Guest blog by Sarah Playforth
At first I thought all my experiences of grief related to the death of people I love, but when I looked further back in my memory, I realised that, although I was not aware at the time, a photo of me at my third birthday party show my grieving face. I had lost my hearing a year before and it’s clear that I had no idea what was going on around me.
I decided as a teenager that the only person I could truly rely on to comfort and sustain me was myself. I learnt that lesson, but it took me a long time to realise it was not always good to hold so determinedly on to my independence.
In my teenage years, when my first serious boy friend finished with me, that grief felt overwhelming. Other times of grieving – for my guinea pigs, for my first dog, for a little known maths teacher, for Winston Churchill – seem minor compared to my bereavements of 1980. In that year my father died too young in his late 50s, his mother, the matriarch of our family of aunts, uncles and cousins died in her mid 90s and then my second baby, my first son, Ben, died at eight days. In the next few years my maternal grandparents died. I think now that the death of my baby hurt me more deeply than any other; it was a visceral deeply felt physical hurt as well as emotional, and I was overwhelmed with grief for the next three years, which showed in some pretty awful behaviour that hurt others and didn’t really help, as much as carry me along those years to a manageable place.
My middle brother died in 2016 and that reminded me of when my father died – a death leaving another hole in my close family network. My mother died in 2022 and that too was a physical as well as emotional pain for me. I like to imagine my mum, me, my daughters and granddaughters as Russian dolls so having the outer doll missing hurts.
It’s a strange feeling, being the matriarch.
I never found other people were able to comfort me in my grief until I met my second husband, who persisted in nurturing and consoling me in the face of my “bloody independence” and somehow also enabling my freedom to make choices. My preferred way to live with grief is to walk alone by the sea, or swim in it, walk on the downs or in a forest. I feel deeply part of the natural world and, on the whole, it has always been there for me. Three camel trips in the Sinai desert, a trek along the Great Wall of China and several sailing/hiking holidays on the Turkish Aegean were adventures that indulged my love of nature to the extreme and also helped me cope with grief.
I went to counselling several times when in a grieving time for preference because that also helped me to find my way myself, instead of giving me advice. Having said that, I do have some advice for anyone recently bereaved. Do accept all practical assistance you are offered – and all hugs. You will find that the practical issues will keep you busy, then when they are dealt with, grief can come roaring back shouting “what about dealing with me now”. Let it happen however it feels for you. It will stay with you but gradually take up less of your life. Indulge yourself in whatever ways suit you.
Some people find it really hard to talk to people who are bereaved but may help in other ways. A friend of mine who had a baby at the same time as I had Ben, so felt very loath to talk to me, left us a home made, family-sized steak and kidney pie on the doorstep.
Acknowledging grief as something that sits permanently in my soul and can have as much or as little attention as I choose, works for me.
My life holds many small moments of joy that have stayed with me throughout grief: my dog’s head on my knee; smiles on the faces of my daughters and granddaughters; hugs from my husband; newly emerging daffodils and other spring flowers; the view from my window; the sea in all its moods; fox cubs in my garden; and many more.