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The Many Faces of Grief

the Many Faces of Grief Shock, Anger, Sadness, Fear, Exhaustion, Isolated and Alone, Rebirth: hope, joy, thankfulness, acceptance
Thank you to Pixabay.

“The Many Faces of Grief” by Joan Y. Edwards

Grief is the normal internal feeling one experiences in reaction to a loss. You have seen them. You have experienced them. They are real. They are not a figment of your imagination. However, when grieving your imagination sometimes takes over. How long does grief last? It may last a lifetime. How long it impacts your life or stops you from living to the utmost is sometimes up to you and sometimes feels like it is out of your control. All of this points to the effects of your feelings after someone you love dies. 

1. One face of grief is shock. You know that everyone dies. You may have had clues this was the time God was calling your loved one home. Or you may have been rejecting that idea and thinking he was going to be healed and live longer with you. You remember well that everyone dies. It still is a shock when death comes. No matter how young or old the person is. It is a shock to your emotional system to find that they are no longer alive. 

2, One face of grief is anger. Anger that your loved one has left you all alone.  You can’t feel their touch. You don’t have their encouraging words, the warm hugs, the light kisses, the listening ear. They left you alone with all the financial, legal, household and personal items to figure out and take care of. You have to sort through their clothing, their favorite books and DVDs.  How could they leave you with all that headache and worry to go through by yourself. It really wasn’t their intention. Probably, they would rather be here on earth with you.

3. Another face of grief is sadness. You feel sadness that your loved one has left you all alone.  You can’t feel their touch. You don’t have the encouraging words, the warm hugs, the light kisses, the listening ear. You miss being with them. You miss looking into their eyes and seeing their smiling face. The memories of moments the two of you shared together are gone now unless you shared them with someone else.  I found myself telling my daughters and his daughter about things that my husband and I had done together. I think through sharing them it helped keep the memories alive a little longer and to let go at least once for those memories.  It takes many times of letting go. Perhaps a way of letting go of these memories is to write them down. If you want to share them with others, it is okay. If you want to shred them, it is okay. You can have a candle service and thank God for the wonderful memories.  You can also bury your written words in a flower garden or in the woods. 

4. Another face of grief is fear. The things you are afraid of can be numerous. Some of the fears are stronger than others. The fear of being alone if you were married to the deceased loved one can be hard to handle. Depending upon your background. If being abandoned at an early age was a prevalent memory for you, your spouse’s death may trigger those feelings of abandonment and fear of how you’re going to make it being alone.  Sort of like in the game of tag, “Ready or Not, Here I come.” Death says, “Ready or Not, Here I come.”

5. Another face of grief is exhaustion. After the death of a loved one, you can’t get to sleep. Once you get to sleep, you wake up in a few hours. You start thinking  about the events leading up to the death. Planning the funeral, going to the funeral,  attending the burial: all take energy.  After that you have the legal matters that must be taken care of. Why did your loved one leave you with all this to do? Even when your loved one leaves a will or trust and beneficiary on death papers signed, it is still stressful. Waiting to get connected by phone to the right party can take up to an hour. This waiting is stressful in regular times. It triples the stress after someone dies. The tears flow at unexpected times.  Having to say “My husband died” over and over again on the phone may take a notch out of your calmness. The tears flow. It’s okay. It’s a natural response. It is part of the healing process.  Crying levels your emotions and helps your body relax and start healing. 

6. Another face of grief is feeling alone and isolated. You don’t have the loved one who died to share the small details of your life: what you ate for lunch, to know if you took your medicine on time, what you watched on TV, or who you missed most from high school. You are no longer the center of your loved ones life. They are no longer the center of yours; although parts of you still think they are. It’s recognizing this reality that your loved one is not there anymore, that is the hardest to accept.

There is a feeling of alienation from usual gatherings of family and friends.  With COVID, you are even more isolated for good reason, You want your family and friends to be protected. You want to be protected.  Being with others that you and your spouse used to get together with is a time of healing for all of you. Somehow Zoom and other video chats aren’t the same as face to face and receiving a warm hug and encouragement from family and close friends. 

I am lucky and very thankful that I have family and friends who call to check on me or come by to visit; both Carl’s family and mine. I have been fortunate enough to see my family face to face.  Not every day, but occasionally. They check on me often. And whenever I tell them I especially miss them they set up time for the whole family to get together. Now that I’ve had the second Covid vaccine, I’ll be able to meet and see my family and friends who live close and those who live far away. Many have been sick  and others are going through rough times. I want to be there for them.

There is part of the grieving process that you have to do alone. No one can do it for you. It is your grief. Other members of the family and close friends have to go through their own personal grief.  

7. Seventh face of grief is Rebirth of Self (hope, joy, thankfulness, acceptance, new purpose).  The stress of the death and your grief may even make you sick. Achieve a balance of eating the right foods, exercising, doing the things you used to enjoy: walking, reading, going to the movies. Doing something new may give you a new way to look at things.

Cook a new dish, bake a cake, buy yourself an ice cream cone with chocolate sprinkles. Draw a picture, write a song, take pictures, plant new flowers. All of these things are good.

When you get to the acceptance phase, you are ready to help other people. There is a need within you to find a new purpose or a renew the purpose you may have forgotten during all this grief. You find a purpose for living since your loved one is no longer there. You will designate a new emphasis or renew a past idea.

