Tag Archives: Grief

Divorce, break-ups, and the bitter loss of shared dreams

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Via Amber, a blog post at the Atlantic by Ta-Nehisi Coates on the Steve McNair story. The comments selection is particularly remarkable, and Amber notes that at one point, Coates asks:

I have an open question for readers: the person who broke your hearts the hardest, whom it took you the longest to get over, were they higher on social and economic ladders than you? Or were they lower?

Amber follows up with a question of her own:

Part of the trauma of losing a relationship is the trauma of losing the imagined future with that person. One can mourn that miscarried future, and whatever security it might have brought, without reducing the beloved to a meal ticket or a leg up the social ladder. Does this reflect your experiences?

And it’s got me thinking: not about the sad McNair story, but about the ways in which heterosexual romance in this culture is so wrapped up in aspirations and dreams, in issues of class and status. I’ve touched on this before; I’m hardly the only person to point out that we train aging men to seek out younger women as evidence of continued virility and prowess. But this sense that a particular romance opens a door to previously unattainable possibilities seems more widespread than just the older man/younger woman dynamic. It may not be universal, but it’s common enough to be nearly so. For a great many of us, a serious relationship serves to provide security, opportunity, and hope for what could not otherwise be achieved. And indeed, as Amber suggests, the grief we often feel at the end of a relationship is less over what was actually lost and more over the loss of the great cavalry of dreams we had (often unconsciously) marshalled. In other words, we mourn for what might have been at least as much as we do for what actually was. Continue reading →

Gazing at Gaza and watching “the Wrestler”: some thoughts on when to look and when to turn away

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I’ve avoided blogging about the Israeli incursion into Gaza for the relatively sensible reason that I have very little original to contribute. I’ve been heartsick at the violence, at the images I see online and on television. I follow my usual rule for looking at images of violence and war: I set aside a few minutes when I feel I’m in a reasonably reflective space, and I spend a short while (never more than half an hour) absorbing what I’m seeing. I know that compared to so many, I lead a life of tremendous privilege and safety; I cannot presume to understand fully what goes through the mind of a child in Gaza or a young soldier in the Israeli Defense Forces. I can imagine, however, and visual images serve as catalysts for that imagining. Because before I can do anything else that might be remotely helpful, I’ve got to do the first task of the global bystander: I’ve got to acknowledge, I’ve got to witness, I’ve got — to the best of my ability — look.

One of the reasons I find pornography so problematic (even as I grow less doctrinaire on the subject of how to deal with sex work from a feminist perspective) is because of this sense that what we gaze at matters. If there’s one thing that’s caused me to be more of a jerk than anything else in my life, it’s the failure to empathize. And for me — and I’m willing to admit this is not a universal response at all — repeatedly using pornography did impact my ability to empathize with my real, flesh-and-blood sexual partners. For me, and again, only for me, connecting my arousal to a one-dimensional image rather than an actual human being made it much harder to connect with girlfriends, wives and lovers. My anti-pornography feelings are, on a gut level, derived from my own admittedly compulsive use of sexually explicit imagery in my younger years. One of the many ways in which I honor not only my marriage but my sense of what I want sex to be is by avoiding looking at porn.

I’ve learned, however, to distinguish between “using” an image for my sexual arousal (which, in my singular experience, damages my empathy) and “witnessing” an image for the sake of creating greater empathy. That sounds like so much psychobabble, so let me offer an example. The best film I’ve seen this awards season so far is the captivating Mickey Rourke vehicle, The Wrestler. It’s a graphic film; several of the wrestling scenes are barbaric. I had to force myself to keep my eyes on the screen at times, trusting that in this context, taking in the brutality was a necessary part of understanding the life the central character lived. I can’t speak to the realism of the scenes, as I have no brief for professional wrestling, but can say that my own discomfort at the violence helped raise compassion for the protagonist. Similarly, Marisa Tomei’s character in the film portrays a stripper; in one or two scenes, she dances nude. I haven’t gone to a strip club in more than a decade; staring at a performer’s breasts is not something I do anymore. But in this film, the nudity worked perfectly — it was connected to one of the film’s larger themes, about the way in which bodies are commodified and the way in which those who make their living with their flesh hold on to sovereignty despite being brutalized, despite being ogled.

