One man on Reddit responded with a life lesson we all need to hear.
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Alright, here goes. I’m old. What that means is that I’ve survived (so far) and a lot of people I’ve known and loved did not. I’ve lost friends, best friends, acquaintances, co-workers, grandparents, mom, relatives, teachers, mentors, students, neighbors, and a host of other folks. I have no children, and I can’t imagine the pain it must be to lose a child. But here’s my two cents.
As for grief, you’ll find it comes in waves. When the ship is first wrecked, you’re drowning, with wreckage all around you. And all you can do is float.
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I wish I could say you get used to people dying. I never did. I don’t want to. It tears a hole through me whenever somebody I love dies, no matter the circumstances. But I don’t want it to “not matter”. I don’t want it to be something that just passes. My scars are a testament to the love and the relationship that I had for and with that person. And if the scar is deep, so was the love. So be it.
Scars are a testament to life. Scars are a testament that I can love deeply and live deeply and be cut, or even gouged, and that I can heal and continue to live and continue to love. And the scar tissue is stronger than the original flesh ever was. Scars are a testament to life. Scars are only ugly to people who can’t see.
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As for grief, you’ll find it comes in waves. When the ship is first wrecked, you’re drowning, with wreckage all around you. Everything floating around you reminds you of the beauty and the magnificence of the ship that was, and is no more. And all you can do is float. You find some piece of the wreckage and you hang on for a while. Maybe it’s some physical thing. Maybe it’s a happy memory or a photograph.
Maybe it’s a person who is also floating. For a while, all you can do is float. Stay alive.
Take it from an old guy. The waves never stop coming, and somehow you don’t really want them to.
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In the beginning, the waves are 100 feet tall and crash over you without mercy. They come 10 seconds apart and don’t even give you time to catch your breath. All you can do is hang on and float. After a while, maybe weeks, maybe months, you’ll find the waves are still 100 feet tall, but they come further apart. When they come, they still crash all over you and wipe you out.
But in between, you can breathe, you can function. You never know what’s going to trigger the grief. It might be a song, a picture, a street intersection, the smell of a cup of coffee. It can be just about anything…and the wave comes crashing. But in between waves, there is life.
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Somewhere down the line, and it’s different for everybody, you find that the waves are only 80 feet tall. Or 50 feet tall. And while they still come, they come further apart. You can see them coming. An anniversary, a birthday, or Christmas, or landing at O’Hare. You can see it coming, for the most part, and prepare yourself.
And when it washes over you, you know that somehow you will, again, come out the other side. Soaking wet, sputtering, still hanging on to some tiny piece of the wreckage, but you’ll come out.
Take it from an old guy. The waves never stop coming, and somehow you don’t really want them to. But you learn that you’ll survive them. And other waves will come. And you’ll survive them too. If you’re lucky, you’ll have lots of scars from lots of loves. And lots of shipwrecks.
Originally seen on: Reddit
Photo: Getty
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When my daughter died in a car accident at age 22, I was sent this, and I printed it out and attached it to the mirror in my bathroom. I have had a lot of shipwrecks since then, and I am grateful for them. Most recently we lost our 19 yr old nephew, in another car accident on his way back to college. It never gets easier. But I recover from the waves quicker. Thank you to whomever wrote. I try to pass it on.
My twin different last year on mother’s day, I saw this shirt after send cried so hard because it’s truth to the core! Thank you for helping me grieve! ❤
This is a great read. However, grief does not have to be a sad moment. It can be a happy moment of remembrance as well. The scars are not the only testaments of love, sometimes memories and the fact that I will keep on smiling for them can also be a testament.
I lost my best friend when we were 28, the grief was so great I think it handicapped me for about a year, the waves were so tall and so close together, just as you describe, fourteen years later I still get a wave no and then.
Thank you so much for writing this piece. This is the best description of the grieving process I have ever read. I have felt the waves and still do from time to time. Today I no longer fear the waves, painful though they may be. Today I am grateful for the waves. They remind me that I can love and loose and still love again.
“But in between, you can breathe, you can function. You never know what’s going to trigger the grief. It might be a song, a picture, a street intersection, the smell of a cup of coffee. It can be just about anything…and the wave comes crashing. But in between waves, there is life. The waves never stop coming, and somehow you don’t really want them to. ” Yeah. Thats exactly what its like. I hate it and yet cling on to it desperately all the time because its all I have left of them once they’ve left this world. Once those… Read more »