(soft music)
Hello and welcome to Dear grief Guide.
A podcast where each week I answer one anonymous letter
from a listener feeling lost, stuck, heartbroken,
or overwhelmed in the midst of grief.
My name is Shelby Fercitya.
I'm a grief coach and author,
and I'm here to help you create a life you love
from the life lost forced you to live.
Let's get to today's letter.
(soft music)
Dear grief guide,
it feels like my whole body is grieving.
Normally I get sick as often as any other person,
but since my grandmother passed away suddenly three months ago,
it's been relentless.
It started with acute fatigue and aches
right after her funeral,
but then came a wave of viruses,
sinus infections, and general illnesses.
Nothing too serious thankfully,
but it's become a constant nuisance.
I never expected grief to hit me this way, physically.
I'm a rundown, snotty version of my former self.
I find myself buying loads of Kleenex at the grocery store,
not because of crying,
but because of being sick so often.
I find myself wondering if anyone else
has experienced something similar?
Has grief impacted your health this way?
It's like my physical body is reflecting the pain
and loss I feel emotionally.
My grandmother was such a spiritual person
and when sometimes talk about feeling a heart sick
when she was sad, upset, or grieving,
is that what this is?
Thank you in advance for any insights.
I'm deeply grateful for you.
Signed, "Aling Soul."
Hi there, Aling Soul,
and thank you so much for writing to me
about this topic specifically.
Yes, you're not crazy, you're not alone.
So many people get sick on some level
after devastating loss and the reason why is because grief
is a stressor.
It is something that weakens our immune system
because being under stress for long periods of time
or being under intense stress for short periods of time
causes our bodies to react in protective ways.
And a lot of times that means our immune systems,
the things that normally protect us against viruses
and sinus infections and general aches and pains,
even healing, cuts and bruises.
Those things are diminished when we're grieving
because we are in a state of stress.
Now of course, I'm not a doctor and can't speak
to exactly what processes are happening in the body
that are affected by grief.
I don't have necessarily the terminology for it,
but there are so many grieving people that I work with
and I have stories of my own that become sick after loss
because it is just an exhausting experience to be grieving.
I like it very much to having to travel a lot
and getting sick after having to do a lot of cumulative travel.
Also going through any other sort of stressful event,
a breakup, a job loss, a major geographic move,
sometimes people get sick after major events like that.
People also can get sick after major joyful events
where lots of stress is involved.
For instance, getting sick after a wedding
or getting sick perhaps after a graduation
or after some sort of other major life milestone,
it's normal, especially if there's a lot of stress
or a lot of planning involved,
like a really big work death mind to get sick after that
because we have demanded whether consciously
or unconsciously that our bodies work
and be present with us because they have no other choice
through the most stressful experiences of our lives.
And by consequence, for lack of better phrasing,
we pay the piper by getting sick by being down for the count
for a little while.
So I'm not surprised that this has been your experience
since the death of your grandmother.
I got sick for sure after my mother's death in 2013
I suddenly, without any other explanation,
became allergic to a lot of foods
that I had eaten for my entire life.
I developed like six new food allergies
that I suddenly had to cope with.
I would break out in hives or rashes
or just generally be intolerant to them.
Like it would, I would feel pain in my body after eating,
which is hard and I drew a lot of metaphors
between trying to nourish myself
and actually that causing pain in my grief
because my most nourishing figure my mother had died.
So there's a lot of spiritual parallels
that I drew for that.
That's my own meaning that I've made in that.
And then after my best friend's death in 2022 from COVID,
I woke up in the morning after her death brushed my hair
and a huge clump of it fell out,
which is an autoimmune response to stress is losing hair
and I eventually got diagnosed with a thyroid disorder,
which also results in hair loss and can be brought about
by stress.
That's one cause of this thyroid disorder.
And so in each of these instances,
the death of my mother and the death of my best friend,
I got sick.
Now I'm not saying for people who are listening
who it did not get sick.
I'm not saying that getting sick is a default occurrence.
After devastating loss, I'm just saying it's common.
Many people find that they are in such a state of
high stress or adrenaline, the presence of adrenaline
that they accomplish and do a lot of things after a loss.
You're like, I'm not sick, I'm invincible.
They go the other way.
They accomplish a lot or do a lot or climb ladders
or make a lot of grand plans after a loss
because they're still riding that high.
And then for other people, there is sort of this,
my person has died, something has ended,
and there's like a crash.
And getting sick oftentimes is part of that fallout.
What I can suggest for you, Ailing Soul,
is to tend to your grief by tending to yourself,
especially your physical body.
I don't often suggest this in life after a loss,
but if people are issuing you invitations
to do things, to go places, to come to a party
where there's lots of people there,
you might consider declining.
You might say no to invitations that are
any sort of additional tax on your energy
because that is energy you do not have to spend right now.
I know so many of us are living in what society would
consider post-COVID world, but masks are still really helpful
for preventing the spread of illnesses,
preventing you from sending something to somebody else,
and preventing you from receiving an illness
from somebody else.
If you are able to mask up, especially if you use things
like public transit or go to crowd and grocery store,
concert, if you work in a place that's very crowded
or deals with the general public or especially children,
I would recommend masking up if you can.
