Alone as We Grieve Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Alone as We Grieve - Essay Example In any case, one thing is sure; body, mind, and spirit are the essential constituents of a living person. We know that our body gets destroyed after the death. However, we do not know what happens to the soul after death. There are plenty of people who believe that soul cannot be died even after the death of a person, as it is a form of energy, which drives our body. They substantiate their arguments with the help of scientific principles. Science accepts the existence of an energy, which drives our body. But, scientific principles say that energy can neither be created, nor be destroyed. If that is true science should explain what happens to the soul (energy) after death. In short, nobody can deny the existence of life after death. Didion’s experiences and feelings after the death of her husband can be analyzed under the above context. Didion wants to be alone—especially on the night of her husband’s death—but at other times she seems surrounded by people . In the following essay, I will examine the relationship between grief as we imagine it, and grief as it really is, in Joan Didion’s After Life†. â€Å"I remember a sense of shock. I wanted to say not yet but my mouth had gone dry. I could deal with â€Å"autopsy† but the notion of â€Å"obituary† had not occurred to me† (p11). These words clearly suggest the deep attachment Didion had with her husband. It should be noted that the autopsy is normally conducted on dead bodies, which are unknown to the doctor. At the same time, the word obituary we normally use when some of beloved ones passes away. In both the cases, one may feel grief, but the grief felt in the second case is deeper than the grief felt in the first case. â€Å"Grief is different. Grief has no distance. Grief comes in waves, paroxysms, sudden apprehensions that weaken the knees, blind the eyes, and obliterate the dailiness† (p10). It is difficult to define grief in simple ter ms. Pain, helplessness and physical humiliation are some of the characteristics of grief. While pain affects both body and mind, grief affects only the mind or soul. Grief comes as waves and sudden apprehensions whereas pain affects a person continuously. All humans in this world should have experienced some kind of pain during their lifetime. Therefore, anybody can define pain in their own ways. However, it is difficult for a person who never experiences actual grief to define grief exactly. In other words, what we think about grief is actually different from what we feel because of grief. For example, it is easy for a person to give soothing words to the person who experiences grief. He may even criticize the griever for not controlling his/her grief. This is because of the differences about the perceptions of grief and the feeling of grief. Grief, when it comes, is nothing we expect it to be. It is not what I felt when my parents died. what I felt in each instance was sadness, lo neliness, regret, for time gone by, for things unsaid, for my inability to share or even in any real way to acknowledge, at the end, the pain and helplessness and physical humiliation they each endured (p.10). Death of beloved ones always generates grief in the minds of a person. However, it is not necessary that the grief generated by the death of parents is same as the grief generated by the death of husband or children. Even though a person may have only one mother and father, that mother and father may have more than one child. So, grief generated