We Need to Talk About Loss …and Identity.
The following is an excerpt taken from my new book ‘The Impossible Question of Living Well’. The excerpt explores the impact of loss, and how we might heal when loss occurs.
The Impossible Question of Living Well, by Dr Helen Street, 2024
Grieving the Loss of Connection
When a significant threat or a loss happens, we suffer and grieve for the part of ourselves that has been threatened or lost. We may be angry or sad, tearful or exhausted. We may well focus on that which we lost - be it a person, the job or the place - however, it is the resulting fracturing of our identity that causes our suffering. Our suffering is directly comparable to the degree? by which our identity has been threatened or fractured by threat or loss.
Clinical psychologist and researcher Professor Mike Powers explored the relationships between goals and depression throughout the 1990s. ?Powers found that the impact of losing a goal is directly related to the degree to which we define ourselves by that goal,? more than any objective measure of the goal size.? Simply put, Power’s clinical psychology research supported the notion that we do not grieve for the person or thing we lose, rather we grieve for the loss of the relationship we had with that person or thing.? This means that when a relationship contributes to our understanding of ourselves in the world, our identity is fractured when that relationship is damaged or lost.
Similarly, the work of Professor Glynis Breakwell has helped me to understand the relationship between identity and loss.? Breakwell is a highly acclaimed social psychologist, an expert in identity, and, luckily for me, was the head of my psychology department when I was studying in Surrey in the late 1980s. She not only inspired me with her social psychology lectures, she gave me a summer job, and taught me with many quick-witted comments and insightful anecdotes.
In her pioneering 1986 book Coping with Threatened Identities, Breakwell argues that the majority of depressive episodes can be attributed to the experience of a threatened identity.? She suggests that, when struggling with grief, we need to acknowledge the fracture that has happened within us, more than the loss that has happened to us. It is not enough to stop wanting the return of all we have lost; we need to regain a sense of ourselves in order to heal.
There is a vast body of information offering advice on how we might? recover well from the impact of trauma and loss. For example, the work of Professor Aaron Beck exploring the impact of thoughts on our feelings, still forms the basis of much psychotherapy today. Aaron Beck is often considered to be the father of modern approaches to psychotherapy, namely Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, or CBT. His research and clinical practice during the 1960s were evolutionary, shifting ideas of therapy from deep psychoanalysis over one or more years; to six weeks of effective cognitive guidance. Simply put, Beck’s? CBT is based on the belief that our feelings are guided by our thoughts. If we are upset about an event, this is because of how we think about the event, rather than the event per se. For example, if you think not getting a job? means ‘I am unemployable and worthless’ you will feel far more upset than if you think ‘This is frustrating but I will find something that fits me better.’ Or, if you think breaking up with your partner means? ‘I will never find another relationship. I will be alone forever’, you are going to be far more upset than if you think: ‘I am unsure what will happen in the future for me romantically. I may need to invest more heavily in my relationships with friends for a while’. Thus, if we can learn to rethink and reframe an unhelpful interpretation of an event in a more realistic and helpful way, we will feel better about it.? Beck is not suggesting that we should reframe negative events as wholly positive. Rather, he believed that we will be less upset, and consequently more resilient, if we learn to catastrophize ?less and reduce the negative assumptions we make about the impact of an event that distresses us.
Thus, traditional cognitive behavioural techniques often involve challenging the catastrophizing???? ?thoughts we may have when we face adversity.? Once we become aware of the all-consuming, distressing impact of unhealthy thoughts we can learn to challenge and change them for more realistic and helpful ones.
Other cognitive techniques help us to learn to focus on what we can control, rather than on what we cannot, when adversity strikes. The more we focus on aspects of life out of our control (‘Will he love me again?’ ‘Why didn’t I do or say something different?’ etc) the more we feel out of control. In contrast, focusing on our attitude and how we can move forward well is within our control and can help us feel more agency in a difficult situation, and more hopeful.
