Comparing Grief: A Useless Endeavor

Understanding Grief / Understanding Grief : Eleanor Haley



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I was struck by something WYG guest blogger, Nick Frye, said in his article Self-care in Grief: The Myth of Keeping Busy.  Somewhat unrelated to his main topic was the opening line to another important discussion.  He said…

“Isn’t it…true that every relationship is unique and therefore we all have our own unique experience with grief? After all, even a well-meaning friend who has had a parallel loss does not know how you feel. What we all do share is the experience of a broken heart because we lost someone/thing we love.”

When Nick spoke about his wife’s head injury I recognized his grief, but only because I had a similar experience.  Several years ago my brother was in a terrible car accident and ended up in a coma.  For 2 weeks we stood on the edge of a cliff trying to pull him back into consciousness; finally, his strength won and, little by little, he re-entered the world.  We, his friends and much of his family, celebrated and then returned to our normal lives.

But recovering from a life-altering brain injury is no quick or easy thing and while the rest of us carried on as though nothing had changed, my brother, his wife and his children were left to walk hundreds and hundreds of miles - sometimes lost, sometimes angry, always carrying more weight than any one person should bear - towards a life they no longer even recognized.  I can never know the depths of their loss, but I realized it was real and it needed to be grieved.

Even before WYG, I spent a lot of time on grief websites and I've often noticed comments from people who identify with the feelings of grief but don't feel their particular loss is important enough to say they are 'grieving'.  There is the feeling that different types of losses - an early pregnancy, a beloved pet, an elderly grandparent - cannot or should not elicit the same grief response as someone who has lost a spouse or a parent, for example, and therefore the classification of 'grief' does not belong to them.

But I ask you if it’s not grief then what is it?

There are probably a few people out there saying to their computer screen, but it’s not the same, and you're right...no one’s grief is the same.  As Nick pointed out, blanket comparisons can’t be made for even parallel losses. Regardless of the type of loss, no one can know the extent of another’s pain and sorrow.  Although grief is grief, how you experience it is as unique as you and me.

Comparing Loss copy

There is no equation for summing up the grief felt after any particular type of death.  We cannot say that father minus child = x amount of pain, or husband minus wife = x amount of sadness.  It just doesn’t work that way.  Sometimes we want it to; either because we know someone who is grieving and we want them to believe ‘we understand’ or because we are lonely in our grief and we want to be able to relate to others with similar losses.  Unfortunately, the complexity of relationships makes this impossible.

Gestalt theorist Kurt Koffka said,

“The whole is other than the sum of its parts”

… today we more often hear people say…

“The whole is greater than the sum of its parts”

Although not necessarily its original implication, it’s a theory that holds true when talking about relationships.

The equation You + Me = Us is cute but it does not compute.  ‘Us’ is composed of much more than the sum of two individuals in a relationship; it’s a system, not a linear equation.  Take a marriage for example; there’s a husband, a wife, and everything that exists in between. Emotions felt towards one another, how they relate to one another, unresolved issues, how their lives intertwine, their children, how they help define each other, how they help support one another, dependency, history, perceived future, needs, intimacy, routine, sex, love...the list goes on.

When one spouse dies you can’t simply subtract them out of the equation, the whole system is thrown off.  Bills, children, household chores, companionship, affection - all these things were previously striving towards equilibrium in the system.  Remove one person and everything must be renegotiated and redefined. You can’t possibly know what it means for someone's spouse to die, it will impact their lives in ways not even they would have expected.

Our experience with the aftermath of a death, the 'grief', is a culmination of who and what we lost and our individual ability to cope with this.  Our tolerance for pain differs and we all feel varying shades of hurt.  Loneliness, absence, regret, need, longing, guilt, stress, lack of support - how much of this do you live with and how much can you tolerate?

