Grief’s Irrelevant Timelines and Tears in Trader Joe’s
And how grief gives glimpses into your great capacity for love.
“Grief has an impenetrable timetable.”
-Sister Monica Joan
I first heard the phrase while watching Call the Midwife, a BBC show that holds a special place in my heart. Honestly, if the show’s not in your watch queue, that must be amended. Especially if you work in women’s health.
In one episode, a character who experienced great loss vents about the seemingly interminable grieving process. The phrase in question was given in response by one of the show’s most beloved characters.
And it has stuck with me ever since.
We often try to put grief in a box.
And in a culture obsessed with linear timelines and control, I’ve noticed we expect grief to conform to certain expectations. Like graduating college in four years. Securing a stable job. Getting married. Buying a house.
Paths with well-defined beginnings and endings.
Paths where we can trace grief’s progress accordingly and wipe our hands at the finish. Synthesize it into understandable phases and publish a “how-to” novel (or two).
And yet, I’ve not met a single person who follows said path.
Grief comes and goes in waves.
Sometimes, it does look like a prescribed phase (e.g., anger or bargaining), and sometimes, it’s a wild, living thing that takes up residence in your stomach for weeks and months on end.
We cannot contain grief.
Nor should we try.
It needs to be felt—and acknowledged—for it to move. For when grief remains stagnant, that’s when it festers. It sinks into your bones and makes an untidy home.
The first time I felt significant grief, I was in middle school. And I refused to feel it or let it out. I thought, if I don’t acknowledge its presence, I can pretend it's not there (like all the solvable social problems facing Seattle). But I digress.
There it stayed.
Waiting.
Until ten years later, it rose in a vengeful wave and crashed down, upending and uprooting everything I knew.
Everything I’d tried so hard to build.
Gone in a matter of months.
A foolish woman built her house upon the sand, it seemed.
My grief demanded a response. It demanded to be felt.
Ten years was too long to lie dormant.
And feel it, I did. This time, I opened the door to its turbulence. Or rather, the door crashed open, but the energy I’d spent holding it shut dissipated in mere seconds, too spent to fight. I let the long-held grief move through my body, move through my mind, and let it flood every corner, not one left untouched.
Yet my grief didn’t consume me.
To my utter surprise, with time and space, its power began to lessen.
But make no mistake: the grief did not entirely disappear. Moving does not mean moving out. A small piece likes to stay, not as a threat but as a reminder.
Grief scoffs at our idea of time.
Grief holds no color-coded schedule.
Some days, the grief feels more prominent; others, it's content to lie still. I judge neither.
For people who like linear growth, understanding grief's unpredictable cycle requires a bit of work (three cheers for therapists).
But when we’ve allowed ourselves to feel its intensity and let it move through our bodies, we learn to put one foot in front of the other once more and step into someone not unfamiliar, but new all the same.
Why talk about grief?
Because there’s no room.
Or rather, little room.
At work, at home, at the grocery store, on your morning walk. I’ve worn sunglasses on many a trip to the Trader Joe’s frozen foods aisle in an ill attempt to hide the telltale mascara streaks. The longer I stare at the frozen mac and cheese, I think, perhaps my tears will follow suit and solidify. On a positive note, if you’ve ever wanted to create more space for yourself in a crowded grocery aisle, I recommend visible signs of sadness.
People don’t want to be confronted with grief. They look up, down, or anywhere but your pain.
It feels too tender to see and to be seen.
And, if we’re honest, visible grief’s a bit embarrassing.
Revealing.
Uncomfortable.
For instance, how do you respond when someone tells you honestly about their day? The horrible things happening at work? The new diagnosis? We stutter, squeak out an “I’m so sorry,” and change the subject as soon as it feels appropriate. It’s often awkward and uncomfortable.
And, back to the original phrase in question, what about the expectation that grief reaches a natural end? We pour forth platitudes, all the while expecting the griever to stop grieving.
Eventually.
We want them to return to the way they were before.
We expect them to.
Because what do we do with this new person, with their pain? Yes, the grief often lessens. But grief also leaves its mark in seen and unseen ways. They are not the same. You are not the same.
So why do we expect such a return on such short notice?
We are many people throughout our lives, often because of grief.
And why do we grieve?
As one scriptwriter so eloquently wrote, “But what is grief if not love persevering?” They’re inextricably intertwined. So, in effect, when we demand grief to slow, to lessen, we’re asking someone—and ourselves, in a sense— to stop loving. We’re asking them to diminish their capacity for love.
I believe my grief ran in torrents because, at its core, I am a human being worthy of love. And what was taken from me, in that moment ten years or so ago, was the belief I was no longer loveable. But, sometime later, I began to see what I was meant for.
Connection, relationship, love.
So I mourned.
You may grieve for a lost child or parent or spouse. A broken dream. A failed relationship.
Because you’re professing love—for yourself, your loved ones, your community, your life.
So let it stay. Let it remind you of your humanity.
Of your great capacity to show and accept love. Let it change you as it moves through you.
For we cannot hide from grief.
But we can give it space.
We can allow ourselves to feel. To move. To grow.
Final thought.
Often, when we grieve, we do so in isolation. We wipe away the evidence, nary a mascara streak in sight. (Unless you’re in need of some soul-soothing frozen foods from Trader Joe’s.) Yet the moments I’ve cried in the presence of family and friends, been held, been seen? There’s nothing like being witnessed in your lowest moments and finding your whole self accepted.
So, what if it wasn’t uncommon to see someone weeping at the grocery store or at work?
And, to take it one step further, what if we felt comfortable watching? What if we made space to hold each other’s grief—for our friends, loved ones, even strangers?
We must not demand of ourselves to be done with grief.
To see it, as many things we do, as something to cross off a list or mark complete.
Grief has an impenetrable timetable.
And it’s got a lot more to do with love than we imagine.
P.S. One of the most profound resources, I believe, on the whole of the internet sits on Kate Bowler’s website. On this page are links to blessings for grief. Each hits home in its own unique way and gives language to grief when we’ve lost the words to say.
P.P.S. Want to read one of the most raw, profound books on grief? I dare you to pick up a copy of Rob Delaney’s A Heart That Works.