Healthy Grief | Dr. Karen Kramer

Deana Brown Mitchell: Hi, everyone, it's Deana at the Realize Foundation. And today we have a special guest. Her name is Dr. Karen Kramer, and she has a brand new book out, called Healthy Grief. And it's really important in our community. So many people have lost people to suicide or other ways. And going through that grief. And I think suicide is a special case, because you don't always understand it, you know, as if you lose a loved one to suicide, you never get to understand why. And I think that's the hardest part of that kind of grief. And so, I'm gonna let you Dr. Karen, talk about your new book, and how maybe that fits into what I just said.

Dr. Karen Kramer: Yes, yes Deana I will. So this about text or subtitle to healthy grief is normalizing and navigating loss and a culture of toxic positivity. So let's start there with the subtitle. And it's when it comes to feelings of loss of hopelessness, of grief. So it is grief. It's beyond just death and dying. It's this strong emotional feeling that we have, to some form of loss when what once was it's no longer and I'm going to open up my book, metaphorically here in front of us to really focus on that definition first, before I started diving in even more, so the idea that we had something at one point in time, and it may be a loved one that we had, it could be a health, a career, hopes and dreams that we once had a relationship that we had, for those of us getting older, a certain kind of health, a certain kind of style, whatever it is, we once had something. And then something happened, that we no longer had that thing, even if it's hopes and dreams, we no longer had that thing and something happened. But instead of just changing a page over from one chapter to the other, we can easily jump into the next chapter sees the number light, when out acknowledging that it is grief, it is a strong emotion that we have to something that once was that it's that process we go through from jumping from one chapter to another chapter in our life. And it's that process that we go through. And in many cases, I bring in the term toxic positivity. And talk about that, which is we think about well, yeah, don't we want to be positive. But when we want somebody else, or even ourselves, we feel like we have to be positive. The toxic part is when it hinders that healthy grief process. When it hinders that process of us going through the Grief and Healing from it, especially if we have lost somebody like it is for us who have lost somebody's buddy, even if we've lost somebody for suicide into your point that you just made is we may not know unnecessarily why or how or what the choice that they went through whether through that. In other words, there's a lot of questions that we may have. But it doesn't help us when somebody else is like, oh, it's time to get over it or put a smile on your face, or they're in a better place or some of those phrases that have been heard. And that's the toxic positivity when somebody is trying to make us better good intentions, trying to make us feel good. When we just want to be seen, heard and understood for the own emotions that were going through as part of this process. Flipside, we feel we have to put on that smiley, happy, fake smile and go through because that's what's accepted. She'd be able to process through that we have to be this happy person when truly we're going through this emotion. And they're actually you mentioned something and I'm going to come back to it. I had been mentioned it. One of the gentlemen that I interviewed for this book. So there's 30 Creech survival case studies that are in this book, and one of the gentlemen had death by suicide had lost his son, just 11 years prior to and he said one of the things that was said to him was, oh, well, your son's in a better place than he is basically like, you know, that wanted to flip them off, like my son would have been better here with me. How dare you say something like that? So I just wanted to finish up with that comment as well.

Deana Brown Mitchell: Yeah, that's true. And I think to your your point about toxic positivity, is that you know, that it's, it's a big conversation around mental health in general, not just in the sense of law of grief, is that you know, when people are dealing with depression or anxiety or, you know, any number of, you know, mental health letters. Toxic positivity is real. I mean, I'm somebody who's suffered from depression my whole life. And it's like, some days, you have to let yourself be in a funk, you have to let yourself cry, you have to let yourself get those emotions out, or they or they just keep turning into more and more of the same. And so when somebody's like, oh, you should just be happy, you have so much to be thankful for you have, you know, all these things going for you. It doesn't help us process. What is wrong, like, and for me, personally, I didn't process a lot of that for decades. And so when 2020 happened, I was forced to, you know, go back and process a lot of things that had happened in my life that I had never acknowledged or talked about at all. And so it's really hard when you're in a place like that, whether it's grief, or whether it's depression, or whether it's, you know, whatever it is, that you're going through some kind of challenge or adversity, that it's okay to not be positive all the time. And you have to make that space for yourself, in order to have that time to process it and really feel better. You know, like, some days, you'll just feel like crying. And there's some point when you're crying that you're like, I'm done crying like it's done. I'm over it. Well, we have to go through that same process with with grief and with, you know, not being positive.

