Kaveri and I drew a picture to show what we’d done together since we met over a year ago
Our mini team
Tag: grief
Tipping point (and disconnection).
I’m rereading this book.
“Transactive memory is part of what intimacy means….. it is the loss of this kind of joint memory that helps to make divorce so painful. .. They once were able to discuss their experiences to reach a shared understanding…. The loss of transactive memory feels like losing a part of one’s own mind.” Page 189
I can vouch for that and more, having ‘lost’ the two women Liz and MAnjula—Manjula and Liz, that were so critically important to me in my life.
There’s much in this book to recommend it.
Now in Manjula’s library
Meet an important person
Please say hello to Kaveri
Over two years ago I asked friends to keep an eye out for a young girl who I might support in Manjula’s name.
There’s no shortage of children experiencing challenging circumstances here in India. I wanted to find someone with a similar background to MAnjula but no one came forward.
Then one day in the park opposite our house I heard a helloooooo.
My first introduction to Kaveri
Shortly after that first meeting I was using Manjula’s ‘flash cards’ to discover how much English she knew.
This video shows how she responded by turning the tables on me
I was impressed with her confident assertiveness with a foreigner she’d only just met.
Yesterday Sowbaghya who has become indispensable at Mysore Bed and Breakfast and Radikha Kaveri’s aunty who’s more like a sister and I were reflecting with kaveri on how she’d changed over this last year or so.
I’d clearly spotted a smart cookie, confident and assertive a good communicator. She’s carried along that same track
Yesterday reading a pictorial version of the Little Prince she was confidently tackling unfamiliar words switching to phonetic pronunciation where necessary.
She’s important in my life for many reasons not least for helping me manage my grief. Growing to help me fill the space around it.
I look forward to our continuing time together and helping her continue to grow her beautiful character.
Grumpy old man
One of my first clients as a student social worker was an old man.
He was seriously grumpy
We would joke about where grumpiness came from.
Was it inherent in the person? Was it learned through experience? Did it arrive with old age?
I now know the answer.
It’s all three
The key factor though is we can choose to be grumpy or not.
I was more grumpy, especially over the past few years, now I’m a bit less.
and I’ve not got the T shirt.
Footnote
As I can’t stop talking, writing, wording….
One flavour of grumpy is anger and I realise it’s derived from being sad. Another is post trauma and the impact it has.
Visit Manjula’s library there’s lots to discover that might help.
Me, I’m still working on it.
Grief and grieving
I have to say something about this….. but I’m not ready to yet, beyond the following…
… I’ve just had helpful discussions with my sons. It’s critical to be heard.
Other friends have fedback that they’ve recently seen a real difference in me.
“Grief is not one thing, and it is not linear. It looks and feels different for everyone, and it can hit you at any point – even months or years after the fact.” From this article in the Guardian Newspaper.
In my view it keeps coming in waves.
The Guardian feature writer Emine Saner reports on the acceptance of grief as a medical condition
I don’t recognise this, but as I say — it’s different for everyone.
There is the risk of ‘pathologising” ie to ‘label’ things unhelpfully and somehow blame the individual.
But back to the first point, I believe grief after we lose someone is always with us, as I’ve said before it’s a new life-long-friend that we have to learn to live with for the rest of our lives.
We don’t get over it, yes it changes particularly through the process of grieving but it remains with us.
I say again .. we don’t ‘get over it’ and such statements can be at the very least unhelpful.
I understand however that there are some situations when the raw roughness of grief can be absolutely debilitating. At times it has been for me.
I have however valued the opportunity to share my feelings online and directly with friends. To celebrate Manjula and shout about her from the virtual treetops. That helped.
To reiterate … the bottom line is that this situation is unique for everyone and we all deal with it differently.
and … It never goes away.
More later.
Getting it
Poor Sowbaghya has to listen when Lucie has shown me the paw and Billet-Doux treats the place like a hotel.
Are they giving me a not-so-hidden message?
OK, I’ve bored her, explaining how (she knows) I read a lot, so have a broad knowledge (superficial) of many things.
That includes what to do about my current situation.
The problem is : we know stuff but do we act on it? We may have received the information but it’s not sunk in or led to the necessary change.
It’s as if I’m in an automatic Photo Booth that’s lead lined or surrounded by an (iron) curtain that stops the information getting through. I get it but not enough as it does not lead to action.