Even within a family, the same loss will affect individuals differently.  It would be useless to compare my grief to my sisters; her worldview is different, her support system is different, and her feelings towards death and dying are not the same.  I live with a lot of regrets, does she?  She has nightmares about my mother, do I?  Although I can probably identify and relate to aspects of her pain, I can never fully understand it.

Grief is the loss of something we love and at its core, it is complex, complicated, and sneaky.  It is something that stays with us forever. Its depth, its trajectory, and its timing are often unpredictable and surprising. We are limited in our ability to truly understand another's grief because most of us have yet to fully understand our own. What we do have in common, is the experience of a broken heart and the wisdom to feel compassion for others facing similar pain. What we can do is remember that it isn't something to be judged. Grief isn't a problem to be solved; grief is a weight we forever carry.

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23 Comments on "Comparing Grief: A Useless Endeavor"

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  1. Marissa  September 11, 2020 at 3:00 pm Reply

    Hello Everyone, I was pleased to see this topic re-visited on the WYG forum. Feelings are hurt and friendships are fractured by the insensitive comments of those who consider their grief to be worse. I lost my beloved sister suddenly & traumatically only 2 years ago. I was older, and growing up I was often referred to as her “2nd mother.” I could not wait for her to be born. She was my soul-mate and best friend, my past, present, and what would have been my future. She was not supposed to go first. Throughout this painful grief journey, I have come to find that adult sibling loss is often minimized, and low on the “hierarchy” of grief. Even at a bereavement group, I heard a member comment that, losing a sibling is hard, “but nothing like losing a spouse and life partner.” Well, my sister “WAS” my life partner.
    I know someone who took a lot of criticism for saying her dog’s death was worse than that of her husband. I supported her and told her she had a right to her feelings, especially since her marriage was not a very good one. Recently her estranged adult daughter died. She refused to see her daughter for 15 years, nor allow her to visit. She was angry that her daughter was a substance abuser, who ended up with serious medical problems that ultimately led to her death in her late 50’s. When my sister died this person was initially supportive, but later said “What about me, I lost my dog.” (back to the comparisons). When I called to offer condolences about her daughter, I again offered support, and did not judge her as others did, for not seeing her daughter all those years. She wanted to change the subject and asked what was happening with me. I simply responded by sharing that lockdown has given me too much time to think about my sister, and intensify my grief. I barely finished my sentence before she abruptly said “I lost my daughter and you are still crying about your sister.” I found myself apologizing, but then feeling hurt and confused. I will never stop crying about my sister. I should not have had to apologize for that. One loss need not invalidate another. A past poster aptly summed it up “The amount of space the person takes up in your life & heart, determines the intensity of the grief.” Well said and something to consider when we respond to another’s loss.
    Thank you for listening.

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  2. Joe  March 3, 2020 at 4:15 pm Reply

    Vicky is right, there is NOTHING compared to losing your child, NOTHING. Not saying that your loss and grief isn’t bad, it is.

    Just consider your self lucky if your grieving is something other that losing your child. TRUST me on this one, I speak from experience ;(

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  3. Bri  June 21, 2019 at 1:52 pm Reply

