Painting as Grief Therapy
Painting has certainly played a large role in helping me deal with my grief. We had gone through two very difficult and painful years, with sudden deaths of young family members, surgery, which left me immobile and housebound for weeks, our whole town was evacuated due to threat of forest fire. All this happened in the midst of the the Covid outbreak which in itself caused confusion, fear and stress. For us it was stress upon stress.
Grief
Grief is a strange thing. It is something we all go through at one time or another but yet is also so very personal, intimate and isolating. . I found the depth of grief is different with each loss as well. For most of my above losses, the painful feelings of grief were tempered by some feelings of gratitude. Someone was no longer suffering. The inconvenience of the surgical recovery was tolerated knowing that the end result was beneficial. The fear and uncertainty of the evacuation was tempered by knowing that at least we were all safe and that a whole team of professionals were working very hard to do whatever they could to save the town. It was hard, yes but I felt strong through all that. I knew we would somehow come through.
Carson
The sudden death of my 13 year old grandson was different though. That was absolutely devastating. The pain was more than just emotional. It was physical. We were all so broken I didn’t know how we would ever survive this.
Somehow though we did. We had some incredible support from family, from our church family, from our community, the school and the hockey association, even from total strangers. We are not whole anymore though. We each have deep wounds that I don’t think will ever completely heal. We carry on. We do things and have fun and laugh but there is always a veil of sadness that accompanies us. At times its still like a blackout curtain. Other times it might be the thinnest sheer. Mostly its somewhere in between, but it is always there.
Healing
It was about a year after all this happened when an acquaintance asked how we were doing, which many people did. Then she asked what we were doing to cope. She asked what worked the best for us. That took me by surprise and I had to stop and think. What was I doing to help deal with the grief. I knew that for me journaling helped. I wrote two or three pages most mornings of what I was thinking, feeling, what I was upset about and what I planned to do for the day. I took long walks and being out in nature and fresh air, seeing and hearing the birds, watching the season unfold was especially calming for me. And I painted.
When I was housebound and so missed seeing our lake I painted it and hung it on the wall across from the sofa. If I couldn’t see the actual lake at least I could see my painting of it.
I painted landscapes and I have had several people tell me how peaceful my paintings were. I thought about that and I think that maybe my mind was trying to create some peace when my actual world felt like it was falling apart.
I painted several pictures of my grandson. In painting him it was like I could touch him again It felt that somehow I was capturing some of his essence. It felt so good to be able to do that.
Creativity
I believe that any form of creativity is healing. It is a way of expressing emotions that you can’t always articulate or are even aware that you have. Creativity is a release and its always healthier to get things out than to keep them in. It doesn’t matter if its visual arts, music, dancing, baking, sewing, gardening, whatever. There are so many was to be creative. All of them can be a healthy way to deal with feelings, both good and bad. I encourage every one of you – find some creative outlet. You don’t have to be good at it. Just enjoy it. Enjoy the process. Let yourself go and find healing and freedom in it.
Final Thoughts
I don’t think you ever “get through” or “past” your grief, especially a deep grief. You somehow absorb it. You learn to live with it and it becomes a part of you. Grief is, after all, love. For me, painting has helped me to learn to live with my grief.
