winding road where any bend may reveal a totally new landscape. – C.S. Lewis

It’s like a storm that blows through. There is wind, there is rain, there is calm, there is shock, the storm is the storm, and it shifts and changes and the task is to figure out how to ride the waves of the storm through.

The 5 stages of grief includes denial. Not feeling. Numbness. Feeling things and yet being at a loss for words and a clear way to identify it. It’s not the absence of grief, it’s part of the process. In time, it tends to shift and change and words and clarity comes.

Keep holding on. You are not alone in the wrestling.

 

[Tinyflame]

Yes @Justmehere , I think that might be why C.S. Lewis called it "A Grief Observed".

(or, another of his books: "Finding Joy". )

 

[Justmehere]

To me, sometimes grief feels like being in an empty room with a screaming hum and everything is too bright. Probably sounds weird.

 

[Friday]

Depends on what I’ve lost, and how suddenly, how completely, and how irrevocably.

It it’s quieter moments, it’s like the trailing fingers of a lover. The barest brush sending waves straight to the core of me, and somehow deeper. From there It blows like a warm breeze in the summer time, wrong for the way it heats and brings heavy, honey thick, and stealing. It’s a presence, a weight, from the inside out. Belly, throat, heart, & bones. Draws the breath right out of me, closes my eyes, and begs me still. Time slows. Decisions are made.

In its not quiet moments? The concussive blast of thunder, as the air rushes to fill the gap left by jagged bolts of electricity. Deafening, overwhelming.

Time and all other things cease. The world stops. My world stops. And blows apart in the same moment. Whilst the rest of the world carries on. As if I’ve been grabbed by and ocean wave of it and flung/ tumbled/ hurled/ drug in all directions at once. Impossible to breathe, sudden sharp pains and flooding heat bleeding whilst drug over coral, blows from rocks, fighting to find my feet in the maelstrom, to gasp for breath... but all that happens is the keening wail sorrow howling.... or silence. Spine ripped out through my chest. Mind shattered. Heart broken. A crushed explosion. Unending, impossible, timeless pain.

Whether honey pouring over my bones, or a crushed explosion? It feels familar. Well known.