I did a 5-part blog and podcast on grief last year. I’m sure you know the stages: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. I think there should be a 6th stage of grief…EXHAUSTION. Because grief is fucking exhausting!
My whole body hurts with how exhausted it is from pain. This 6th stage is for any loss, any grief. I’ve written about chronic pain because I know chronic pain…and it is exhausting. I’m exhausted. I woke up this morning because I was in pain, and after a full night’s sleep I am still exhausted. Every ounce of me is exhausted.
My dad died two months ago, and I’m exhausted. Exhausted and frustrated because I don’t think I’ve even begun to grieve his loss because I don’t have the time or the energy. I boxed up all of his clothes and donated them to hospice. It’s strange packing up someone’s life and giving it away. I don’t want all traces of him to be gone. My sister and I kept things that were important to us and things we thought would be meaningful to our kids. I had a dream that my dad’s baseball cap, which has been hanging on the kitchen chair for the past year, had moved to another chair. In the dream that was my dad letting me know he’s still around. And so, his hat hangs on the kitchen chair, waiting for him to move it. I’m really tired.
My mom has dementia and lives in a skilled nursing facility. She has good days and bad days – and they are either REALLY good or REALLY bad. Today is bad. I am the enemy she fights against. She says mean and hateful things to me. She hangs up on me several times a day…and, although it’s pitiful, I’ve tried to beat her to hanging up…although I won’t just hang up on her. I try and end a negative conversation first but she’s always faster than I am. It’s exhausting. I’m tired of trying to calm her and placate her. It’s exhausting. She’s exhausting. I found myself on the couch crying and telling my wife that I try to do everything for her but it’s never enough and it’s never right. I’m so fucking exhausted. I can’t even touch any of the grief I feel about her or my dad. It would require way more energy than I have – maybe more than I’m willing to give at this moment.
This week I found out that besides a separated AC joint in my shoulder I also have a torn rotator cuff. That helped explain the length of time it’s taking for my shoulder to heal and the amount of pain I’m still experiencing. I packed up my dad’s clothes, as I mentioned, and am in the middle of taking care of the financial stuff for both of them. We’ve also been trying to move my mom to a different facility where she would have more people she could interact with. I had the move all set up until the administrator, of the current facility, decided he knew what was best for my mom and told her she should go to assisted living. Of course, he didn’t tell her she can’t afford it and he didn’t consider her safety or needs because he doesn’t know her. He won’t do the paperwork for the transfer and now she only wants to go to assisted living. So, I’m having a pointless fight with this administrator, who is overstepping his position, and my mom is refusing to move…so that’s all fucked. I don’t really know what to do, what I do know is I’m exhausted.
I think exhaustion is the 6th stage of grief. If you’ve ever experienced grief, it’s obvious, right? Exhaustion is the overlooked stage. Maybe exhaustion is the last stage coming after acceptance…you’ve come to terms with the loss but are so wiped out. You probably didn’t even realize how exhausted you were. I think exhaustion is woven in between all the other stages. There’s denial, exhaustion, anger, exhaustion, bargaining, exhaustion, depression, exhaustion, acceptance, exhaustion. It’s exhausting just reading all of that. And all those stages come and go as they please. I’m not sure how long it takes to feel like you are on the other side of grief…maybe there is no other side. Maybe we just adapt to the loss, and it becomes incorporated into who we are.
I am learning that exhaustion does not go away just because I accept a situation. Accepting chronic pain doesn’t stop me from waking up in pain. It doesn’t end the days where I am in so much pain, I’m afraid to take a step, because I’m scared of falling. It doesn’t stop the frustration of not being able to lift one leg to step into shorts because it’s agony…the lifting and the standing on one leg. It’s relentless. Its fucking exhausting.
