Grief: The Emotion That Hurts The Most

People tend to avoid discussing the topic of grief as it makes us recall painful memories and the abyss that lost loved ones leave in our lives. It’s never easy to let someone or something important go, especially when losing the ones who shared laughter and tears with us, stood by our sides, and loved and cared about us without asking for any recognition. Lives are like the tides in an ocean. People come and go, and we can’t stop the tide from leaving the shore, just like we can’t stop death from taking away our loved ones. 

We experience many different emotions in our lives: happiness, excitement, disappointment, sadness, gratefulness, and more. Grief, the one feeling that we try to escape from, is the hardest to endure and overcome. According to the American Psychological Association, grief is the anguish experienced after a significant loss, usually the death of a loved one. People also experience grief over the loss of a pet, an idol, a job, a relationship, or even a way of life.

Whatever the source of grief, different psychological illnesses will emerge for people who immerse themselves in grief for a prolonged time. These conditions include anxiety, depression, and suicidal thoughts. If one suffers from intense grief without seeking professional help, their immune systems suffer, and physical health becomes negatively affected. 

College Student Grief Awareness Day

Learning how to cope with the loss of your loved ones is hard. However, we must realize the adverse consequences of prolonged grief to try and avoid falling into the pits of despair. And on April  21st, we take special notice of college students grieving through College Student Grief Awareness Day. This day aims to encourage college students to reach out for help if they are suffering from the grief they feel affects their mental and physical health. 

We derive academic knowledge from schools, but we seldom learn how to handle negative, painful emotions. College should teach students how to survive in the real world—not just by preparing them to succeed in the workplace but also by taking care of themselves and keeping a healthy state of mind. Unfortunately, college students, often away from their usual support systems, families, and close peers find themselves more vulnerable when they experience loss. Without a healthy way to feel and express their emotions, grief often becomes a giant snowball that rolls down the mountain, causing a tailspin in their life. 

To learn more about how college students experience grief, I interviewed three students from the College of Southern Nevada and listened to their stories about walking through the valleys of their lives.

Grief: Losing A Dog’s Company Was Too Much To Bear

Eva Gray, a CSN nursing program student, lost her dog Bobby last year. “Bobby passed away… because of lung cancer,” she said. “I was studying for my final exam and received the phone call from my parents saying Bobby couldn’t make it. I was too shocked to react and cried for the whole night.” 

Eva then reminisced about her good old days with Bobby. With tears in her eyes, she said, “Bobby was there with me during my whole childhood. He was the sweetest dog I have ever met. I was scared of darkness, and he knew it. He would sleep with me and comfort me whenever I went to bed.” 

Eva couldn’t face the fact that Bobby was gone and she’d never see him again. After finishing her final exam, she returned home, wishing to hear Bobby’s welcoming bark. However, the only thing waiting for her was Bobby’s cremated remains. 

“I went back to the campus, and suddenly my life was grim and gloomy. I didn’t want to talk, eat, drink, and sleep,” she said. “All I could think about was that I missed the chance to see Bobby’s last day on earth and that I was a bad pet owner.” 

Learning to Move On

After three months of grieving, Eva realized she needed to move on as she believed a part of Bobby still lingers on in her life and memories. “Bobby was such a merry dog that he would cheer me up whenever I was sad. Although he wasn’t physically with me this time, his fluffy and cute face will always be in my heart,” she said. “I will move on with my life as I know Bobby would love to see me standing up again if he was here.” 

While coping with Bobby’s loss, Eva shared that not living at home during that time made the process more difficult because she had to grieve alone. “My old friends from high school consoled me over phone calls, but it just didn’t help much,” she said. “The moment that I realized I had to move on was that my academic results had plummeted. I knew I had to be strong and focus on my study; I couldn’t waste my parents’ money and my time anymore.” 

Finding Light Through The Shadows

Goodwin Forrester, a CSN science major, shared his story about his experience with grief and how he overcame it. 

He related the feeling of grief to that of a shadow hanging over you. “[It’s] a powerful feeling of sorrow that consumes one’s demeanor for a variety of reasons,” he said. “It can range from the loss of a loved one to tragedies and misfortunes worldwide. Grief, at its root, is a great pain caused by a horrific occurrence that recently transpired.” 

