The experience of losing a child inevitably leads to powerful and sometimes overwhelming thoughts and feelings and we share these with others in many ways. There are times, particularly in the early years, when our feelings are on the outside and exposed to the world as they are so huge and we haven’t yet learned how to make sufficient space for them inside ourselves. These are the times that we cannot stop crying or are raging at the world, and these times can be many. As time goes by we are still full of grief and pain and if we are to share this with others we face making ourselves vulnerable and the people who are listening also face making themselves vulnerable.
So what IS vulnerability?
Being vulnerable is being at risk of harm from something outside ourselves, something that cannot be predicted or controlled. When we communicate with another person, whether that is as a casual acquaintance or a life partner we make ourselves vulnerable when we share something about ourselves with the other person and that is a risk. We take that risk because the outcome can be that what we have shown is seen, is empathised with and understood and is accepted as being valid and unique to us and this can make us feel accepted and connected. We might not take that risk because the outcome can be that what we have shown is not seen, not understood or accepted as valid and as a consequence we may then feel that we are being rejected by the other.
We need to be accepted by others to, literally, survive
Feeling accepted or rejected by the other is a powerful thing that leads to potent feelings in us. Social psychologists have shown that one of our most powerful survival strategies is to be accepted by others. Acceptance by others provides us with mutual protection and a sense of safety whilst rejection leads to isolation and…well… greater vulnerability! This means that we are motivated to do what we can to feel accepted and this is about sharing our views, our values, our likes and dislikes and our experience.
Others sometimes try to avoid what we think or feel
When other people find our experience difficult they sometimes try to stop us thinking what we think or feeling what we feel. They do this by offering us platitudes, such as “At least you had 19 years with him.” or ill-founded advice, “She wouldn’t want you to be sad.” (How the fuck would you know?). Sometimes other people find our experience so difficult that they do all kinds of mental gymnastics to interpret what we are saying about our child’s death as something with a backstory that is so different to their child’s backstory that they feel safe from the risk of something bad happening to their child too. This can even lead to them avoiding us altogether.
We start to wear a mask to protect ourselves and others
As time passes we, as bereaved parents, often learn that many others are uncomfortable with our thoughts and feelings and so, to avoid rejection by them, we try hard to hide these. We sometimes do this to protect ourselves and sometimes to protect the other person. I cannot count the number of times over the years that I have apologised to other people for telling them parts of my story or how I feel when I register the shock on their facesas I speak,. One way of hiding our true feelings is to, metaphorically, wear a mask. So to present a ‘face’ to the world that is easier for them to cope with and also to use that mask as protection for ourselves by not taking the risk of sharing something that will cause them to react badly to us. The tragic downside of wearing that mask is that we can become isolated because this feels easier than feeling continually vulnerable.
It's about them, not about me
The reality is that when I share something about myself I cannot control or predict how the other person will react to that because how they react is about them and not about me! This means that they are either sufficiently comfortable with what I am sharing, or courageous enough to listen anyway or they are simply too uncomfortable with what I am sharing and feel the need protect themselves by maintaining a distance from what I am sharing.
The amazing vulnerability researcher, Brené Brown, describes vulnerability as those moments where you are:
Emotionally exposed
Taking a risk
Facing uncertainty
And this often feels horrible. However, if we can dare to take that risk the outcome can be so valuable to us as we feel understood and connected with the other person on a deeper level. It may help to remember that the reactions of others are not really about me at all but about their own stomach-churning feelings of vulnerability when such strong feelings and tragic events are involved.
We all need to finding the courage to be vulnerable
So the risk of making ourselves vulnerable needs to be taken by two people. Firstly, in order to get understanding and connection with others we need to make ourselves vulnerable by somehow sharing how things really are for us. Secondly, in order to respond to us appropriately and helpfully, our family members, friends and colleagues need to make themselves vulnerable. This means to actually pay attention and listen to how things are for us and not to try to reason our feelings away or to tell us we should be feeling differently than we are but to dare to step, for a time, into our world. I have had a number of people in my life since losing my son where this has been a risk that we are both prepared to take and that has made all the difference.