Tag Archives: health

Gender and Grief: Do Men Grieve Differently?

IMG_3056I’ve been thinking about men a lot lately.  Yes, I know, I can hear the snickers.  I want to highlight that June 15 – 21 is Men’s Health Week in Canada (and other parts of the world too.)  Men are under-represented in the use of health care services.  I’m about to start another all gender bereavement support group and men are usually under-represented in these groups as well.

So where are the men?  Maybe they don’t grieve.  They are strong and non-emotional beings anyway right? Crying – forget about it!

Let’s bust open that myth right now.  Men experience loss too and when any one of us loses something that matters to us, we grieve.  Period.  There are no gender implications.  The process of grieving however will look different on each of us.  Here too there are no absolutes by gender – all men do not grieve in one way just as all women do not grieve in another.

I have read research articles about men and grief.  I have reflected on the experiences of the men who have come to the bereavement support groups I have facilitated.  I’ve spoken with men and women about men and grief.  Here are some of the themes that have emerged:

  • Men are expected to be emotionally strong in order to support their spouse/family/friends/colleagues.  Appearing strong and attempting to not overburden others in the context of support involves hiding feelings of grief and anger.  Shame is felt at showing weakness such as expressing emotions – at being vulnerable.
  • Men’s attachment roles are often downgraded.  For example the father who has experienced the loss of a child through stillbirth.  Or the son who was not the primary caregiver to his father.  There can be a projection by others that these attachments matter less and therefore hurt less.  He, after all, was not pregnant.  He, after all, was not the one who emptied the bed pan.
  • Self-blame can loom large.  He believes he should have done more – worked hard, spoken louder, spent more time, gotten to the hospital faster… – infinite possibilities.  The voice of “if only…”

And yet – having offered these themes about men, I need to acknowledge that they can apply to women too.  I have heard women speak about how they have had to be strong for their children at the death of the spouse/father.  While expressing emotions seems to be more acceptable for women, there can be references to “Don’t be so dramatic,” or “You need to get over it.  It is time to stop crying.”  If society is more open to women expressing their emotions, there seem to be limits here too.

Women experience disenfranchised grief as well – when the loss is not recognized or acknowledged by others.  Miscarriage can fall into this category.  If acknowledge as a loss, some see it as insignificant, not a ‘big deal’.  Friends or colleagues might express surprise at the depth of grief that is present.  Job loss, as another example, can be a disenfranchised loss for either gender.  You’ve lost a job – no big deal – you can get another even better one.  This is an opportunity!

And I have yet to meet a griever – of any ilk – who has not dipped into self-blame in a voice of regret or a voice of “If only…”

What if its not about gender?

Some guiding principles for each and everyone of us…

My longing is that each of us can discover that place, a sweet spot, where we find some ease in our own individual experiences of grief while recognizing part of what can contribute to that ease is to hear and work with the stories and experiences of others.  It is not about comparing and judging one’s grief story versus another’s, rather it is about discovering the shared resonance, the place of shared meaning in, and understanding of, the losses that have occurred.

I also long for each of us to come to an understanding of the emotions of grief where we are not shamed or made to feel a sense of constriction around expressing any emotion.  Sure, we can talk about healthy and unhealthy ways to express emotions, but the underlying premise is that all emotions are valid and valuable.  Some of us will explore and express those emotions verbally, some of us might do so in more physical ways, and yet others might have a quieter, less expressive process.

Lest there be any questions about why I linked health and bereavement in the first place, let me add that grieving  is a normal, healthy human process.  It serves a purpose and as such contributes to health – mental, physical, and spiritual.

And last, but certainly not least, it is for each of us as individuals to decide what constitutes a loss that matters. Wouldn’t it be lovely if society as a whole could embrace this and perhaps begin with an empathetic question around possible pain rather than disregarding or minimizing because there is judgement about the scale and scope of loss?

Please do not take any of this to imply that conversations about gender and grief are not warranted.  More research looking at different groups and their experience of grief can continue to contribute to our broader understanding.  I personally want to create safe containers for individuals to come to and process their grief.  I recognize that might mean considering gender in the mix.  A men’s only grief group is a valid approach.  I just know that whenever I start talking about gender and grief I feel pulled to acknowledge that grief is not easy for any of us – regardless of gender, age, or culture.  And while grief doesn’t have to be hard, we do feel losses.  That is the core of grief.