    Thank you, and you are so right. While its true that certain losses are more, shall I say, “tragic” than others (for example, losing a young child vs losing a grandparent who lived a long life), there are certainly many factors that affect how we grieve, ie: How close were you to that person? Were you dependent on them? Was the way they died traumatic/unexpected? Did you play a hand in their death? Did you have a good support system when they passed? All of these factors play a part in our grief response. Even someone who has experienced the same type of loss will not be able to relate entirely. For instance, one person’s relationship to their grandparents may be completely different than another person’s relationship to theirs. I’ve had friends who barely knew their grandparents, and friends who were raised by their grandparents. It stands to reason that losing a grandparent who filled the role of parent might be harder than losing a grandparent you only saw occasionally. Likewise, losing a loving parent can have a greater impact than losing an abusive or absent parent. Or, losing parents might be more devastating/stressful to an only child dealing with the loss on their own than it is for someone with siblings who share their grief. What if the diseased person, regardless of relationship, was the only family the bereft had? These are just a few examples, but the point is that grief is not black and white. That is what people need to understand. I am in no way trying to minimalize the loss of a child. I do realize that, generally speaking, losing a child affects people more profoundly than other types of losses because it disrupts the natural order of things. Furthermore, its a parent’s job and instinct to protect and nurture their children, so losing a child can lead to intense feelings of failure and guilt. My mother lost a son and I lost my brother, but I do not pretend to understand how she feels. I have no children of my own, so I can’t imagine what its like. I know it affected her more than it did me. Even 12 years later, she struggles with it daily. But while my pain might not be comparable to hers, that doesn’t mean my own grief isn’t valid, yet sometimes I feel like its a competition with her. She has reminded me (and others) on many occasions that nobody can understand her grief. And she’s right, we can’t, because her grief is her own. But our grief is our own, too, and its frustrating when she feels the need to “one up” everybody. It seems like nobody can talk about their losses or hardships without her making the conversation about her. I just try to remind myself that she is hurting and this is how she deals with HER grief.

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  4. Bebe  March 11, 2019 at 1:48 pm Reply

    I agree with the premise of not comparing. I can’t imagine the loss of a child. I don’t have children, however, I recognize that it is an “out of order” loss that affects everything in the future. Every Mother’s Day, birthday, holiday, school event, graduation, possible marriage and grandkids… Constant reminders of a future that should have been.

    This is not to take away or minimize others.

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  5. Diana  October 13, 2018 at 1:18 am Reply

    Deboorah and Robert,

    Thank you for addressing the judgments Tiffab and Vicki are making. Their comments are not only inappropriate and judgmental- they reek of some sort of grief superiority complex by which they created a hierarchy where they are at the top of the food chain. Grief hurts, everyone’s experience is unique. Kindness and compassion go a long way.

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  6. B.  August 1, 2017 at 3:23 pm Reply

    I have been thinking about this since you posted this last month. I think the loss of a child (which has happened to me) is different from other losses. It grates on me when people tell me about their grandparents dying or even their parents. Not the same at all. I have lost all of my grandparents and my father. Nothing has shaken my beliefs about just about everything like suddenly losing my young adult son has done.

    I have not lost a spouse, but I am sure THAT loss is devastating. And sibling loss, also. I have watched my youngest child struggle greatly after losing his beloved big brother.

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  7. Laurel Alfred  July 14, 2017 at 12:48 pm Reply

    Thank you for this. I have never been comfortable with the idea of thinking that one loss is greater than another. I have come to the conclusion that the amount of space the lost one takes up in your life and your heart determines the intensinity of grief we feel. I lost my spouse 3 years ago, and the pain is there every minute, and rarely lessens. I have a friend who never married or had children, the loss of her parent was devastating to her, and continues to be so. Another friend lost her spouse of over 30 years to divorce, over 12 years ago, and she too, feels the pain of that loss to this day, in a most painful way. To me, trying to compare grief is a hurtful action, and I love that you have put this in words in such an understandable way.

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  8. Robert  September 18, 2016 at 12:42 am Reply

    With some people its like a sick game of oneupsmanship. You’rs isnt so bad, mine is way worse. So someone confides in you about grief or guilt theyre feeling. You trust them on some level to be sharing those things and the only thing they decide to do is tell you how much worse theirs is to yours? Whats wrong with saying , “i cant even imagine how bad that would be” and just listen. Its not a competition for gods sakes

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  9. Vicki  August 30, 2015 at 9:24 pm Reply

    I have recently lost my youngest child. I have talked to many mothers before and after that have had multiple losses of brothers, sisters, spouses, parents, etc, including my own grandmother, who lost all before she died. Not one has ever said anything other than the fact that losing a child is the worst, most devastating loss they ever faced. I don’t see how anything could ever compare. Anyone that says differently has never lost a child.

