Grief and Fear
Grief and fear. Many of my clients are faced with some degree of both of these. There’s a way they often entangle that isn’t always obvious. Some may be stirred up by world events. God knows there’s no shortage of those these days! And, often, some intensity of that feeling can be rooted in early experiences in life.
Many of us as children lived with some degree of not knowing if our needs would be met, from the extremes of hunger, neglect, or abuse; to the more nuanced needs of attunement and emotional support. There’s some level of fear that comes with that — “will I be okay?”
Tara, a Tibetan deity often credited with soothing fear
For a very young child, our society’s emphasis on individualism and self sufficiency before they may be ready is actually terrifying and confusing. I hear it in my office often. “My mom took long trips for work, and no one really prepared me before or repaired with me afterwards. I was too little to understand on my own!” “My dad was mad at me all the time. I didn’t mean to be bad!” When I ask what this client had done that was bad, the answer was, “I was making noise and running around.” You know, the things normal little kids do. Or, I’ve heard, “I had to be in the hospital for a few days and my mom couldn’t stay with me. I was frantic! I’d never been away from her before! I didn’t understand!”
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