Loss

Hello, Cadre. How you doing today? Call and response. I watch a lot of Mickey Mouse clubhouse with my 3 year old and they're like constantly asking questions and it's so cute because I can hear her answer and I'm like, at what point do we lose that kind of ability? Where we're like. They're like, what color is this? She's like yellow. And I'm like, at what point you gonna realize that like goofy can't hear her? Hi, my name is Brittany Hagan. I am one of the Cadre contributors and I have been sober for 15 years.

I'm also an army veteran, a single mom, divorcee, and I also, I have a silly little radio show about pop culture. But when I'm here, I like to talk about things a little bit more serious. And today's a big one. That's why I'm kind of being goofy is because like it's about grief and how everybody handles grief so differently. I was thinking about this. I was on a run today. I was thinking about like how I wanted to verbalize this because a little insight on my life right now is that we had a big loss in our family.

We lost a child, died in our family. And it was last week and it's like, it's all encompassing. It's been a lot. I took off today and tomorrow at work because today's the funeral and I knew that coming on here and just kind of talking. I talked to my therapist yesterday and now I'm talking to you guys for a little bit. But grief is so freaking weird. And like, you know what's really wild too about it all is that there is something about how we really focus on love languages, right? That's like a big conversation.

If you're in, I don't know if you alive. You heard somebody like, what's your love language? How do you show love? How do you receive love? Like, what is your love language? And I kind of am like, should we write a book? We. I don't know who, maybe you, Mel, if you're still here. But like should we write a book about grief languages? Cuz I do feel like grief languages at this point. Like grief language is, I feel like is more beneficial to most people. Like figuring out how people around you grieve.

I took notes. If I look over here, I swear I'm not like dual monitoring you. Grief is in that way, like with that love language. So different. There's different grieving styles and knowing each other's grieving styles can be very powerful because it can help you and your loved ones kind of process and like kind of allow for whatever you need in that moment. I wrote down that grief is universal, but the way we process it isn't. So like, it's inevitable. We will all go some through something that.

Where we will grieve very hard. But what we do in those moments or in those big feelings is so individualized, which is like so nuts, right? Like there is no universal. This is how you feel sad. Some people cry for a week, other people go silent. Other people throw themselves into their work. And I think it's really important to try to take the judgment out, which is hard because grief is one of those things too where we're like, you're not feeling it, are you? Whatever. Because you're working out or cause you're not working out or cause you're not cleaning or you're cleaning too much.

We have a lot of judgment around grief. And like I do hope and for myself as well, because I have a lot of family in town. A lot of people are grieving that you can take the judgment out. I think there's something very powerful. And if we see grief, like love languages, like I. My love language. I mean, isn't it at the end it's like all of them. But like, I love physical touch. I like acts of service, love gifts. But you have to know me, right? And like there's no wrong way for love language. So I think we have to normalize.

There's no really wrong way for grief. Also normalize that there is some wrong ways for grief. Even as I said it, like, as an alcoholic, I'm like, there are some really wrong ways for grief. But on a broad sense, how you grieve is how you grieve. And it's so individualized. Let's talk about. I wrote them different grieving styles. Now there's the externalizer. Talks a lot, need to process out loud, cries openly. These people I and I talk a lot. I mean, you know that I'm telling you I have a radio show.

I talk here a lot. I talk in general. Ask anybody. I'm a big talker. But unfortunately, when things really get hard, I don't really want to talk about it. There's the internalizer. Keeps it inside. May journal. Journaling would be a very healthy way. Thinks deeply, grieves quietly. I grieve quietly at home. I am such a reverter to like keeping everything in of sometimes an avoider. But like I am absolutely internalizer. The doer dives into tasks Organizing cleaning, planning as a way to cope. This is also me as I literally just was vacuuming.

I mean, we're going to the funeral today and I like at some point need to quit vacuuming and cleaning and doing all the things. But that helps. That's a tool for me to put that energy into there. The seeker turns to faith. Wouldn't that be a lovely one? I hope my kid, I hope I can acquire this for my kid. Turns to faith, spirituality and community for answers and comfort. I feel like again, like I shouldn't, like, again, I'm putting so much judge on it. On it. But like, that's a good one. You lean towards your networks and spirituality.

Amazing. Amazing. The avoider distracts with work, substances or entertainment. Sometimes temporary, sometimes dangerous. I did write that none of these are wrong, but I, I kind of want to double back on that. Like there are, say more like healthy ways, right? Because I think anything in the extreme, right. Like if you're doing stuff so much where you're go, you're avoiding that feeling. I was talking to my therapist today yesterday about this and kind of flushing out this conversation I want to have with you guys.

