Latest / Turning Grief into Growth: The Journey of Transformation / Episode #30-Dr. Frank Campbell

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Episode #30-Dr. Frank Campbell · Turning Grief into Growth: The Journey of Transformation

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome back to the book of the colour.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_01: Well, good morning, good day, and good night, Don.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_01: I'm just gonna cover all the bases right there.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_01: So we've got uh another podcast.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I think I still am excited uh for every single guest that we have on this podcast, but I am extra super excited uh for our repeat guest, uh Dr.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: Frank Campbell, uh, that we have on.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: Uh he's meant a lot to uh both of us, I know, and it's helped us a lot in uh both of our journeys.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh he was on episode 14.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, for those that uh might be wondering when he was on before, and this is episode 30 uh that we're recording.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: So uh yeah, we're excited to have you back, Frank.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_03: Well, we um we wanted our our 30th episode to be special.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_03: Uh they're all special, like like you're saying, but I think um I think uh this is cool because it's really the first you are the first person that we are having back of uh a three people, so um that's pretty awesome.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_03: Um I just want to go uh well most of the people that know me, uh Frank doesn't mean for Doctor.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_03: Um he's just a really good person, Dr.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_03: Frank Know.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_03: Um, he he likes to be called Frank.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_03: He doesn't need the the doctor in front, but he deserves to have that because he's got a lot of wisdom and uh political behind that.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_03: Um he's well known throughout um the college world and um uh uh throughout the Greek uh the Greek world of uh North America.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_03: Um there are lost teams.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_03: Uh I keep hearing about people um talking about lost teams, uh which plans for local outreach to suicide survivors.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_03: Um Frank started this, I don't know how many years ago.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_03: Um, but uh every everywhere I go, I I run into people that talk about they're on the lost team.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_03: I'm like, oh I know Frank.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_03: So I feel really honored and and special um to to call you a friend.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_03: So thank you for being here.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: It's ironic.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I just spoke at the uh national conference up in um St.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: Louis, and it was my 30th year to um introduce that concept.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: So to be on your 30th show seems all but fitting.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: So I appreciate the chance to be here.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um you know, complicated bereavement uh visits every door.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: There's no reason for us to assume that when a loss occurs, that it won't have complex and complicated process for that individual that's grieving.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: And how that affects each person is about the relationship with the deceased and also the manner of death and how sudden or unexpected or how traumatic that event may have been.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's not for in my opinion, it's not for any therapist to determine whether or not this grief is traumatic.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: It's up to that individual who often reports symptomology that's obvious: having trouble eating, having trouble sleeping, having uninvited thoughts come into their mind and interrupted visions.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's like walking around in a wake nightmare.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's it's difficult for that person to function.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: And others may minimize that response and say, Well, you know, uh I've lost this or I've lost that, and and I never acted like this.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: What's wrong with you?
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we have really microwaved bereavement in our country in the last hundred years.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: We've gone from a time where we wore black for a year and covered mirrors and and were publicly grieving, and it was supported, it was acknowledged as normal and appropriate to three days if it's in town, four if it's out of town, and then we want you back to the way you were before the loss, and it's just ridiculous.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: So I think this ability to process grief in a social manner that is acceptable is a setup for internal conflict and frustration and pathology, uh, difficulty being in the world.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: So I had come up with this concept uh back in the 90s called the Canyon of Why, because it fit into what I saw most people go through with a loss that for them was profound, and oftentimes they were also experiencing symptoms of trauma.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: So that's one thing we could talk about today if you like.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it's a metaphor.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: I tend to think in pictures and speak in metaphor.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: So um let's do it.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, would you like to do that?
