“No matter what you feel, it will eventually pass. You won’t feel sad forever. At some point, you will feel happy again. You won’t feel anxious forever. Over time, you will feel calm again. You You don’t have to fight your feelings or feel guilty for having them. You just have to accept them and be kind to yourself while you get through them. Fighting your emotions and shaming yourself will only cause you more pain. , and you don’t deserve this. You deserve your own love, acceptance, and compassion.Lori Decheny
To this day, I still remember that phone call. After a tiring day at work, I just got home, put on my sneakers, and went for a jog. I left my phone on the table because I couldn’t take any more calls from clients that day.
While I was jogging, I suddenly felt something was wrong. I tried to shake it but I couldn’t. This feeling is very common, like an instinctive “knowing” that something terrible has happened.
I turned around and ran home. When I got there, I picked up my phone and saw twenty missed calls from my parents. I didn’t even have to call back. I know what it is.
I grabbed my car keys and started driving to find my mom. I called her while I was driving but she was so emotional and distraught that she could barely speak. Dad picked up the phone and asked me to come quickly. “Your brother…” he said. “Your brother is no longer with us.”
My brother was only twenty-eight at the time, two years younger than me, and he had decided enough was enough. His life was filled with severe anxiety and depression, which he tried to alleviate through alcohol and, I suspect, stronger drugs.
Of course, this isn’t always the case. He just wants to fit in—to find his place in society and achieve his goals. Nothing was more important to him than friends and family.
But society failed him time and time again. First, try to get him into a “one-size-fits-all” education system that doesn’t suit him. Then, after he was diagnosed with depression, he wanted to get help and heal himself, but doctors decided he was too happy and healthy to receive psychological care. He was dumped full of drugs which did nothing but worsen his physical and mental condition.
He had struggled with depression for years and battled Finland’s supposedly best medical system in the world, but he couldn’t take it anymore. He saw no other way out of the ongoing pain and suffering than to end it all.
As I recall, my brother was always outgoing and sociable. Nothing was more important to him than his friends and family. He was very open about it and the last thing he wanted to do was cause any pain or suffering to those closest to him. Or anyone else, for that matter.
But we, our parents and I, tried to understand what was going on and how to deal with it.
How not to cope with loss
The first few days, I was depressed. I couldn’t eat, sleep, or do anything but lie in bed and stare at the ceiling. I called my parents every day to make sure they were okay, but they didn’t know what to do either. They could offer me no comfort, and I could offer them nothing. I didn’t know what to do or how to deal with my emotions.
The days passed and I returned to my daily routine. My boss was very supportive and told me I could take as much time off as I needed. But I told him I was fine and said I had no intention of calling in sick.
That’s the only way I can deal with it: by working and taking my mind off what’s going on. The way I deal with my emotions is not to deal with them at all. I did everything I could so that I didn’t have to think about it: I worked, I hung out with friends, I did anything to distract myself except spend time thinking about what was happening.
Needless to say, this is not a healthy way to handle this situation.
Soon, I began to notice a complete lack of energy. Some days I couldn’t even get out of bed. I turned off my phone because I was too anxious to process anything and stayed in bed all day.
If I was dissatisfied with my job before, things seem even more frustrating now. I couldn’t find joy in anything and avoided social contact. I was irritable and unmotivated, even for things I used to enjoy
I thought things would improve over time. They say time is medicine. Not in my case. It feels like things are getting worse by the day. I checked out all the signs of severe depression and started thinking seriously about what my life was going to be like.
Then one night when I went to bed I was so tired of it all. I felt depressed and anxious, an empty shell of the happy extrovert I once was. I sighed, closed my eyes, and quietly asked myself: “What is the meaning of all this? What should I do? How can I overcome this difficulty?”
To my surprise, I received a reply.
“help.”
I don’t want to say it was divine intervention or anything like that. It’s more like being suddenly in touch with a long-forgotten wisdom deep within one’s own being. my purpose. The motivation behind every action I take.
Whatever it was, I knew at that moment that this was going to be my way out. The reason I didn’t heal over time was because I should have been helping myself by learning how to overcome depression and anxiety, and then helping others do the same. This became very clear to me.
I also understood the root of my problem. Depression, anxiety—all because I couldn’t handle the emotions surrounding my brother’s death. Heavy thoughts and emotions piled up, causing my body and mind to react negatively.
I vowed that I would find a way to release the thoughts and emotions related to what happened to my brother. I decided to be happy again. Happiness and good mental health—these will be my guiding principles in life.
The search for answers has been an arduous but rewarding journey. It took me months of thinking, researching, meditating, and seeking advice, but eventually I found the emotional blocks that were holding me back and a way to release them in a healthy way.
Now I want to share with you something that has helped me.
