hey josh,
today at the clinic, we had a sharing session with dr. bee lim and we were able to ask her questions about trauma-informed intervention, and other parts of clinical work that she does.
i wanted to hear views on how grief changes how one views their identity. Especially for someone who has lost their partner or family, how can trauma-informed intervention help them. it was the first question in the list gathered for her sharing, so she very kindly spoke at length to answer it.
she said grief definitely changes one’s identity and much of what we are taught in dealing with grief doesn’t consider the meaning of the incident leading up to said grief.
the meaning of the incident can be cultural, spirital, sociocultural, etc but most importantly, relational – what did it mean to the person who is now grieving?
i liked that she said it’s not about what trauma-informed intervention can provide, e.g. we need to fix this in 6 or 10 sessions, but being able to work through the pace of grief. as we all know by now, grief doesn’t have a timeline, but how we respond to it changes over time. she did say cliche as it sounds, time does heal (plays a part).
she also spoke about how grief alters identities – how would losing a spouse, a partner, a child, a friend, a brother, a grandchild inevitably changes the entirety of one’s identity. the work then is to understand this part of your identity and work on the what now? what does the void in your identity mean now, and how can you bridge/renew/re-understand what your identity means? i’m not putting this across in the best way possible, but it’s really about not denying that part of your identity, but reworking to make meaning from what’s lost into a new part of your identity. she also spoke about psychological flexibility – the ability to not be stuck in the past or planning too far ahead. ironically, sometimes grief keeps us rooted in the present, because either backwards or forwards can feel too much.
during break, i was able to speak to dr bee a bit more and i told her the question was from me, and that we have a podcast about grief, and it’s because we lost someone very dear to us – here’s another new person meeting you 🙂 – and that you’re the reason we are learning more about grief and trying to continue to do good work as you would have.
i think you would’ve liked the talk today.
p.s. today is also my boss’ wife’s birthday – the first one after she left us. i spoke to my boss before about understandng and accepting who he is now, without ying with us. and i asked him how he would celebrate her birthday today and it’s a nice quiet one at home with her favs. i hope she is with katniss now and that maybe you’ll get to say hello to her too. the last thing she told me was not to cry in front of her son, and i think i kept my promise.
“lynnda”
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