Grief Doesn’t Have a Timeline - And It Shouldn’t - Written by: Joelle Delancey

I was 16 when my Mom was killed by a drunk driver. I’m now 36 and there are days that the grief can still feel new and raw. 

Many years ago, I attended a Motherless Daughters retre

at and for the first time, I felt “normal” in my grief. One of the common themes discussed was how we all felt like we should be “over” our loss and we all truly felt like there was something wrong with us. It felt like a boulder was lifted when we all realized that there isn’t truly an end to our grief. We know there will be good days and bad days, where the grief seems to pull us under. Knowing that there was no true end to my grief was a relief, but it didn’t make the pain any less.

7 Stages of Grief?

Many of us have heard of the 7 Stages of Grief, but very few of us know that those seven stages are for someone who has received a terminal diagnosis - not for someone who is experiencing the loss of someone. The seven stages were originally only 5 and sometimes were referred to as the Kübler-Ross Model. A lot of us believed that our grief was a check list; mark off each step and BAM we are healed! It was like a gut punch when I thought that I had endured each stage, but would still struggle and feel the pain of losing my Mom. What did I do wrong? Did I not sit in a stage long enough for it to count? What about the days where I felt like I had gone backwards and was experiencing deep anger again after thinking I had turned a corner? Knowing that there was no true end to my grief was only half of the battle. I also had to accept that I would always miss my Mom to some degree.

An Ocean of Grief

My favorite thing to compare my grief to is an ocean. When you are first experiencing your grief, it’s like being in the middle of the ocean during a hurricane. You can’t tell which way is up and you are just trying to survive the day to day. As you move through the pain and process your grief, the waves aren’t constant and you find that the shore is within sight. Some days you are pushed closer to the shore and other days you are pulled out with the tide. Eventually you do make it back to shore and are standing solidly on the sand. While standing there, some days you can see the waves of grief coming at you. Those days are the ones you are prepared for and expect the pain to come. Those days are anniversaries or birthdays and even the holidays. They are days that are hard and you find yourself digging your feet into the sand to stay anchored and upright. 

The Worst Surprise

The days that are the hardest are the ones you don’t see coming, the days where the ocean has a rip-current are the hardest. Those are the days that you don’t know are going to be hard and painful until you are being pulled under by surprise. Those days are the ones that may have no rhyme or reason for the pain. There could be no reason at all for the grief to come at you or maybe it was a day where for a split second, you forgot they were gone and went to call them before reality smacks you in the face.

Love & Grief

Love, like grief, is limitless. Just because the ones we love are gone, does not mean that the love we had for them - and the love they had for us - goes away. Grief is the same; there is no limit or set time when it goes away. Love and grief will be with us until we are able to be reunited with those we have loved and lost.

About the Author: Joelle Delancey lost her mother to a drunk driver when she was sixteen, a moment that changed the trajectory of her life. Now twenty years later, she is passionate about speaking the truth about long-term grief and shares her story through drunk driving prevention presentations. When she isn't sharing her heart or her history, she is a wife and a busy mom to three children. She works as a school aide and spends her off-hours at sporting and music events, cheering loudly for her kids in everything they do.