The purpose of sharing my personal experience is not to minimize or trivialize the unique pain you may be experiencing. Loss affects each of us differently, and there is no one-size-fits-all approach. My purpose in sharing this story and the next three stages of letting go is to provide comfort or insight to each of you on your own path to healing.
1. Give yourself permission to grieve.
The first stage, and our first natural response to the loss of a loved one, is grief, and the first mistake I made was not allowing myself to grieve.
If grief can be expressed naturally, it can be a powerful tool for coping with loss. It helps you let go when you can’t. It allows you to express and process your emotions, including sadness, anger and confusion, which are common reactions to bereavement.
Elisabeth Kübler-Ross identified five distinct stages of the grieving process:
- reject
- anger
- bargain
- frustrated
- acceptance
However, as you probably know, this process is highly personal. I never felt the need to deny what happened. I wasn’t angry about it or trying to bargain my way out of the situation.
Instead, I suppressed my sadness. I resorted to all the unhelpful coping methods such as overeating, drinking, working around the clock, etc. This led me to the fourth stage, depression, which kept me stuck for a long time.
Fortunately, grieving is easy. Just let it happen naturally and do it the way it wants to express itself.
If you allow yourself to express sadness, the sadness will disappear, or at least diminish. My mother unknowingly became an expert in this area. “I cried so much that I have no more tears to shed now,” she said. She had dealt with her grief and moved on from it faster than I had.
When you express your sadness naturally rather than trying to suppress it or ignore it, you can ultimately move beyond it. But if you learn to suppress your sadness instead of crying, your sadness can turn into melancholy, as it did in my case.
Recovering and recovering from the emotional pain and sadness associated with grief can take time. As my story demonstrates, recovery from loss, depression, and mental and physical health issues is possible, as dark as the situation may seem. When I finally allowed myself to grieve, I noticed a significant improvement in my mood. I felt lighter, had more energy, and suddenly, life didn’t seem so dark anymore.
2. Accept and forgive.
The second phase is to accept what happened and forgive those involved, including yourself, to reduce anger and resentment and ultimately create a sense of peace.
Essentially, forgiveness is a two-part process:
First, forgive yourself. We tend to blame ourselves even when there is nothing we can do about it. Chances are, you’ve done your best. But especially if you feel you made a mistake, forgiveness is crucial to healing. Go to the mirror and look into your eyes. Say, “I forgive you.” It will feel uncomfortable and difficult at first, but if you keep working at it, it will get easier and easier.
Second, forgive others. I firmly believe that deep down in our hearts, the people we have lost never wanted us to suffer. Forgive them and anyone you may blame for their pain. You can tell them in person, or close your eyes, imagine them in front of you, and say to them, “I forgive you.”
In the case of my brother, it was easy to see that his actions were not intended to cause pain or sorrow to others. He did this because it was the only way he knew how to deal with pain and depression.
I could have blamed my depression on his behavior, but I understood the pain and suffering he was in and why he had no choice.
It’s also easy for me to blame my parents for what happened. They had their own problems, including divorce and depression, which severely affected my brother and I. But the thought never crossed my mind. I love my parents and I believe they do their best to raise healthy, happy children.
Forgiving yourself is the hardest part. I believed that if I saw my brother more often, gave him more time, and listened to his concerns, I could somehow help him heal. It takes time and deep self-reflection to understand that we can’t change other people’s minds. In the best case, we can help them Change their minds, but we cannot make decisions for them. We each follow our own path in life, and our choices are ultimately our own to make.
I could have done anything to make a difference. I have now accepted this and forgiven myself and others.
3. Move forward with purpose.
For me, the most important part of moving on is finding meaning and purpose in loss. It can be as simple as reflecting on the positives of a relationship, a lesson learned, or the impact your loved one has had on your life.
For my part, I have decided to dedicate my life to passing on what I have learned so that no one else suffers the same fate as my brother. It was a profound calling that gave meaning to my brother’s life and purpose to everything I had to go through.
It was my way of honoring his memory and feeling like it finally gave my brother the meaning in his life that he had been looking for. He never found his place in the world, but now he will tell his story through me to help others live happy lives of purpose.
The beauty of life lies in its brevity
One truth about life is that it eventually ends. Therefore, we are bound to experience losses throughout our lives.
While letting go and moving on after a loss is undoubtedly one of the hardest things to do, that’s what we should do. There is no point in giving up on life just because we have lost someone dear to us. We can grieve for as long as we need to, but ultimately, acceptance and forgiveness paves the way for us to move on, regain joy, and honor those we have lost.
Remember: there is always hope and there is always someone willing to help. So whenever you feel like things are more than you can handle, don’t be afraid to ask for support. You don’t have to go through this alone.
