One thing I realized fairly early on in my grief journey (thank goodness) was that in spite of my great concern for how my wife and surviving son and daughter were dealing with what had happened to Curtis, I really couldn't be of much help to them until I started to help myself. Indeed, since all of us were trying to figure things out in our own ways it was often impossible to truly understand each other's
perspective. One thing I had to accept (whether I wanted to or not) was that what I was feeling was entirely normal. The chaos, the anger, the confusion, the uncertainty, the hopelessness, the sorrow, and all the other things grief had suddenly unleashed on my life were completely normal and understandable. My life was not normal, and never would be again, but what I was feeling was normal.
Once I began to accept that truism, I was able to stop being so hard on myself. I realized that I didn't have to try to be in control of an absolutely uncontrollable situation. My problem was not going to go away easily, if ever. There were no quick fixes, no easy solutions, no short-cuts, no magic spells. I had to just take things one step at a time. As I was able to allow myself this freedom, I found myself in a better place to be able to help the rest of my family as well. I didn't expect my journey to be much easier, but I hoped I was becoming a little more prepared for what lay ahead. There would still be much to learn.
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