What early grief was like, for me

My son died just over four years ago. He was twenty-one years old. And while my grief is with me for life, it has evolved over the last four years, and I expect it will continue to.

Those first weeks and month’s after Tristan’s death were what I refer to as my “early grief”. It was heartwrenchingly painful to breathe during that time, but what made things even worse was that I was continually surprised by the ways in which grief raised its ugly head and took a bite out of me. It was relentless in its ability to find new ways to knock me down.

Now, I know that most of the things I experienced are textbook reations to sudden, deep grief. But at the time, I felt like I wasn’t doing a “good job” of grieving. Or living.

So, if you’re just beginning your grief journey, I hope you won’t be as surprised as I was. I hope you won’t feel alone, and you’ll know that this stage doesn’t last forever.

I was angry.

I’m not typically an angry person, but I felt completely entitled to my anger at the world that failed to save my son. I was angry at harm reduction advocates for saying that recovery doesn’t work and is not a priority when recovery saved Tristan’s life and brought him back to himself. For a time, anyway. Until it didn’t. I was angry at the addictions recovery system for not doing enough to protect and save Tristan. I was angry at society for the shame and stigma it shrouds addiction in, and at our government for not responding adequately to the opioid crisis. That anger made sense to me. But what really surprised me was my anger at random, individual people.  

Every time I left the house, I needed to brace myself for the anger I knew was coming. I was angry at every young man I saw on the street for being alive, when Tristan wasn’t. I was even angrier at old men for living such a surplus of years. Somehow, it felt that they were alive because Tristan was dead; that Tristan had died so they could live. There was one time, just a few weeks after his death, when I drove by a young man, about Tristan’s age, standing at bus stop. He was wearing a white cook’s jacket and checkered pants like I’d seen Tristan wear a thousand times. It could have been Tristan. And I thought it should have been Tristan. I had to pull over, I was shaking so hard, and I just started sobbing. I was sure this guy must have used drugs at some point in his life, so why was he alive and Tristan wasn’t?  I really needed to make sense of my anger, because I knew in my head that it wasn’t valid, but all I could come up with was that this man was alive because he must have had a better mother than I was to Tristan. It felt so obvious to me. Clearly, I wasn’t thinking straight in that moment, but it helped me realize that my anger was there to protect me from the pain and guilt waiting on the other side of it.

I was emotionally numb.

One thing that surprised me about early grief was how emotionally numb I became, and how long that lasted. Those first few days I really struggled to even feel enough to cry, and I was very well contained during Tristan’s celebration of life. I got together with a small group of close friends about a week after his death, and as they poured their condolences over me, I could see their increasing confusion as they shed more tears than I did. It was pretty uncomfortable as I tried to explain my lack of feeling, until one of my friends said, “That’s your body’s way of looking after you. Slowly, over time, you’ll feel things. You don’t need to rush it, it will come when you’re ready.” That was one of the nicest, most helpful things I heard during that time. And it was true. But while this early numbness about Tristan’s death was uncomfortable—it felt like I wasn’t grieving “properly”—I could understand it. It was the numbness towards other things in my life that surprised me.

I no longer felt as connected to my two dughters, or my granddaughter, or my mother, or my friends. I no longer felt connect to myself. It was like I was an observer, and not even a very interested one. I struggled to hold conversations because I just couldn’t find it in me to care about anything anybody wanted to talk about. I found it easier to be alone, and so I went travelling for awhile but when it was time for me to come home, I worried that I may not be able to properly love again. There was the better part of year when I really thought my emotions were broken, for good. It turns out, they weren’t. I could love again, and I do. And I’m deeply grateful to have so many people to love.

My brain filled with swamp water.

Another thing that surprised me about early grief was how my brain stopped working. I accepted that in the first few days and weeks after my son’s death, it would be hard for me to process things or remember details. I couldn’t focus enough to read a book or even follow the plot in a TV show. Candy Crush was my go-to escape hatch. But six month’s after Tristan’s death, I went back to work and it was like my brain had turned to swamp water and I could barely get the work done at the most basic level. Worst of all, I really didn’t care, which also surprised me because I’d always taken such pride in my work. I became scared about my ability to continue to earn a living. Over the next while, I reassessed my professional life and what was most important to me. Now, more than four years since Tristan’s death, I still don’t see patterns or connections as quickly as I used to, I don’t think I articulate my thoughts as clearly, and I continue to not care about the minutia of life (though I care greatly about things that really matter to me!) And this is totally ok by me.  Rather than trying to regain what’s lost in myself, I’ve refocused my attention, both professionally and personally, on things that matter to me and where I can be successful.

I was a bit compulsive.

Part of the consequence of “not caring”about things, for me, was that I was unmoved by any rational reasons why I shouldn’t do anything I felt like in the moment. For example, I had to buy new shoes for my son’s Celebration of Life service because the black pumps I had, which were perfectly acceptable for every other occasion, seemed completely inappropriate for this one. I felt that if I didn’t get new shoes, I was somehow disrespecting Tristan. So I went shoe shopping, and tried on more styles of black pumps than I’d ever known existed. Finally, I tried on a pair of $400 basic black pumps in a trendy boutique, and decided they were the best thing in this world since Tristan’s birth. So much so that, when they didn’t have my size, I squeezed into half a size down. It didn’t make sense, but the beauty of these shoes and the sacrifices I’d be making by both buying and wearing them, seemed not just fitting, but necessary. That purchase was absolutely the compulsiveness of early grief, but to this day, I still feel like I’m somehow honouring Tristan every time I wear my beautiful, uncomfortable, outrageously expensve shoes.

I’m no longer so compulsive, but I still prioritize what I want for me and my loved ones, now, over possible financial consequences down the road. One thing I learned from Tristan’s death is that “all the time in the world” is a lie. You have to live life while you can. I suppose that juggling practicality and purpose is something I still need to work on but given one or the other, I choose to live with purpose.

My body was not my friend.

I was exhausted. Exhausted! I hauled my carcass around as best I could, but all I wanted to do was sleep. Unfortunately, I couldn’t sleep well, so no matter how many hours I spent in bed it was never enough.

Joy was complicated.

I found it so difficult to feel joy when I was in the early stages of grief. For me, the only emotions that worked well those first few months were anger and guilt, and the smallest drop of joy could set off a tidle wave of guilt in me. What kind of mom was I if could feel joy after losing my son? But, slowly, I started paying attention to small moments of everyday joy: the sun on my face, a nice buttery croissant, my granddaughter’s laughter. They gave me a moment of space that I could breathe into. But I was still conflicted until I had a coversation with Tristan, more than a year after his death, telling him I’d live forever in pain and give up all joy if I could just stay close to him, and he, in my mind, laughed at me (as he often had) and told me that I didn’t need to let go of the pain, but I also didn’t need to hold onto it quite so tightly. That I could make room for joy, because I couldn’t possibly lose him. He’d always be right there with me. And he was right. He always is.