For example Kanchana gave me the ‘secret’ book and Tom has provided all sorts of positive insights—many others have helped— but it’s not led to the realisation of awareness and ‘action.’
You know the sort of stuff.
Well it began to fall into place this week. The timings right on the fourth anniversary of losing MAnjula
For more than four years there’s been a volcanic reaction, starting with the denial, then the acute shock of loss followed by the slow constant grinding down of grief.
Leading to anger and intolerance, to myself and others. it’s all so wrong… that negativeness is not what MAnjula (aka Full Full) and I are about.
It’s had its ups as well as downs and I’m generally quite robust (or so I thought) but the biggest challenge is the blame, the guilt, the what-ifs, wrapped up in depression. I have the overall feeling that I’ve let Manjula down and now I can’t do anything about it as she’s not physically with me anymore.
But I can …
learn to forgive myself, let the past be there, continue to celebrate MAnjula and as Louise says
“Life is really very simple. What we give out, we get back”
I really believe that but now need to act on it.
I remind Kaveri to ‘be kind’ and I need to listen and act on it myself and with myself
Hay’s book appeared in Manjula’s library, on the 23rd March, a gift from Rakesh
Farrell Factoid
Goes without saying, listening is an integral part of this process. This popped up today.
Ina
Ina leaves … The premises and now I’m sad.
Ina from Adelaide was Manjula’s closest friend., amongst our guests
It was as if there was an essence of MAnjula wafting back here with me, as she regaled me with the stories of the times they’d spent together. More dimensions of my wonderful were revealed.
They’d sometimes, maybe usually arrange for Ina to visit when I was away.
I can’t think why.
After first visiting in 2014 she was back in 2015, shortly after we got engaged and then each year with breaks solely due to the pandemic.
In 2018 we had a great time (yes I was allowed to be here) celebrating Manjula’s 45th birthday, also hosting our first ‘ workawayer ‘ Willian from Brazil.
During this visit which lasted two months! The longest ever. 👍🏽🤔🤭🙂
We went to a traditional dance to share with MAnjula. Then made a special celebration of Manjula’s Birthday as Ina had missed our big event in August on her birthday itself.
Led Lucie astray.
… revisited places on Srirangaptnam close to MAnjula and I, that had featured in our wedding.
Ina together with reading ‘a pocketful of happiness’ by Richard E Grant has helped me realise — as oddball in Kelly’s Heroes would say: “less of those negative waves man,” —- that I’ve allowed the grief gravy to engulf me leaving angry bitter negativeness in its forever trail.
So I’m going to sort it and get myself back on track to rewrite our story with one or two innovative tweaks.
Ina’s farewell note:
Stephen having Manjula in my life was one of the best things that happened to me, I still think of her a lot and she continues to be a great inspiration.
Tears again
Should I be Retracing steps?
After meeting up with our mysore BnB family at WOMAD and knocking on a few of their doors I went camping.
I shouldn’t have been.
It proved to be a tonic.
over to bee-man Stephen to drop our beautiful tent, return the fancy hire car and prepare to return home
In my experience, when grieving, we regularly get ambushed by memories of magical times together. They make me both happy and sad. I’ve learned not to run away but to face them, even create them, so it was ok to retrace my steps.
Thank you for joining my journey and your support.
Making different connections
Great things happen unexpectedly, just when you need them.
I’d just finished packing my bags, here in Vancouver, ready for the flight back to London, when Sharon — a friend of my son Oliver — came calling to say farewell.
What a wonderful surprise.
To be able to have an open conversation of the trials and tribulations of dealing with our lifelong unwanted friend yes….. grief
No one can ever know what it’s like for another but we’ve come pretty close.
It isn’t about ‘getting over it’ … both of us remember and celebrate — not only in our hearts — but also the physical reminders, the photos, the wonderfulness and the flotsam of souls grown together. We have both kept our original house and are surrounded by the loved one we fondly remember, deal with the difficult times, but also continue to laugh together.
Thank you Sharon, a great new friend
It’s good to share, as I have done personally and online. As reflected in this article.
After life
New park benches are sponsored by Netflix linked to Ricky Gervais’s series, in association with a charity tackling mental health issues.
They’ve placed them in different locations in the U.K.
An insightful series dealing with his reactions after the death of his wife. It helped me and it resonates with so many of the impacts of the loss.
We’ve done it too
Manjula’s Mysore had previously installed benches in a museum garden and the park opposite our house.
Me and MYCycle 