In The Absence Of Love, Is Grief Possible?

Is Grief Connected to Love?

I wrote this piece: https://medium.com/inspire-250/when-grief-wont-visit-9322bb662d3a

I have been here with my mother. Her cruelty towards me prevents grief from visiting and staying. — Annelise Lords

Someone said: Well, it is possible to grieve for such a person. The realization that the person dies in his/her ignorance can be a cause of grief.

This answer isn’t meant as a form of disrespect for a person or life, but sometimes when our bodies respond to certain emotions, it speaks the truth. We have a choice to release the truth or hide it.

I can’t at this moment because Grief is pain.

Did our world grieve for Hitler for the millions of innocent Jews he slaughtered?

What about the millions of innocent children and adults murdered in Cambodia, Peru, The Slave Trade, etc., and other genocides in our world committed by the cruelty of humanity?

Who do we grieve for? The victims or the perp?

Another response: Thanks for your interesting article that made me stop and think. I have seen this in action and I think some do have trouble with grief when the memories are bad or they were treated badly. Seems this might be normal. I have never felt that way myself, but I was able to forgive while still living.

Forgiveness lessens the pain, but many refuse to grieve for the ones who put their lives through hell. Some do it consciously with the help of pain and anger. I did it unconsciously. I couldn’t feel sad when my mother died. My body responds with the truth. Sometimes how our bodies respond to our emotions tells us the truth that many don’t want to know, admit, or listen to. I listened to my body, so I went deep within me for answers. Then life showed me why.

Grief is pain and love. How much love or hatred is stored in your heart for the deceased determines how you handle grief. If nothing positive is there, our bodies respond accordingly, giving us a choice of how to answer and forgive. Many humans won’t admit the truth, because of fear of what others think of them.

The truth is connected to grief, pain, and love.

More response: It’s a matter that needs to be considered. I had no idea that such a thing would occur. I believe that grief is a natural phenomenon and we must grieve for everyone. The dead person has a genuine right to it.

Grief is connected to our emotions. How someone dies, will touch hearts and we will grieve for them whether we know them or not. When we know them, what they do, and how they live their lives, it’s a different emotion. And that’s how our emotions speak to us. Listen!

According to The Capacity to Love Requires the Necessity to Mourn by Alan D. Wolfelt, Ph.D.

You see, love and grief are two sides of the same precious coin. One does not — and cannot — exist without the other. They are the yin and yang of our lives. People sometimes say that grief is the price we pay for the joy of having loved.

If grief is pain, which it is, no human can grieve for every human that dies. Can you imagine the level of pain we would be carrying in our hearts?

Grief isn’t a right or a privilege. It’s an involuntary action connected to our emotions. I couldn’t grieve for my mother. She gave me a reason not to.

Maybe it was anger, my inability to love her, and her to love me. Her cruelty towards her children and others. My body responds with more truth than I wanted to admit to. Whatever my reasons, I refuse to pretend, because that adds more pain to my life.

After her death, I checked every organ in my body, hoping to find something to hold on to. I did find gratitude for her giving me the gift of life. I forgave her, but still in the absence of the right emotion, which is love, grief still refused to visit.

It was the opposite for my father. Life has the answers to every question humans can’t answer.

Grief...Our Timeless Gift of Love - Grief and Loss Center

Each year, I talk with hundreds of grieving people. As I listen to their stories, I can almost physically touch their…

mygriefandloss.org

Grief is firmly grounded in our capacity to give and receive love. Even though all relationships end in one way or another, the great majority of us choose to love. And when the end comes, we grieve in direct proportion to the depth of the relationship with the person we love. We have the amazing capacity to simultaneously hold both the heartache and the gratitude of having had that person in our lives. And beneath the feelings of isolation, sadness and loneliness is love.

What if there was no love there?

Can you grieve in the absence of love?

Life has shown me that in the absence of love, grief forgets, or refuses to visit me. I had no love connection with my mother. I tried, I really tried to love her. Some humans make it impossible for you to love them. A child shouldn’t be denied a mother’s love. A mother shouldn’t deny her child her love. A mother’s love has no boundaries in her heart. Being denied a mother’s love does affect how her child will grieve for her.

This isn’t limited to mothers; it is extended to all areas of our lives.

In the absence of love, can you grieve for the cruelty that, that individual has inflicted upon you, even after you have forgiven them?

Think about it. Pain and all. Can you?

Thank you for reading this piece. I hope you enjoy it.