Holding Space for Joy in Grief: A Summer of Love & Loss

Transparently, my first blog post was to be published months ago. It was supposed to be about spiritual hygiene or the power of visualization. (Those will still be published as well, don’t worry!) But life and divinity has a way of steering us in unexpected directions, and my first post took on new meaning as my life shifted profoundly. Instead, my first Magickal Musing is about love and loss. It’s about death and grief and the complexities of human emotion. It’s about growing up and embracing life’s transitions and the unexpected lessons that they bring.

In the Summer of 2024, I experienced two major life altering events: the passing of my father and engagement to my fiancé. Through this time I have been learning how to be more present and graceful with myself and how to hold space for the complexity of experiencing joy while holding profound grief. These dual experiences reminded me that life rarely offers us just one emotion at a time, and that learning to hold both joy and sorrow is a worthy lesson in itself, however uninvited the lesson may be. In sharing my journey, my hope is that this musing resonates with others who may also be learning to navigate life’s unexpected turns, in one form or another. 

Loss

My dad was a complicated man. He did his best to beat his circumstances, grow as an individual, learn from his mistakes, make the best of the cards he was dealt.. He often fell short. As a child, these shortcomings were devastating. Crushing and incomprehensible. As an adult, they felt no better, though I did begin to understand the “why.” I was mentally preparing to have a hard conversation with my dad about just that. I had been avoiding it because the last time I attempted, it didn’t go so well. But we were in a better place. I was excited to witness the demonstration of his evolution. 

My dad suffered from kidney disease and had been on dialysis since I was in middle school. He had a lot of ‘close calls’ during my childhood. But he promised he’d stick around to meet his grandchildren. The prospect of this brought me incredible joy. I had no doubt he would be a much better grandfather than he was a dad. And then suddenly, 4 days before his 55th birthday, my dad was pronounced deceased. 

When I received the news that my dad had passed, I was floored. Stuck. It felt as if my brain decided to shut down and reset unexpectedly. I already had a complicated relationship with grief. I’m sure we all do to varying extents. In particular for me though, I felt like I had always received news of a loved one passing in inopportune times and places that caused me to feel I needed to compartmentalize and “deal with” the news later. When my dad died, however,  I knew I didn’t want to just put it to the back of my mind to deal with at another time. 

And as I write and reflect now, I realize there’s never really an “opportune” time to hear your loved one will no longer participate in this Earthly journey with you. There’s an underlying societal expectation to check your emotions. To grieve and mourn in private. Hold yourself together. I recognized it, but this time I chose differently. 

Part of the struggle with grieving is that not everyone grieves the same.

People react differently to grief. They have different needs. I wanted to pause and cry and shake and breathe. To honor the fact that the man that gave me life is no longer here with me. The family I was with when we got the news, however, wanted to keep going; stay busy. This was hard to contend with. It was heavy. I needed to process. 

I’m sure that part of why I needed this pause is because of the complexities of the relationship my dad and I had in life.  As a good friend of mine put it, “I had already grieved our relationship while he was still living,” many times over. 

In doing some research about grief, I found that there are actually quite a few different types or classifications of grief. While my dad was alive, I was experiencing a form of anticipatory grief. Both because of the nature of our relationship and because he was dealing with kidney failure for the greater part of my life. Both of these factors caused me to consider his death many times before his actual passing. And though the emotions and physiological effects of that were very real, they were nothing like what I felt when he was truly gone from this earth. 

My dad was not perfect. In fact, he was pretty damn far from it! And that came to be one of my favorite things about him. He evolved. He grew. Sometimes, he took accountability. And most of all, he proved that people can indeed change.

I cherish his memory and our relationship. I take pride in the love we shared. He truly loves my brother and I, unconditionally. He demonstrated that regularly. He saw me through my darkest period of depression. He understood it intimately. He provided gentle, loving understanding. And not once did he make me feel judged or ridiculed. He has taught me invaluable life lessons and brought me uncountable laughs and smiles. He loved harder than anyone I’ve known. And I miss him so much.

And, at the same time, I felt a sense of relief.

Though it hurts so badly to not be able to pick up the phone and call him knowing he will always answer, I am relieved he is no longer suffering. I am relieved he no longer has to battle with his health nor his finances. And I am relieved he can cause me no further harm.. 

