Thoughts on sadness
It's raining in Austin today. Pouring down quite impressively when I headed out for the bus this morning. The rain seems to suit my mood these days.
I've been doing a lot of thinking. Mostly about different kinds of sadness. Sad is probably the easiest way to describe my mood. It's not an in-your-face, kick-you-in-the-stomach kind of sadness. It's a pensive melancholy. At one point during our grief class, my dad made reference to something he had read about "hard grief" vs. "soft sadness." This is soft sadness. If raging grief is like a flooding river, this is more like a really big swimming pool. Grief can be threatening -- you can drown in it. This sadness is far less threatening -- you're far more likely just to bob around in it.
One of the things that throws me about grieving is how it entirely lacks a linear progression. There are no easy, quick steps from hard grief to soft sadness. Today I'm sad. Tomorrow or next week or next month I may find myself smack in the middle of full-on, panicky, really painful grief. I don't know why, but I'm always surprised when that happens.
On top of that, sadness is still painful. It's a different kind of painful, like a dull, far-reaching ache, instead of the sharp agony of grief. This kind of sadness is tricky, deceitful. There's no denying grief. It steps up and takes center stage. Sadness lurks. It waits until you've forgotten about it. Then it pops up, like when you're listening to your favorite music, or when you're having dinner, or when you're laughing at someone's really funny joke.
I read somewhere that grief doesn't need to be healed. It is, itself, the healing. Furthermore, it's not something you get over. It's something you get through. And the grief may subside, but the sadness will be there forever. You will never not miss the people you've lost.
I don't know that any of this makes sense. It's really just a random collection of thoughts. All I know is that today I'm sad, but thankfully not miserable.
I've been doing a lot of thinking. Mostly about different kinds of sadness. Sad is probably the easiest way to describe my mood. It's not an in-your-face, kick-you-in-the-stomach kind of sadness. It's a pensive melancholy. At one point during our grief class, my dad made reference to something he had read about "hard grief" vs. "soft sadness." This is soft sadness. If raging grief is like a flooding river, this is more like a really big swimming pool. Grief can be threatening -- you can drown in it. This sadness is far less threatening -- you're far more likely just to bob around in it.
One of the things that throws me about grieving is how it entirely lacks a linear progression. There are no easy, quick steps from hard grief to soft sadness. Today I'm sad. Tomorrow or next week or next month I may find myself smack in the middle of full-on, panicky, really painful grief. I don't know why, but I'm always surprised when that happens.
On top of that, sadness is still painful. It's a different kind of painful, like a dull, far-reaching ache, instead of the sharp agony of grief. This kind of sadness is tricky, deceitful. There's no denying grief. It steps up and takes center stage. Sadness lurks. It waits until you've forgotten about it. Then it pops up, like when you're listening to your favorite music, or when you're having dinner, or when you're laughing at someone's really funny joke.
I read somewhere that grief doesn't need to be healed. It is, itself, the healing. Furthermore, it's not something you get over. It's something you get through. And the grief may subside, but the sadness will be there forever. You will never not miss the people you've lost.
I don't know that any of this makes sense. It's really just a random collection of thoughts. All I know is that today I'm sad, but thankfully not miserable.
posted by Audrey at 8:26 AM
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