I welcome your thoughts/comments on gender and grief.

 

© Dr. Catherine Hajnal 2015. All rights reserved.

 

Acknowledging Your Losses

As part of the course work I was taking to become a certified Life Coach we dipped into art therapy.  Each of us in the class was invited to pick up a piece of clay and play with it our hands.  We could squish it, pound it, shape it however we wanted.  I started squishing the clay around in my right hand having it ooze through my fingers, then my left, and then back to my right.

We were also asked to connect with the clay through as many senses as possible exploring texture, colour, smell, weight, etc.  I opened my right hand and first noticed the shape the clay had taken looked a lot like the images of the vertebrae I had seen in the x-rays of my back.  The round core and the “jutty out” parts of the facet joints.  Then I noticed the weight – how heavy the clay felt in my hands.  And the tears began to flow. And flow.  And flow.

I literally cried for hours that day because in that briefest of moments the weight of the clay connected me with the weight, with the burden that my back had been for me for over 20 years.  I’ve come to be grateful for that pain because it has lead to so many amazing things in my life.  In that moment however I needed to acknowledge my sadness associated with the choices I couldn’t make because of my back.  I needed to acknowledge the energy my back and pain had consumed.  The weight of that clay represented the moments of sweating profusely because of the pain I was in when all I was trying to doing was stand there and teach, the times I had to say “no” to a friend’s invitation because I was too exhausted and in too much pain, the trips I couldn’t take, the high-heels I couldn’t wear, the gardening I couldn’t do, the racket sports I had put aside.

Until that time I had focused on getting healthy and happy.  At this point in my life journey I had left academia.  I was now living in Vancouver, supported by friends and family to make a new set of choices.  I had but two months earlier undergone an 8 hour double level spinal fusion surgery that had been extremely successful.  I had connected with and was excited by the idea of becoming a life coach or counsellor so had gone back to school to better appreciate the differences, and to hone my skills so that I could feel confident in my ability to hold a client and their needs safely and professionally.  I was told that the fusion would not fully take hold for at least a year, maybe two so it seemed like the right timing to go back to school.  So yes I could acknowledge having made progress – amazing progress as a matter of fact though I would never have labelled it that at the time – and yet here I was crying for hours.

I am so grateful to the facilitator in class that day.  He brought to my awareness that I had grieving to do.  That I needed to acknowledge my losses.  Clearly there were many.  Yet they were not the kind of losses we typically think about.  I hadn’t lost a person or relationship close to me.  I wasn’t terminally ill – I had recovered.  Yet I understand now my “stiff upper lip”, “solder on” attitudes served me in one way and harmed me in another.

 If you’re brave enough to say “goodbye”, life will reward you with a new “hello”. ~ Paul Coehlo

Grieving is a very natural human process.  The reality is we experience loss daily and it needs to be grieved.  This doesn’t mean you have to grieve for days or months or years even – though sometimes, depending on the loss and your process, that’s exactly what you’ll do.  There doesn’t have to be public displays of mourning though sometimes there will be that as well.  What I do advocate is that we take time to acknowledge our losses – big and small – because there are no beginnings without an ending.  We are effected by losses and rather than pushing those emotions back inside, I’m inviting acknowledging them so that the e-motion (energy in motion) can be released.  That energy release can lead to new things.  It certainly did for me.

The next day after my clay experience I was exhausted and I absolutely felt lighter.  I also felt calmer.  I could begin to see all the changes that I had made in a different light – I could begin to celebrate them rather than stay focused on “What is the next thing I need to get done?  Keep going.  Keep going. Soldier on.”

My own experience with loss has inspired me to study the processes of grief more closely and bring it more deeply into my work.  I have seen the value of acknowledging losses and stepping into the associated sadness – the sense of freedom it garnered, the relaxation, the sense of opening and even more possibility.

If sharing my story of losses has struck a cord, I invite you to contact me.  I am also offering a workshop on Creative Hurt:  Turning Loss into Learning and Growth.  (March 1st.  More details on my Schedule page.)  The invitation is to begin to acknowledge your losses and in so doing discover what catalysts those could be for you moving forward.