On Loss, Loneliness and Not Faking It

“Art is exactly what we need when we don’t have the luxury of feeling normal.” Ethan Hawke

I lost a dear companion over the holidays.

When a loss is unexpected like this one was, it can feel like a rupture in the unspoken rules of life that allow us to function day to day.  We know that death and other endings are inevitable and yet when it happens to us it can feel like such a betrayal.  Certainly, this wasn’t supposed to happen to me. Certainly not now.

It makes sense.  Don’t we all need a certain degree of cognitive dissonance to the fragility of life in order to function? Then we get the phone call, the diagnosis, the bad news and the safe illusions we cling to are momentarily shattered.

When losses happen around holidays it can feel like you bought a movie ticket to watch a rom com but unintentionally walked into the wrong theater and slowly realize you’re watching Brian’s Song. Our brains can struggle processing “this is not the movie I intended to see.”

Even without a loss to contend with holidays are hard.  We like to pretend they aren’t but I think they are for most people.

Yet, every year, we enter a collective amnesia and act as if they aren’t or maybe we just hope that perhaps this year it might be different.  I like to call this a hopium addiction.

It’s this contradiction between how we act and how we feel that is the hardest for me. 

Perhaps instead of saying “Happy Holidays” we should normalize greeting each other with “Hang in There it’s Almost January”.

I don’t say this to be cynical or bah humbug but instead to speak to the loneliness that happens when our insides don’t match the outside world. 

This is why literature is so important.  As Ethan Hawke says, “Art is exactly what we need when we don’t have the luxury of feeling normal.” 

Art tells us we’re not alone.  We aren’t the only ones who feel this way.  It is in shared connection that we heal the part of us that feels terminally unique.  The part that wonders “what’s wrong with me?”

It’s even better, of course, if we receive that identification in real life.

However, we can only receive that gift when we are vulnerable enough to be real with each other.  To share our inner landscape.

It’s strange isn’t it that this can feel hardest to do around those who in theory know us the best.     

If you’ve ever felt alone in the midst of a crowd of people that love you then you know what I’m talking about.

It’s telling that twelve step meetings rely on anonymity in order to create safety.  If no one knows who I am then I can be honest and vulnerable.

I’ve been told that many of us as children learned that we can’t be authentically ourselves and remain lovingly attached to our care givers.  Since disconnection – abandonment – would mean death, we learn to hid our authentic selves.

Even if you grew up in an emotionally healthy home our ancestral brain is programmed that we can’t survive if we’re banished from the tribe.  So, we strive to fit in.  “Happy Holidays.”

You might ask what this has to do with Mid Life? 

I think many of us hit a certain age where we just can’t fake it anymore.

We no longer have the energy to suit up and show up if we aren’t feeling it.    

We are no longer satisfied with mere company ~ we yearn for connection. 

We deeply long for, or dare I say we can’t function without, a certain congruity between who we are and how we show up in the world.

For me, most of my crises have occurred when confronted with my own incongruities. 

I get on a scale and think, “Surely this isn’t my weight.” Only to remember how long it’s been since I’ve gone to the gym.

I see my credit card statement and begin scanning for the fraudulent charges because there is no way I spent all this money last month. 

I see a picture of my kids and can’t believe they looked “so little” not that long ago.  I then neurotically insist they leave their devices and come play a game with me as if this one act will stave off the rush of time.

This happens to all of us.  It’s easy to get seduced by the gravity of things that don’t really matter.

And then we lose something dear to us and we get a profound and unwanted wakeup call that we’ve veered off course. That our busyness has disconnected us from our center and we didn’t notice.

Perhaps that’s what this so-called mid-life crisis is really an invitation to do – to see all the ways big and small that I’ve gotten away from what my heart holds most dear so that like Ebenezer Scrooge I too can do a rewrite of Christmas morning.

This may sound simple but it’s not always easy so I’m learning to give myself some grace.

As for my dear companion I just wish I had had one more day – to walk on the beach, to cuddle on the sofa, to make her favorite meal.

For today, the best I can do is to be ok with not being ok and give myself permission not to fake it.