topic Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief in Multicultural experiences

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Donte — Mon, 15 Jan 2018 00:41:51 GMT

The other day as a song unexpectedly popped up on the radio, I found myself overwhelmed by myriads of emotions. Memories of my late partner and the years we had together flooded my mind. Tears started rolling uninvitedly on my cheeks.

It's funny how grief raises her head out of the blue, even years later, when you have come to terms with the loss, the permanency, the death of your loved one.

As I was standing there, my eye caught the fruit bowl on my kitchen bench. I looked at the bananas, pears, apples, mandarins etc. in the bowl. I realised that a few looked a bit off. Some were starting to rot. Instinctively, I wanted to remove them from the bowl, but something stopped me. I decided to take a few steps backwards. Then had another look.

Suddenly, a smile appeared on my face.

'This bowl is my life!', I thought to myself. There are amazing things in it. My daughter, my friendships, work, home, pets, family and relatives overseas, all the material things and hobbies I enjoy. There are also some bad things, pain, loss, issues, problems, challenges that are affecting me. But when I take a few steps backwards, and look at the whole bowl in its entirety, it's actually beautiful and pleasant. There are in it things that I love and give me pleasure and joy.

This thought made me feel better and I found myself remembering the good things and feeling thankful for my life and my countless blessings.

How do you deal with pain? Problems? Issues? Grief? Is there a particular way that you've learnt to see things through your cultural or religious background? Through your upbringing? How do you see your uncomfortable challenges in life? How do you normalise loss and carry on? what's your experience?

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

quirkywords — Tue, 23 Jan 2018 05:45:06 GMT

Donte

What a great post and a wonderful imagery.

In my culture, everything is solved with food. I would not admire the fruit bowl I would eat all the fruit.

Food from chicken soup to help when you are sick or unhappy, to home made bread to wonderful dips and salads.

In my culture we either over dramatise our problems or play them down nothing in between.

I was taught that there is always someone a lot worse off so don't complain but count your blessings.

I suppose I make comfort food when I feel pain.

Thanks for the questions.

Quirky

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Donte — Wed, 04 Jul 2018 12:53:05 GMT

I remember while growing up, my parents used to have the serenity prayer on a wall in our lounge room translated into Greek and knitted by my grandmother who had given it to them after my grandfather died due to his alcoholism.

"God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference." The Seventh-day Adventists in Greece were facilitating peer support meetings for alcoholics and family support groups which grandma attended religiously as she was trying to cope with the violence and abuse she was subjected to by my alcoholic grandfather.

Growing up I could never understand why would anyone ask this of God. Why accept the things you hate? Why keep up with the things that hurt you?

Later on, as I got older I started understanding the skill of learning to accept those things that cannot be changed. I often think nowadays that everything is perfectly as it should be. But for years I struggled with this notion, until I reached the point of understanding that what 'should be' is always 'what is'. In other words, there are really no 'should's' in the world, only what is. The 'should's' are fantasies, large and small, and are not reality - they do not exist.

Most often when we experience distress in life it's because we consistently and rigidly refuse to accept reality, or 'what is', and demand that it be something different. You refuse to accept that your loved one is not mentally stable, no matter how much you insist that he/she be so. Or you refuse to accept the body you were born with and keep trying to change it, hide it, or create the illusion that is different from what it is.

You may be thinking, 'Yes, but isn't there something to be said for being dissatisfied with the status quo and reaching for something higher?' We first have t accept everything about reality before we even consider making a change. For example, you must accept first that your loved one does not naturally have the skills to manage his/her mental health and may even have a resistance to learning such skills. Perhaps in the future he/she may acquire these skills, but the present moment requires you to accept where he/she is, for only then will you be able to see the opportunities to truly help him/her to acquire the skills, and perhaps the desire, to manage his/her mental health more effectively.

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Elizabeth CP — Thu, 05 Jul 2018 07:26:41 GMT

I think you are right about learning to accept the things we can't change. No amount of ranting & raving will change what has already occured. My husband was really angry & upset when he became blind but it was only after he accepted that it wasn't going to change he could move on & learn to live with it.

