One aspect or "stage" of grief that I don't feel I've truly experienced yet is anger. Anger doesn't sit well with me. I have a great deal of trouble expressing anger. But I have often wondered if, by not having experienced that part of the spectrum of grief-driven emotions, I have found myself still so desperately sad after six years. And I'm not sure how to access that obviously repressed emotion.
The thing is, Chris and I were able to come to peace with his cancer and its teminal diagnosis. We spent the last year of his life loving each other, mourning what would be the end of our wonderful life together, but accepting that this was the hand we had been dealt. We thought we were being very pragmatic, but were we? Has that decision to make the best out of tragic situation continued with me and held me back?
I just can't understand how being angry changes anything. No matter how I rail against the fates, my anger isn't going to change the fact that Chris died. Did Chris and I feel the emotions that come with grief - of course we did. But neither of us felt comfortable being angry. The truth is, we were so incredibly well suited to each other, we rarely disagreed about anything. Our souls were so linked, we felt each other's feelings and emotions. Of course we spent time crying together and feeling short changed by life and fate. But I don't think we ever got angry.
I don't believe Chris and I considered ourselves somehow intellectually superior and able to rationalise our feelings. We knew we couldn't change anything by being angry, but perhaps that isn't the purpose of anger in grief. I need to consider this in greater depth. Maybe, if I am able to find that emotion deep within and I can release it in a constructive way, maybe my grief will ease up a bit. I think, even as years pass by, we learn from grief. Perhaps I have more to learn than I realised.
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I love this study of violets. In his last year, Chris was unable to go far from home and couldn't carry his camera equipment. He stuck close to home, finding little treasures in our garden. What a lovely composition he made here. The photograph was taken of the flowers in the garden, but Chris used his skills in digital art to create this dramatic portrait of the flowers.
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