Grief

As a social worker we are many things.  We are advocates, we are policymakers, therapists, community organizers and we connect people to resources. We work in many settings.  We work in hospitals, hospice, child welfare, substance abuse treatment facilities, policy institutes, homeless shelters, adoption agencies, and psychiatric hospitals.  These lists are not all inclusive. The truth is social workers work everywhere and often do everything.  One of the most important roles we have is grief counselor.  This is easy to recognize in some settings such as hospice but it is true in all the settings we work.  

A social worker walks hand in hand with a client as they walk through grief.  As a community we recognize the grief of losing someone we care about to death.   We even hear talk about a divorce being like a death.  In truth grief encompasses much more.  Grief is a response to loss and human beings experience loss throughout their life.  As human beings we grieve the loss of relationships, jobs, communities, families, parents, security, home, and so much more.   Largely, we experience grief at the intersection of our vision and our reality. 

             

Each of us has a vision of our life.  The human struggle is to integrate the reality of our life with our vision.  We ask ourselves, “What did I expect out of life?” Our answers to this question vary.  For each of us there are different pieces of our vision that are dear to us.  One of us may easily transition from one career to the next while another can’t seem to let go of “how they thought it would be”.  

The process of moving through life transitions is the process of grief.  Throughout an individual’s lifetime they have many experiences that cause a disruption in the “normal”.  This can be anything that requires a shift in the picture, anything that requires them to adapt and create a “new normal”.  To create a “new normal” we must first grieve the loss of what we thought was “supposed to be”.  We must learn to live in a world that is in some way different from what we ever imagined. 

Many of us will be successful in grieving small changes to our life vision but we must also incorporate critical incidents.  Critical incidents are those moments in life that fundamentally change our trajectory.  They alter our path permanently.  Some critical incidents may be anticipated such as a marriage, birth, graduation, or empty nest.  But many will be unexpected.  Many will be moments we never anticipated.  Contingencies we couldn’t envision much less prepare for.  This is the moment when many of us say "I will not", "I cannot".  This is the moment we often must borrow from the strength of those around us.

When these critical incidents occur our tools and coping skills are often inadequate and are overwhelmed by the abrupt and sometimes violent shift from what we “thought” our world was to what it “must become”.  It is only natural that the skills that served us so well in our “normal” would be inadequate to face this “new normal” we never imagined.   

As a social worker we will often be called upon during these times to walk with someone as they grieve, accept, and learn to find hope in new things.   During this time someone will honor you with his or her story.  They will share their vulnerability.  As you honor this trust and create a safe place for them to struggle with integrating the new, you will see the beauty of human beings.  An angle of human beings that not everyone gets to witness, The moment when someone takes what was a shattered vase and pieces it back together bit by bit until it is a beautiful mosaic.  No, it will never be the vase it was.  It will be something so much stronger and more beautiful than anyone ever imagined.