Learning how to deal with loss can make the difference between a fruitful life and fighting to survive. In this article, The Forged presents the causes of grief and how to deal with loss as a man.
My hands fidgeted as I stared into space.
A lamp spilling dim light stood on the nightstand. Shadows from the lamp hovered in the corners of the quaint bedroom. My brother sat in the chair on the other side of the bed with eyes glazed over, creating the illusion that he was looking at the wall.
My dad sat at my mom’s bedside, holding her hand. His head hung from exhaustion and emotional weight while he closed his eyes, trying to snatch the lightest moment of rest.
I watched her chest rise.
It slowly lowered with soft shudders.
I waited.
Her chest finally rose.
It slowly lowered with soft shudders.
I waited.
It didn’t rise.
Later, as I walked into the cool night air, I felt we were supposed to be waiting for one more family member. But she wasn’t coming with us. I looked up and took a moment to take in the stars and realized that I was driving home alone. She was never coming home with us again.
Every Loss is Unique
I was 26 when my mom passed away. She poured her heart and soul into me and helped shape me into the person of God I am today. When I had to come clean on something, she was the one I trusted. If I needed advice on some private topic, she was there. She raised me and loved me deeply.
All said and told, I cried for about 15 seconds immediately after it happened. The rest of my processing of grief occurred over the coming weeks and months, but not a lot of emotion came out. In fact, I became concerned something was wrong with me. Why couldn’t I shed more tears? Shouldn’t I be torn up and distraught?
As a Christian, there is such a thing as a “peace that surpasses all understanding.” A mentor of mine opened my eyes to the reality that I had peace from God about losing my mother. She followed Christ, so I held dear, “To live is Christ, to die is gain.”
Over time, I grew to understand my grief. I learned its source and grew from it. But once in a while, sadness still hits.
Sometimes, I think of her when I watch my children play. She always wanted grandchildren to love on, and she passed before she got the opportunity. She would have loved them dearly. If the moment is just right, I feel a small pang of sadness that she never got the chance to pour love out on them.
At the end of the day, I know that reminiscing is okay, but obsessing isn’t. I cannot change the past, and I refuse to allow it to ruin my future. So I take a bittersweet reflection during the moment, and I move forward.
I’ve come to understand my emotional responses to trauma. However, what works for me may not heal the wound for you. Each of us has to figure out our emotional response to the losses we feel.
What They Say About Dealing with Loss
Men hear a lot of different advice on dealing with loss. We hear from the old guard that we need to suck it up and never let anybody know we’ve got pain. The voice in our head doubles down on this idea. Then we hear from the modern, more feminine-driven quarters who tell us to let our emotions pour out. They tell us we’re repressed and need to be expressive with our feelings.
Nothing like a circle of crying guys to make you feel more like a man.
As men, we suppress, repress, or express. Philosophies from every corner of the advice-o-sphere seem to work with one of those three concepts. Yet, every “solution” from the advice-o-sphere seems outrageous and overly simplified. And they are. Loss is complex and so are our relationships.
Remember, we don’t deal with loss in a vacuum. It comes with the baggage of history, experience, prior events, relationship dynamics, and personal demeanor.
The typical trope of a guy holding down all his feelings/emotions because nobody cares or will listen is only a half-truth. We were built to handle problems and issues, which requires not allowing emotions to derail our plans. We train ourselves to hold those emotions down because if we express them in the wrong situation, they become dangerous.
Detaching to Deal with Loss
Think about not detaching in the middle of a war. You’ve seen your best friend killed in front of you as the enemy charges your position. Breaking down in tears while expressing grief will get you killed. So a soldier must detach himself from the events, put the emotions away, and deal with them later.
It's a powerful tool for men. When trained well, we can suppress the immediate onslaught of emotions to get the job done.
We also recognize the danger of bringing our issues into the home. There is a true possibility of changing our home’s dynamic when obsessing over our emotional pains and traumas. However, if we don’t learn how to deal with those feelings properly, we risk permanently detaching from everything, which can destroy relationships and dynamics. Worse yet, we suppress an emotion such as sadness, only to exhibit big emotions of anger or bitterness in its place.
Conventional wisdom from the therapy realm believes in exploring emotions and allowing them to be expressed. Unfortunately, it can go too far. This is how you get cry circles. And yes, I’ve watched videos of a group of guys in a park crying their eyes out and pairing off for long hugs as they bawled.
Extremes When You Deal with Loss
Sadly, humans tend to swing to extremes when looking for solutions. While swallowing emotions was the old prevailing wisdom, it has become modern wisdom to let it out in uncontrolled fits. We think, “If suppression is bad and unhealthy for guys, then the opposite must be the cure. Guys need to let the emotions fly and they’ll suddenly get healing after the wave ceases.”
If lack of emotional expression harms guys, the therapy class has decided we must bring it to the surface.
I’m not saying tears or crying aren’t useful for a guy to process grief. They may be a vital part of the process. It’s all in what helps him understand the truth of the wound.
