Guides
Is There a Right Way to Grieve?
Loss Is Not One Thing
When someone asks if they are grieving the right way, I want to know what has been lost. It may be a person you loved. It may also be a role, a relationship as it used to be, or the life you expected to have. Those losses can feel different from one another, and some are hard to name because other people do not immediately recognize them.
I do not bring a checklist for how you should feel. Some days may be full of sadness, while another day is mostly ordinary errands and a sudden memory. You can feel anger, relief, confusion, affection, or nothing clear at all. No one moment tells the whole story of your loss.
No Clock for the Work
People may ask whether you are doing better or suggest that enough time has passed. Grief does not follow a timetable that I can hand you. An anniversary, a family gathering, or a change in routine can bring something forward long after the loss itself. That does not mean you have done grief incorrectly.
Therapy can offer a place to talk without having to measure your feelings against someone else's expectations. We may look at what has changed in your daily life, what you miss, and which relationships make room for what you are experiencing. I will not tell you when you ought to be finished.
The Lives We Do Not Get to Live
Sometimes I think about Marvel’s Loki, sitting beyond the TVA with all those branching timelines in his hands. Real life is not like that. We only get to experience one timeline.
There are other versions of our lives we can imagine in extraordinary detail: the person we might have married, the children we might have had, the career we might have chosen, the city we might have lived in, the version of ourselves we might have become. We can picture those lives clearly enough that they can almost feel real, but we do not get to live every possible version of ourselves.
That does not mean imagining them is always bad. Sometimes those unlived lives teach us something about what still matters to us. They can inspire us. They can become fertilizer for what we create now. We cannot go back and step into another timeline, but sometimes we can take something from that imagined life and use it to shape the one that is still in front of us.
When I was a kid, I once wrote that the elevator of life doesn’t stop at every floor. Even then, that idea both comforted me and made me sad. I think it still does.
Others May Grieve Differently
Families and friends do not always respond to loss in the same way. One person wants to remember out loud; another changes the subject. Those differences can hurt even when nobody intends harm. We can talk about what you need from the people around you and what it is like when they cannot give it.
Attachment-based and family systems ideas may help us understand the relationships around a loss. I will not use a theory to tell you what a connection meant to you. Your own memories and values belong at the center of that conversation.
You Can Begin Wherever You Are
If you want to ask about therapy, send me a general message through the contact page, leaving private health details out of the form. I handle my own scheduling, and you can start with a free 15-minute introductory conversation if you'd like. You do not need a polished account of what happened to contact me.
Sessions are available virtually when you are in Texas. In-home therapy may be possible around Killeen, Copperas Cove, and Temple when it fits. We can discuss which setting gives you enough privacy and comfort to talk. Your grief does not have to meet a deadline to have a place here.
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