Children, Lessons in Loss, Miscarriage, Self-care

Fog of Grief

Smelly Socks and Garden Peas

Yesterday (31 January 2023) marked four years since baby boy3 made an unexpected and far too early exit from my body.

I’m not someone who dwells or wallows in the grief I feel for his loss. I acknowledge it, I’m honest about it with myself and with others. I don’t shy away from talking about him with my closest friends or referring to him with even acquaintances. I don’t and won’t pretend he didn’t happen. But I don’t rub my own or anyone else’s nose in our loss either.

Each year, I mark his loss and his due birthday (in June) with a longer or harder run than my regular routes offer. As I’m recovering still from flu in December, I didn’t even attempt a half marathon this year. Instead I ran on Friday, from school drop off, up our local big hill. Just 11km all in all, but very slow (1h37min) and with 295m of ascent. It was hard work and honestly, I walked a lot.

The weather was pretty unpromising when I set off, with fog and cloud in the valley and up the slopes. As I reached the real climbs, it was dense and quite cold. But I didn’t find the fog scary or disorienting, it was comforting somehow. That set me thinking that sometimes the fog of grief is like that too. It’s somewhere we can be peaceful, we can see only what we can see, we aren’t overwhelmed by all the other things off in the distance. We can take comfort as we take some time to just “be” in our grief. We can explore it, or not.

I know my grief, my loss. It’s just a part of my life and of who I am, who our family is. It’s another facet of me. It doesn’t mean that the rest of me isn’t there. The world still exists in the fog, but doesn’t intrude.

The fog of grief is comfortable, and comforting. It feels good to be aware of it, without being overcome by it.

As I ran on Friday, I climbed the hill and as I got higher, I came out of the fog and clouds and to the summit. There, I could see the layer of clouds below, but also the lighter skies and the beautiful views in the distance. Grief’s like that too. It’s not all close and enveloping. The rest of the world and life is still out there and grief doesn’t stop us seeing it’s beauty. Maybe even in grief we are more sensitive and appreciative of the positives in the rest of our lives.

There, those are my thoughts for this year. All that remains is for me to say, as always and forever, we love you baby boy3, we miss you and we wish you could have stayed to become a present member of our family.

Love from Smell xxx

Published by Smelly Socks and Garden Peas

Rants, rambles, loss, gin, guests, recipes, funny kids, occasional poems, and a bit of running.

29 thoughts on “Fog of Grief”

  2. Pingback: Maggie Rogers and the power of joy – A Silly Place
  3. Pingback: RED January 2023 Review – Smelly Socks and Garden Peas

  4. Beautiful post and uplifting for those who have recently lost loved ones (among them adear friend of mine) to know the fog of grief occasionally clears.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  8. You’ve written this beautifully and I can see what you mean with the fog being comforting, how you can take time to just “be” with the grief and what it entails. Sending lots of love at such a difficult time 💙 xxxxx

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  10. Sorry to hear you lost a baby. Lost some myself, early on. Love everything you said about fog and grief. I suddenly lost my momma last March and what you describe really sums up some things I’ve felt in the past 10 months. Beautiful writing.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

      1. Thank you. What I really like about the fog/grief thing is it validates feeling however we feel in the grief journey and that it’s ok, wherever we are. The comfort of that space- just like the idea of that. Sometimes grief can feel like a thing to race through. I like the idea of getting through as is needed.

        Liked by 1 person

      2. My husband and I have grieved very differently. His gushed out right away while mine ebbs and flows. But being in different places in our grief doesn’t affect how we each feel or support the other. Even within a couple who’ve experienced the same thing, everyone goes their own way. I’m glad my words resonate for you, it’s nice for me too to know someone else shares the same feeling of comfort.

        Liked by 2 people

      3. Love what you said a bunch. How different paths in grief can still support another in grief. Love “goes there one way.” What instantly came to mind was the song ‘Go Your Own Way’ by Fleetwood Mac. Which the song may have different meaning, but you’ve inspired me to think of “goes their own way” especially through grief as a gift, really. I’m in my grief journey and those who love me meet me where I am, even if it’s not where they are. Thank you for that. 🌸

        Liked by 1 person

      5. It sure is. Hits home. Here I’ve felt ‘rushed’ to grieve correctly/quickly (some old idea I learned as a kid). But, really I see now that there is no rush. Man, that’s so freeing. ❤️

        Liked by 1 person

  12. This is so beautifully expressed, Smell. I’m so sorry for your loss. I imagine you’ll always wonder “what if”. Sadly, life doesn’t give us answers to those questions…just more questions. I’m grateful you’re part of our blogging community. Sending you a virtual hug.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Please log in using one of these methods to post your comment:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.