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: So screen share.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: I've got this is uh not an attempt to say that I know what I'm doing artistically, but there's a slide here I want to share with you.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: This comes from a quilt that I made along with other people at our traumatic loss center.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: We make quilt squares each year and weave a quilt.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: So our walls throughout the building are covered in what I consider sacred art.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and it's images of individuals who've died in a traumatic way, or it's reminiscent of them.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: So imagine, if you will, you're flying over a canyon like the Grand Canyon, or any type of canyon you could bring to mind.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: And the reason why metaphors have to have what's known as reification.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, if I show you a chair, you know and I know chairs are all different.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: But this the physical chair, you would say, Oh, yeah, that's a chair.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: Well, what I was hoping to accomplish with this crude rendering, this is all pieces of fabric cut up to try and make this image, is the idea of looking down into a canyon that the bereaved have been tossed into.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: And at the base of that canyon is a river with a strong current that they can't predict in the future because they've never been in this canyon.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: And like most canyons that I've experienced in whitewater rafting, there are rapids, there are boulders, there's a danger of being tossed into the water.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: And as they enter the canyon, although it seems manageable, they don't realize they have to row their own boat through this canyon.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: They kind of imagine themselves surrounded by the people that may have been there in the beginning or at the funeral, and all of them saying, you know, we'll be here for you.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: But pretty quickly, they find themselves alone in this canyon trying to cope with the enormous walls, uh, the lack of other people, the rapids, the movement of the river, which is unpredictable at best, especially if they're not trained in how to navigate a river.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: Rivers and whitewater rafting can be extremely dangerous, and most people would rather have a guide along.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: So I think most of us, like the two of you, uh, we have become guides in this canyon because we've been through this canyon many times personally, or we've chaperoned others through the canyon.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: And the ability of having someone who's been through this before, even though the relationships are unique, is that the terrain isn't.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: And the terrain may change based on the amount of rainfall or the amount of water that's available at that time when a person enters the canyon.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: The reality is you've got to make it through the canyon.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: And unfortunately, for so many people, they are plagued with why?
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: Why did this death happen?
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: Why now?
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, why is it I feel the way I do?
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: Some of their whys are about themselves.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: Most of their whys may be about the person who's died.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_00: So in the canyon of Y, the metaphor also shifts to a different symbolic representation, and that's the letter Y.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: So in this part of the canyon, all you can see is this fork in the river that's coming.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: Now that the water does continue on either side of this top of the Y, but you can't see that.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: You're just moving up to a fork in the road.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: And forks in the road symbolically create internal ambivalence.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: This mixed feeling, do I go left or right?
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: What's the correct choice?
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_00: I've never been down this canyon before.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: And the parallel there is with crisis theory.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: Crisis theory predicts that when you're struggling with a crisis that's self-defined and your current coping is failing to support you, you will come to a fork in the road.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: And that fork, if it had a signpost, would say, This way is danger, this way is opportunity.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: And we know that for people that are struggling with grief, not knowing which way is danger and which way is opportunity means it's a flip of the coin.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: They may choose a channel of the river on the fork that leads to danger without having any insight into that.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: This is where a guide can help.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: A guide can say, you know, some people have taken that route, but we haven't seen them have a lot of success with it.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe that's drinking or drugs or other things that might be maladaptive coping to get temporary relief from the stress and pain of their grief, but it doesn't result in improved future.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_00: So the danger part isn't known when they come to this self-defined crisis.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: Guides are able to say, This way might be safer for you.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: Talking about your loss, being with others who are grieving, being able to share your story in a non-judgmental environment, being able to gain support from others, especially those who are maybe further into the canyon, but have now come back to help others get through this navigable way.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: So the Canyon of Why puzzles for the person not only why is this happening, but it it puts forth the reality that one path might be much safer in your grief than another.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: So often people want to compare this complicated bereavement they're in the middle of to other losses in their life that did not put them in the canyon of why.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_00: For whatever reason, the relationship with that person that died did not throw them into this unknown geography, that now they're clawing their way down a river to try and get to the other side.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'll tell you, there is something beyond the canyon of why, and that's the desert of what.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: And on the desert of what, you begin to really embrace your grief because what this loss means to you today becomes where your grief lives.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_00: Your grief is in your emotional closet, why is in your psychological closet, and those are very different regions to explore.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_00: So I can pull the slide down now as long as we can kind of just imagine when we talk about the Canyon of Y, there's a great deal of geography to it, but we're only going to focus today in our talks about how hard it is to know which path would be the best.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_00: Because believe me, there will be people in your life encouraging you to go in a direction that may have worked for them.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: Or it may have been that the loss wasn't so significant that they couldn't do some of these maladaptive things and still process their loss.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_00: But we need to talk about how to find and choose that side that goes away from danger toward opportunity.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: So that's okay with you guys.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: I'll I'll stop and get your reaction to what I've said so far and see where to go.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_03: Perfect.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_01: Well, once again, my reaction is I ran out of paper on the first page because I I keep taking so many notes.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you're recording it, so you don't have to worry about it.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_01: Man, I don't even know where to start.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_01: So let me ask you this.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_01: We had a guest on recently, and they said that if you ask the why questions, it implies there's an answer.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_01: And there's not always an answer.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_01: And though we were talking about how you almost have to reprogram the mind of a bereaved person in understanding that there's not an answer to have, because we're always programmed to think, okay, there's a question why, so therefore the answer is afterwards, and I can't seem to find that answer.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_01: Do you do you agree with that?