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    • Eleanor  August 31, 2015 at 11:48 am Reply

      Vicki,

      It is not that we don’t recognize how devastatingly painful the death of a child can be, it’s just that we believe there is little use in comparing grief. We can never really know what another person is experiencing and no one could ever know the depths of another’s pain. In the end, what good does comparing grief do to help either person heal? Very little as far as we can tell, and yet it happens all the time.

      If you see a benefit in comparison that we don’t, we genuinely would love to know more about your perspective. But from our perspective when we start to make judgements or view our own pain in relation to our assumptions about others, we run the risk of making people feel further isolated and misunderstood. I’m sorry about the death of your youngest child. I’m sure not a minute goes by that they aren’t dearly missed.

      Sincerely,
      Eleanor

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      • Vicki  September 1, 2015 at 10:46 am

        Only those that have lost a child can understand that pain. Nothing prepares you for that.

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      • Deborah  February 20, 2016 at 1:07 pm

        That is your experience. You just gutted me by stating the death of my husband isn’t as awful as the death of your child. I don’t have a child, so I guess you `win’ in who has it worse. Happy? Thanks for making the death of my husband utterly irrelevant in terms of my grief. You have it worse, you’d gladly trade places because what I’m experiencing is a cake-walk, in comparison. I’m so tired of people saying there’s nothing worse than the loss of a child. It’s a generalized statement that only serves to elevate one type of suffering while minimizing the pain carried by those whose loss doesn’t involve a child. Each experience is unique-and it could be said some parent/child relationships are not good or healthy or loving while a relationship between a 93 year old and a 89 year old is like one soul dwelling in two bodies-so when one dies the others grief is more devastating than that of a parent and child who wrren’t close. JUst stop making assumptions about who has it worse. Each experience is unique. Comfort the person with a simple”I’m so sorry .” Let them grieve and never ever suggest it could be worse. It inly adds to the pain.

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      • James  November 10, 2017 at 1:25 am

        Thanks for this comment, it just helped me a lot. My best friend committed suicide and his father keeps saying “its different when it was your son”. Or “a parents loss is different” things similar to that. He mentions these things every time i say his son meant the world to me or if i say anything about how devastated i am. So it makes my word feel meaningless or less than.

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      • pietro  March 8, 2018 at 11:02 am

        Hi deborah

        you are absolutely right.

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      • Natalue  March 12, 2016 at 7:49 pm

        Nothing prepares you for the loss of anyone! Especially of someone who passes away early in their life. And it doesn’t matter how much of your DNA the other person has. It doesn’t determine the pain you feel! You can only feel your own pain, your own grief and you can never ever compare your pain to anyone elses – since you’re not the other person and you simply do not know how they feel. That is very rude and insensitive thing to do.

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  10. Tiffab  February 21, 2015 at 8:28 pm Reply

    Sorry, but I have to disagree with you here. In fact, these types of questions are not outside of the realm of social science. For instance, you could set up an experiment in which you compare 1,000 50-year-old people who have lost a parent to 1,000 appropriately matched 50 year olds who have lost a child. You could administer tests that assess the amount of grief that people are experiencing. In this case, it is a total no-brainer that the loss of a child is going to result in more serious grief symptoms that the loss of a parent. In other words, losing a child at that age is worse that losing a parent. While there may be a few odd cases that do not follow this rule, it is a general truth nonetheless. Losing a child is also worse that losing a cat. Yes, there may be two cases out of 1,000 in which people don’t care much for their kids and like their cats better. But that is pretty unusual and does not prevent us from generalizing. To suggest otherwise is disrespectful toward those people who have experienced profound losses.