Acceptance is about accepting reality but then working out how to deal with it most effectively. After an injury I tried to push myself to do things only to find myself struggling to move because of pain & exhaustion. Once I accepted the reality I came up with a plan to go for very short walks & slowly increase the distance until I'd regained the strength & endurance I needed to function.

In contrast I read a book some time ago recommending we allow time to wallow in our grief or hurts. I'm not explaining it as well as the author but the idea was that by trying to stop ourselves thinking about the things which upset us we don't give ourselves chance to deal with the hurt or pain. Instead accepting our feelings as being real & valid allows us to move forward.

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Donte — Thu, 05 Jul 2018 12:20:40 GMT

I think you are right Elizabeth.

I remember for decades not accepting that I was unwanted. That my mother wanted to abort me and was unsuccessful despite her numerous attempts.

I remember having huge difficulty accepting that i was a mistake and an accident (condom broke and I was born - mum 18, dad in the army).

Growing up I had huge acceptance issues knowing that I am a homosexual. Didn't really want to be and neither did I ask for it.

That lack of acceptance led me to live a life of shame, guilt, lies and internal turmoil. I was a fake. And I ruined not only my life but also my wife's and to an extent my child's as well.

Then after my divorce, when I became bankrupt and lost millions of dollars worth of properties, I couldn't accept that it was my own stupidity and recklessness that led me to the financial destruction I faced.

After I got infected with HIV from my partner, I lived in denial for a decade. pretending I didn't have a terminal illness and that there was no way my beloved lover and partner could do this to me (head stuck in the sand).

After his death of AIDS five years ago, I'm still struggling to accept that he didn't love me enough to care, to look after me, to fight for me and our love, to look after himself, to want to live, to keep taking his meds and to not want to die. It's been unfathomable to accept that my love for him, with all the personal sacrifices and costs, meant absolutely nothing. And yet, he didn't care less. he stopped his medications and died six months later in intensive care 33 kilos.

Very hard for me to accept that love is nothing and means nothing and you can never save anybody. It's just an illusion. And I have destroyed my life and my health in the process.

But hey, ce' la vie as the French say.

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Donte — Thu, 05 Jul 2018 21:46:36 GMT

Hello Quirkywords,

Thank you for posting in this thread.

This topic of course is not about food, but rather an analogy of our life and the various aspects in it that make it what it is. The fruit bowl just happened to instigate a thought process in my mind and thought I'd share it in here.

Food however is indeed important to all human beings. If we don't eat we die. I do not know of any culture that does not value food and eating. So thank you for bringing up this subject of eating and particularly comfort eating or emotional eating.

I am glad that you have found comfort in food. Many people are emotional eaters. Food is necessary, however, it can become an addiction and contribute to numerous health issues such as obesity, diabetes etc which are plentiful in our western cultures.

Anorexia, bulimia and other food-related mental health illnesses are very serious and need medical intervention.

I understand that this is not the point you were making but thought it's a great opportunity to explore this serious issue of over-eating, eating the wrong types of foods, and trying to medicate through food.

It could be that we try to replace human connection, relationships etc with eating, just to cover up the pain, to escape, to soothe our wounds and feel better, to not feel the emptiness. It is a double-edged sword for sure and like all things needs to be kept at bay or it can easily get out of hand.

Just out of curiosity, are people in your culture mostly obese? I know of certain cultures where the bigger the person (especially women), the 'happier' they are perceived to be and if someone's skinny they looked upon as unhappy, miserable individuals with lots of problems and bad luck/misfortunes. These cultural attitudes contribute to high mortality rates/co-morbidities and complex health problems in those particular cultures where the lifespan is overall much lower than the rest of the population.

I find it interesting how cultural notions of happiness, joy, comfort, success and fulfillment etc can lead to severe health issues and early death.

In certain cultural groups it would be much harder to talk about emotions, depression, anxiety and other mental illnesses which need treatment and will not go away no matter how much the person eats.

Wondering what approach to take when tackling lifestyle choices based on cultural traditions and belief systems that go back generations...

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Donte — Thu, 05 Jul 2018 22:03:29 GMT

Hello Elizabeth,

I am sorry to hear about your husband's blindness. I often think to myself how horrible it must be if I turned blind one day. Not able to drive anymore and lose so much of my cherished independence and having to rely on others for my care and basic things would be very upsetting.

