The past few months I have been reminded of the short time we get to experience this thing we call life. It’s not really a fun subject to think about but mortality is reality. I was reluctant to write about this subject but I want this blog to be about women’s thoughts and feelings. These are mine and maybe they are yours too. Maybe knowing you aren’t alone will give you some comfort. I know I always need comfort in any form I can get. And many times it doesn’t come from the opposite sex. I can’t imagine men worrying about these things especially since my husband says he has decided he is just not going to die. I’m not trying to make light of this subject and I know he says this in jest but it just emphasizes how different our minds work. I know he isn’t thinking about how much time he has left, it’s just not part of his thought process. It’s so obvious, as he spends ZERO time obsessing about anything. Hence why this blog focuses on US, women.
We usually only think about how limited our time is when we or someone we love experiences a loss. Why is it when we are young we experience time as if it is going to last forever. We can’t wait to get to the next phase of our lives, attain the next milestone-not really giving much thought to the depth of the present moment. This is what age does for us, it gives us wisdom, something I wish we could possess a little earlier on in life. But unfortunately that is not how the “circle of life” works.
At what age do we take a step back and think, wow, my time here is getting shorter and shorter. I know it sounds morbid but I do think about it more now. So if I had to answer my own question, I’m thinking I didn’t start dwelling on this until my early fifties. I guess that makes some sense as fifty is at least halfway to the end, if we consider 100 the end. The average life expectancy for someone born in the early sixties is about 74 (for women). And if one is close to sixty that’s only another fifteen years… Fifteen years goes by in a blink of an eye these days. Although, my husband is convinced time is actually speeding up. Since I don’t possess a degree in quantum physics I really can’t argue. Maybe it truly is. Now of course my time could even be much shorter as no one knows when their time here is going to end. But the older we get and the more losses we experience the more our mortality becomes part of our thoughts. I know it does for me.
A few wonderful women I know recently lost their husbands way too early. I have also experienced family members taken from me that chronologically should still be here. The reoccurring grief becomes a constant reminder of our own calling. The word “grief” itself triggers intense sadness for me. Grief, a deep sadness usually caused by the loss of someone. The word denotes deep sorrow. The word alone cannot capture the magnitude of feelings evoked by these losses. Grieving is a process and as research points out truly an individual one. I’m sure you have heard of the stages of grief. These stages help us navigate through this unwanted process. Sometimes you go through them all and sometimes only a few. The process is different for everyone but nonetheless a process we should all go through to ultimately attain some sense of healing and acceptance.
It’s odd to me as I think we all do grieve and many times we don’t even recognize it as grieving. I think it’s because it’s not always due to the loss of a person in the physical sense. Think about how many things we lose over the course of our lives: time, friendships, lovers, treasures, jobs, and devastatingly, we lose hope all too often. The loss of life is obviously the most difficult for us to endure and probably has the most profound effect on our lives. We mourn losses of our loved ones, and lets not forget for many of us, the children we will never get to meet, for minutes, hours, days, months, years, for the rest of our lives. The unwanted experience bestowed upon us at the most expected and unexpected of times.
Losses of individuals never leave us. They leave a void in our lives. Our hearts feel as if they are broken, never to be mended. The sheer thought of losing my parents makes my heart ache so much. So many of my friends have already lost theirs and my heart aches for their loss as the thought is terrifying for me. I know ultimately this day will come as it will for all of us. The when is the big question. I think to myself, if it hurts this much just thinking about it, how will I ever be able to survive it when that dreaded time arrives. I know rationally there is no alternative but to cope with it. Somehow, someway I will have to, regardless of how much it hurts. I guess this is one of the challenging parts of being alive. The coping, the sadness, the mourning the inevitable. And yet we still have no choice but to go on after losses. The grief eventually manageable but never really gone.
Sometimes it seems like we can accept it more easily when we lose someone we have watched suffer through an illness. To truly watch someone you love in pain is also probably one of the most difficult things we as humans can experience. Being totally helpless is like experiencing their pain with them. And of course, I’m sure our pain cannot compare at all to theirs. But when they leave this earthly world and leave their pain behind you feel a sense of relief for them. Now gone, you have the loss of them to grapple with, just a further extension of the pain experienced while they suffered. This process is like a tide, an ebb and flow. The waves continuous, until you are hopefully one day reunited with them.
Some of us are more fortunate to not have experienced losses of loved ones in our lives until much later. I would say, myself being included have been extremely fortunate thus far. But some of us are not so fortunate. Some of us lose children very early, a spouse in their prime, or a parent at an all too young age. This is when the term “ life is unfair” screams at us. We all struggle with these thoughts of how and why. Those of us who have a religious foundation cling to it for some semblance of understanding. The following quote I feel captures exactly what grief is. Some wise person got this so right. I so wish I knew the individual that has or had this insight.
The price of love…Nothing could be more accurate. We only mourn those we love. We can feel sad for people that we know who have lost their loved ones but we really only grieve when it is our love that is lost.
We don’t only mourn the loss of our loved ones as I noted earlier. As I referenced we lose many things and experience losses in the abstract. I have mourned the loss of my children growing up and leaving our home for years and still do. I have mourned the loss of friendships for all kinds of reasons, relationships with co-workers from job changes, pets that have crossed over the rainbow bridge, favorite clothes that I no longer fit into and of course, the one most of us like to deny, my youth. And unfortunately in these tumultuous times I am losing faith in mankind. Can I even say that today without offending someone? There are days when I anticipate loss and the sadness just overwhelms me. There are so many transitions in life and to some degree many contain an element of loss. Depending upon the intensity of the love that was lost depends on how long our grief lasts. When our love is deep it will never totally leave us but hopefully become tolerable. The passage of time and the love of others surrounding us will allow us to keep our love alive through our memories. We could limit our pain through limiting our love but then what meaning does our life have without love? Loss is the part of the journey that makes us so appreciative of the love we have had and do have in our lives. It is part of our humanity which unites us. But in life we also find joy. Little snippets which can ease the experience of grieving. Experience a laugh on me and watch the video below to free our minds momentarily of any thoughts of sadness. We need these moments to help us heal. Smiling and laughing with each other is the best medicine for all of us. Slowly filling the holes in our hearts. This time uniting us in joy not only sadness. ❤
When I was a young girl I would often lie in bed at night and think about loosing my parents, and say to myself, oh they have plenty of time left and that would seem to help me! We know that is nit always the case. As I am know in my senior years, I am extremely fortunate to enjoy my wonderful children and Grand-children. I never take each day fir granted. I wake up and say thank you lord for another day. We never know if when Gid will call us home, so enjoy every day and don’t sweat the small stuff!
Another wonderful blog my girl.
Another biased review from my wonderful mother. Many thanks mom, I’m glad you are at least enjoying it. That alone makes it worth it. XO