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    • Litsa  February 22, 2015 at 8:19 am Reply

      Tiffab, I think that you had misunderstood what we intended from this post. We completely agree that there are certain losses from which we can almost always see extremely intense feelings of grief. The crux of this article is understanding our concern that many people feel certain losses ‘cannot or should not elicit the same grief response as someone who has lost a spouse or a child and therefore the classification of ‘grief’ does not belong to them.’ The goal of this post was to help people understand that grief is about how you’re feeling, and no one can tell you that you are not grieving. On some of our other posts there have been many long debates in comments about comparing grief. I think many people are surprised when they see individuals who have lost a child do speak up, saying that it actually was not the ‘worst’ grief they experienced. In fact, One thing that has come up in comments here, on Facebook, and in my work in person with grievers, is people talking about the loss of a spouse that occurs after the loss of a child. Though many people who lose a child suffer in their marriage afterwards, the reality is that spouses do in some cases support each other tremendously in their grief. We have heard a surprising number of parents who have lost children say that when their spouse died later, they actually felt more intense grief because they no longer have anyone left to support them, and the person who would have always been such a tremendous support to them in their grief is now gone. We completely, 100% agree with the idea that we can study different types of loss and the impact they have and see trends. But we have to be responsible about how we apply that information. The point we are making in this article is that you can never know for sure what another individual is personally experiencing with their grief, and it is dangerous to assume, and at the end of the day it is not really anyone else’s place to assume. There is no question that we will all assume that the loss of a child is a devastating and profound loss. That is a given. What becomes dangerous is thinking that other losses, for specific individuals, can’t be profound. It is then disrespectful to their losses to minimize them, or make them feel as though they don’t have the right to grieve their losses in the same way as someone who has experienced a loss that is typically assumed to be ‘worse’. Having worked with hundreds of grievers over the years, I never stop being surprised at how many times those assumptions we make about who in the family will be most deeply impacted by a loss end up being completely wrong. I think the exceptions to the rule are actually very common, which is why it is so important that we treat each individual as just that, an individual. We talk to them about their unique grief experience. Sometimes our grief experience is connected to the other support system in our lives, our general resilience, how well we have been able to navigate past losses, the impact of other secondary losses that may accompany the loss, our coping skills, our relationship to the person who died, and a million other things. When we stop focusing just on comparing broad categories of losses, and think about all of those individual factors that impact people every day, I think we end up being more respectful to everyone in their grief. It doesn’t mean we don’t acknowledge that some losses are generally absolutely and completely devastating, we just apply that information in a more responsible way and remember that they are not the only losses that can be completely and absolutely devastating.

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  11. Traci  October 3, 2014 at 5:12 am Reply

    i lost my husband of 22 yrs. to stage 4 lung and brain cancer….he had been ill for many years before….
    after he passed my mom had the ‘guts’ or something to compare my hubby to my dad….
    my parents were married 16 yrs. and i heard all kinds of bad things from my mom growing up…about him….i was only about 5 when they got divorced…..all i know is on more than 1 time…she said “dean deserted you, just like your dad did me”…..
    to me….i had a screwed up childhood….lol….and as you can tell still a screwed up adulthood…..lol……i miss my teddybear!! ❤

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    • Eleanor  October 3, 2014 at 10:12 am Reply

      Traci,

      Ohhh I’m so sorry about your husband. I know you must miss him so much. Ha…I’m not really sure what one can say about your mother’s comparison because clearly your husband did NOT desert you. As I’m sure you well know, sometimes you just have to brush it off. Ugh.

      Eleanor

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  12. Marty Tousley (@GriefHealing)  March 27, 2013 at 2:31 pm Reply

    Eleanor, this is such an important topic ~ and one that comes up frequently in my own practice as a grief counselor. Thank you for writing about it here! I’ve added a link to your article beneath my own Grief Healing Blog post, “Is Pet Loss Comparable to Loss of a Loved One,” here: https://j.mp/GZocuf

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    • Eleanor  March 27, 2013 at 3:39 pm Reply

      Thank you Marty! We loved your post on pet loss and are honored to be referenced. Of course we agree that all losses are different although some have a far greater impact than others. Regardless of where grief emotions fall on the spectrum they are still important to acknowledge and process one way or another.

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