Accepting that my dad died doesn’t end the work that needs to be done. There are details to take care of…I didn’t realize how many details. And acceptance doesn’t help me deal with my mom’s emotions and grief. She was exhausting before my dad died. And accepting my mom’s dementia doesn’t stop the constant phone calls and complaints. It’s 10 am and I have already been hung up on 3 times. Acceptance doesn’t change that. I am exhausted. And in that exhaustion, I am trying to do the right thing all the time. But I don’t even know the right thing all the time. I am doing the best I can, although it never seems to be quite good enough. There’s always more – more to do, more to fix, more to appease, more to be responsible for…even if I’m not.
So, I’m exhausted, big damn deal. You may even be thinking, “Go take a nap!” This is not exhaustion that a nap helps or resolves. This is exhaustion in every cell of my being. Exhaustion to the bone. Now my natural reaction to all of this is to shut down emotionally…pull myself up by the bootstraps and march on. I don’t even own boots, but on I march. I’ll keep going because I don’t feel like I have any other choice. I’ll be responsible and keep moving forward…that’s what I do. As I write this I realize, I have totally shut down my emotions. I haven’t been feeling much of anything except pain and pressure. Pain in my body and pressure to keep doing…whatever needs doing.
I shut down inadvertently. I didn’t even realize it until now, writing about grief. A grief that I know I have not even touched…yet. So, what does shutting down do for me? It definitely does not end the exhaustion. It might even add to it because I waste so much energy trying not to feel. It cuts me off from myself and from caring for myself. I can’t care for what I refuse to see or feel. It creates a barrier between me and the people I love. It keeps them at a distance so that even if they could help, I’m not allowing them to. It causes doubts and confusion. It makes problems seem bigger than they are…it can make grief seem bigger than it is…or maybe more unmanageable is a better way to put it. I am fighting what already is…everything I’ve written about is already reality. I waste my time and energy longing for things to be different than they are. Now that’s exhausting…a waste of energy and exhausting.
So, let’s be real…sometimes I feel hopeless. I look out in front of me and fear that I’ll always feel as exhausted, sad, confused, and in the same pain as I am right now. But here’s the thing, I have no idea what the future holds…not 10 years from now, not even 10 minutes from now. There’s a line in the Indigo Girls song, “Closer to Fine,” that says, “And the less I seek my source for some definitive, the closer I am to fine.” I long for things to be stable and solid…something I can hang on to, solid ground to steady myself. But everything is changing all the time. If I can release this longing. Release this need for certainty. If I can lean into what scares me, then I can allow what is to be…as it already is…without all the kicking, screaming, and fighting. And I am closer to fine.
If I can stop looking for an answer, stop thinking I need an answer to save me…stop looking for the definitive…then I am fine. I am fine because I am here in this moment, just being in this moment, and I’m fine. When I try to change the past or arrange the future, then I’m really fucked. I’m fucked because I can’t but I’m still trying to convince myself that I can. I think maybe the answer is that there is no answer. There’s not one definite answer that works for the world. One answer that everyone is looking for. I don’t need an answer. I need a moment-to-moment strategy to live my life. And here it is…Stay. Just stay. Stay where I am. Stay with whatever feeling or situation I have in that moment. Just be where I am. Just be who I am. Just fucking stay.
I need to release myself from the idea that I can take care of everything and everyone…I actually try to do that. Release myself and stay with whatever is there. I might feel scared or relieved, possibly pissed off, frustrated, discouraged, envious, abandoned, used, manipulated…you name it and stay with it…right where you are. Acknowledge whatever is there and stay with it. Look at it. Be curious about it. Be prepared to learn from it. We learn when we stay. We learn because we stay. Stay until you don’t need to anymore. And then, as Dharma used to say on “Dharma and Greg,” put it in a bubble and blow it away. Let go.
There you have it…my 2 strategies for life…Stay and Let Go. I knew I could be brief…too bad I didn’t start here; you could have been done in one minute. Seriously, it’s not bad advice. I’m learning to follow it myself. And behind the staying and letting go, always be guided by love…and some gentleness. It takes time to learn, and grow, and change. Love yourself through it. Love those close to you through it. Love those you’re not that crazy about through it. And people you don’t know or don’t think you care about…love them too. The only thing that will change the world is love. So, get to it. The world needs love. Desperately.
Love must win…always.
Kai Raines 