Feeling Inside Out and Upside Down? Feel All the Feels (Episode 141)

When life feels...too much, start with one feeling.

What Causes Grief and Loss?

What things cause grief and loss? While it's easy to default to the death of a loved one, grief and loss can also be experienced during events like:

• A conflict or breakup of a relationship
• A diagnosis or disability
• Loss of a job
• Health issues
• A miscarriage
• Moving, or a child leaving home
• Retirement
• A big change, like a move
• Death of a pet
• A loved one's serious illness
• Loss of a cherished thing or dream
• Loss of safety after trauma

The list could go on and on. The point here is not to pinpoint all the things that "should" cause you grief, but to convey how many things are realities of life that can send people into grief. It could simply be that our emotions go haywire not from grief or anything unwanted, but simply too much change at once. 

Grief & Mindset

Whatever your loss, it’s personal to you, so don’t feel ashamed about how you feel, or believe that it’s somehow only appropriate to grieve for certain things. If the person, animal, relationship, or situation was significant to you, it’s normal to grieve the loss you’re experiencing. Whatever the cause of your grief, though, there are healthy ways to cope with the pain that, in time, can ease your sadness and help you come to terms with your loss, find new meaning, and eventually move on with your life.

The Stages of Grief

Again, taken directly from the grief article,

In 1969, psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross introduced what became known as the “five stages of grief.” These stages of grief were based on her studies of the feelings of patients facing terminal illness, but many people have generalized them to other types of negative life changes and losses, such as the death of a loved one or a break-up.

If you are experiencing any of these emotions following a loss, it may help to know that your reaction is natural and that you’ll heal in time. However, not everyone who grieves goes through all of these stages—and that’s okay.

Contrary to popular belief, you do not have to go through each stage in order to heal. In fact, some people resolve their grief without going through any of these stages. And if you do go through these stages of grief, you probably won’t experience them in a neat, sequential order, so don’t worry about what you “should” be feeling or which stage you’re supposed to be in.

Kübler-Ross herself never intended for these stages to be a rigid framework that applies to everyone who mourns. In her last book before her death in 2004, she said of the five stages of grief: “They were never meant to help tuck messy emotions into neat packages. They are responses to loss that many people have, but there is not a typical response to loss, as there is no typical loss. Our grieving is as individual as our lives.”

"Negative" Emotions Have Merit

We have to process our healing individually. Different emotions will crop up, and oftentimes if you are stuck in a perceived negative emotion, pay attention to what lesson you may learn. It may be you are learning how to navigate your anger, so the universe has offered you lots of little opportunities to be angry and work through it. It may be that sadness keeps reminding you of its importance until you choose to embrace that and sit with it before it can be let go.

The Myths about Grieving and Emotions

There are many myths about how you're "supposed" to feel. Yet time and time again, it boils down to emotions being like a fingerprint; they are unique to each individual and processed in a different way. 

Myth: The pain will go away faster if you ignore it. Right - suppression is a great way to invite an eruption. 

You need to be strong in the face of loss. Crying does not equal weakness. Sometimes admitting your own vulnerability is what enforces in another that it's okay to feel. You can be positive while also being honest with your own emotions and vulnerability as well. It shows true authenticity and humanity. 

If you don't cry, you don't really feel loss. We all experience things differently. And there is major growth in allow ourselves to experience all the feels. Not to force them; they will crop up as sure as we are human beings. But recognize that a cry may be most needed for one whereas an hour at a punching bag may be a better outlet for another. 

Get Physical

If you're feeling trapped in your head and your emotions, sometimes the best way to reset is literally getting physical. It's getting out of your head and heart and into physical movement and your body. Activity allows your mind and body to get busy, and sometimes can start those processing wheels turning on the emotions you may be experiencing. 

It Feels from the Inside Out

This week we watched "Inside Out" again. It gets me every time, and was super helpful for us to watch as a family. I highly recommend this - it's a girl going through change...not only with a move to a new state, but also as adolescence comes into play and her emotions start to get more complex. 

It's worth a watch, and I'll leave it at this - ALL emotions are valid. They may not all be helpful all the time, but each one has merit and is needed, and as we grow and mature, we can see how things like joy and sadness can both be experienced at once. 

Create Space

Sometimes, in our effort to "help" someone, we rush to fix it. We say things like, "Don't cry!", "You're fine/okay", or "Toughen up!"

But do we know they shouldn't express that emotion? Do we know entirely that they really are okay? 

Create space - for you, your partner, your children - to feel. To really allow yourself to feel, and to allow yourself to heal. 

​Suppression is a surefire way to invite an explosion. Feel all the feels - emotions aren't going to go away, so it's important we learn to navigate them. ALL of them. 

Get Support

Express Your Feelings in a creative and tangible way

It may be through journalling, writing a letter - to yourself or someone else, that you may or may not send, or maybe you dance it out. 

For our girls, before they could write, we'd give them opportunities to draw out their emotions - sometimes in angry scribbles, throwing paint on a canvas, or anything that fosters creative expression. Sometimes your best creativity comes from a complex emotion you sit in. Great things can still come out of anger, sadness, fear and more. 

Find comfort in routines and things you love

We are all coming at this season from different perspectives. Allow the ones in your life to process their emotions, and set the example for them by creating the space to allow yourself to process emotions as well. The uniqueness in each of us strengthens all of us.

Namaste