And like for me, whenever I suppress or push things down, it multiplies. So for me, not acknowledging, not grieving isn't really an option anymore because I don't have time to let things multiply. I also don't have tolerance for that anymore. And for other people around me, the pushing things down and it coming back exponentially. So I know, like, I really leaned into thinking in my head there's like no right or wrong way. And I, to an extent, right. But it's, it's hard. I mean, I think it's almost like there's a way before you get into a relationship to find out the way people grieve or deal with loss or disappointment might be more beneficial than finding out financially if you light up or if how you raise children, like, because it's so impactful in the time that you need it the most, that you could be needing each other the most if your grieving styles not only don't align, but aggravate one of each other.

I mean, that is so hard because this is the most vulnerable state you'll probably ever be in when you're dealing with your loss. So I mean, a God, it's like, funny because I always start these and have like a certain conclusion I want to get to. But talking with you guys, I always end up finding myself going elsewhere. But it's. Maybe grieving is one of those things where when you're doing it right, you're verbalizing the actions and you're compromising your grieving in some way if it would have benefit your loved ones.

I don't know. This is again, I'm still figuring it out. I have these thoughts where I go, that's a very interesting thing is like, would you pivot the way you grieve if you knew it would help other people? Would you talk about things in a time that you normally don't if you knew that it could help your loved one? I don't know. I think that's so interesting because this is the first time I've had a big loss in my life with a three year old daughter. And I definitely find myself doing other things than I would do had I been alone in my normal, in my past where I don't have to consider somebody else's feelings.

Like I said, I'm usually the avoider. I kind of stick, stay in and, and kind of deal with my feelings. But with my kiddo, my little three year old, Go, go. I find myself reaching out for community and showing her that we still have so many loved ones in our lives. Interesting. I gotta write that down at some point. So I think that acknowledging that how different and important it is to understand each other's grieving styles, we can't expect everyone to grieve exactly like us. And that's, I think that compromise and that figuring that out with your loved one is like, I know how my mom gets.

My mom doesn't want to sit in the sad, I want to sit in the sad. My sister wants to accomplish things. And between us three, it's like, it can be chaotic, right? But we know that about each other. When we were talking about that compromise piece, this is something I wrote down. If your silence is talking, but your friends is silence, you might think they don't care, but really they're grieving in their own way. And like, that's where I keep coming back to, like, is there a chance for growth and compromise in the grieving process?

Probably, right? I mean that's usually when it happens, when we're at our lowest. I do believe that grieving styles like love, language aren't one size fits all. And it might change with you in general from day to day to day, from when you're in your 20s to your 30s to your 40s to your 50s, the healthiest thing we can do. And this is like where that freaking digging with inside is recognize what your style is and respect others. But, like, recognize what your style and. And if it's serving you, you know, just because you have an inclination, like me, to go inward, maybe you push outward a little.

Maybe you reach out. Maybe you tell people what's going on. Yeah, I feel like I'm having, like, an epiphany while I was supposed to be talking to you guys. I was supposed to have this. This whole thing figured out. But, man, sometimes you just have these while you're talking. Grief is love with nowhere to go. I read that this week and went, oh, my God, isn't that so true? I'm also realizing, too, so my family's really getting together on the parents who lost this child and, like, how important it is to just show up and not have an answer, but just be there and just sit in the silence.

And it's really hard when you can't solve something. Right. Like, I struggle with that. I struggle with, like, what to do when there's nothing to do, when there's nothing that will fit fix this. So I hope. I hope you got something out of this. I mean, I know I did, which I don't think that's the point, but here we are. I think there's something really important in finding. In figuring out your grieving style, figuring out your loved one's grieving styles. And, like, I really want to sit and think on, like, is there some just beautifulness to somebody pivoting their grieving style to help each other out is, like, there's some kind of magic in that.

Especially when, you know, like, mine is silence and yours is talking. And you know that I'm talking it out because I know that would make you feel better and how magical that is. It just makes me want to get to know myself and others more so I can be a more helpful, thoughtful individual in community with that. I pass. This isn't an AA meeting. Okay. Thanks for hanging out with me. I hope you got something. I know I did. Again, not the point. All right, check you later. Do, do, do. Do you like my teddy bear sweater?

I have, like, way too many.