Dr. Karen Kramer: Yeah, yeah, yes. And you're taking me back to another one of the grief survival case studies that is showing up in healthy grapes. By the way, there are 30 or 30, different grapes, rival case studies that are in there. One of them is Donna. Donna lost her daughter, death by suicide when her daughter was 19 years old. And one of the things that she says in the book is she is an advocate or doing mental health checkups at a younger age, because she says my daughter, I lost my daughter due to mental illness. And the reason why she's saying that is really to bring more array awareness, which is I love the fact that you're doing this is raising more awareness to those of us who are struggling ourselves or have loved ones who are struggling with some form of mental illness to be able to process through that is how can we normalize these conversations? How can we have that support to help people process through the challenges that are going on for them, so she is a big advocate for it. And I feel very blessed that she shared her story and healthy grief. And there's a second part to it, too, that I want to add on to what you just said, is around emotions and processing through the emotions is I found individuals were whether they were my clients or not this came up and the grace that is like, I feel lost, I feel stuck. I don't know where I am. I'm frustrated. So one of the things that is in the healthy grief framework. So there is a five stage healthy grief framework, which is part of the book is talking about emotions, and emotional flow. So most people are familiar with Kubler Ross, it's five stages of great, hey, the door Ross originally created that framework for those who were terminally ill. And it it's been expanded into other areas as well. But what I typically ask is, can you list all five of those stages? What are the five stages, and typically the responses even from my peers who are well versed in it, they can't. So one of the models I actually use with executives, and new managers from my leadership side, because that's been my background for over 30 years. And it is a model to understand the various different flows of emotions. And I found myself bringing that into the healthy grief framework with the idea about thinking about what are the various different flows of emotions that people may be going through? Not that they're going to start at this end and end over here. And not that it's going to be a straight line or all the way through. It's almost like going to a mall. If you've ever been to a large mall and you're like I'm not even quite sure where the restroom is. I'm not even quite sure where this shoe store and going to or this restaurant, but you look for that kiosk, right that nap and a mall. And one of the first things is you may go and try to figure out where you're where the restrooms are where you're trying to go. But you're not going to get there unless you also identify on the map that red.or That x that indicates where you currently are on that map. So you need to identify both points, where am I now? And where do I want to go, if I just know where I want to go, but I have no clue as to where I am on the map, it's not going to help me. So this process, it's called Dancing with Sara, this emotion model is intended to help the individuals identify like, You're not wrong, and having these emotions, you're having emotions, here is where it sits on this flow. It's like finding that mall X in the middle of that mall kiosk to know that it's okay. It's okay, you're grieving and your natural way and shares where you are on the process. So that's another thing that that clients as well as those reading the book have found helpful, and just understanding where are they in this process of emotions.

Deana Brown Mitchell: That's such a good point. Because, you know, like, like you said, you know, we're always focused on whatever's next or whatever, how we're moving forward. And I think that that speaks to the books we publish to with people stories is that people come into that project with the thought, like, my story is going to help other people. And in 100%, it does, but what they don't realize is how much the journey of writing their story, and publishing, it helps them. And I think it's, it's a huge aha moment for a lot of people that are involved in our projects. And if you're listening to this, and you don't know what I'm talking about, we published books called scars to stars. And it's really just people telling their story of overcoming adversity. And we believe that having these conversations and community around adversity can help people to not get to the point of suicidal ideation, hopefully, because we can help them with understand more about the struggles that are going through that get them there. And so whether that's addiction, or whether that's, you know, mental illness, or whether it's, you know, abuse, whatever it is, we talk about all those things in our book, and we hope that we don't get to the point of grief in the way that we're talking about it here. But, you know, it's, the conversation piece is so huge, because I had a suicide attempt when I was 27. And for 23 years, I never talked about it, I didn't tell anybody. And when I finally met another person who had survived a suicide attempt, and I could actually have a conversation with them, it changed everything for me, because I knew then that I wasn't alone. Someone else had been there. And, you know, just talking about it out loud, it gets the junk out of your head, it helps you process and, and move forward. And I think it's the same thing with grief. And it's like, you can't you can't bottle it up forever. And also process it like you have to talk about it to process it. Right. Yeah. It's really important, and I would, I'm really excited for our community, to hear what you're doing and and about your book, because there's so many people and I've been in Facebook groups about suicide, and it's just heartbreaking the stories people have about losing a child, a parent, brother, sister, and how it affects them forever, you know, for the rest of their life, and how we can have these conversations in order to at least help them cope with it, you know?

