How We Grieve

Welcome to A New Life podcast with Pamela Jean, where it's all about empowering women to empower more women. Get ready, friends, to create a new life. And here is your host, Pamela Jean. Hello, my friends, and welcome to this week's episode of New Life podcast. I'm Pamela Jean, your host. Thanks for joining me today. Hey, friends, if you don't mind, will you please like and subscribe to this podcast and share it with your friends? It helps us get found on Google, it helps our algorithms and all those crazy things that we all want to do to be found in this world of the Internet. So I would really appreciate it if you could help me with that then. Also, if you don't mind leaving a review. If you've enjoyed A New Life podcast, please share a review. It just helps us grow our audience. And I want the world to hear some of this content because I think it's really, really important. But today's topic is about how we grieve. And I picked this topic today because it is right around the time that I had one of the biggest grief events of my entire life. And it's around the time of my dad's death. He died 18 years ago. Yeah. Can you believe that? 18 years ago is when my father passed away. He was 58 years old. So he was not an old man by any stretch. He was a very young man when he died, which translates to me not being very old when I lost my dad. I would be remiss to say that I miss him. Wow. I miss him. Even after all of those years, I still miss him. I'm still triggered by crazy smells. Smells and sounds and food and tastes. I still can remember him. I can't look at a flannel jacket, you know, those quilted flannel jackets with the pearly snaps, and not think of my dad. So there's so many things that still resonate about him. But I want to dive into this topic because it's going to touch each of us at one point or another in our lives. And the grief process is, as much as it's a universal experience, everybody experiences grief. We also experience it differently. Universally, we're all going to experience grief in our life, but how it affects each of us is so, so different. It can be very challenging to navigate, especially in roles of leadership for inst. You know, grief is not only about the loss of a loved one. It can also stem from the loss of a job. Have you ever gotten your dream job and then only to have it taken away from you? That's like a grieving process. You know, maybe the company went bankrupt or they were bought out by another company and your position was eliminated. You know, there's a lot of different reasons for that, but it was your dream job and you loved it, and it was your identity. You wrapped your identity around that job and that was taken from you. So you not only lost your income, but you lost your identity. That is difficult. That's hard. Relationships, relationships. If you have gone through a divorce or lost what you thought was a best friend, that is a grieving process. You know, it's like if you've been through a divorce, I think you might be able to identify that it's the loss of the dream, the loss of the life you thought you were going to have. There's a grieving process that comes along with that. As leaders and as just people, it's crucial to understand how grief impacts ourselves, our teams, and our organizations, because it will impact us. So let's talk a little bit about understanding the stages of grief. And I know if you've lost a loved one, but you may not think that, how can you compare the loss of a loved one compared to the loss of a relationship or of a job? You know, as I said, grief is a universal experience, but each of us will go through it differently. So to judge whose grief is greater or lesser is really irrelevant because the grief process is very real to whoever is going through the grief process. So let's just talk a little bit about the stages of grief. There's five stages, really, that I want to just point out. There's denial, there's anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. You know, these stages are not linear, and individuals may move back and forth between them and absolutely will experience them differently. The loss of my dad, I can't say that I really went through anger. No, I did go through anger. Definitely did. I wouldn't say that I connected with depression. I can't say that I was really depressed. I was sad because I missed him, but I wasn't clinically depressed and needed help walking through that. But I was definitely angry. I'm not going to lie about that, because, you know, it's like, wow, he was 58 years old, healthy in so many ways, had been diagnosed misdiagnosed. Kidney cancer is what he had, but they didn't discover the kidney cancer until it was just in a stage four raging in his body, that by the time they discovered it, there was not much they could do. Like most men, my dad was not one to go to the doctor, and I Can honestly say I'm not one to go either. So I can't really, you know, blame him for that. Well, I can blame him for that, because maybe that's why I don't go. Anyway, I digress, but he was misdiagnosed with. With backaches, with a kidney stone, with just, you know, you're working too hard. You need to slow down those types of things. And the. The cancer itself was not really discovered until. Wow. The tumor was so big, and it was so wrapped up into the other veins and arteries, it was not operable. So, you know, obviously that was difficult. So. Anger. Yeah, I was angry. God, why did you take him so soon? What the heck? I mean, how. How can I not have My dad. And I would love to call my dad today and ask him questions. He was. He could fix anything and just. Just be able to lean in on him on some of those things. I do miss him a lot. So anger I definitely went through. Instead of depression, I'm gonna say sadness, and I definitely went through an acceptance process. The triggers don't hurt as much as they used to. Sometimes the smells bring tears to my eyes, but I don't weep. You learn to adjust yourselves with those triggers, and you do find ways to work through it. But, you know, in leadership, it's essential to recognize that grief doesn't have a timeline. Some people bounce back quickly, and other people need more time and support. And it is okay there. Like I said, there's not a right or a wrong. Now, there's maybe a fine line of someone taking advantage of leadership or taking advantage of a situation. But as leaders, we do have to create a safe space, space for people to express their emotions and be available to them, to offer the empathy and the understanding with some. Some boundaries, a little bit of boundaries, with reasonable. You don't want someone to stay a victim of a loss, because staying a victim of anything, honestly, is not going to serve you or them or anybody. So having that fine line of empathy and understanding and allowing space for people to feel the grief that they're in, but how do we effectively lead through grief? What does that look like? It's okay for us to show some vulnerability and express our own grief, as I have with you today. You know, I lost my grandfather when I was in my 20s, but that was. He was old. You know, to me, he was old. So losing someone elderly just seems like a natural process of life. So that really didn't impact me much. But losing my dad when he was only 58 years old, and I'm not far from 58, so it's a little bit of a weird