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: Or yeah, I think the problem that I've noticed in traveling around the world and opening lost teams in other countries, especially in the east, is they have less trouble with ambivalence.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_00: They they can accept that opposites can be true.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_00: And we in this country and in most of the Western world, we do not like opposites.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: We want A plus B plus C to equal the formula that balances out A, B, and C.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: And in that comment that I made earlier about the grief lives in your emotional closet, if I really take it back to the author of that quote, it was Ed Schneidman.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_00: And he was talking about people who die in a traumatic way and mostly focused on those who die by suicide.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: But he was saying, you're trying to understand what the deceased placed in your emotional closet was their psychological problems.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_00: So from my emotion, I can't understand somebody else's mental issues or psychological problems.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: I I don't consider suicide a mental health issue, I consider it a public health issue because we see contagion occur and we see people die that don't have diagnosable mental illness by suicide.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm of the opinion that any traumatic loss can often lead to suicide loss.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: We know this especially with youth, because we see people that die in car crashes or die in some type of overdose or other manner of death in suicide is almost always the precursor to then another youth dying by suicide.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: And that makes it a contagion issue rather than some biological familial disorder.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_00: So I don't think we've helped out anybody by relegating one to a special group or a special population.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, we'd have a lot of false positives if we do that.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so what you're describing is what I've seen with people that have had deaths to long-term terminal illnesses, too.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: People do not know what the minefield will hold for them, regardless of the manner of death for the loved one, because I think it's more about the relationship they had with that person and what they wanted from that person in that relationship that may have gone unreported, unrequited, uh all types of dilemmas there for people that lose someone at a point where they haven't finished the work between each other.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_01: Is that laid on a foundation for your uh and and I think back on 2017, my dad died and I never shed a tear.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: I still haven't shed a tear, but my parents got divorced when I was 10 months old.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't have that relationship.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_01: I've heard of people that have lost their fathers and just are bereaved and torn up.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_01: And there's a part of me that's jealous uh for that um grieving of the loss of the father, uh, because I I know what it holds.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_01: I know it holds the fact that I didn't have that kind of relationship.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_00: Let me interrupt just a second.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: What you've described is one side of grief.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: The balance, you see, would be the others who, as you said, are distraught and grieve and cry.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: We have trouble holding both of these to be true.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: That's what I meant about the paradox.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody who wants to sleep on the grave uh will will talk about that, and others might say, Oh, yeah, I'd go every day.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: And the one who can't go down the street where the cemetery is is going, what's wrong with me?
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we don't hold opposites as true, and they are true.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sorry, Don, go ahead.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_03: No, no, I'm glad you pointed that out, and you're absolutely right.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, you know, my mom died at the age of 63, and I was in my early 40s.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_03: Uh is that right?
