Need some end-of-year creative oomph? Join us for this sweet online gathering on Friday (9am PST // 12pm EST). We will do a dance party, drawing lesson, and hear gorgeous song and poetry live. Free and all welcome. Around Thanksgiving a weird little bump showed up under John’s eye. We did our share of wildly ineffective googling (trust me: typing “cyst” into search leads you to some very intense images). We took pictures. We messaged our doctor. We tried not to overreact even as the bump became two bumps and then one scabbed over right under his eyebrow and then a strange pain started stretching into his scalp.
thank you so much Courtney. My husband is a hospice chaplain and I am a chaplain for body and soul. We sometimes say I help people get into their bodies and he helps him get out. Acknowledgment of grief is artfullness at its best.  it helps enormously to ritualize sorrow within our lives.
Sawubona Courtney! Thank you for these words that help me know that I see you. This discussion has deepened in me throughout the day. Alongside others responding here, I agree we need collective grief practice. In researching my early settler ancestors, I learned that the culture that became dominant on this continent not only didn't have grief practices but actually considered grieving a sin and prohibited it. I have been fortunate to participate in grieving as taught by the Dagara people of West Africa and also in Joanna Macy's Truth Mandala ceremony designed to help us express, release, and transform our most painful feelings in community. In these spaces, it's amazing to feel and hear how far back into history the grief can go. The "chickenpox" of my own grief these days--whether the presenting sadness is suffering of friends and family, another unthinkable massacre, or climate grief--it all traces back to my ancestors and the choices our culture made four and five hundred years ago to build a world based on extraction and white supremacy. I'm hoping Courtney's brave sharing will get us talking together and rediscovering our ancient ways to grieve so that we can repair the harm and rebuild this world.
This is beautiful, Courtney, and so true - and timely at this season of the year.
My beloved sister Ellen died 31 years ago yesterday, at 35, and you would think I would be over it. Yet a few weeks ago, I thought, "I just have to tell Ellen this," and reached for my phone. Hell, she died before cell phones were even a thing. And when I remembered that a long conversation with her was not possible - at least one in which she responded, laughing, the way I so wistfully remember - I felt that momentary outrage, that medicine ball, before I could let it go. I shared this on FB - thank you for sharing your own medicine ball with us.
I can relate to your loved one whose mysterious disease has been going on for years and years. This essay was a good reminder that those around me share my grief over my health and all the losses that come with it.
Thank you for this. Watching my never-sick husband deal with shingles this year, and connecting it to the way grief lingers and resurfaces randomly, feels true. Do you know the poem “Talking to Grief” by Denise Levertov? It’s been a helpful prompt in grief writing workshops I’ve led, about making room for grief, like space for an old dog curled up in the corner. https://grateful.org/resource/talking-to-grief/
“It’s unruly, terrifically tender, and bad at showing up in public.” You managed to make me laugh here. I will be on watch for grief today. My own and others’.
Such a powerful sharing of thoughts and experiences! While looking for helpful resources I discovered Anderson Cooper’s podcast All There Is. I lost a son at 6 mos, one of my others sons and his wife lost twins at birth. Always grateful for vocabulary and rituals around grief. What are a lucky and grateful community. Thank you for continuing the conversation. ♥️
I can't even begin to tell you how much I needed this particular piece of writing today, thank you for sharing it. I resonated SO much with the "who invited you?!" sentiment.
I'm so sorry about your friend. Wishing you and your friend peace as you make your ways together. Re: shingles, sigh. I'm glad John got the care he needed. (And I'm feeling grateful my Shingles vaccine series is behind me.) Finally, thank you so much for your wise and beautiful words about grief.
Thank you for acknowledging what we all experience, but that which our society doesn't. As a psychologist said to me recently (dealing with family illness and impending death )It is good that we talk about loss and grief and how to support each other. He said that our society isn't very good or willing to talk about death - even though it's inevitable and part of our human existence. Open up the conversation, he advised.
(Pauline Boss has done great research studies in loss - do you know her work?)
I feel like my grief is always coursing underneath, like an aquifer, and various experiences that happen on the surface can unexpectedly drill down into that ever-present water. Only recently, however, have I begun to feel that my life would be less vibrant, less fecund without the periodic watering of tears that comes from that deep resource of emotion spilling out over everything. Because I don't think that aquifer is just mine. I think it connects me to all other people who also grieve, which is to say all people. It's through my grief that I most often feel the most connected to other humans, who are just trying to get from one end of the day to the next while feeling the incredible poignancy of being connected to the infinite from inside these incredibly fragile, finite bodies of ours.
Courtney, your incredible eloquence has elicited the deepest empathy from all your friends. This letter to us is a tribute to your inner strength and uncanny ability to communicate. We are profoundly grateful for sharing these eternal truths about humanity. DD
I agree most of us carry a hidden grief that recurs sometimes in response to a triggering circumstance and sometimes seemingly out of nowhere. For me it feels like being covered by a wave.
For anyone this might help, there is a ritual in many synagogues that is sung on the sabbath that I think is beautiful and perhaps could help. At a point near the end of the service everyone is asked to think of someone he/she knows who is in need of healing. Then the Mi Shebeirach is sung with those people in our hearts. My favorite version is sung by Debbie Friedman. You can find it on youtube.
John is one of my favorite people in the wide-wide world, and so are you. I’m holding John in the Light for peace, healing, and well-being, and you, my dear friend, for the same. Lots of love to both of you...