For me, I’m just not a crier. Sometimes, I’ve wondered whether that’s an unhealthy defense mechanism within me. But I understand that I don’t operate that way. My inner mind may be an absolute whirlwind, but it rarely connects much with my outer expression of emotions.
Each guy needs to build a useful process to deal with grief. But it takes time and courage to deal with trauma. That means not shying away from the thoughts and emotions swirling around the person you lost.
The Complexity of Loss
In reality, it’s not just losing the person, but that the event encases your entire past with them in concrete. There’s no going back. The state it was in when they died is how it stayed. This can be difficult for us to deal with. We can’t fix what was broken when they died. We can’t build off what was lost.
After all, we don’t like permanent consequences. We avoid the thought of a choice or having an event that we can’t get back from. When we deal with loss, we're forced to come to terms with how our relationship with the person ended. If it was a beautiful relationship, we struggle with never enjoying new experiences with them. If it was a difficult relationship that we wish would have been healthy, we struggle with what could have been that never will be.
We also deal with the circumstances of the loss. It’s typically easier to watch a person who lived a full life quietly and peacefully slip away in their sleep after saying their goodbyes. We feel there was a completion to the relationship and their life. However, losing a person in their youth or prime of life becomes extremely painful because we hold onto the lost potential of their life as well as the relationship we can’t grow.
Every loss exposes the complex factors that shape our grief. Strains or unvoiced regrets about the relationship cause grief. Bitterness and wounds need to be worked through. If we deeply loved them and cannot think of living without them, then we have work to do on ourselves and how we handle the loss of the relationship.
How to Deal with Loss
Dealing with loss takes time. However, there are some things we can focus on when dealing with it.
1. Accept that each timeline is different
We all process grief differently, and each loss is unique. Instead of holding yourself to a timeline to achieve a “healed” state, measure your progress by weighing out the emotions as they come. After all, your emotions are a great signal to help determine what is going on. Just don’t let them own you and control you.
2. Take some time by yourself to weigh out your thoughts
This means going for a drive, sitting in a tree stand, working on the car, or going for a walk. It means getting yourself alone and being intentional about accessing your thoughts. We train ourselves to not think about an issue because most likely emotions lurk behind the curtain of those thoughts. Instead, get some courage and think through the loss. Most likely, it will lead to feeling emotions.
3. Observe the emotions
Allow yourself to feel those emotions. If you need to cry, go for it. If you need to be angry, allow yourself to be angry. We need to use a release valve on our emotions, and sometimes we get so pent up, that when the emotions start happening, they come through full force. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but be aware that feelings are not our master, nor are they always accurate.
4. Follow the emotions back
Weigh out WHY the emotion is there. If it’s anger, what is making you angry? Is there an unresolved conflict? Did they treat you in horrible ways and it seems as though they got away with it? Are you mad at God for taking them from you? Did you have unmet expectations on how things were supposed to “work out”?
5. Deal with the source of the emotions
Problems need resolution. If you cannot resolve the issue because the person is gone, then it's up to you to work on resolving the issue in your heart. Resolution heals the wound and eases the emotions. When they recede, the future seems better and more accessible.
Mind you, one of the most powerful tools on the face of the earth is forgiveness. It can be a process, but it is vital. God designed reality to work through forgiveness. If we’ve been harmed by the person who is gone, then forgiveness becomes the tool needed. Now, forgiveness is a topic unto itself, so we’ll discuss that more in another post.
6. Do not dwell forever
If you find yourself going around in circles on something, then it means it’s unresolved. That may be because you’re not accepting the solution to the problem. Is your pride getting in the way? Is fear holding you back? Figure out what keeps you from resolving the issues or outlooks holding you back from healing.
7. Discuss it
This doesn’t mean sitting down with some female therapist wearing thick black glasses in a room taken from a Martha Stewart catalog. It may mean bourbon on the back porch with a good friend, or pulling an alternator on the family minivan with a trusted brother. Get with one or two other guys and let them know where you’re at. Take their wisdom and weigh it out with prayer and other wise counsel. Use it to take time to be introspective.
However, do not just complain about a situation. Observe it, gather information, and work on a solution that uses traits of honesty, sacrifice, righteousness, love, and courage.
Dealing With Loss is Not Easy
Losing someone is a monumental event. We may take a while to struggle with loss, but at some point, we have to move forward. A person who stays in grieving mode forever becomes a drain on those around them. They become a black hole for attention and resources. They become a victim.
You are not a victim. Be determined to overcome. Become the man who continues to be a provider for others. Accept that grief may take weeks, months, or years to resolve. But you must determine in your heart that you will heal and move forward.
Remember, your emotions are there for a reason, and you should allow them to come to the surface in a controlled manner. However, do not become a slave to anger, bitterness, sadness, depression, or anxiety. When you feel and safely vent those emotions, observe and use them to find the source of the issue. Fix the issue.
Gentlemen, this is a massively complex topic. That means no man should have to deal with it all alone. Find brotherhood and begin to unravel what you’re going through. Seek healing through proper methods, and become a stronger man because of it.
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