It must have been very hard for you too as a partner to have to become a carer. You must be missing the time when you were a partner and not a nurse.

It is absolutely necessary and very important, I believe, for our recovery mindset to grieve our losses. To express this grief. To talk about it and do whatever we can to feel the pain as this brings us eventually to a point of normalizing it and accepting it (if not fully, as somethings can never become fully accepted, at least find some level of comfort and be able to function with our compromised health).

I come from a background where people traditionally wouldn't talk about the loss, the illness or the tragedy. All was hash hash and under the carpet. Fear, lack of education, stigma, superstition coupled with pride and ego and mingled with distorted religious beliefs made it almost impossible for someone to freely express their loss. People would made the sign of the cross and spit three times, together with other terrible and stupid superstitions, avoid interaction, not only with the ill person, but also with the whole family, and make the person feel ostracised. Many wouldn't even attend a funeral out of fear that the bad luck would follow them. (This is where the custom of breaking plates during a celebration, a wedding and a happy event started: people would smash plates to scare away the evil and break the bad luck that would otherwise come and snatch away their joy.)

Ludicrous, I know. And yet, thousands of years of superstition and traditions still find their way through to our modern, educated, and 'civilised' culture and people still carry little 'evil eyes' around and practise certain nonsensical rituals.

Hope the age of reason, logic and technology to help us free ourselves from fear and free us up to be able to feel again. To express. To engage. To start living again.

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Jigsaw9 — Thu, 05 Jul 2018 22:58:57 GMT

Donte

Excellent analogy regarding the fruit bowl. Just wanted to bring up another point that we choose what kind of fruit we want to be. You can be something rare or something among the common folk. We must take advantage when we are ripe and we must hope to be looked after when we are rotting. We can either choose to be eaten up by this world, or choose to leave seeds for the next generation. Everyone should have a goal of leaving a legacy behind. Something people will remember you by.

Something as simple as advising people on these forums is a good start. Use any skills/experience/knowledge you have for the betterment of generations to come. This way you are not a slice of watermelon that gets eaten then forgotten. You are one that left seeds behind that made more watermelons and so on.

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Donte — Fri, 06 Jul 2018 01:57:47 GMT

Thank you Jigsaw9,

That's a beautiful thought.

Initially I was thinking that the fruit bowl is our life and every fruit in it is an aspect of our lives. But as the conversation unravels it's great to see the different points that come across and various interpretations.

This is the beauty of sharing. 🙂

Our conversation reminded me of my parents who are believers and growing up they would always talk about the fruit of the spirit: love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

Of course we don't need to believe in a god to experience these attributes. As an atheist, I believe in this fruit as well. I think it links very well with our recovery journey no matter what background or belief system one has. And this is the greatest legacy. X

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Jigsaw9 — Sun, 08 Jul 2018 23:41:26 GMT

We should always look at things from different angles. We constantly limit ourself by seeing things from our perspective only. We shouldn't do this. We need to take a birds eye view and see whats going on outside the box in order to understand the situation inside it. Hope that makes sense???

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Donte — Mon, 09 Jul 2018 04:35:14 GMT

Hello Jisaw,

Yes! Great advice. I think it's good to strive to do this - see things outside the box we are in.

I'd like to hear from you how do you manage to do this? We are all in certain boxes (cultural, spiritual, social, gender, age etc) and that is necessary for self-preservation and survival as the boxes offer us security and safety and help us have structure and understand ourselves and our roles within the world/society we find ourselves in e.g parents, lovers, workers etc.

Personally, I always felt I didn't fit in the boxes provided for me. I have always strive to break the boxes, squash them, destroy them, and let myself free but I realize each time I do this i find myself in another box and then another and another...

When I broke free from my heterosexual marriage and came out of that box, I found myself in the gay box, when years later I left the gay scene I found myself in another box.

How do we leave those boxes behind? And how do we self-define without them? Also, how do others define us then?

As an ideal it makes sense but it fails in practical terms. This is my experience. If you could elaborate from your perspective would be great insight. X

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Jigsaw9 — Mon, 09 Jul 2018 06:49:03 GMT

Donte

Thank you for your reply and i appreciate your kind words. 'How do we leave those boxes behind? And how do we self-define without them?'