The Body-Mind Connection
Those interested in the relationship between physical and mental wellbeing have focused more on the importance of caring for our physical selves to support our psychological selves. Certainly, the more we understand about the relationship between mind and body, the more we learn about the importance of lifestyle in supporting our emotional reactions and moods. For example, Professor Felice Jacka from the Food and Mood Centre, based at Deakin University in Australia, is one of a growing number of academics finding strong correlations between the food we eat, how we feel and our capacity to cope when things go wrong.
It makes sense to try to maintain a healthy diet of natural wholefoods, always get adequate sleep and do some exercise, especially when life is tough.? Unfortunately, it is when we are the most stressed that we tend to crave the most wine, chocolate or ice cream, have the least motivation to exercise and have the most trouble getting to sleep. Thus, although we can certainly help ourselves have more emotional stamina and strength by being physically healthy, it is also important that we have self-compassion and are sympathetic to our primaeval reactions to threat. Over thousands of years we have evolved to crave high-calorie food, hide away and prepare for bad times when we are experiencing threat. This is so we are well prepared if we need to hide from an angry mammoth, fight a hungry sabre tooth tiger, or speedily run away from a starving bear. However you meet, numb or placate your wants and needs when you are highly stressed or distressed, remember to always go gently, and be kind to yourself.
The Power of Now
Others suggest we can find our most meaningful reparation and resilience in the details of life. They encourage us to learn to ‘take a break’ from focusing on the pain of struggle. In doing so, we need to remind ourselves to breathe in the moment, and to acknowledge the beauty of the ‘little things’.? For example, even when we are consumed with the pain of loss, a hot cup of coffee, the smell of rain or a shared moment of humour can give us a mental mini break from the unbearable weight of distress.
As we progress, taking a few hours to do something fun can make an enormous difference to our capacity, without dishonouring a longer term need to grieve. Be it an episode of a favourite TV show, a drink with a friend, or a walk with the dog, small moments of nurturing distraction can provide us with a reminder of the value of life, and a valuable mental break. Certainly, evenings spent in the company of good friends have helped me through everything from a bad day at work to the awful experience of losing someone I love.
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All roads to recovery - be they physically or psychologically focused - are meaningful when they support a process of reparation and reconnection, both within us, and between us and the world. They are meaningful because they help us to regain a sense of our whole-being, be it through our thoughts, our behaviour, our social connection or a more spiritual experience.
Acknowledge, Accept, Connect, Trust
I believe that embracing a process that best honours the constantly changing cycle of our identity creation, fracture and re-creation is vital to our long-term ability to be resilient, no matter what adversity or losses we face.
This process can be conceptualised in four steps. These are:
Step One: Acknowledge
No matter what paths we choose on our journey to recovery, we need to ensure we begin with awareness, acknowledgement and honouring of our fractured identity.
Step Two: Accept
In order to be able to let go of anything - from a broken relationship to a lost job - we need to be able to deeply understand that everything changes in life. In doing so, we learn to live with flexibility in an impermanent world.
Step Three: Connect
As we begin to heal, we need to begin to connect with our social world once more. This is not about re-creating the same connections that were threatened or lost: it is not about replacing a lost romance with a new one, or a lost job with another. Rather, it is about finding ways to connect with the social contexts of our lives so that we have our needs met and feel whole.
Step Four: Trust in Yourself
When things have gone wrong, it can seem artificial and unrealistic to contemplate ‘everything being alright’ in the future. Indeed, some adversity leads to long-term turmoil and devastation, especially when that adversity involves the loss of our health and the need to face our own mortality.
Moreover, even if things are going well, or our adversity seems manageable, it is foolhardy to trust that life will not be hard at some point in the future.
No matter what challenges life brings, if we can develop trust and faith in ourselves, and learn to listen to our inner voice, we can move forward well.
'The Impossible Question of Living Well', by Dr Helen Street, is published by Wise Solutions and available online from Amazon, Positive Schools and all good bookshops.