Aug 24, 2023
Today's guest, Aga, compares her life of grief to living in a
deep, dark forest. She says that she longs to see light.
Occasionally, bits of light do find their way down through all of
the darkness, but then, in an instant, the light disappears, and
she is left in the darkness again. I love this analogy so much
because it emphasizes the unpredictability of having those moments
of light and how brief and fleeting they can often be.
Aga will be the first to say that she had a stressful life
when her son, Maks was alive. He was born with hypoplastic left
heart syndrome, and her life really revolved around getting him all
of the care that he needed. There was constant anxiety. She
wondered each day if she would get a call from school to come pick
up Max if he was ill. Every holiday had back-up plans in case Max
was sick or something else happened.
Today, almost a year and a half after Maks' death at the age
of 12, Aga has none of that stress and anxiety, and she hates it.
She hates that she could now go to a movie after work or travel out
of town with almost no notice. Friends from the outside likely
think that the 'silver lining' of her son's sudden death is that
she has gained freedom in her life. For Aga though, that freedom is
suffocating, and she hates it. She longs for the anxiety of her
former life when she was constantly worried about Maks. She feels
lost without it.
That brings me back to her amazing forest example because not
only is Aga in the dark forest of grief, she is lost in the dark
forest of grief. She no longer knows her purpose, has no idea where
she is going, or even who she is anymore. This is why we need
people to walk with us in the forest of grief. We need people who
have navigated the forest for a while who will hold our hand when
things get especially dark. These people will not have the answers
to all of our questions, but they will stand beside us as we begin
to figure out the answers for ourselves.