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I think so.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_03: Um anyway, uh I had a rough time uh dealing with her loss.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_03: Now some uh probably twenty-five years later, my father uh dies, and that was nowhere near as difficult for me.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_03: Um partially because of uh the the age that we made it to, um and partially because I had learned so much more about grief.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_03: I've had so many more experiences with grief.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_03: Um so you know it was easier for me to to handle that.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_03: Um but I love them, you know, both the same.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_03: Uh like that that wasn't any different.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_03: So uh it it's just that I grew in, I feel like I had a lot of growth in my grief um between the two of us.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I think it's um it might not be as accurate to say I've learned how to deal with it or I've learned to cope with it.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's back coping.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_00: I think what happens is we we don't become desensitized because of exposure, we just learn new ways to add resources to become more resilient when that happens.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_00: And it doesn't mean that the next death won't take us to the ground because that death might hit a different place than our ability to cope.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: And so the more traumatic the death, I think the more challenging it is to navigate the canyon.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the canyon for your mom probably had a why.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: The canyon for your dad may have had a why, but it may have been almost like a trickle off to the side that you just ignored because it just wasn't important.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_00: You knew that wasn't the way to the end.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 20:43
  unknown: Right.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm trying to use metaphors because that language we can talk about, whereas that feel what you felt, you know.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so that resilience it it adds a little more elasticity, it gives you a little more stretch, a little more flexibility.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_01: Stretch Armstrong is what I always go back to.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_00: Love that.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_03: You know, we we refer uh since your episode that we did with you uh the 14th episode, when we mentioned you had mentioned the panel as well.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_03: Uh Greg and I have referred to that uh quite often on this podcast.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_03: Um and uh so I'm glad that we're talking about it now, uh, because it does it it I think those metaphors that you use that I struggled with so early on um in my uh in my grief, uh they they're so helpful.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_00: So it's uh it's a language that's hard to teach.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I've watched people on on one hand, they might, if they're the one that's grieving, say, Oh yes, that makes sense.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_00: But as soon as you ask them to use metaphor, they they are dumbfounded, you know?
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_00: And so I I don't think it's about whether you think in pictures and speak in metaphor like I do.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's a matter of translating your emotion into a picture.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_00: So for example, if if we're teaching a class on how to speak in metaphor, I might say to someone, tell me your biggest fear about your grief.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: What is it you're most afraid of?
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: And they might say, Well, I'm afraid of being alone.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I'm afraid of people just abandoning me and my grief because it's so profound others don't want to be around me.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: And I said, So if I were to ask you, do you think an iceberg would be a picture of how you see your grief if you're this iceberg floating around out there?
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_00: What is it about an iceberg that makes it difficult?
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_00: And should and somebody might say, Well, you can only see 10% of it.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: I said, Yeah, that's true.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: And did you know that icebergs tumble as they shift shape?
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_00: And when their shape shifts, it only happens at the water line where people can actually see the top of the iceberg, but not the bottom.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: And that the bottom goes out in a very unpredictable fashion.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_00: But when it turns and when it tosses, it's a deadly thing because 90% of it's going to come out of the water.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're anywhere near that iceberg, you're you're going to die.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_00: We also know that it was nothing above the water line that sank the Titanic.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_00: It was what was below the tide, the waterline that that ripped the side and broke two rivets on the side, is what I was told when I was in Belfast where they built the ship.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_00: And and that a small tear can bring down this enormous vessel that was supposed to be unsinkable.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_00: It means what's on going on down below that others can't see is pretty dangerous stuff.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_00: So does any of that fit for your grief?
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_00: And if they say, Well, yeah, you know, I I feel frozen most of the time, right?
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_00: And they start describing their grief now for the first time.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_00: Well, then they have to turn to someone and say, I just feel like an iceberg.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_00: And now the other person has to respond in a way that recognizing that metaphor.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_00: And so they struggle now.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: Now they struggle to respond, even though they're grieving also.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_00: And so somebody else says, What if I pull alongside?
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, what if what if I come aboard the iceberg?
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: Would that help?
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_00: What if I just stay out here and and stay with you as you thaw?
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and so now they're starting to speak in metaphor to that bereaved person, and now the person has new tools to say, I think that would be nice, or I would feel less alone if you were there and just with me.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_00: Does that make any sense?