Dr. Karen Kramer: Yeah. And a couple things are coming up for me, as I'm hearing you, too, is part of the book, the healthy grief book, and it's intended to talk about healthy, great, we can grieve and grieve various different ways. And we grieve in our own way. Are we grieving healthily. So what do I mean by that? I mean, are we grieving in such a way? So it's not settling in our body? Are we grieving in such a way that it is not negatively impacting the relationships around us? So internally and externally, and in healthy grief, I also talk about the various different stories because they are case studies, that I look at any kind of any of those stories that came to me whether they were my clients, my own stories, or others who came to me, and with any mention about physical ailments in the body. I also stepped back and I looked at how does grief show up in the body? So let me tell you about Stephanie. And Stephanie is a reason why I wrote healthy grief and relates to what we're just talking about. So Stephanie came to me, she was in her early 50s. And she had just been diagnosed with Stage Two colon cancer. Now she knew what I did. We had we'd been friends for a while. So she knew what I did. But she had been kind of tiptoeing around it like that doesn't apply to me. I don't want to do any therapy, and which, by the way, I'm not a traditional therapist, that that was her idea of what I did. And she mentioned to us one night that she said to a group of us as friends, and she said, I just been diagnosed with Stage Two colon cancer. And at that moment, I just got this energetic way. Like this was her calling this was her meaning this is her wake up call. So after everybody else of our friends gave her their hug, condolences, I came up to her and gave her an energetic hug. And I whispered in her ear, and I said, Stephanie, this is your wake up call, you will get through this call me. Again. She knew what I did. The next day or two days later, she went to the doctor who said, Stephanie, this has been growing, you may have just been diagnosed, but this has been growing in your body for five years. Now five years is indicative. Now I'm sharing her story. And I'm also sharing some similar stories that are in healthy greed. It doesn't necessarily mean that by the years for everyone, it doesn't mean cancer for everyone. I just want to hear Destiny story that was so powerful. She then asked the question, again, you this has been growing in you for five years, it really hit her because it was almost five years to the day, it was two months away from five years to the day when her husband committed suicide, died by suicide. And she was carrying the guilt of not being able to save him she was the first one that was there was not being able to save him. So we did the work, the energetic work about being able to release that guilt that she was holding on to because she said she was about ready to carry that guilt to the grave with not being able to help him at that time. And she also had four children who were leaning on her and needing her. So by doing the work. Now, let me stop there. That's another reason why I chose to write this book after working with Stephanie, because I said, this point in time, people need to understand that grief is more than just death and dying, it could be carrying around the guilt of the loss. Just as I mentioned, when we started, there's various different types of loss out there, even the COVID loss because you mentioned that that loss of normalcy is a loss, it's out there. And so having an understanding how grief is more than just death and dying. The second part of it is how unresolved grief over a period of time will settle in the body. Let me repeat that unresolved grief over a period of time will settle in the body. Now I just was came from a mastermind this last weekend with an individual who was talking about trauma, and PTSD and suicide, because that was part of his background, because he came from the military background, and was helping those overcome PTSD and war time drama of trauma and suicide. So his brand was the same thing of mind that unresolved grief for him. He was saying well settle into mental illness. I'm saying unresolved grief will settle in the body, right? So it's looking at why healthy great is we grieve in various different ways. But there's healthy ways to grieve, and there's not so healthy ways to grieve. And that's the reason why more like even this podcast, getting it out there. So people understand that, yes, you can grieve in your own way. There's also healthier ways to do it without it settling in the body. Now for Stephanie, she's moving towards remission. And again, once you remove that energetic hold on that grief, and again, in her case, it was that loss of her husband, then it allows the body to come back to balance. There's more on that. So I'm not going to talk too much more in here on that. But let's put it aside. One thing and I love the fact that I'm bringing up Stephanie because one thing is that I wanted to create a platform for her to be able to share her story not only what led to her grief, but her healing journey as well. And just on month after we launched healthy grief, she was invited by a veteran to come talk to other veterans, other military veterans who had considered suicide or attempted suicide and to talk to them and she was basically the face to say, if you were you You chose to look at me I am the face, I am that that spouse that you would have left, I had these children that you would have left behind. And in most cases, they were males, as I understood it, who were part of that I don't know how many were in that environment. But a number of them came up to her afterwards and just thanked her for sharing her story. Back to what we're talking about today. Stories are so powerful stories are so powerful, those individuals who wrote their own stories for healthy grief. And again, these were case studies, it was an anthology, I specifically picked the individuals who wrote the stories for the book, it was a case study, because I analyzed those stories for the reader to understand how they can pull through the themes of the healthy grief model. And also wanted to make sure that the individuals submitting those stories, or healthfully enough on their, their process, healing, where by writing the story was not going to re traumatize them. What just as you mentioned, Deanna, that there, it's the stories people were saying, just by writing their story for healthy grief, that in and of itself, was healing.

