I've been in counseling, and my counselor tells me I have never grieved the difficult and dysfunctional life from my past. Long story short, I grew up in a highly dysfunctional and unhealthy situation and I've been suffering with the effects of that my entire life. My counselor says if I could grieve what I lost (a normal childhood, my sense of self, etc), that it would help me to move forward.
Does anyone have any advice for grieving something that happened over years and years in the past?
I also lost my father, brother and nephew within the last three years, and my mom developed dementia. All of this has triggered a lot of bad memories from my past.
Thank you.
The following 2 users give hugs of support to: Colinette Phoenix (03-24-2012), souriya123 (03-22-2012)
I've been in counseling, and my counselor tells me I have never grieved the difficult and dysfunctional life from my past.
Does anyone have any advice for grieving something that happened over years and years in the past?
I also lost my father, brother and nephew within the last three years, and my mom developed dementia. All of this has triggered a lot of bad memories from my past.
Thank you.
My dear Colinette,
My best advice,as I too am going through way too much,is to take things little by little;one day at a time.
The things i contemplate on a daily basis cannot be posted here but I will say that I understand and am here for you.
Grieving is a process and if you trust a little,i'll meet you halfway and maybe we can work this out;at the very lest gain some valuable insight to bring to your therapist.
Hello, I hope I can say something that will be helpful for you...
I just lost both my parents a few months ago, they went 30 days apart. I am finding the grief process to be quite a mixture of memories and losses. There is both beauty and pain involved, but I think you just have to honor where you are today and love yourself for where you have gotten...
You take what lessons you can from your life, you take what ever bit of graciousness you can from what you learned, you leave the mistakes and the moments of misery behind you and walk away as clean and strong as you can.
Even the parts of your life that have been difficult or unfair still have made you what and who you are. You cannot take the bad out of the good, but you can credit both sides of the lessons as yours. Some to never be repeated, and some to live your life by. The act of grieving is the act of separating all those emotions and memories and making your future out of the results.
It does not matter how long you have waited to grieve, it only matters that you grieve honestly and deep in your heart...and come out a stronger and more confident person.