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's a companion.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_00: Because the others may not be able to respond.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's really like they're speaking a language you don't understand.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_01: Right, right.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_01: Let me ask you a question.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_01: So we're talking about the canyon of Y.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_01: We talked about coming to the fork in the river.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_01: And let's say that maybe there's a danger sign pointing, you know, one way.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_01: Let's just say it's left.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and you know, you choose to go left anyway.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: And you said that you know, like we're all kind of guides uh on this river at this point, or we can come along people and say, Well, we've seen people take this way below before, and maybe it's it hasn't been as I haven't taken the form as I thought, whether it's the use or trying to numb your degree.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um when you make that choice, um, is there a redo with that?
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_01: So I I I go up to one.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_01: Or we go up a little bit again or replace the floor called House of Flavors ice cream.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_01: I always had to get more ice cream.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um, or it was uh daily curve, it would put at the counter, and there was probably 50 or 60 different flavors, and I struggled with man, do I do I get blue moon or do I get macking allen peanut butter fudge?
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_01: Or do I get super moon, whatever it might have been?
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: And it's like you're not gonna go wrong with you're gonna have ice cream in your mouth, you know, at the end of that time, but there are some decisions that do have uh a traumatic effect that sometimes are hard to undo.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_01: Can you undo those?
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_01: Can you redo them?
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_01: Can you point them back and back paddle?
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_00: I uh you see what I'm asking?
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_00: I do.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_00: And what you were experiencing is ambivalence.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_00: And see, ambivalence is debilitating.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_00: Think of any major decision you've had to make in your life where you struggle.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_00: Do I buy this car, do I not buy this car, buy the house, not buy the house, take the job, not take the job, get the ice cream, not get that ice cream.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_00: The reality is you could have picked any flavor and changed your mind after you took a bite of it.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_00: But what you were wanting to do is to absolutely pick the best one now.
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_00: At this moment in time, the decision you made was so important it created ambivalence.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_00: You know, this one or this one.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_00: And imagining that while probably having other people say, Come on, man, pick something.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_00: Just pick something.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I think people who are grieving have people saying, pick something.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_00: You know, if you're gonna take off today, take off.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_00: If you're gonna go home, go home.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_00: If you can't come to work today, don't come to work.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_00: People struggle with the decisions of everyday life, uh whether to get out of bed or not, whether to turn on the TV or not, these can become monumental decisions when you're disabled at the Canyon of Wild.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_00: When you're at that fork in the road and you're struggling, that's where someone who can say, specifically, you know, there was a time when I was at that place too, and I actually went this way, and well, it just didn't work out for me.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_00: I I can't say whether it'll work out for you or not, but I want you to know, I'll be here if you come back and you decide you want to try the other side.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_00: I know more about that side of the canyon.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_00: That side of the canyon helped me get through safely, but that side over there didn't.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_00: That's a different way of offering insight into that danger side.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_00: Uh or uh, as you said, I've seen other people take that route and they come back usually.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_00: And when they do, they they're much more able to manage this side of the canyon.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's filled with people that want to support you.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's filled with people that know how to speak and language that mirrors what you're going through because they've been through it.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_00: And they've survived the canyon of why, and now they've come back to actually escort people through.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_03: Well, I have a client right now, and he's dealing with a different type of grief.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_03: Um not uh loss of life, but um I hope he listens to this episode because it is right up where he's you know, it's it's gonna be very helpful, I think.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: There's so many losses that we have have in our life.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: Uh maybe Naomi Golan back in the 80s wrote a book called Passing Through Transitions.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_00: And she really talked about all the different developmental milestones as children we have to transfer through and successfully negotiate, but also adults in life and picking a career, leaving a career, losing a career, uh aging, crossing different.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I've I've lived long enough to know now that you have a lot more self-defined crises ahead the longer you live.
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_00: The water doesn't necessarily get calmer, it just gets more tricky, more difficult to manage because maybe you're more fatigued, or you you now you have more arthritis in your body, and paddling's not so fun anymore.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_00: So there are all these transitions in life that may not be about an external loss of a person to life.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_00: It might be about a narcissistic injury, something that we see as a loss of ability.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's mobility.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe somebody uh look at all the returning people from military experience where they've lost a leg or a limb or they've had some uh physical damage.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_00: Those are narcissistic injuries.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_00: And I think we think of the word narcissism in the more negative term where a person is so self-absorbed.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_00: What I'm saying is when I first had to wear glasses at 40, I was no longer a 20-20 vision.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_00: I was no longer a sharpshooter.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: You know, if I wanted to use a weapon, I had to wear uh glasses to see properly.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_00: That's a narcissistic injury.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I've had hearing loss and other things.
