Grief Journey vs Learning to Drive: A Comparison
June 7th, 2018
Photo Credit: Mandy Cullen
Do you remember that feeling when you first started to drive? I remember wanting to turn the corner so smoothly like I’d seen my friends and parents do with ease so many times before.
I envisioned myself, just like them, effortlessly flicking on the blinker, letting up on the gas before rolling around the corner, turning the wheel with the palm of one hand (so cool) and gradually accelerating after the corner. Ya know what I mean? Smoooth.
Pan to me actually trying it when I was 15. I clumsily fumble to turn the blinker on and somehow in the process accidentally manage to turn the windshield wipers on. I wait too long to brake before the corner, so I have to slam on the brakes to make the corner… only to find I slowed down too much and need to accelerate to make the corner. I hit the gas too hard and the car leaps forward mid-corner.
Regardless of it all, I am a teenager and still feel good, so I decide to try to turn the rest of the corner with the palm of one hand. It starts gloriously, until a moment later when I lose grip and the wheel slides out of my hand, abruptly jerking the car to one side. I manage to regain control of the wheel just in time to accelerate now that I’ve rounded the corner. I, again, hit the gas too hard and the car unnaturally lunges forward.
I now envision any unfortunate onlookers resembling me in this photo. Smoooth. Juuust the way I’d envisioned it.
Anyone else have similar situations in life? Where you envision how something is going to go and when it comes down to it, it looks nothing like you envisioned it?
Yeaaaah. Me too. And driving is far from the only example from my life. My driving analogy sounds a lot like my grief journey. Uncoordinated, discombobulated and downright messy.
I had seen others move through grief long before Ben died. I envisioned how I would handle a death if it were to happen to me. I thought I’d move through the “stages of grief” and get on with my life.
Wooof. I’ve never been so wrong.
I never could have guessed how I would cope with the death of my brother until I was forced to do so. I’m back in that car when I was 15, clumsily fumbling through losing Ben to suicide. I may have seen others do it before me, just like I’d seen my parents and friends effortlessly turn a corner lookin’ oh-so-cool, but it’s vastly different when you’re in the driver’s seat.
If you know someone going through a loss or a hard time, give them grace. If you are someone going through a loss or hard time, allow yourself grace. We are hard on ourselves, but as my mom would say, we were given no manual on life. Stay in your lane and enjoy the ride, crew.
Xoxo,
C
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