Good Grief

Posted by fxckfeelings on June 28, 2009

A lot of readers, either with amusement or anger, like to challenge the “fuck feelings” mentality; surely, they respond, not everyone’s just a big baby, and there must be some legitimacy to some feelings, given the right circumstances. Those readers might try to use these two cases—the feelings within, and/or the situations that have spawned them—to find the exception to the rule. But if you really think we assign some feelings more value than others, then you misunderstand the rule entirely.
–Dr. Lastname

I know this site has fun with people who whine because the truth hurts, but I want to know whether you can apply that philosophy in situations like mine. My son died in a car accident a year ago—he was just a little guy, bad weather…total freak accident. One day he was fine, the next day, he was gone. My wife was driving, and while I know it wasn’t her fault, I’ve pulled away from her, and she doesn’t really talk to me, either. It’s possible that I’m drinking too much, because I am drinking to numb the pain. Would you honestly tell someone in my position, “fuck feelings”? What would you tell me? I know this is short, but my goal isn’t complicated. I just want to get over the pain of my grief.

From your first question, it seems you think this site confuses whining with real pain, which isn’t our intended message. Pain is what it is—all questions posed on this site involve real pain—and grief over the loss of a child happens to be the worst. At least, we can’t imagine anything worse.

But pain becomes dangerous when you expect to control it, because you then hope for things that simply aren’t going to happen and avoid dealing with what you’ve got, which is a life that can dump terrible suffering on you, for no reason, at a moment’s notice.

Here, your pain is telling you that you need to drink, there’s no point in not numbing the pain of your loss, there’s nothing left in your marriage because your wife isn’t talking to you, you were unable to protect your son, you’ll have nothing to give other kids, and things are just going to get worse. You pain is real, but what its telling you is fucking bullshit.

Essentially, your pain is trying to destroy your beliefs. The truth is, you love your wife, you raised a good son, and life inflicted its worst possible wound on the two of you and caused pain that will never go away. That’s bad enough. Don’t make it worse.

If your goal is to make your grief go away or connect with your wife at a time when both goals are impossible, you’ll feel more helpless and more responsible for its crippling effects. That’s why your goal should not be to get over grief, but to endure it, and the pain it entails, for however long it lasts, without forgetting who you are and what matters.

Talking about it and expressing your feelings may help, but only if the process pushes you back to a realistic acceptance of how truly terrible life can be, how little its cruelty has to do with you personally, and how important it is for you to continue to value what you’ve always valued.

Otherwise, expressing your grief can be a form of crying-in-the-beer that may deepen your sense of despair, victim-hood, isolation, and self-loathing, and that’s what you need to oppose. You need to cry with the right person, the right spiritual philosophy, and the right goal.

Your goal with your grief is to honor your son’s memory and the good love that went into his life. Giving up drinking honors his memory, so try as hard as you can. You need to keep moving and working and doing positive things so you can nurture and distract yourself.

You need to remind your wife that, regardless of how empty the two of you feel right now, the love you shared is not gone, and his memory, which you share as only parents can, will never die. You can’t be sure your relationship will revive; but it’s your job to stand by its foundation.

And, as with all pain, never ask why when you know there’s no answer. Your son is gone for the same reason that wars and hurricanes happen—life is unfair. Asking why is a way of insisting on your right to behave badly until you get an answer and some relief.

Since that’s not going to happen, it feeds your passivity, anger, and sense of failure. It’s an unacceptable and dangerous question. You must bear the pain of having no answer, as well as the loss itself, in order to go ahead and do your job. And yes, fuck all the hopeless feelings that tell you otherwise.

STATEMENT:
So compose a statement to help separate the pain of grief from the value of your love and responsibilities. “I can’t control the pain, but I wouldn’t feel it if I didn’t love my son and if he hadn’t grown to be someone I could love and who could give love. Whether he lived to be 9 or 90, his life had meaning and gave meaning to the world, as did our love for him. I succeeded, he succeeded, and our family succeeded, and that’s what I need to remember for as long as my pain goes on.

If life were different, he would have grown up and we would have shared joy together; but that’s not why we brought him into this world and the fact that life can be so unbearably cruel does not change a thing. It can break my heart; but not change what I believe, why we made him, the memory of love, or who and what I care about. I will work every day to stay sober and honor his memory by remembering what was meaningful about his life and continuing to pursue a life with the same meaning.”

My wife is genuinely upset because of me, and I’m not sure what to do about it, especially because I think she’s overreacting. Like a lot of post-pubescent males, I like to look at pornography occasionally on-line. I don’t do it all the time, I don’t look at anything weird, but I do look, and my wife saw some sites in my browser history, and it really, really hurt her. She came to me crying that our marriage is worthless and that I don’t really love or value her, and as much as I’ve told her that’s not true, that she has it all wrong, that I’ll stop looking if it means that much to her, etc, etc, she’s acting like I’ve had an affair and our marriage is a sham. At this point, I think she might be right, since she doesn’t trust me enough to look at naked women online, and won’t stop battering me with tears and guilt. At this point, I just want to get away from her. My goal is to get her to see that I haven’t done anything wrong, or at least stop crying.

You can’t control how someone’s going to react to anything you do, let alone over-react. If your goal is to get your wife to come to her senses, you’ll have more luck finding a stripper who seems to like you and actually does.

All the effort you make in this fruitless quest is just going to wear you out, make you feel even more responsible and guilty for her feelings, and cause you eventually to get mad and confirm her belief in the low value of your love. Assume that she can’t help feeling the pain she feels; but don’t take responsibility for causing it or making it go away.

A better goal is to summon your own reasons for believing in your marriage and making them available to her, while putting a lid on the process of emotional reaction and persuasion. Review the facts and persuade yourself: the facts are on your side.

Sure, you’re e-horny, but you stick with her. And that’s because you love her and your self-control is fine. That’s why you’re not concerned and think she has no reason to be concerned.

Fear, like pain, is dangerous if it affects your beliefs. Fear has undermined her belief in you and in your marriage. Don’t take responsibility for her fear, but instead, urge her to fight it with reason. Remind her that you’re not afraid of your sexual urges, porn-site habits, or wandering behaviors. You have confidence in your love for her; but you are afraid of her fear.

If she asks why she should have to feel this pain, tell her that it’s because she loves you and may been hurt in the past and that it’s thus unavoidable. You can’t protect her from it without being someone you’re not. You wish you could, but it wouldn’t work.

So fear may be part of the cost of loving one another; but, in your mind, it’s worth it. It’s not a discussion that should continue. You hope she’ll see the value of your marriage and decide to stick together; but you don’t believe it helps for her to attack you or for you to take responsibility for her pain, so you won’t.

STATEMENT:
“I can see how much it hurts you to be reminded that I can lust after other women, and I’m sorry. But I believe my love for you is solid. I’m glad you told me what was upsetting you and I thought hard about what was my fault and what I could do better. I think I’m basically doing OK, and so are we, because I’m faithful and my porn interests don’t interfere with my being an active, loyal, hard-working husband. And now I’m not going to discuss this further because it won’t do any good and it might do some harm.”