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_00: All of these deficits create that ambivalence and anger.
• 31:29
  unknown: Yeah.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_00: I think a lot of people don't realize that under fear is almost always anger.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_01: I I've never heard the term narcissist used in that context uh outside of her negative um connotation.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_01: My my mom is uh ailing.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_01: Uh she's in independent living currently in an apartment, but uh she's had a long road uh since breaking her leg last year.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm gonna just talk just for a second because she doesn't listen to this podcast, but she asked me to come over yesterday to cut her toenails.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, it's a monthly occurrence, things we take for granted.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I get over there and I've got the you know toenail timers out in my hand, and and she's like, right, this is not the crisis right now.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_01: The crisis is I'm out of muscle relaxer, and the doctor won't refill it unless I go in.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_01: I have no way to get there tomorrow.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I I couldn't take her, and so we're trying to call my you know and my nieces and nephews and stuff they could take her in in the fear on her face.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I'm thinking, oh, not the end of the world.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_01: But for her it was, and she's like, I don't care about my toenails, that's not the crisis, even though that's why she called me over there.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_01: So I I do find it interesting that when you're going through trauma, the the thing that is so traumatic changes from time to time, where the emphasis is not on the same syllabus at that time and the emphasis is on a different syllable at that point.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um, does that make sense?
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, and the empathy is harder to conjure if you're the person that can get in the car and go to the doctor and take care of these types of things.
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_00: So empathy becomes difficult and appreciation for how deep in the canyon right now she is.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_00: She's she's not at a fork of the road, she's at a wall of the canyon where she can't see a way around it and she's helpless.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_00: And being helpless, the older you are, you have many more decades of not being helpless.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_00: So that it's almost like going over a waterfall in the canyon that you've never been over before, and you and you're in free fall.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_00: You have no idea what's going to happen at the bottom of this waterfall.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_00: But what you most fear is the landing, not the falling, it's the landing.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: As they say, it's never the fall that kills you, it's the landing.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_00: So for your mom right now, what you represented was a lifeguard along this river.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_00: You walk up, and now you're the lifeguard, and she's able to say, right now I don't need you to teach me how to swim.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_00: I need you to throw me a life preserver and pull me to safety because I'm hurting so bad, I can't think about learning how to swim.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_00: But she will have plenty of people that try to talk to her about how to swim while she's out there drowning.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the problem with our society.
• 34:25
  SPEAKER_00: We want to minimize other people's problems.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_00: And healthcare providers become very desensitized to these issues.
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_00: Very difficult for them to see how important these muscle relaxers are for her.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_00: They would see it as, oh, that sounds like a drug dependency, or maybe we need to wean her off of that.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_00: No, I would guess at her age right now, the risk of addiction is absolutely not something to be worried about.
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we talked about that.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_00: Freedom of pain at this moment.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_00: And the fact that you go and do her toenails probably gives her the one opportunity.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_00: You're like her oasis every month, that she knows she can count on you to come and do that.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_00: But now she's something she doesn't know how to handle by herself, and she's in that that whirlpool.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and Don, you talked about your client with a different type of grief that wasn't death.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, I've been very self-aware that this is a different type of grief, even for my mom, and the fact of her loss of freedom, the fact we had to sell her house, she doesn't have a car anymore.
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_01: So it's like she's really going through this grief.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_03: I was more thinking she's grieving the loss of her her her life the way it was, her independence.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_03: Um, and and I'm sure we all do that to a certain extent.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_03: You know, I'd love to have the body that I had when I was 20 years old, but you know, but I I've grieved that body.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I don't have it.
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_00: But now imagine you don't have a driver's license or a car.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_03: Exactly.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_00: You don't know how to use the technology that's all around you that others seem to use so freely and quickly.