Naming that was very hard to sit with. It caused me to feel shame and guilt. But I know others will resonate with this truth in their own lives, so I will state it out loud. I feel relief knowing that there are no new emotional wounds my father can inflict upon me. 

But with this relief, also came guilt. I felt guilty for not being able to be more forgiving and understanding of him in life. I carried so much hurt that immediately felt less significant after he was gone. Suddenly, his wrong doings didn’t matter so much. Yet, it felt I had no access to this relief while he walked the Earth.  I told my dad this after his passing, and he said he understands and forgives me. We were able to have that hard conversation I was gearing up for and he received everything I had to say with more compassion and understanding than I ever could have imagined. I am incredibly grateful for this and look forward to continuing to cultivate our relationship even still.

Love

My (now) fiancé, AJ, has continued to be incredibly supportive of me as I process this loss. He was intended to meet my dad in person this same summer. I had told my dad about AJ and he was excited to meet him as well. In a sense, I suppose they still did meet as AJ accompanied me to Dallas for my dad’s services. AJ was able to meet my dad’s memory and hear all the beautiful truths everyone shared.

My fiancé has also experienced the loss of a parent. In fact, both of his parents had transitioned many years before AJ and I met. As such, I feel a twisted kind of blessed to have a partner that shares this unique type of grief with me. We have been able to mourn and cry together and talk about the nuances of our grief in ways that are intimate, vulnerable and beautiful. And while I am incredibly grateful for this, it also caused more guilt! Not everyone sharing this loss with me has ‘an AJ’ to support them through their grief journey. But I do. And there is guilt in that. 

More than that, during this time of grieving, my partnership has brought me tremendous joy. I am incredibly lucky to have someone who prioritizes my joy and happiness in active tangible ways every day.

An example of this is my proposal story, which is truly magickal.

A couple months after my dad passed, my fiancé took me on a (previously planned) trip to Pismo Beach: my happy place. We had traveled there before, about a year prior, and had an incredible time. One night on that first trip, we walked on the pier and prayed together beneath the moon and stars, listening to the ocean crash around us. AJ proposed to me in that same exact spot, making my happy place exceedingly more joyous. Every day of our trip he gave me a gift and on this day he gave me a book that he used to propose to me with. It’s everything I never knew I wanted. It’s authentic, creative, vulnerable, heart warming and the best keepsake ever! For weeks, I took it with me everywhere I went! I’ve enjoyed being able to share the book with my loved ones and watch them witness our love for each other and, more pointedly, a testament of his love for me. 

If that wasn’t enough, not only did he video record the proposal, he hired thee best and my most favorite photographer to capture images for us to cherish forever: my line sister, best friend and now, maid of honor. He also included my mom. AJ coordinating all this effort, paying for their expenses, and more, warmed my heart in ways I cannot explain. It also made for great stories about them sneaking and plotting around because their room was actually on the same floor as AJ and mine. Hilarious! 

And I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention my breathtaking, stunning, unfreakingbelievable ring. In full honesty, my first thought when I saw it was “This is too much!”  It is more beautiful than anything I ever had imagined for myself. And he constantly reminds me that I deserve that and more.

After the proposal, we were all able to have dinner together. We went back to the room to get ready and I was so elated, I began jumping on the hotel bed with joy. We went out to a bar to continue the celebration and I was on cloud nine for a solid week.

Love & Loss

I was suddenly snatched from this reality right as I was to return to work. My brother, a very talented artist, released a song entitled “Despondence.” Once again, I was floored. My entire family was grieving my dad and here I was high as a kite riding a wave of immense joy while my brother was suffering. How could I?

I felt guilt for celebrating the engagement milestone of my relationship. It was as if I was asking myself “How dare you feel joy while those you love are suffering? You should suffer too! Suffer!” And suffer, I did. Until I remembered a conversation I had with my dad when his aunt had passed. He said he felt guilty for not feeling worse. I told him he was stupid. We laughed. I said “with all the hardships and suffering we endure in this world, you’re choosing to feel suffering because in actuality you feel good? That don’t sound right” He said I was right. And remembering that brought me great comfort and great sorrow. 

