Grief can drive us crazy, or so it seems. This is especially true when the hoilday season is approaching.

The following is adapted from the Book Excellence Award Winner, Teen Grief: Caring for the Grieving Teenage Heart. Whether or not you have teens, I think your grieving heart will resonate with this.

If you’re not grieving, you can support others who are. After all, you know what it’s like.

Are you going crazy? Read on…

 

Loss can upend a person’s world. There are times when grieving hearts wonder if they might be losing it and going crazy.

 

From the Grieving Teen’s Heart

KATIE

I don’t feel like me anymore. I’m off, out-of-sync, weird. 

Maybe I’m losing it. Nothing makes sense. Am I going crazy?

You’re dead. I’m not. What do I do with that?

I still have dreams. Good ones and bad ones. You die over and over and over again.

Maybe I need help. Real help. Serious help. 

I feel so different from everyone else. I don’t feel anything close to normal, whatever that is. 

I lost you. I’m not who I was, but I don’t know who I am.  

How do I do this?

 

JOSH

I’m losing it.

Everybody else is moving along just fine while I’m stuck in this pit. Who am I now? What kind of world is this?

You die. I go crazy. Maybe I died with you and all that’s left here in this alternate world is my outer shell. 

A shell. Yeah, that’s what I feel like. Hard. Empty. 

I can’t tell anyone about this. No one is safe enough. What do they do with crazy people? Lock them up? Medicate them?

Crazy Josh. Maybe so. 

 

Feeling crazy is common in grief

Feeling crazy from time to time is common in grief. Our world has been altered forever, in an instant. The sheer volume of emotional upset and change is staggering. No wonder we feel crazy or like we’re coming unhinged.

Teens are normally immersed in an identity crisis, desperately trying to figure out who they are and their place in the world. Then death or the departure of a loved one thrusts them into an even crazier situation. No wonder they feel nuts.

 

You can make a difference.

How can you help?

First, be aware that grieving people, especially teenagers, usually feel crazy at some point.

Despite what they tell you, but they don’t feel fine, and they’re probably questioning their sanity.

Second, know that teens (and others who are grieving) aren’t nuts, but are being intensely challenged by a difficult and crazy situation.

Our goal is to help them shift from, “Am I nuts?” to “How do I handle all this craziness?”

You can help them make this shift, simply by bringing the issue up. “They say that most people who are grieving feel like they’re going crazy.  I know I felt like I was losing it. How about you?”

Third, don’t attempt to go this alone.

You aren’t the sole source of assistance for this teen or that grieving person you know. Who else do they need to be connected to? Who else can support them in meaningful ways that help?

• Helpful family members
• Supportive friends
• Encouraging people/teens who know grief
• An understanding physician
• A compassionate grief counselor or professional therapist
• Clergy, pastor, or spiritual professional who connects well with teens

Fourth, know that we live in a crazy-making world.

The sheer amount of negative, traumatic, and sometimes contradictory information cascading down upon us can strip us of our sense of competence, safety, and security. Over time, we develop a strategy to deal with deaths and upsets. These strategies can be healthy, destructive, or anything in between:

• Heavy exercise or athletics
• Journaling, poetry, or story-writing
• Drawing, painting or sculpting
• Prayer, relaxation breathing, meditation, or visualization
• Being mentored or seeking counsel
• Attending a support group or connecting with people who know grief
• Lying, hiding, or defiant behavior
• Self-medicating with alcohol or drugs
• Verbal or emotional abuse, fighting, or violent behavior
• Depression, despair, hopelessness, suicidal thoughts or fantasies
• Sexual acting-out, pornographic tendencies, or lewd behavior
• Danger-seeking, death-defying activities, or overt risk-taking

You’re not in charge of what choices the teens or other grieving hearts around you make, but you can love them toward making the best choices possible with the experience and resources available to you. In the meantime, it’s prudent to keep a watch on yourself and your own life. The healthier you are, the more health, safety, and sanity you can promote in a grieving teenager’s or adult’s life.

A grieving person’s world has changed. No wonder they feel crazy at times.

 

Question: Have you felt “crazy” in your grief? Do you still wonder about your sanity at times?

Additional Resources:

Grief and Emotional Pain – Grief Soundbites, Gary Roe YouTube

The Journey from Grief to Healing – Harvesting Happiness podcast

Grieving During the Holidays, Part 1 – PEACE 107 Radio