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_00: You you see yourself as a dinosaur wandering on you know toward extinction.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: This is what's difficult for people to appreciate is the magnitude of a self-defined crisis.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_00: Look at a young person who breaks up with a first love.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_00: We tend to say, oh, you know, plenty of fish in the sea, as if that makes any sense about relationships.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_00: But we we minimize glib reassurance.
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, you're gonna be fine, you'll meet somebody else, blah, blah, blah.
• 36:42
  SPEAKER_00: For that person, they are down in this dark hole and they don't see any light coming in and any options out.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_00: For us to be able to transfer our ability to see the future into their ability to be lost and see nothing, is very challenging to do.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_00: Taking a trip into the well is what people need.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_00: They need us to be with them in the darkness, not just say come to the light.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_00: Because we have to first join them before we can ever walk with them.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's for me the analogy of what therapy is about.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_00: It's about walking with a person through the pain and disillusionment and loss that they are currently face to face with, and not just trying to pull them or yank them towards something better.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I don't know anybody that gets out of the river without helping themselves as well as having help to get out of the river.
• 37:48
  SPEAKER_00: I imagine now that if I fell out of my boat, for example, my ability at my advanced age to climb back into that boat is pretty much impossible.
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_00: I might be able to hold on to the boat and think about things I can do, but meanwhile, I'm also dealing with the shock of being in the water.
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'm dealing with maybe cold water, so it makes me want to be, you know, very uh scared for hypothermia if it if it happens.
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_00: If I'm in if I'm in Michigan, hypothermia would be no small risk.
• 38:23
  SPEAKER_00: It would be very clear risk up in the mitten.
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_00: So I know that I have a lot of thoughts flooding my mind, but holding on to that boat has to be number one.
• 38:35
  SPEAKER_00: Well, your mom was holding on to you like that boat.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_00: You were her life preserver.
• 38:40
  SPEAKER_00: And the fact that you took on solving the issue is probably the first way she knew you walked alongside of her and said, What about this?
• 38:50
  SPEAKER_00: What about this?
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_00: Let's try this.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_00: Would this work?
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_00: What can we do right now to help you?
• 38:57
  SPEAKER_00: What what would a heating pad right now on the place that's cramping or wherever the manifestation of your pain is?
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_00: What could we do right now that may not be as good as a muscle relaxer, but it could help you feel less pain at this exact moment?
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_00: Then she becomes part of the problem to solve, and that gives her more strength internally to think about ways to solve problems on her own.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_01: And I did none of those things, just so you know.
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_01: Because I have great empathy in uh certain areas, and other areas I struggle, and and I think that's like all of us.
• 39:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 39:34
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you're close to the person, yeah, and you also may not see that as the crisis they see.
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_00: We we have to be honest about the fact that problems teenagers have are not always something that I can be as empathetic about because that world for them is the a horrible environment they're in.
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I may have trouble knowing that they've lost their friends on Facebook.
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_00: But for them, they're so if I add a metaphor, it might be they're out on an island all alone and there's nobody else on the island.
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_00: And uh it's more like that movie Lost.
• 40:11
  SPEAKER_03: It uh it is time that we wrap this up, I think.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_03: And uh Frank, just wondering if you have any words of wisdom, pearls that you would love to uh leave our listeners with.
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_00: I think the one that I come back to most of the time is when you're struggling with a crisis, talk to someone about the crisis.
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_00: Call 988, call a crisis line, people that are trained to listen, because too often people give advice or glib reassurance.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_00: And neither of those have I found to be helpful.
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, figure out a way to get someone close to you who you think will be a listening ear.
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_00: And one way that is through formalize resources like calling crisis lines or or even searching uh in on your phone, on Google, or whatever resource for where can I get help for this?
• 41:08
  SPEAKER_00: And uh be honest about what you're struggling with.
• 41:11
  SPEAKER_00: Also to remember where there are other times in my life where right now I'm really sad.
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_00: I was sad at another time, and when I did this or that, it helped.
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_00: We tend to say, well, my sadness today is too great for something that helped me in the past.
• 41:28
  SPEAKER_00: Well, sad is sad, it's the same thing.
