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Originally Posted by BethVA62
It's sooooooo difficult to ignore when you feel like you feel when you go to the funeral of someone you loved. It's hard to shake the ache in chest, being on the edge of tears all day, sick feeling in the gut, it's the same feeling I had at my first husbands funeral. I was dying inside, but as people came to the funeral and brought hugs, food and gifts to the house I had to work hard to smile for them and thank them with out bursting out in tears or breaking down and hiding in a dark corner. It's the same feeling I have on my b-day. I try really hard to shake it, and I have had 47 years of trying to shake it or "get over it", I manage to suck it up on most of the other days of the year, I don't like it one bit, and once again - hopefully next year will be less intense.
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I hear what you said about how hard it is to keep yourself from bursting into tears. We live in a culture whereby open expressions of sadness and grief are taboo and instead we're supposed to put on the ol' stiff upper lip. When it comes to physical pain, eg. a broken leg, people ask all about it, listen to the patient's experience of it, offer comfort and empathy, sign the patient's cast, etc; But when it comes to emotional pain - one is met with dead silence or praise for the griever's (fake) smiles as as 'being strong'.
Sometimes I wish I could openly wail and receive comfort from others the way I've seen on news coverage of grief-stricken people in the Middle East.
As I've learned over the years with grief and loss, for me it actually takes more courage and energy to allow myself to grieve than to bottle it up. But as some have said, the way 'out' is 'through'.