This is not the aim of seeing things from outside the box. Naturally the boxes define us and we can't do anything to change that. You say you were heterosexual then became homosexual... you can't change that. That experience is something you went through and it is real. We should embrace our past, learn from it, and build for the future.

I have been fortunate to do a fair bit of travelling. I've seen many different levels of lifestyles. You and i see an apple for example and see it as a piece of fruit. Something we may snack on when we are hungry. Others see it as something they will never eat, maybe due to an allergy or whatever reason; yet some people will view it as something they must eat to survive. In extreme cases of poverty, eating that same apple that we only seen as something to snack on when hungry will be the difference between living or dying from starvation.

The same analogy can be used for many situations. We need to step back and think about what things mean to others, and not just ourselves.

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Donte — Mon, 09 Jul 2018 08:45:08 GMT

Thank you Jigsaw,

That's beautiful. Still not sure how to do this though. X

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Donte — Mon, 09 Jul 2018 09:00:14 GMT

When we feel uncomfortable emotions like sadness, fear, or anger, arguing with ourselves or trying to think our way back to serenity isn't feasible. In moments of distress, trying to play 'mind tricks' by forcing ourselves to think of something else or challenge the validity of what we feel isn't very effective - in fact, it usually makes things worse.

What I discovered is that in moments like these, the most effective thing we can do is to engage in a behavior that helps to both distract and soothe us.

Walking away from distress means simply that you must use your behaviour to change the way you are feeling and to reduce distress. Once we get our distress feelings down, we can then consider more effective options for getting what we want - as opposed to blowing up or overreacting.

I think, rarely when we feeling intense emotions we act in our own best interest.

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Donte — Mon, 09 Jul 2018 09:11:31 GMT

Hey Jigsaw9,

People do not choose their sexuality. Apologies if I gave you that impression. I was never heterosexual. I was born homosexual but was forced by society, culture and religious conditioning to abide by the rules and married someone of the opposite sex as I felt I had no choice. I, like many others, felt I had no choice. This has contributed hugely to my mental illnesses.

Many people find themselves in this terrible predicament, especially if they are from a culturally or linguistically diverse background, where often, their personal self is sacrificed to community's and family's rules and ideals. It's a crime really. One that often goes under the carpet. The individual and their needs is never the focal point but rather their family, village and community.

I have met so many people, just like me, who have suffered abuse and bullying and persecution from their families and community just because they were born gay and that didn't fit their community's or religion's ideals and beliefs. Collectivist cultures have many disadvantages too if you happen to be born different. If you can't abide by the prescribed path...

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Donte — Thu, 12 Jul 2018 09:10:51 GMT

Hi Elizabeth,

I've been thinking on this more and I think it is extremely helpful to remember that acceptance is not approval. Very often, those things that we must accept in life are also those things we do not like, and perhaps even despise. For example, you likely would not choose to be HIV+ and may even despise what that virus has done to millions, but if you test positive for the HIV antibody, you must accept that you are HIV+. To consistently refuse to accept this keeps you in continuous, excessive, and unnecessary suffering.

Once we fully accept everything about us and are honest about it with the important people in our life, much of that distress disappears.

My wish is that these forums can provide the necessary space for people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds to share and receive support that often is non-existent or minimal in their collectivist communities and religious groups, so they can come to accept the things that torture them and develop strategies towards a recovery mindset. X

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Donte — Sun, 05 Aug 2018 00:03:10 GMT

"The most important decision you make is to be in a good mood."

--Voltaire

Fruit bowl: dealing with pain and grief

Donte — Sat, 25 Aug 2018 01:12:00 GMT

I’ve been thinking lately how destruction, hardship, devastation, darkness is actually absolutely pivotal in regeneration and development of positive outcomes. For example, how forest fires have amazing benefits to the regeneration of trees and bush.

Similarly, sometimes enemies are our best teachers as we can learn so much from their mistakes. Destruction often means rebirth.

None of us are getting out of here alive, so please stop treating yourself like an afterthought. Eat the delicious food. Walk in the sunshine. Jump in the ocean. Say the truth that you are carrying in your heart like hidden treasure. Be silly. Be kind. Be weird. There’s no time for anything else.