#003 - Lessons on grief
See you all in 2024 x
Christmas has turned into a weird time for me. I’ve always absolutely adored Christmas time (and I still do), but it just feels different now. This is my second Christmas after losing my Dad, and the first one where I don’t feel completely, utterly and beyond all-consumed by grief. That’s not to say the grief isn’t still one hundred percent there, sitting with me every day. It just feels a little more natural to me now, like I have managed to grow around it slightly in the past 12 months.
I woke up from a dream the other morning, and arose quite discombobulated. In my dream, my dad and I were at my office together, with him sharing some sage advice on how to scale my business, taking me to lunch and telling me how proud he was of me. This is the kind of advice I sadly no longer have access to as I attempt to navigate business ownership, which is perhaps one of the loneliest expeditions of my life. This, hand in hand with my grief, is a loneliness cocktail fit for the Grinch.
In the same dream, dad and I were sharing a couch, sitting close as I moved into hug him. Just before I was able engulf his body with mine, I woke up. I turned over, and thought about how I should call dad, and then it all came flooding back. Instead of being able to ever hug him again, I remembered he was gone. Tears started welling up in my eyes, immediately upon waking.
In the immediate aftermath of his passing, I found myself sleeping a lot. I wondered if there was something wrong with me. Through therapy and research, I realised that exhaustion and excessive sleeping were both normal occurrences as a result of bereavement and trauma. Despite the exhaustion, I re-opened my office two weeks after his passing and got on with my life, to the best of my abilities. To an outsider looking in, you wouldn’t have been able to tell that I was going through hell every day. I don’t think many people even realised how difficult those first few months were, as I navigated this new normal while trying to keep my every day life afloat. It was torture.
In grief, I’ve become more of a people pleaser than ever, so overtly cognisant that my loved ones are grieving and going through the same difficult life transitions, so I push my own struggles aside. On the contrary to this, I also have learnt that life is about doing whatever the fuck you want. It’s your life and I’m sick of caring how others choose to live theirs, so I simply believe others should feel the same way about mine.
I am writing this from the airport where I am looking towards a proper break — two weeks where I want to dedicate myself to reading books, sleeping, resting and learning. It’s truly been the most enormous two years of my life with the highest ups and the lowest lows, losing one of the most cherished people in my life and marrying another (I got married, six months to the day after Dad died, to the love of my life, Jack).
Grief is such a collective experience, a unique and terrifying thing. Throughout my heartache, I have often battled with the feeling that my pain or loss was never enough to justify grief, upset or behaving like an absolute lost baboon. I think this is something we all struggle with - the comparison of never thinking our pain is enough. I am not on the front line. I’m not living in Gaza, where genocide is unfolding. My family, for the most part, is safe, and generally happy and healthy. Within these paramaters, I level my pain in a figurative measuring cup against the entire world. And with all the horrific things in the world, how could I have any ground to complain? How could my pain ever be enough? My dad was 69, I was 29. I got 29 beautiful years with him. Some people get none. Some of my more diplomatic and reasonable friends have quickly rebutted this internal argument of mine, imploring that while it’s important to have empathy for others, we must have empathy for ourselves too, perhaps above all.
With this learning, I also learnt that humans cannot be expected to level up misery for one another. We cannot compare our grieving, and we cannot expect others to carry our pain for us. It’s literally impossible for others to reflect our own pain like a mirror. This is definitely one of the biggest lessons thus far — grief can be like living in different countries for different people going through it, even when mourning the very same person.
I know people who treat grief like a slow burn, crying loudly or falling into silence. I am envious of these people. I joke my way through grief, using comedy to make the pain seem less impactful. I sling it over my shoulder and pop it into a cupboard for another day in those times it feels too heavy. It took me a while to come to terms with this style of grieving, but this is another lesson — there is no right way to grieve. The only thing that matters is getting through it, one way or another.