And then my last tip makes soup.
(laughs)
This might seem really silly,
but there are so many foods that are nourishing for grief,
and if you like soup or broth or anything else
that contains a lot of nutrients in an easy vehicle
for consumption, make soup or buy soup.
Store-bought soup is fine as well.
Make it as easy as you possibly can for you to nourish yourself
to restore the physical body that is telling you very much,
I have been weakened by this.
I need you to take care of me.
There is a tremendous book by an author named Janet
Rich Ellsbach called Extra Helping,
and she is a chef and a recipe designer
who has created a book of recipes
for major life transitions, including grief.
And so you might pick up a copy of her book
and make some of her griefy recipes.
I have tried a few of them myself.
After I had a major stressful medical event in 2021,
one of my very dear friends, actually the best friend
who died flew out to Washington State
where I was living at the time and made several
of Janet Rich Ellsbach's recipes for me to eat as I healed.
And having my refrigerator full of these meals
was immensely helpful.
And that's something I'll tack on to this too.
It's been three months, but if you still have people
in your circle who are asking things like,
let me know if there's anything I can do,
or I want to support you, I just don't know how,
or how are you doing or what can I do for you.
If people around you are still asking those questions,
ask them to cook nourishing things for you.
I know in the aftermath of loss so many people
bring over cakes and cookies and casseroles and things like that.
And if that sounds good to you, eat them.
But also, if you have somebody in your life who you know
would make an incredible pot of soup that you can freeze
or something like a multi-layer lasagna that's full
of veggies and broths and things that feel good
for your body to eat, or somebody who's really good
at making tea, like something hot that you can drink
to clear out your sinuses or whatever else is happening
with you, ask for that.
Ask for that.
Put out an all call on social media,
send a group text to the group text,
send something out that says,
I've been getting sick a lot and I would love help getting well
and see who responds to that.
Because just as your healing can be done in community,
people inviting you out of the house, going to parties,
learning things about yourself as a grieving person
in the world, you can also request that community be brought
to you, that you be helped in the care and the privacy
of your own home as you heal your body from this devastating
loss.
Lastly, I want to talk about this term heart sick
because I have not heard this a lot and I don't know a lot
about it.
So I think whatever definition of heart sick you go by
and that your grandmother went by, use that one.
I will say that feeling heart sick or feeling troubled
in the heart, feeling conflicted about personal events
or world events, this can translate to physically being sick
sometimes.
I'm thinking of, and this is all anecdotal, I don't.
Again, I'm not a medical professional,
I do not have statistics on this.
But I imagine for people who are concerned about things
that are happening in their lives,
that are happening in the larger world,
for people who worry a lot, for people who are afraid
or sad or in really hard places and wondering what it all means,
what is grief, what are we here for, why all this pain,
why all this mourning, I would not be surprised if heart
sickness would translate into full body sickness,
or even like minor aches and pains, minor aches and pains.
So if this feels like what your grandmother would describe
as heart sick, I would say sure, ascribe that definition
to what you're going through right now.
There is a heart sickness that comes from grief
and sometimes that translates to being physically ill.
Yes, sure.
And especially if that makes you feel closer to your grandmother,
double down on that definition.
Whatever she did to heal herself,
when she was feeling heart sick, those things might feel
healing for you too, whether it is making and consuming
nourishing foods, gardening, getting out the sunshine,
getting a lot more sleep than usual, only consuming things
that feel comforting and nourishing, kind of turning off the
noise and the stress and the anxiety and the fear of the
world.
If these are things that she did to address heart sickness,
maybe she prayed more, maybe she read spiritual books more,
I'm not sure what she did, but you might even find yourself
feeling closer to her in her heart sickness by finding
mirrored ways to heal your own.
Ailing soul, I wish you so much rest, so much nourishment,
so much healing.
So much connection with your grandmother is you navigate
this sickness and to trust that this is not where you and your
body will live forever.
That I know for sure.
I am sending you so many healing thoughts and vibes,
in tandem with everyone who's listening to the show this
week.
[Music]
That's all for this episode of Dear Grave Guide.
Thank you so much for joining me today.
If you're feeling lost, stuck, heartbroken or overwhelmed in
the midst of your own grief, check out my free workshop
Grow Through Grave, three ways to stop feeling stuck and
start moving forward.
I'll give you three easy actionable tools for navigating
life after loss and show you how you can create peace,
stability and compassion right there in the middle of
grief's confusion and uncertainty.
You can find the workshop link in the show notes.
If this podcast helped you feel a little less alone in your
grief, please subscribe and leave a review on Apple
podcasts, Spotify or wherever you're listening.
And be sure to share Dear Grave Guide with a friend,
because you never know what someone you love is going through.
You can submit your anonymous letter for the show and find
additional grief support at shallbeforcitya.com.
Music for Dear Grave Guide is performed by Eddie Goldstein,
editing by Ruth Spence of Celebio.
Until next time, I see you.
I am so proud of you and the work that you're doing in the
world.
And I love you.
Because even through grief, we are growing.
Music for Dear Grave Guide.
[Music]