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LIFE WITH CYNTHIA: The journey of grief

In this week's column, Cynthia Breadner talks about walking with those struggling with grief
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One of the joys of my work is to watch a person, who is grieving and overcome with loss and sadness begin to find something to live for and a reason to get out of bed in the morning. It is rewarding to walk the journey and live with them for a time in their world that feels so grim and sad. People measure the depths of love by the depths of their grief. If we have not loved deeply and fully then grief is not present at the time of loss.

I attended a wake this week of an elderly woman who I had become very fond of. She taught me and welcomed me into her world only in the last two years. I know this distinctly because we met when she came to the Bradford grief group just a month after the death of her husband. She was so sad. Over the next two years we talked, and we talked, about him and what their life was together and how different her life felt without him. The depth of her grief was evidence of the depths of her love.

Currently, I am walking with a parent after the loss of their young adult child. The very breath has been taken from their body, and I mean the parent not the child. This parent struggles to be able to take a deep breath into their lungs, the grief has such a grip. Panic attacks and anxiety comes over them with not even a moment’s notice and the fear of living without the beloved is almost more than they can bear.

This morning I read an article on how they have categorized “prolonged grief” and entered it into the DSM-5, which, by definition, is the standard classification of mental disorders used by mental health professionals in the United States. There is now a diagnosis called “Prolonged Grief Disorder”. What does this mean? It means professionals can now diagnose this disorder and can be charged accordingly and covered under various places for payment.

One writer said, “If including prolonged grief in the DSM-5 enables more individuals who are suffering from it to get help, that's good. But the idea that only a medical diagnosis gets you help is deeply problematic and reflects the hold corporate and administrative attitudes have on medicine.” With this said I begin again with my first words of this pondering, “One of the joys of my work …”

Deep and prolonged grief is real and is challenging in anyone’s life. I provide grief support and prolonged care for anyone needing help during and through any loss. I cannot give a medical diagnosis nor am I in the education parameters to bill anyone for this care. I simply do it because of one of the joys of my work ….

There are few people walking the streets today who are not one of the walking wounded. Our hurts, losses and griefs are many and they pile up. Complicated grief begins to eat away at our soul and, in turn, eats away at the very vessel which carries the soul, our bodies. The woman whose husband dies after 60+ years of marriage, the parent whose child dies suddenly of illness or accident, the person whose job has disappeared, the breakdown of relationships and the losses felt during the pandemic are all part of life’s prolonged grief and I truly cannot believe anyone needs a doctor to formally diagnose to feel this pain. To get treatment paid for and recognized, likely, but not to feel the pain of it all.

Life brings us prolonged grief simply because we live life to the fullest. When we love and live deeply the losses are felt in heartiness and hotly. Know this and welcome that with great love comes great loss. One of the joys of my work is to watch as a person realizes life can be happy, full and great again even with the scars of loss. Aging brings us wisdom, the wisdom to see we are human beings having a spiritual experience and with that experience we must suffer loss in order to know joy.

#breakingstibah

#dancynadventures

Cynthia Breadner is a teacher, author, grief specialist and bereavement counsellor; a soul care worker and offers specialized care in spiritually integrated therapies. She works as a LTC chaplain assisting with end-of-life care for client and family. She is the mother part of the #DanCynAdventures duo and practices fitness, health and wellness. She is available remotely by safe and secure video connections, if you have any questions contact her today! [email protected] breakingstibah.com


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Cynthia Breadner

About the Author: Cynthia Breadner

Writer Cynthia Breadner is a grief specialist and bereavement counsellor, a soul care worker providing one-on-one support at breakingstibah.com
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