{"id":383074,"date":"2026-03-13T12:01:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-13T12:01:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/383074\/"},"modified":"2026-03-13T12:01:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-13T12:01:16","slug":"mourning-on-schedule-how-grieving-became-a-mental-illness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/383074\/","title":{"rendered":"Mourning on Schedule: How Grieving Became a ‘Mental Illness’"},"content":{"rendered":"

I wrote this poem five months after Ginny\u2019s passing:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Waking Up<\/p>\n

Every day
I wake up
And remember she\u2019s not there
5 times a night
I wake up
And lose her yet again
Sometimes
In my dreams
She comes to me
It seems so real
And I rejoice
Until I wake up
And lose her yet again
Joy becomes pain
Yet I still want her to come
Even if it\u2019s just a dream
She still loves me
Like she always has
Until I wake up
And remember.<\/p>\n

My wife, Ginny, died last April. Ten months ago.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

I still cry almost every day. I often wish she were still here. I have dreams about her. I sometimes talk to her as if she can hear me. Things remind me of her, all the time, and when it gets to me, I cry again. It\u2019s hard to get out of bed some mornings. I feel unmotivated, forgetful, and unable to think straight. I\u2019m frequently tired but wake up multiple times a night and have trouble going back to sleep. I move and think much more slowly than normal for me.<\/p>\n

I have sometimes wished I were dead. No plans to do anything, more the feeling that my life no longer seems worth living.<\/p>\n

It would appear I have a \u201cmental disorder.\u201d<\/p>\n

I meet the criteria for \u201cMajor Depressive Disorder\u201d: depressed mood, sleep disturbance, loss of energy, cognitive impairment, and thoughts of death. Five of nine criteria for more than two weeks. I\u2019m ill!<\/p>\n

In another two months, unless things radically change, I will have a new mental disorder: \u201cProlonged Grief Disorder\u201d! Here is the description: \u201cA distinct mental disorder where the intensity and duration of grief symptoms are disabling and exceed social, cultural, or religious norms.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to the DSM, the \u201csocial, cultural or religious norm\u201d for grieving in the USA is a year. Twelve months. Oh, only six months if you\u2019re a child. I guess kids are supposed to \u201cget over it\u201d more quickly. Because they\u2019re resilient, right?<\/p>\n

Who decided that and how? We will find out a little later in this piece.<\/p>\n

My Love Story<\/strong><\/p>\n

I grew up with a very hard-working, very emotionally distant mother, four brothers close in age, and a father who was away at work most of the time. I learned early on that love and affection were scarce commodities and that I\u2019d better get used to fending for myself. I spent a lot of my early childhood alone, and pretended I liked it that way. But I was miserable and hated myself. I was incredibly shy and terrified of talking to a girl I liked, let alone asking her on a date!<\/p>\n

Ginny and I met on our second day of college on a bike ride. It took me five more weeks to figure out she liked me and ask her out. She had to make it pretty obvious. I was pretty dumb about girls!<\/p>\n

\"\"Ginny changed all that. She loved me for who I was. She was my safe place, my true love, the person I could count on. We were together for 49 years. Married for 44. Raised three boys, went camping, backpacking, biking, played tennis, ping pong, card games, board games, watched movies together, laughed a lot, cried a lot, snuggled a lot, sometimes argued but always sorted it out by bedtime. We said we loved each other probably five times a day or more. When I needed love and support, I went to Ginny. She did the same with me.<\/p>\n

Ginny taught me to have fun. She taught me to love myself. She made it safe for me to love others fully. She was my life.<\/p>\n

She died of cancer at age 66.<\/p>\n

To say that I miss Ginny is the grossest of understatements. We used to talk all the time about being like her Auntie Til and Uncle Al \u2014 riding our bikes around into our 80s, seeing our grandkids have kids of their own, driving our RV around the country, visiting Canyonlands, Yellowstone and other parks around the country, and visiting our relatives on the East Coast (we lived in Olympia, WA). To lose her not only meant losing our companionship. It meant losing our vision of what our future would look like. It meant losing a huge part of my identity. It meant losing a big part of my purpose in being alive.<\/p>\n

We never expected that Ginny would be the one to die first. We talked about it often. All the men in my family, both sides, died in their 60s or sooner of heart attacks, except my dad, who survived a heart attack at 40 and changed his lifestyle, and managed to make it to 85. But notwithstanding his amazing recovery story, we both figured I\u2019d die first. On the other hand, the women in her family all lived into their 90s. There was no cancer on either side of the family. I was completely unprepared to still be here when she was gone. That was not how the story was supposed to go!<\/p>\n

When Ginny died, I also lost my safe haven. I thought I had dealt with the attachment difficulties I noted above, but apparently, I had set them aside with the idea that I\u2019d never have to deal with them, because I\u2019d always have Ginny, and she\u2019d always love me! When she died, a huge rush of these feelings unexpectedly came back on me with a vengeance. Now I was alone again, just like I was as a child. Fortunately, I\u2019ve learned a lot of skills since then and have a pretty good network of genuine friends who have helped me move through this very painful time. And I was fortunate to find a very compassionate and competent grief counselor who has been seeing me for the better part of eight months now. But I am still alone much of the time, and it is very, very hard. I feel sad, angry, frightened, lonely, and sometimes wonder why I am still here and what it is I\u2019m supposed to be doing. And I get tired. Existentially tired. Exhausted.<\/p>\n

So does this make me \u201cmentally ill?\u201d Or am I just a person who misses someone they loved very much, and has to deal with the sadness of moving on alone? And how long am I permitted to take with that? When am I supposed to be \u201cdone\u201d with grieving? How long is \u201ctoo long\u201d?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

What is \u201cNormal?\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

So what is \u201cnormal grieving?\u201d Let\u2019s take a look at some social, cultural and religious norms for grieving around the world.<\/p>\n

Here are some examples of what is considered normal grieving in different cultures:<\/p>\n