thought that, you know, if I followed his path, I would be gone in two years. That's just so weird to think about. And what would he have done differently if he knew he only had two years left to live? You know, I think about that a lot. But being vulnerable and able to express your own grief just helps build some authentic trust and strength. Strengthens connections with your team, with the people that you work with, or your family or your friends. And secondly, communication is vital. Keep the lines of communication open. If you are walking through grief with someone, if. If someone you know and love is suffering, you know, surmountable grief, keep the lines of communication open and encourage honest dialogue. Let your team member or your friends or whoever it is know that it's okay to talk about their feelings, and you're always there to support them. And I think sometimes if we are witnessing someone going through grief, we don't know what to say. And I don't want to ask him because I don't want him to cry. I don't want to make him feel bad. But avoidance, avoidance is only going to make it worse for the person suffering the grief, and it's going to draw a wedge between your friendship, between your communication. So just say, hey, you know, I don't know how you're feeling today, but I just want you to know that I'm thinking of you, that you are on my mind. And if you want to talk about your dad, talk about your spouse, talk about your friend, whatever, I'm here for you. That is really all the grieving person needs to know. But keep that communication open and don't avoid talking about the person they love. Just say, hey, do you want to talk about so and so? Do you want to talk about your dad? If you want to talk about your dad, I would love to hear stories about your dad. I would love to hear stories about your son or your daughter. Be open about that and don't make it taboo to talk about it because, oh, I don't want to make them mad. You know, provide support. Provide support. You know, figure out ways that you can support the person grieving by listening that listening ear. Or if it's a work situation, if it's one of your employees, work out some flexible work hours. Offer them some counseling services or coaching. Remember that your leadership is not just about achieving goals. It's about caring for the people that work for you. It's caring for the people that are part of your life. That are walking through a dark place because of grief and loss. You know, there's one thing that is 100% universal for you and for me, is that we are both going to die at some point. Our lives are not going to last forever. You know, we know that, right? We know that to be true. But how you walk through grief, knowing that and help someone else walk through grief is just so, so important. So it's like, you know you're going to die at some point, and you know that you will suffer some sorts of loss at some point. And it's important that you keep those lines of communication open. When you walk through grief with someone, it can be such a catalyst for some incredible growth. Individuals and friendships and teams can develop resiliency, empathy, and a deeper appreciation for life. The precious moments, life, you know, when we go through hard times together as friends or colleagues or business people, we become closer together by going through adversity. Those hard times are really an opportunity to grow in your relationship, to grow in your friendships. We can guide our friendships and our teams through this journey and really come out on the other side so much stronger and better for it. Have you ever had a situation where you looked back and you thought, wow, that was so awful. I so did not like going through that experience. But on the other side, I am really glad I did because I am better for it. That is the same thing with grief. Whether it's the loss of a loved one, the loss of a career, the death of a relationship, the death of a marriage or a family, you can come out stronger on the other side of it. You absolutely can. And it's so possible. So I just want to leave you with a few thoughts. You know, when my dad died, I knew. Well, no, I didn't know at first. Of course at first. When we found out of his diagnosis, I really thought that he was going to fight it and win because my dad was strong and he was stubborn. So I thought strength and stubbornness would get him through anything, right? But as I said before, the cancer was so far gone and so fully developed and immersed in his kidneys, it was not operable. I had a visual of, oh, we'll just take out one kidney. You can live on one kidney, and that's no big deal. That wasn't to be. So I watched him fight for his life with countless different drug protocols and experimental treatments and this, that, and the other thing. For two years. For two years, I watched him fight. And, you know, I asked for a miracle. I prayed for a miracle. And when I was talking to a doctor about, you know, about my dad. I said, you know, I was really praying for a miracle. And the doctor looked at me and he said, well, you got. You got one. I'm like, got a miracle. How do you figure? My dad's not one. My dad passed away. How is that a miracle? He said, the miracle is that your dad lived two years with stage four kidney cancer. That's your miracle. And that really hit me because I thought, wow, that is just so, so true. But the blessing and the hidden gift in the loss of my father is that I had two years to let him know how much he meant to me. I had two years to tell him all the things I wanted to tell him. And fortunately, he was able to tell me all of those things, too. And that was such a beautiful gift. So I was grateful for the two years knowing he wasn't going to live, as opposed to someone who might lose a loved one in an accident just out of the blue, not aware, and not have those two years to say what you want to say and do what you want to do with each other. So I'm grateful that I had that. I'm grateful for the cancer. I'm grateful for the time I had with him. But, friends, if you can lead your friendships, your business, with your employees, with your staff, with empathy, compassion, and understanding, you can help develop teams and relationships to navigate those stormy, stormy seas of grief and emerge stronger on the other side. It is absolutely possible to do that. I don't wish grief on anyone because it is a hard walk to walk. But I will say the grief that I've experienced in my life personally has made me better. I am better because of it, and I learned a lot through it. And I know if you are listening to this today and you are walking through the beginning stages of grief or whatever stage you're in, you know, I've had a lot of years to process this, whatever that looks like for you. I can promise you what you're going through right now is going to make you better. You're going to be better for it, and because of it. You may not be able to see it right now, but I promise you, you eventually will. My friends, thank you so much for joining me today. I really appreciate your time. And if you are walking through grief today and you want someone to talk to, reach out to me, send me a dm. Send me an email. Pamela Je. I would love to have a conversation with you. We'll see you next time. Thank you for joining us today on a New Life podcast. We will see you next time.