Forrester’s story about grief isn’t about losing someone close but about losing his idol, a legend in the pop music industry, Billy Joe “B.J.” Thomas, known for hits like “Hooked on a Feeling” and “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head.”

“When B. J. Thomas passed away last year I was grief-stricken because I admired both his music and who he was as a person,” Forrester said. “It was hard to accept the fact that he passed away.”

Losing someone that you look up to is hard to accept. I remember the day when Kobe Bryant passed away in an accident; all the basketball maniacs around me felt so shocked and upset that they refused to believe that it happened.

When bright stars suddenly fade away, those who admire them can only lament the loss of their brilliance with tears. 

Stepping Out of the Shadow

When asked how he stepped out from the shadow of grief, Forrester said that realizing the legacy Thomas left behind–one of love, spirit, and amazing music–helped him overcome his grief. 

“While he’s physically gone from the world, he’ll always be with us through the soul of his music,” he said. “Losing someone, whether you knew them personally or not, is a tough thing to endure. I’ve learned that the best way to honor them and move on from it is to remember who they were, embody that, and realize that no one’s ever truly gone.”

There are many ways to face grief. Some cope with it by relying on social support, while others face their loss by letting time heal the wound. Some even seek professional help when they are suffering from immense grief. Forrester chose to untangle the negative emotions through deep introspection of himself. “I find that by thinking it through, looking back at everything, and figuring out what’s causing the grief, I learned something about myself and moved on past the grief.”

Sharing his thoughts on the school’s counseling and advising services for students experiencing immense grief, he said he felt that it “works nicely.”

“However, I believe it would be more practical and effective if they advertised those services more pronouncedly because they’re obscure and often not mentioned,” he said. “As a result, not many students know that they have these resources available, meaning that they get underutilized, and students’ mental health needs go unaddressed.”

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Acceptance: The Key To Overcoming Grief

Robert Burg, a CSN journalism major, lost his job last year and fell into the loop of grief. “I loved my job, and I was very attached to it. But, I needed to move on and find another. To be honest, I am still not over it. I still think every day about how it could have been avoided,” he said.

Burg experienced grief relatively mildly as he tried to pull himself out of the loop. He embraced his negative thoughts, as opposed to rejecting them. Over time, he eventually considered the opposite side of things and stopped himself from dwelling on the past. 

“The best way to overcome grief is to accept that the event that caused grief happened. And that there may be more events that will cause grief and suffering throughout life,” he said. “Overcoming grief is staying focused on personal life goals and dreams, and metaphorically, “pick yourself up.” 

Regarding the current support system CSN offers, Burg shared that he feels the school could “implement more practical and feasible services to students.” And not just to those experiencing grief but also feeling isolated or stressed. He presented an example of students hailing from outside the state or country and something happening to them while on their own in college.

“The college should have someone for them to talk to as their parents aren’t close by, and who knows if they made friends their first semester. They should have a mental health advisor along with their academic advisor,” he explained. “However, it should be monitored as school stress is not grief. There is healthy stress in college that should be well-practiced between instructors and students. Stress between schoolwork gives practice for real-world situations in whatever industry they are studying.”

Not A Monster To Fear

Experiencing grief is an inevitable part of life. It’s hard to deal with, but no one can avoid it. So we should help one another through it when it happens to them. Loss is the essence of life; it’s what gives it meaning.

People that we care for and love surround us, and at the same time, we must also realize death and accidents are unpredictable and unstoppable. It causes so much pain to lose someone or something you love, but all the painful feelings reflect how beautiful and invaluable memories you have had. 

Grief isn’t something we need to fear, run away from, hide from, or hate. Instead, it’s something to embrace as a necessary process for us to heal and be reborn after loss. So allow yourself to feel sad and cry, but also allow yourself to find help, talk with people, and let all the raindrops become a rainbow. We have to believe that, eventually, rainbows and sunlight shine through after the storms we weather in life.

Grief is not the end of the world – giving up is. And when you no longer struggle in the swamp of grief, you can feel the strength you’ve gained in the process of trudging through the emotional mud.