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마음이 아플 때| The One with Som Ghosh - On Grief and Loss: Episode 10 (2018)
This day, last year, my father passed away. While he was in ill health, his demise, at the time that it happened, was unexpected by all medical statistical norms. With his demise, I lost my second parent. Grief can be relentless and almost always robust. However, the nature of grief during the first parental loss is characteristically distinct from the second parental loss. During the first parental loss, there is a transactional framework of support system between the surviving parent and the child (at least in my case) to an extent that one might underestimate the overreaching ability of grief to startle you. The nature of grief after the second parental loss is incredibly insidious and unexpectedly long lasting. The long-lasting nature of this grief delivers a fresh new comprehension to certain constructs in the most perceptive way possible despite having the knowledge of them for the longest time.
• Some such constructs are:
1. Death is way more real than the way we think of it on any random day.
2. Death is absolute and irreversible. (Relevant because you stand their looking at the corpse and tell yourself in your head- what if a miracle happens and he comes back to life; no matter how habitually objective you are as a person, in that moment in time you believe with every bit of conviction that can be gathered that he might come back to life).
3. It does not matter what your deal is- you may be King Kong in HD, or you may be a fire breathing dragon, or most importantly you may be the “BAATUL” (Bengali superhuman comic character that I read a lot while growing up) - do not fight grief- let it take its course, work with it, and allow it to dilute and fade away into oblivion.
4. Burial as a post demise procedure is a more affectionate, endearing, lasting, and reinforcing way to bid a warm farewell to a near one as opposed to the Hindu (I am a Hindu by birth) way of cremation (combustion). I am sure there is a rationale for the Hindu way of saying goodbye, but once it is done, you have nothing left of the bodily form. In case of the former, you restore a sense of belonging because you know that the organic remains remain and that you can always sit next to the grave (for the rest of your life whenever you want) and have a casual chat knowing that there is some matter in particulate form that you can relate to.
5. Apart from your spouse/ partner of several years (I am thinking at least 35 years- arbitrary selection of a number), your parents (assuming they are normal and regular folks), and the family dog {cats are just too funny, arrogant, and indifferent (haha) and about other pets I am clueless}, you have to actively put in the work to earn the love and the trust we seek. The aforementioned three relationships by far are the sole premises where the condition of ‘unconditional’ love holds true. So when one of the three premises is gone forever, shit gets real!
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By Mo! Sibyl
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This day, last year, my father passed away. While he was in ill health, his demise, at the time that it happened, was unexpected by all medical statistical norms. With his demise, I lost my second parent. Grief can be relentless and almost always robust. However, the nature of grief during the first parental loss is characteristically distinct from the second parental loss. During the first parental loss, there is a transactional framework of support system between the surviving parent and the child (at least in my case) to an extent that one might underestimate the overreaching ability of grief to startle you. The nature of grief after the second parental loss is incredibly insidious and unexpectedly long lasting. The long-lasting nature of this grief delivers a fresh new comprehension to certain constructs in the most perceptive way possible despite having the knowledge of them for the longest time.
• Some such constructs are:
1. Death is way more real than the way we think of it on any random day.
2. Death is absolute and irreversible. (Relevant because you stand their looking at the corpse and tell yourself in your head- what if a miracle happens and he comes back to life; no matter how habitually objective you are as a person, in that moment in time you believe with every bit of conviction that can be gathered that he might come back to life).
3. It does not matter what your deal is- you may be King Kong in HD, or you may be a fire breathing dragon, or most importantly you may be the “BAATUL” (Bengali superhuman comic character that I read a lot while growing up) - do not fight grief- let it take its course, work with it, and allow it to dilute and fade away into oblivion.
4. Burial as a post demise procedure is a more affectionate, endearing, lasting, and reinforcing way to bid a warm farewell to a near one as opposed to the Hindu (I am a Hindu by birth) way of cremation (combustion). I am sure there is a rationale for the Hindu way of saying goodbye, but once it is done, you have nothing left of the bodily form. In case of the former, you restore a sense of belonging because you know that the organic remains remain and that you can always sit next to the grave (for the rest of your life whenever you want) and have a casual chat knowing that there is some matter in particulate form that you can relate to.
5. Apart from your spouse/ partner of several years (I am thinking at least 35 years- arbitrary selection of a number), your parents (assuming they are normal and regular folks), and the family dog {cats are just too funny, arrogant, and indifferent (haha) and about other pets I am clueless}, you have to actively put in the work to earn the love and the trust we seek. The aforementioned three relationships by far are the sole premises where the condition of ‘unconditional’ love holds true. So when one of the three premises is gone forever, shit gets real!