treatment for "complicated grief"

March 9, 2018 9:09 PM

Have you experienced and worked through complicated grief/persistent complex bereavement disorder after the death of a loved one? Tell me how it got better. (content note: suicide)

My boyfriend of two years had severe treatment-resistant depression and killed himself 3 months ago. (I am not angry with him and I don't blame myself.) I'm not getting better, it's not getting easier, and in fact it feels like it is getting worse.

Today my therapist and I talked about starting therapeutic treatment for "complicated grief" and perhaps a touch of PTSD from the shock and the way everything unfolded. After having read the descriptions, this sounds about right.

I am wondering if MeFites who have experienced this found any particular treatments/activities/processes helpful? I have plenty of professionals to talk to, but I am very interested in your personal experiences of both professional treatment and stuff you did on your own to work through this.

My goals are to be reasonably functional again, and maybe someday to be able to look at a photo of him or read a conversation we had and feel warmth instead of hours of crushing agony.

I have: an insanely wonderful and amazing support network of family and friends, many local. Time to do whatever I want. Access to the resources available in my home of NYC. Cost of treatment is unimportant.

Help? And thank you, so very much.

posted by supersweet to Health & Fitness (7 answers total)

I have experienced this.
My soulmate spouse died suddenly, in an accident that was questioned to have been a suicide, but was deemed otherwise. It left lingering questions that could not be answered in many ways.
The relationship had been intense and wonderful - he was almost like a god to me - so to have him vanish so suddenly, and in such a fashion, without my being able to see a body (trusting the funeral director that I would not want to see the damage)... made me almost believe that he had faked his own death.
There were also other things about our relationship dynamic that made it impossible for me to function in normality amongst average people. I'd had a difficult life up until I met him, and it had felt like real life started when we got together. Magic happened, and he moved mountains (literally and figuratively: blasted logging roads through wilderness, and was my cheerleader in so many ways).
When he disappeared, I spoke to him in my head, and we had conversations. I kept thinking that I saw him, or that he would show up again, at home or somewhere else. With the confusing thoughts of possibly faked death, I wondered if this was a test of my loyalty.
Anyway, enough of the backstory. You want to know about how I moved on... so...

I put as much effort into doing everything that I possibly could that would be monumental achievements or activities (after sorting through all of the paperwork and belongings to clear up the legal stuff first) - that would give me a sense of being able to look back and realize that those things I did were AFTER him and WITHOUT him by my side. By doing this, it gave a sense of distance from the event of death - unlike nothing else could. When I filled each moment with another new thing or accomplishment, it was a bit like the difference between walking down a vibrant and busy street block, compared to sitting in a dingy in the middle of the ocean, and travelling the same distance. Sitting in the dingy would feel endless, hopeless, and boring both looking back and looking forward. Walking the street and taking everything in would provide many more things to think about, experience, and share (even if it were still sharing it with him in my head, rather than any new person I might meet).

There were many days, even weeks and months of catatonia, but at the same time, even those periods were therapeutic and cathartic. I wrote many journals that were just words that fell off the tips of my fingers, and which I could not look at for months, some, even years... but I would occasionally glance at them - and if reading them tended to make me relive the emotion that brought on the words, I would close it up and put it away for another day to try again. Eventually, I was able to look back at them, and realize that I didn't recognize the person in them any more.

I was suicidal. I had the means to do this thing. It crossed my mind almost daily for a while. The means to which stayed locked in its place while I held the knowledge that it was there. I'm not saying this was a good thing, but it made me think about it in a way that had never before occurred to me. I felt that even if I didn't kill myself, I would probably die soon anyway, and that I didn't need any of my belongings or money. This was a mistake... but I lent my entire savings to someone (with a written loan agreement for payments with interest, so covering my bases anyway)... but it was never repaid. This made me sink even lower, and I found myself feeling like I was going crazy and might seriously injure the guy who defrauded me (with my locked-up lethal means-to-an-end)... but the funny thing was, that I stopped wanting to kill myself, because I had someone to be angry at. Or maybe just seriously disappointed, because I knew he was a terrible financial risk. It's strange, because I blamed myself for giving it all away, but in doing so I realized that I HAD to look out for #1, and #1 is me. Nobody else was going to do it, and I had to want to do it for myself.

I also learned that I had to trust my gut - I had been having serious psychosomatic issues that affected my digestion and elimination in ways that made me think I had irritable bowel syndrome, but it would happen simultaneously by simply watching a scene unfold in a way that triggered a memory - or even when a friendly person would express compassion towards me, or when anything made me FEEL anything. I had to avoid watching television, listening to news programs, and censor movies before watching them, so that I wouldn't get wound up in the emotional dramas or devastation that plagues story lines.