Grief is tidal, ebbing and flowing, no matter how you cope with it. However, it is not exceptional. At the end of the day, we are all just passing through this world, mere visitors making the most of our allotted time slot. Unfortunately for human kind, it is one of the most ordinary things we can go through in our lives. My heart aches for those who have yet to experience it in its capsizing nature, because I know it’s coming for them. It’s a sure thing. How I wish I could prepare them for the tidal wave, but there’s nothing anyone can say or do to prepare you for the reality of loss.
And my final lesson from grief? Coming to terms with the fact that my dad exists in two forms now — as before and after. Before, where he is a living, breathing person who can laugh, hug, cry and be there wholly for me, and his family and friends, with a physical presence that could be touched, heard and experienced. And now, the after, in which he exists only as a memory for the bereaved, resigning agency to the imagination of the living. I will hold his memory forever as I work around the before and the after of his presence. It’s these milestone times of the year that are the hardest to navigate, but it means he is still here, existing in the after. As long as these times of life are difficult, it means he is still around. And I will always choose difficulty, as long as it is tinged with him, forever.
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Kinda obsessed with purchasing…
If you know me, you know that I am obsessed with sunglasses. I think I have about 50 pairs and counting, and it’s well and truly sunglass SEASON! As fast as I accumulate sunglasses, I also tend to lose them just as quickly, so I always have several pairs on my wish list at any given time.
Loewe sunnies from Net-A-Porter, of course. One thing to know about me - I don’t really care whether or not sunglasses ‘suit’ my face… if I like them, I wear them. I feel like these would fall into the ‘not particularly flattering but I love them anyway’ category.
These Willy Wonka-esque Loewe babies are very topical right now as Timmy Chalamet follows in Gene Wilder’s footsteps… this whole collage could have been Loewe sunglasses to be honest, but thought I’d throw some other ops in.
We all know cherry red is the colour du jour of the TikTok girlies right now, and these Cherry Raie sunnies are a perfect way to incorporate the trend into your summer wardrobe.
These orange Jacquemus sunnies are mostly on my wishlist because of the cute af arms.
Sun Buddies are one of my favourite sunglasses brands in the world - they’re so beautifully made and their shapes are classic. I already have these in purple and green, but feel that the yellow would be a fab addition to my sunglass-drobe.
I also have these Poppy Lissiman speed dealer style sunglasses in their yellow colourway, but again, I am a sucker for collecting the things I love in a range of colours… and these are no exception.
Kinda obsessed with listening to…
Zach Bryan’s entire catalogue. I saw him live with my fabulous BPR Team in early December for our work Christmas party, and I am now more obsessed than ever. His music really got me through my earlier stages of grief, so it’s only fitting that he’s my recommendation in today’s newsletter. Him and his band were probably one of the best live music performances I’ve ever seen. He sent out a link to live recordings from his Melbourne show which you can listen to / download here — the belters were being BELTED.
Kinda obsessed with reading…
I am part of the most elite book club in the world (not even over exaggerating - it’s my favourite thing on the planet… we dress up, we do activities and I look forward to it more than anything) and so I thought I’d share with you the my favourite five books we’ve read since the inception of our Cliterary Club:
The Hotel Nantucket by Elin Hilderbrand (a great holiday read if you have time off over the next month!)
PS — if you’re a big reader, follow me on Goodreads here! I log every single book I read (as well as audiobooks I listen to… don’t @ me). I love seeing what other people read too so please add me so I can get even more inspo!
A final remark…
I’m surrounded by Gen Z’s on a day-to-day basis (and honestly I couldn’t love it more). One thing I have picked up from them? ~Manifestingggggg bb~. So in the spirit of moving into 2024 knowing what I want from the year (see: rest and relaxation, and heaps of not giving a fuck), I’ve started a manifestation mood board (and I am very graciously sharing it with you here, in the hopes you don’t rinse me for being cringey af). Yes, I am now that person. Sue me.
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and with that, friends, I’m out for 2023.
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