tovlo
New member
- Joined
- May 2, 2007
- Messages
- 248
- MBTI Type
- INFJ
I'm wondering about the experience of INFJ's and grief experiences.
My mom died yesterday. I've felt soothed emotionally before in my time here seeing the perspectives and experiences of other INFJ's because I felt I understood them without the effort of having to adopt a different perspective to see properly. Right now I feel drained of the energy needed to bring someone else into my emotional experience. I'm hoping by asking this question I will be soothed with that sense that someone truly understands just in hearing the similarity of experience and also perhaps gain some insight into how to effectively manage the things on my plate right now.
I have much weight on me beyond just my mom's death. There are decisions to be made regarding her death that have implications that touch on many other situations of loss I've experienced over the last year. I am completing right now a divorce process. In that process--along with a financial situation forcing me back into full-time work, much of that out of the home and overnights with the resulting almost constant exhaustion--I had to put my previously home-schooled boys back in public school this fall. In large part because of that decision and wanting to honor my oldest teen son's wishes on how that would play out for him, I only see him about 1 day a month now. In the decision process over choosing to divorce I realized that I could no longer remain in the faith I had taken on 10 years ago and so walked away from the parish, and support network, that my to-be-ex husband and children are still part of, and that my mom remained part of. So I'm going to have to re-enter for the process of mourning her death an environment that will be saturated with almost unbearable reminders of all that I've lost in my life over the last year (my family, my mother, my support network, my faith, my financial security). In addition to that, I fear much of that will be living reminders that will be judging me for my choices while I'm emotionally unable to bear it.
I'm afraid in the dwelling on this I have to do to write it all down that I'm just making things worse for myself. I think about it all and then I feel overwhelmed with despair. Yet, it's not all bad in my life. Many of those losses have opened doors that allowed wonderful things to enter in the wake. So...I don't know. Should I shut down my experience of the despair and contemplation of the loss? That feels inauthentic. But then again, maybe I should just not be dwelling on it. Maybe a little numb and uncommunicative while I go into a sort of robot mode and just get done what needs to get done will make the most sense so I don't dive into exaggerated emotions that make everything worse? But then I worry about my few existing relationships and if they will suffer because in that state I have nothing to give them and I can't engage in them openly and honestly when I'm refusing to experience my experience fully. Can I make good decisions when I'm shutting off my experience? I don't think so actually. But can I make good decisions when I'm overwhelmed with despair? No, probably not. It takes emotional energy for me right now to find that place in the middle where emotions aren't out of control or frozen. I don't feel like I have that energy right now.
I don't know. In writing this, I think I know what I need to do and it involves where I need to focus the energy I do have. I need to focus it on myself and getting myself to that mid-point. It might feel like misdirected energy to me when there are arrangements that need to be made and so many people who need me to care-take their emotions, and it seems like these are more immediate needs for where my energy needs to go, but I realize that I need to shut all that out and just take mini-moments to experience my experience, simply letting that emotion be what it is, feeling it in it's moment, but letting it go when it's done without hanging on to it. That takes energy for me because that sort of emotional regulation is not something I do naturally and am only now learning how to do. Yet, I am thinking maybe that's where my energy focus needs to be right now because even though it seems like it's stealing from other things that need my energy, it might actually feed me enough to build the energy to deal with those things too. Maybe.
Anyway, if any INFJ's have any insight into how grief response manifests in us, I'd like to read it just for the comfort and wisdom I suspect will be contained in it.
If the energy expenditure to openly revisit this thread ends up feeling too much for me to manage right now, please know that I'm reading quietly and anything that might be offered is truly appreciated. And I'll be OK too if nothing is offered, so loving hearts full of sympathy, please don't feel obligated to pass along words if no one else responds. I think it was maybe enough just to write this out for someone to receive, even if those someone's were relatively unknown cyberspace companions.
Thanks for reading.
My mom died yesterday. I've felt soothed emotionally before in my time here seeing the perspectives and experiences of other INFJ's because I felt I understood them without the effort of having to adopt a different perspective to see properly. Right now I feel drained of the energy needed to bring someone else into my emotional experience. I'm hoping by asking this question I will be soothed with that sense that someone truly understands just in hearing the similarity of experience and also perhaps gain some insight into how to effectively manage the things on my plate right now.
I have much weight on me beyond just my mom's death. There are decisions to be made regarding her death that have implications that touch on many other situations of loss I've experienced over the last year. I am completing right now a divorce process. In that process--along with a financial situation forcing me back into full-time work, much of that out of the home and overnights with the resulting almost constant exhaustion--I had to put my previously home-schooled boys back in public school this fall. In large part because of that decision and wanting to honor my oldest teen son's wishes on how that would play out for him, I only see him about 1 day a month now. In the decision process over choosing to divorce I realized that I could no longer remain in the faith I had taken on 10 years ago and so walked away from the parish, and support network, that my to-be-ex husband and children are still part of, and that my mom remained part of. So I'm going to have to re-enter for the process of mourning her death an environment that will be saturated with almost unbearable reminders of all that I've lost in my life over the last year (my family, my mother, my support network, my faith, my financial security). In addition to that, I fear much of that will be living reminders that will be judging me for my choices while I'm emotionally unable to bear it.
I'm afraid in the dwelling on this I have to do to write it all down that I'm just making things worse for myself. I think about it all and then I feel overwhelmed with despair. Yet, it's not all bad in my life. Many of those losses have opened doors that allowed wonderful things to enter in the wake. So...I don't know. Should I shut down my experience of the despair and contemplation of the loss? That feels inauthentic. But then again, maybe I should just not be dwelling on it. Maybe a little numb and uncommunicative while I go into a sort of robot mode and just get done what needs to get done will make the most sense so I don't dive into exaggerated emotions that make everything worse? But then I worry about my few existing relationships and if they will suffer because in that state I have nothing to give them and I can't engage in them openly and honestly when I'm refusing to experience my experience fully. Can I make good decisions when I'm shutting off my experience? I don't think so actually. But can I make good decisions when I'm overwhelmed with despair? No, probably not. It takes emotional energy for me right now to find that place in the middle where emotions aren't out of control or frozen. I don't feel like I have that energy right now.
I don't know. In writing this, I think I know what I need to do and it involves where I need to focus the energy I do have. I need to focus it on myself and getting myself to that mid-point. It might feel like misdirected energy to me when there are arrangements that need to be made and so many people who need me to care-take their emotions, and it seems like these are more immediate needs for where my energy needs to go, but I realize that I need to shut all that out and just take mini-moments to experience my experience, simply letting that emotion be what it is, feeling it in it's moment, but letting it go when it's done without hanging on to it. That takes energy for me because that sort of emotional regulation is not something I do naturally and am only now learning how to do. Yet, I am thinking maybe that's where my energy focus needs to be right now because even though it seems like it's stealing from other things that need my energy, it might actually feed me enough to build the energy to deal with those things too. Maybe.
Anyway, if any INFJ's have any insight into how grief response manifests in us, I'd like to read it just for the comfort and wisdom I suspect will be contained in it.
If the energy expenditure to openly revisit this thread ends up feeling too much for me to manage right now, please know that I'm reading quietly and anything that might be offered is truly appreciated. And I'll be OK too if nothing is offered, so loving hearts full of sympathy, please don't feel obligated to pass along words if no one else responds. I think it was maybe enough just to write this out for someone to receive, even if those someone's were relatively unknown cyberspace companions.
Thanks for reading.