On the Path from Loss to Renewal
By R. Benyamin Cirlin, L.C.S.W.
To speak about grief and loss is to approach mystery.
Who among us can really grasp what it means to lose a loved one? Who among us can really fathom what it means to never see, touch, smell or feel a beloved ever again? We are assaulted and overwhelmed by the death of those for whom we care. Reality creeps up on us as a mugger in a dark alleyway and we are defenseless and out of control. Is it any wonder that death induces such intense fear and insecurity?
To speak about grief and loss is to approach mystery.
Coping with loss is ultimately not about understanding, but about responding; it is not about gaining an intellectualized, rational explanation, but about finding a way to continue walking in a world of unanswered questions in spite of our wounds and emotional limps.
For more than twenty-five years, I have spent most of my working life in the presence of people attempting to cope with loss. My clients have faced the loss of loved ones from illness and disease, suicides and homicides. They have faced both timely and untimely deaths. I have witnessed the grief over mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, children, husbands, wives, partners, grandmothers and grandfathers, aunts, uncles and cousins. I have been present for those grieving babies who failed to survive their journey out of the womb, and for those coping with the death of a 95 year old relative who succumbed to Alzheimer's disease. There have been so many similarities in all of these losses, yet so many differences. Each grief is as unique as a fingerprint.
I can not count the number of times I have heard over the years the following sentiment: "I can not survive this pain - it is too great. This darkness is too heavy. I will never truly smile again." People walk into my office having deposited hopefulness outside my door. And thus I am often asked: "how do you do this work? Aren't you constantly depressed?"
It would be a lie to say that I never feel sad. Those clients who have witnessed my tears over the years know that to be true. Yet it is also true that I rarely feel depressed by my work. In fact, I often feel enriched and energized by the struggles I witness. I am blessed to be in the presence of builders, human beings valiantly striving to reconstruct lives of meaning and purpose on the edge of the abyss. Construction work is dirty and messy: you can't build in formal attire. But for those of us who are willing to get grimy and sweaty, building is possible. The hope deposited at my door does not disappear. It waits to be reacquired in a newer, deeper fashion.
In order to understand this process of reacquiring hope, I would like to share a story told by Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach titled "The Great Fixer." Click here to continue reading this article. (PDF)
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