Episode 79: “How long before I get back to normal?”
10/2/24
Music
You are listening to the Life Reconstructed podcast with me, Teresa Amaral Beshwate, grief expert, best-selling author and widow. I’m so glad you’re here because in this and every episode, I shine a light on the widowed way forward.
Hello and welcome to episode 79. In this episode, I answer the question, “How long before I get back to normal?”
Music
I recently received an email with a great question, and I thought that the answer could be helpful for a lot of widowed people, no matter how long ago your person passed. The question was, “How long before I get back to normal?”
I wondered the same thing in the early months as I sat at my desk, unable to read a 3-sentence paragraph and understand it. As I functioned many levels below my pay grade. As I found my car keys in strange places, like the pantry.
I kept wondering when I would get back to normal as I stepped through the first year, and then the second.
Now at 12 years, I want to offer my perspective. And I do it with love and transparency, and with the hope that my answer to this question will help you give yourself lots of grace and patience and compassion.
Normal is different now. There is no getting back to the “normal” you once knew. Death changed you, too. It’s that catastrophic.
This current version of you is picking up the pieces. You know the pieces won’t fit back together the way they once did, but you continue to pick them up, piece by piece, and reassemble them in a way that makes some kind of sense.
You know that you’re not functioning as you once did. The skills you once had haven’t resurfaced. Motivation is MIA and you can’t seem to find a sense of direction. Which is frightening and foreign given that you’re a person who has always had a focus and the tenacity and discipline to get there.
The task at hand is to learn your current self. Be kind and gentle as you do. Get curious about you, now, about the grief you’re experiencing. Find the tools and skills that work for grief, which are different than what worked in the past.
Get curious about how your brain is functioning.
Because your brain is functioning differently now. It will be a process for it to re-wire itself to understand the world without your person’s physical presence. This will take new lived experiences on this side of loss.
Learning this current version of you means being curious about the thoughts you think, the feelings you experience, and the actions you find yourself taking.
Grieving is learning.
So, instead of waiting for your former “normal” to return, it’s more about learning this current version of you, accepting it as your current “normal,” for now.
And this is important: know that there’s a future version of you, too. That version of you is probably a bit beyond what you can imagine right now. Rather than think about what your future self has done or accomplished, think more about how she feels. Perhaps certain, confident and calm. Decisive, deliberate and purpose driven. Happy, version 2.0. Joyful version 2.0. She experiences feelings in a different way than ever before – more deeply and more fully. Can she predict the future? No. But she feels equipped to handle whatever may come.
There is a future version of normal. It’s incredibly beautiful and it not only honors your person, but you, too.
There is no timeline for any of it. There is no such thing as speed grieving. And in fact, there is no finish line for grief. It’s something we learn to carry well. We learn to integrate it into who we are. And while right now it might seem like the only thing you are, because it dominates every thought and feeling, I promise that with intentionality, grief will become just one part of you, among many wonderful other parts.
I like to hike. And I hike with a backpack that has first aid supplies, headlamps, rain gear, things like that. I’m not sure exactly what it weighs, but when I add water, and then put it on my shoulders, I know it’s there. I’m aware of it. But the stronger I get, the more I hike, I go long stretches without even thinking about that backpack, without being aware that it’s even there.
And that’s a good analogy for grief. The more we learn it, the more we learn ourselves, the more we understand that we’re playing the long game, the more we can walk through life hardly noticing its presence for days and weeks and even months. And yes, sometimes we’re aware of it, especially on significant days and during important life events. But we feel equipped to handle all of it.
So “normal” is a moving target. It’s constantly evolving and that’s a good thing. The most important ingredient as you experience any current version of “normal” is curiosity.
Self-criticism is the opposite of curiosity. When we’re choosing curiosity, we can learn and grow. Curiosity requires that we’re kind and loving to ourselves, that we’re willing to see things exactly as they are, without self-judgement. It requires that we’re objective and observant. This is the way forward toward a full and meaningful life that some day you’ll refer to as normal.
If this episode was helpful, and you’re listening on Apple or Spotify, please rate and review it. And no matter where you’re listening, please share it with a widowed friend. And remember that I believe in you, and I’m here for you. Take care.
Music
If you’ve found this podcast helpful, I invite you to check out my best-selling book, also titled Life Reconstructed. It has helped many thousands of people and it can help you, too. If you buy it on my website, you’ll also get the accompanying journal, plus a 3-part video series to help you feel better, starting right away. Simply go to https://www.thesuddenwidowcoach.com/lrbonusbundle to get started today.
