Definition(s) of Grief and Mourning.. What are actually we talking about here?

Grief: A deep sorrow, especially when caused by someones death. It is a feeling within yourself in response to someone or something dying. 

I think the important thing to remember here is that grief is a feeling or actually a large group of very intense feelings that come over you and kind of take you over. It is often totally visceral and emotional and not rational or thoughtful at all.

Mourning: The expression of deep sorrow caused by someones death. An external expression of your inner feelings (of grief) when someone or something dies. 

Mourning is about your expression of how your grief makes you feel and there are many traditional mourning customs like wearing sack cloth and ashes and keening, rocking back and forth and crying, and many other things that your grieving makes your body do to try to relieve the very intense emotions, pain and sometimes actual physical illness you are experiencing. As with grief, they are your expressions and reflect who you are and how you loved. 

Negative behaviors:  There can also be grief or mourning behaviors or the results of anger within our grief and mourning that are loud or violent or hurtful to ourselves or others, or intrusive on others that we should be aware of. If your mourning or grieving starts to move you in those directions, it is important for you to find, contact  and talk to a professional grief counsellor who will be able to help you to channel your grief into more positive pathways.

We grieve because we love.  I believe that it is our love and the ending of our lives with our loved ones that cause us to grieve. We miss them and all the interactions and time spent together and the things we did and were to each other, the things we will never get to do or the things we will never do again. For all these reasons and more, we experience deep sorrow and pain, believing that we will not be able to have any more time or experiences or love with the person who has passed away. And everything and every moment reminds of this. 

And it hurts! And it becomes the most wished for thing we have; if I could only have another hug or another day, another smile or… But while it’s the one thing we want the most,  it’s the one thing we can never have in that way again and though it hurts more than we can say, it is a truth that must eventually be faced and accepted and in a way, it is also a door into our next life. We feel these things because we love!!!

Waves of Grief = Waves of Love ! Each time a wave of grief crashes over you, mixed with the pain and feelings of loss and sadness remember that we grieve because we love.

One of my thoughts early on was “it’s what I want most in all the world and I can’t have it, so I probably have to figure out how to do or want something else. I don’t have to like it, I just have to find a way to do it.” 

I believe we all eventually have to find our way to someplace like this and then begin the very difficult process of starting to live again, to begin to build a new life; to find hope and healing for a future without our loved one.