Deana Brown Mitchell: Yeah, it's very true. It's, it's like when I, before the pandemic, when I owned a business, and I was just working all the time. You know, I had people would say to me, sometimes, like, you should journal. And I was like, I don't have time for that. Right. But in 2020, I did have time for that. And I started journaling. And I started writing about new business ideas. And then I also started writing about the trauma in my life and my suicide attempt, and it is so freeing to write whether it's for just you, or whether you're writing it for other people. It gets the words out of your head and on the paper. And one of our Arthur's said to me in our, in our scars, the stars interview, he said, you know, once you put it on paper, it's just words, it's not doesn't hurt you anymore. It's just words. And I thought that was profound, because it's so true, could be his when we do right, or even talk about it and have a conversation where we're getting the junk out of her head. And it helps us to process it. And I say it in probably laymen terms where you have more scientific terms. But I think it's it's, you know, that the whole point is just to have people have conversations around mental health, death, suicide, grief, you know, because we can't get over things. If we don't let it out or talk about it. It's so important. And I'm so glad that you are here today talking about this, because it's important to our community and to your community, I'm sure and getting the word out more about how that stress and grief manifests in our body. Because it's it does. I mean, I know that but I don't know it on the level that you do.

Dr. Karen Kramer: And I approach it. Anytime I hear anyone talk about any kind of physical ailments showing up with a body. I'm immediately curious, immediately curious, I had a conversation with a woman yesterday, we happen to be in a mastermind together. And she just mentioned something about a fall shoulder injury that she had to the point where the muscle had hold separated from the bone. So I leaned in with just some questions that were coming to me as well as I also laid on my intuition. So some of the work that I do, just to clarify, is looking at the neuroscience of our that psychosomatic in our body. So that subconscious, that unconscious work. That's part of the work that I do. And I also lean in my own intuition. So I was asking her some gentle questions, and also sharing with her either the questions or the words that were coming to mind for me. And she had shared a bit about her upbringing, about her father and then said, oh, yeah, though, that's just a story and then indicating that what was showing up in her shoulder was separate, emphasize that word separate from her father. So I came back and I said, your shoulder muscles separated from the bone. And I just said, What is the word separation mean for you? And in many cases, because I never want to imply anything. I this was just coming up and she sat there and she broke down in tears. And she said, It's my father. That's what's showing up for me. Now, that was two days ago at the time of this recording. That was two days ago. She sent me a text message this morning. She didn't respond to me yesterday when I'm like, How are you know, and it was we were not this was not a Client, this is nothing. She's just somebody who was in a mastermind together, we had bonded, we were having a casual conversation over lunch. It's all it was. She sent me a text message this morning. And she said, I rested all day yesterday. And I woke up this morning, and now I could move my arm which I had not been able to move in the last five years.

Deana Brown Mitchell: Wow. That's awesome. That's awesome. Well, I know we have a time limit to I want to thank you so much for being here today. And for anyone listening, I just want to put up our website you'll be able to find out more about Dr. Karen Kramer and healthy grief around this video, wherever it's posted. And if you'd like if you're interested in telling your story in scars to stars or being on our podcast, you can go to realize foundation.org and just fill out the submission on the scars to stars page. So I hope to see you all in one of our events or one of our books and thank you again Dr. Karen for being here.

Dr. Karen Kramer: Thank you, and all the best to everyone watching and listening.