I began to lean into the contradictions.

Listening to old voicemails I smiled and lamented. Listening to my dad’s music, I smiled and lamented. Recalling memories with my family, we all smiled and lamented. It was the most natural thing. And when I accepted this, I started to feel a bit better. I still felt immense sorrow, but also a bit of healing. Though transparently speaking, there are days when it feels like someone ripped up the entire scab and I have to start the process anew. I think that’s likely to keep happening all of my life. But it gets easier to manage when I allow myself to be wherever I am, feel however I feel, lean into my human existence. Finding joy does not mean I am betraying my dad or his memory. It does not mean I am magically over it or that I’ve “moved on” with my life. Quite the opposite actually. I know he would want me to be happy. I know he is happy for me. And I know he will be at AJ and my wedding, just as he was at our engagement party. It is possible and, I believe it is healing, to welcome joyful moments and honor grief at the same time. 

There are a lot of societal pressures to grieve unseen.

There’s an unspoken ask to cry at home and keep performing capitalism in public. And sometimes the unspoken becomes loud and clear. It’s a myth that grief has a timeline and people should “move on” after a certain amount of time or that there are only a few “appropriate” ways to grieve and they should all be done in the privacy of your own home. Release these shackles and embrace your humanity. Normalize that there’s no “right” way to grieve. Normalize grieving at your own pace.  Normalize taking time to care for yourself in all the little ways you can. Normalize talking about your grief with those outside of your family.I was really afraid of “trauma dumping” on my coworkers about my dad’s death. To my surprise, whenever I did speak with a colleague about it, their response was always welcoming and affirming. Every last time, I found comfort. I realized just how many other people were also grieving and feeling like they had no place to talk about it! And I consequently formed a deeper connection with every last colleague I spoke with. I trusted in the power of community and community showed up for me.

Moving Forward (but never “moving on”)

Each person grieves differently and each person has different requirements in how they care for themselves in that journey. If you don’t know where to begin, start with the basics. Eat nutritious meals. Maybe even cook them! Take a nice bath or shower. Go for walks. Wash your face and put on a nice cologne or perfume you enjoy. Sit in silence and connect with yourself. Listen to what your soul yearns for. 

I began playing my sound bowls with much greater frequency and found comfort in that. In the beginning, exercise was really difficult to wrap my head around, but stretching felt incredible! I was graceful with myself and took it one step at a time before returning to a workout regimen months later. 

Some people find gardening or journaling to be soothing. It can be difficult to begin a new hobby. Take your time. Take breaks. Pace yourself. Some people find comfort in finding a sense of purpose in grief. It may be encouraging to channel their grief into causes (such as Mothers Against Drunk Drivers) or relationships. I’m hoping to channel some of my grief into deepening my mediumship practice. If finding purpose in grief doesn’t resonate with you, don’t do it! Permission to grieve how you like. 
Sometimes, you may find it helpful to speak with a counselor or therapist. I highly encourage this as they are well versed in tools to help you navigate your specific journey with grief in ways that others, especially family members also experiencing this loss, may not have the capacity or expertise to do.

Always seek professional help if your grief feels unbearable or critically interferes with your ability to minimally function.

Ultimately, grief is a lifelong journey. It comes in waves. It ebbs and flows. Navigating the holiday season, birthdays and anniversaries are particularly challenging and nuanced. Your needs may shift. Honor them. If you were looking for permission to feel joy while grieving, you have it. If you were looking for permission to take it slow and be more graceful with yourself, permission granted. 

Take a moment to reflect on your grief journey.

Take a few deep breaths and moments of stillness. How have you been processing your emotions? How has grief impacted your life? How might being more graceful with yourself and being open to all emotions improve your grief journey? How will you care for yourself?

Remember that it’s okay to feel joy. It doesn’t diminish the sincerity of your grief. Consider that choosing to experience joyful moments with your whole heart is a way to carry your loved one’s spirit forward, embracing life in a way that honors them. 

Thank you for taking the time to consider my musing on love and loss. I pray you find healing in your grief journey and I invite you to share this blog post with someone who needs it and continue the conversation in the comment section. 

With Love,

NeNe