I wasn’t aroused by Tomei, but I was moved. In this case, it was good and right for me to look. (That doesn’t mean I’m positing arousal as the enemy; it’s not. The enemy is the failure of empathy, and it is true that for some of us, broken as we are, sexual arousal, like anger, makes empathy more difficult. That’s what makes insisting on one’s right to sex in a relationship so toxic — another topic that comes up ’round here a lot). The husband who demands his wife have sex against her will to satisfy his needs is offering an obvious example. Though the story in “The Wrestler” was fictional, the realism was undeniable — and at least for me and my wife, the effect of that realism was deeply moving. I’m not any more intrigued by professional wrestling and strip clubs, but I came out of the film in a reflective mood. What I had seen, what I had taken in, had touched me. And though my compassion was directed towards fictional characters (though there was admiration, too, for Rourke and Tomei), it was genuine. And anything that makes me feel more of that compassion for other people is probably a good thing. Continue reading →

Disenfranchised grief, part two: grieving the end of transgressive relationships

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Though only a few comments have popped up, I’ve heard from several folks in the past couple of days about their own take on “disenfranchised grief”, the subject raised in this Feministing post which I followed up on here.

In one of those not-terribly-bizarre-but-nonetheless-interesting moments of synchronicity, two of my former students (one male, one female) wrote me over the weekend with stories of disenfranchised grief which had been tied to inappropriate sexual relationships. I’m sticking the whole thing below the fold. Continue reading →

Modes of grieving: my father, Matilde, and disenfranchisement

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I just came across this nice discussion of “disenfranchised grief” and masculinity in the Feministing community.

Disenfranchised grief is grief over a loss that is not conventionally acknowledged or socially acceptable in your culture. Couples who experience infertility, terminate pregnancy due to some genetic disorder that the fetus had, or have a miscarriage often experience disenfranchised grief. Other examples include grief over the incarceration of a loved one, the death of a pet, the breakup of an unacknowledged relationship (i.e. gay couples who haven’t come out yet or have been rejected by their families) or the death of a partner in an unacknowledged relationship, the “loss” of one’s parent due to Alzheimer’s, the death of an ex-spouse or lover, the recurring grief of a birth mother who gave up a child for adoption, and the grief of an adopted child for the relationship they might have had with their birth parent(s). In many of these cases the people who surround the grieving individual may not understand the depth of the grief involved, or may think it’s something the individual should be able to get over already. In other cases, such as in the case of unacknowledged relationships, the individual may not be able to share their grief at all.

So as I’ve been thinking about this it occurs to me that men may often experience disenfranchised grief more often than women, because it’s more socially acceptable for women to express their grief, and because men are often expected not to have the same depth of feeling. I’ve known several men who really wanted children, and were deeply emotionally invested in having a family. When they (and their partner) encountered infertility or miscarriage, their grief was barely even acknowledged, while their partner received a lot of support. When men do express their grief over infertility or a miscarriage, or don’t “get over it” quickly enough, they’re viewed with a mixture of confusion and disapproval. So I think this is one example of the damage a patriarchal culture inflicts on men. What do you think of this? Are there other examples of disenfranchised grief I haven’t thought of? Are there cases where a woman’s grief is more disenfranchised than a man’s?

Check out the comments below the original post (made by Rachel in WY).