What helped the most aside from all of this, was meditation, walks with my dog in the woods, T'ai Chi, Buddhist and Taoist studies to understand the universe in a more connected way than dogma tends to allow, yoga, reconnecting with family to whom I had felt estranged - and forgiving all past trespasses from them while realizing that they did not know me, just as I did not know myself until I broke wide open to be exposed for all to see in my suffering. I tried to be as honest to myself as to others, and started to recognize that most people don't do this - so whenever I met a genuine soul, I made it my goal to develop a friendship that would last - in whatever form that might take (not necessarily intimate or soul baring, but integral to the web I was creating)... I realized that a relationship doesn't need to be deep or all-encompassing to have meaning and value... and that by accepting others with all of their imperfections, I could do the same for myself...
...and realize that life was not over for me, nor would it be - whether I choose to love it or hate it - and I'd much rather love it - really love it - but first I had to accept the pain, and grieve the loss of (surprisingly) the future and the dream that we had created. I will always have the past, and the past was amazing. It would be up to me to wander into the future, being open to new experiences and to figure out what new and different things this world may offer that could also be amazing, but in a different way.

Your path may lead you in many directions. Please be gentle and compassionate with yourself, and be mindful of what you consume, from food, to services, to entertainment, to social networks, to spirituality. It is all nourishment. Choose healthy, and wisely, as if you would for a child who is sensitive and ill... because you are that child when you are this raw. I wish you much love, light, and peace going forward.
posted by itsflyable at 11:04 PM on March 9, 2018 [25 favorites]

Oh, and another thing that kept me going was having a longterm goal that I had never dreamed I would actually complete. It just gave me a direction in which I would take my baby steps towards the future. I did complete that goal, and somewhere along the way, I shed many hundred thousand pounds of baggage weight.

Be light.
posted by itsflyable at 11:10 PM on March 9, 2018 [3 favorites]

I found EMDR therapy to be helpful in speeding up the healing process. No one knows exactly how it works, and some think it's hooey, but I can tell you that, for me, it was powerful. The raw, bone splitting pain faded, and I was left with grief that was just grief, so I was able to quietly and peacefully mourn while still feeling anchored to this world.
posted by batbat at 3:19 AM on March 10, 2018 [4 favorites]

I had the same diagnoses. I was having intrusive thoughts/images that could get in the way of me driving or doing my job or whatever. I was in regular talk therapy before the incident and when I described how I was doing 3 and 6 months out, my therapist added PTSD and complicated grief to my anxiety diagnosis.
The visions were a real problem. It was like I could be in the middle of anything and suddenly in front of me was a movie screen showing scenes from the worst day of my life. Worse, while this started out just about a friend’s terrible death, eventually there were new images, scenes of anything terrible that had ever happened.

It fixed when I practiced looking away. I imagine this is, broadly, metaphorical, but for my movie screen situation it was literal. If I started seeing the images I’d just look up to the right or down to the left or whatever, just away. And eventually the images faded away and I could focus on what was in front of me.
From doing this very real and physical act, I feel like I picked up that I *could* look away, from the worst memories of that time, and focus a bit more on the positive things from when he was alive. That I didn’t have to let my grief be the dominant force in my life.

My example is pretty specific but 5 years later I’m doing much better. Not perfect. I wish you the best.
posted by OrangeVelour at 5:23 AM on March 10, 2018 [3 favorites]

I don’t have specific thoughts about treatment options, but my ex boyfriend committed suicide a few months after our breakup in 2013, and I was still a total wreck 3 months after his death. You should definitely keep doing therapy and explore options for PTSD treatment— but you should also allow yourself time to grieve and process. If you’re truly nonfunctional now, that’s obviously a problem, but it’s totally not weird to experience big waves of grief at this point. I mean, I still get sad for a day or two around his birthday, and it’s been 5 years. Don’t beat yourself up about not being over it yet. It’s okay that you’re still grieving.
posted by Kpele at 8:44 AM on March 10, 2018 [2 favorites]

I have a kind of off the wall suggestion. In the book Rosalie Lightening: A Graphic Novel, which Tom Hart wrote/drew after the death of his daughter, he talks about going to a place with his wife to heal. It's a retreat place. I have vague memories of it, but it's a place for deep grief. For some reason when I read your question I thought you should read the book and maybe consider that as a place to go.
posted by orsonet at 4:29 PM on March 10, 2018

Three months is not long at all, and I’m surprised your therapist would consider complicated grief as a diagnosis at this point. Wikipedia, which may or may not be accurate, says complicated grief should be considered at six months. I’m not trying to minimize your suffering - this sounds horrendous - but please don’t compound it by adding concerns about whether you’re grieving longer or otherwise more than you should. I have suffered from complicated grief - in my case it was years - and I don’t even know what made it better, except my own cancer diagnosis focused my attention on my own life - not a recommended strategy.

Is there a grief support group, if possible a survivors of suicide support group, you can access? I think you would benefit from being around others who have been there. I’m glad you have strong support, but I find that in grieving, It really helps to know people who’ve been through it.
posted by FencingGal at 5:11 PM on March 10, 2018 [3 favorites]