• 41:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's just the uh amount of sadness you're struggling with may be much greater.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_00: But remember what helped you in the past.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_00: And I've been surprised, I've you know, some people say, you know what I was saying before I took a walk.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, really?
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_00: What happened on the walk?
• 41:46
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I just got out of myself.
• 41:48
  SPEAKER_00: I I changed my windshield, my front view.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I got out of the rear view mirror and I got into the windshield.
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_00: Great metaphor.
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_00: Change your environment drive forward when you're looking at the rear view mirror.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_00: So I guess that would be it for now, Don.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_00: I'd say just do something that's worked in the past and test that out again as a coping strategy.
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_00: Because my guess is you've stopped doing whatever that was.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_01: I I hate to do this to you, Don.
• 42:18
  SPEAKER_01: I've got this one pressing question I just want to ask.
• 42:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um recently I was at you and not me, so yeah.
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_01: Recently I I uh witnessed uh uh a gentleman in his 30s who had recently lost his wife.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_01: And he was talking with his grandpa who was in his 80s, and the grandpa had recently lost his wife.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_01: And the grandpa's like, you've got to get remarried, you've got to get you know back up on that horse because I've experienced the loneliness, you know, been four years, you know, for grandpa.
• 42:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, I understand where the grandpa is coming from, but it's only been two months uh for the 30-year-old.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_01: And both incredible family, incredible people, it's coming from a different place.
• 43:02
  SPEAKER_01: So I guess the question is is not all advice, or maybe the statement, not all advice is good advice.
• 43:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um and you have to really always credit advice.
• 43:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, advice ought to always begin with.
• 43:16
  SPEAKER_00: I have no idea if this could help you.
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_00: In my case, it helped me, but it helped me at a different time in my life.
• 43:24
  SPEAKER_00: And to know that men often seek remarriage and women often don't, is a testimony to the difference in genders.
• 43:33
  SPEAKER_00: What men want to do is put that grief on a shelf and not deal with it.
• 43:39
  SPEAKER_00: And what the two of you know and what your listeners learn is that that's not the healthy way.
• 43:45
  SPEAKER_00: If you don't, what you're gonna do is go into a new relationship with an internal sense of cheating on your deceased lover, and it sets you up for more problems, more bad decisions, and men don't.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_00: Want that.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_00: We want to fix the problem.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_00: And so for the grandfather, I think fixing the problem could have been peppered with, but you know it worked for me.
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_00: I have no idea if it would work for you.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_00: What do you think your primary feeling is right now?
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_00: Because I'm an old guy and I don't know how to talk about feelings, but I hear it's a good thing to do.
• 44:21
  SPEAKER_00: You know, the grandfather could actually learn from that 30-year-old what he's struggling with.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_00: But I I would see someone in their 30s losing their wife and having been in a positive relationship with that person completely out there in a rubber raft, all alone with the air flowing out of it and a waterfall up ahead, scared to death of what's going to happen.
• 44:47
  SPEAKER_00: And the person they most depended on helping them or talking to them when they were struggling is not available.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_01: That's good.
• 44:57
  SPEAKER_01: Frank, thank you so much uh for coming back on our 14th episode, now our 30th.
• 45:02
  SPEAKER_01: And uh we always leave the door open uh for you to come back in the future.
• 45:07
  SPEAKER_01: So uh thank you so much.
• 45:10
  SPEAKER_00: Always a pleasure, gentlemen.
• 45:11
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody's getting ready to uh go through the canyon of why and get to the what does this loss mean to me today?
• 45:21
  SPEAKER_00: No matter how the loss manifests itself, the desert of what is still where healing can occur.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 45:29
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Frank.
• 45:30
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much for taking time out of your day to listen.
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_01: We hope turning grief into growth spoke to your heart and becomes a part of your own journey of healing and transformation.
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_01: If you know someone who could use a little hope, please share this episode with them.
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_01: And don't forget to follow, like, or subscribe on your favorite platform so you don't miss what's coming next.
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_01: Don and I can't wait to share more conversations to help you keep turning your grief into growth.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_01: Until next time.