Without knowing the term, I’ve written several times about “disenfranchised grief.” I’ve written about my strong and enduring reaction to my high school girlfriend’s abortion. My most instant connection to that sense dates from June 2006, when I lost my father and our beloved first chinchilla, Matilde, only eleven days apart. I wrote about both deaths, but when I announced Matilde’s death, I shut off comments. I knew that news of my father’s death would elicit tremendous sympathy, but I feared that posting about my devastation at the passing of a 600 gram rodent (albeit one who had captured our hearts and given rise to our rescue charity) would also elicit ridicule. And at that point, if even one idiot had made fun of our grief over the death of Matilde, I would have been crushed. I got so many sincere notes from kind folks who read the post and were unable to comment that I opened up a later post. My own fear of being teased led me to be more mistrustful than might have been necessary. Continue reading →

An “E” feels like an “I”: struggling with how to grieve

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It’s lunchtime, I’ve got one eye on the Spain-France scoreboard, I’m in my office, and I’m frustrated.  I’m underslept, still fighting a cold, and I’m coming to the terms with the fact that I’m not nearly as good at getting in touch with my grief as I thought I was.

From 1986-2003, I was in psychotherapy fairly consistently.  I’ve been around Twelve Step programs since 1987.  I’ve been in a great many men’s groups, gone on countless retreats, sat in innumerable circles and talked about my feelings and listened to others talk about theirs.  I’ve read just about every major self-help book published between, say, the mid-eighties and the mid-nineties.  I’m a born-again ENFP Gemini who lives in L.A., for Pete’s sake — shouldn’t all of this background, all of these character attributes, make me better equipped to process my own grief at my father’s death?

Today and yesterday I’ve been alternating between a kind of numb cheerfulness and a testiness that borders on the openly angry.  I’m not crying; heck,  I’m not even consciously thinking much about either my Dad or Matilde and that I lost them eleven days apart.   I’ve done something classically male (though plenty of women do it as well): I’ve thrown myself into activity to cope, and the solace  it provides is limited indeed.

It’s not that I don’t expect to grieve.  It’s that I don’t know how to grieve well, and I persist in thinking that there’s a "right way" to do this.  I mean, twenty years of therapy can get me to say to myself what others are saying right now: "There are no good or bad emotions, no right or wrong way to handle the death of loved ones.  Whatever you feel is okay.  Take care of yourself."

Yeah, yeah, yeah — I can recite it chapter and verse.  The vocabulary of consolation is so familiar to me; as a youth minister and a teacher whose "door is always open", I’ve held so many hands and proffered 8000 boxes of Kleenex and said therapeutically and pastorally appropriate things to people who are grieving losses.  But I don’t practice what I preach!  For all of my insistence that men need  to become better verbal communicators, and develop the ability to speak of their own inner terrain, all I want to do this week is isolate and bury myself in work and activity.  I don’t want to talk much to anyone.  In other words, I’m reacting the way so many folks react to grief.  But in my hubris and my narcissism, I think "Hugo is supposed to be so wise in the ways of the heart; Hugo has had so much therapy/prayer/encounter group/running naked in the woods/AA/what-have-you that he should be able to grieve in the most emotionally excellent way possible."  I feel as if I need to model for others the most emotionally and spiritually healthy way to grieve — it sounds crazy, but the teacher and the youth leader in me always feels this compulsion to have even the most painful of emotions neatly organized, neither repressed nor indulged.

This post is not a request for advice or sympathy, though I am certainly not too proud to accept either.  Though I describe myself as an "E" (an extrovert), I find that in times of high stress, my desire to crawl into a cave and isolate is immense.  I don’t mind teaching, of course — but in the classroom, I can escape being preoccupied with sadness.  What I don’t really want to do is interact with anyone, other than (possibly) small animals.  Matilde would be such a comfort if she were still alive!  Last night, just as my wife and I had talked about, I dreamed that my Dad and Matty were together in the next world.  It was a very comforting dream; I thought I had cried in my sleep but when I woke my pillow was dry.

I apologize to my readers who want more feminism or faith or politics.  There’s already plenty of introspection on this blog — but ultimately, I’m committed to blogging both the public and private aspects of my life and work.  And right now, I’m struggling to get a handle on what I’m supposed to be feeling and doing, and it is a comfort to document that struggle.