Loooooooove this so much. And really want more public rituals around grief. We’ve got a ways to go, as a people honoring it. Thanks for the beautiful truths. Sending hot casseroles and deliciously awful tv to you, and listening ears. 🕊️
thank you so much Courtney. My husband is a hospice chaplain and I am a chaplain for body and soul. We sometimes say I help people get into their bodies and he helps him get out. Acknowledgment of grief is artfullness at its best.  it helps enormously to ritualize sorrow within our lives.
Sawubona Courtney! Thank you for these words that help me know that I see you. This discussion has deepened in me throughout the day. Alongside others responding here, I agree we need collective grief practice. In researching my early settler ancestors, I learned that the culture that became dominant on this continent not only didn't have grief practices but actually considered grieving a sin and prohibited it. I have been fortunate to participate in grieving as taught by the Dagara people of West Africa and also in Joanna Macy's Truth Mandala ceremony designed to help us express, release, and transform our most painful feelings in community. In these spaces, it's amazing to feel and hear how far back into history the grief can go. The "chickenpox" of my own grief these days--whether the presenting sadness is suffering of friends and family, another unthinkable massacre, or climate grief--it all traces back to my ancestors and the choices our culture made four and five hundred years ago to build a world based on extraction and white supremacy. I'm hoping Courtney's brave sharing will get us talking together and rediscovering our ancient ways to grieve so that we can repair the harm and rebuild this world.
This is beautiful, Courtney, and so true - and timely at this season of the year.
My beloved sister Ellen died 31 years ago yesterday, at 35, and you would think I would be over it. Yet a few weeks ago, I thought, "I just have to tell Ellen this," and reached for my phone. Hell, she died before cell phones were even a thing. And when I remembered that a long conversation with her was not possible - at least one in which she responded, laughing, the way I so wistfully remember - I felt that momentary outrage, that medicine ball, before I could let it go. I shared this on FB - thank you for sharing your own medicine ball with us.
How do acknowledge someone's medicine ball without bringing it out and therefore being the cause of possible recurrence of said grief?
I can relate to your loved one whose mysterious disease has been going on for years and years. This essay was a good reminder that those around me share my grief over my health and all the losses that come with it.
Thank you for this. Watching my never-sick husband deal with shingles this year, and connecting it to the way grief lingers and resurfaces randomly, feels true. Do you know the poem “Talking to Grief” by Denise Levertov? It’s been a helpful prompt in grief writing workshops I’ve led, about making room for grief, like space for an old dog curled up in the corner. https://grateful.org/resource/talking-to-grief/
“It’s unruly, terrifically tender, and bad at showing up in public.” You managed to make me laugh here. I will be on watch for grief today. My own and others’.
Such a powerful sharing of thoughts and experiences! While looking for helpful resources I discovered Anderson Cooper’s podcast All There Is. I lost a son at 6 mos, one of my others sons and his wife lost twins at birth. Always grateful for vocabulary and rituals around grief. What are a lucky and grateful community. Thank you for continuing the conversation. ♥️
I can't even begin to tell you how much I needed this particular piece of writing today, thank you for sharing it. I resonated SO much with the "who invited you?!" sentiment.
I'm so sorry about your friend. Wishing you and your friend peace as you make your ways together. Re: shingles, sigh. I'm glad John got the care he needed. (And I'm feeling grateful my Shingles vaccine series is behind me.) Finally, thank you so much for your wise and beautiful words about grief.
Courtney ~
Thank you for acknowledging what we all experience, but that which our society doesn't. As a psychologist said to me recently (dealing with family illness and impending death )It is good that we talk about loss and grief and how to support each other. He said that our society isn't very good or willing to talk about death - even though it's inevitable and part of our human existence. Open up the conversation, he advised.
(Pauline Boss has done great research studies in loss - do you know her work?)
As always, thanks.
I feel like my grief is always coursing underneath, like an aquifer, and various experiences that happen on the surface can unexpectedly drill down into that ever-present water. Only recently, however, have I begun to feel that my life would be less vibrant, less fecund without the periodic watering of tears that comes from that deep resource of emotion spilling out over everything. Because I don't think that aquifer is just mine. I think it connects me to all other people who also grieve, which is to say all people. It's through my grief that I most often feel the most connected to other humans, who are just trying to get from one end of the day to the next while feeling the incredible poignancy of being connected to the infinite from inside these incredibly fragile, finite bodies of ours.
Courtney, your incredible eloquence has elicited the deepest empathy from all your friends. This letter to us is a tribute to your inner strength and uncanny ability to communicate. We are profoundly grateful for sharing these eternal truths about humanity. DD
I agree most of us carry a hidden grief that recurs sometimes in response to a triggering circumstance and sometimes seemingly out of nowhere. For me it feels like being covered by a wave.
For anyone this might help, there is a ritual in many synagogues that is sung on the sabbath that I think is beautiful and perhaps could help. At a point near the end of the service everyone is asked to think of someone he/she knows who is in need of healing. Then the Mi Shebeirach is sung with those people in our hearts. My favorite version is sung by Debbie Friedman. You can find it on youtube.
John is one of my favorite people in the wide-wide world, and so are you. I’m holding John in the Light for peace, healing, and well-being, and you, my dear friend, for the same. Lots of love to both of you...
Loooooooove this so much. And really want more public rituals around grief. We’ve got a ways to go, as a people honoring it. Thanks for the beautiful truths. Sending hot casseroles and deliciously awful tv to you, and listening ears. 🕊️