God made you to share his goodness and love with others. What you give to our world isn’t provided by anyone else. You are the one to do it. I think after a loved one dies, you have to do things to help rebuild yourself. No one else knows what you need better than you. But you have to speak up. You have to take note of the little nudges of wisdom that come to you.

Think about the flight attendant who tells you that you to put the oxygen mask on yourself first before you put it on your child. It’s important to remember to do what you think you need to do to pull yourself up out of the doldrums. Also, at least once a day, do something to make someone smile. Call a friend. Call a relative. Donate time, money or goods to your favorite charity. Call to thank someone for helping you. Call an old friend you haven’t talked to in ages. Do things that leave you with inner joy.  Share your joy with others.    

There are many other faces of grief. I only chose to elaborate on seven of them. You may see all of these faces on a given day. You may see other faces that I didn’t mention. Whatever face of grief you are experiencing,  love yourself. Be kind and gentle. 

I ask God to help you accept yourself and all of your feelings from the loss of someone you love.

Whatever you are going through today, I hope you realize what a gift you are. I know that you may not understand how important you are to all of the people who know you. It is important to love yourself. 

I am sending hugs and thankfulness for you for reading my blog. Thank you for being the love that transforms the sadness of others into joy. What seems little to you may be a life saver for someone else. 

Resources:

  1. Huffington Post. “A New Look at the 7 Emotional States of Loss:” https://www.huffpost.com/entry/loss-grief_b_5556644
  2. Medicine Net. “Grief Symptoms: Get Facts on the Seven Stages of Grief:” https://www.medicinenet.com/loss_grief_and_bereavement/article.htm
  3. Medicine Net. “Depression: Symptoms, Types, Test, and Treatment: “https://www.medicinenet.com/depression/article.htm#what_are_the_risk_factors_and_causes_of_depression

Never Give Up
Joan Y. Edwards, Author
Copyright © 2009-2021 Joan Y. Edwards

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Setups and Payoffs

Setups and Payoffs

“Setups and Payoffs” by Joan Y. Edwards

I’ve read a number of books and taken courses about novel writing and screenwriting. They all mention the importance of setups and payoffs in novels and movies. So just what is a setup and how do you make it pay off? We know what it feels like when someone sets us up for defeat in real life. 

In the dictionary, a setup is when the author uses a symbol, an event, or a prop to signify something that’s about to happen in the main character’s life…a symbol of the past that may change in the future to give hope or cause defeatSetups are significant to the main character’s current bad situation or responsible for helping them rise above the problem. 

Here’s something I learned from reading Chris Soth’s Million Dollar Screenwriting – The Mini Movie Method In your book or movie script, you want your characters to go from fear to hope…from hope to fear…from fear to hope, etc. When your character’s situation goes from fear to hope, the reader sighs with satisfaction. When the plot goes from hope to fear, the readers feel tension and are afraid for your main character. They relate to the emotions of the main character.

So when you as the author mention things, are they symbols of past defeat or the hope for future success? Will these situations be overcome? Will the main character defeat fear in the final hour of the story? How? Will these set-ups play a part in it? What will have to change before the main character defeats the enemy? Set it up.

Setups and payoffs are essential to all stories. They pull readers in and set them up for a change of emotions. A change of feelings in the story.

Setups may scare us. Danger for the main character from the past, the present, or the future. Setups create or set up a mood and build up a desired emotion.

Payoffs ease your mind.  Payoffs may be payback time for the bad guy. Payoffs may be when the main character wins at something or has a small success.  

Possible things to use as set-ups to add fear or hope to your story.
Prop
Place
Weather
Hopeless situation
Future event
Clothing
Sidekick
Relationship
C
ompetition
Warning

If a doll that Jane had in 5th grade isn’t significant for the story, don’t mention it. Everything and everyone mentioned in a story has to have significance to the story. If a character, prop, or event has no significance to your plot or character formation, cut it out.

In the movie, Better Off Dead, with John Cusack as Lane Meyer, is about a teenage boy who’s devastated because his girlfriend dumps him.  The paperboy comes to collect the $2.00 for the subscription to the paper. However, Lane’s parents aren’t home and he doesn’t have any money. The paperboy creates a lot of havoc every day because he throws the paper and it breaks a window in the garage door. So if the truth was known, the paperboy might owe them more money than the two dollars. This is a set up for the paperboy to ride on his bike and follow the lead character everywhere saying, “I want my two dollars.” Without that one scene where they show that the main character doesn’t have the money, we wouldn’t understand the humor in “I want my two dollars. 

In Shawshank Redemption at the beginning they set up the Bible as being important to Andy. At the end we find out that one of the reasons, the Bible is so important to him is that it contains a hammer with which he will dig his way out of prison. It sets up that the men in the prison are important to Andy and for that reason he goes out on a limb to play music for them over the P.A. system and doesn’t care what repercussions happen to him as a result. He gets them a library so they can learn. It’s so clever when the story tells about how Andy invented a character to doctor up the books for the head of the prison to make a bunch of money illegally. A fictional character…the big payoff at the end is that Andy uses that made up character for his identity when he escapes. Great setups and payoffs throughout this movie. 

Back to the Future with Michael J. Fox has many setups and payoffs. Marty McFly sees  how pathetic his father is and how Biff Tannen bullies his father. At the end of the movie, payoff is that going back to the past, changed the present condition of his family.  Biff is no longer able to bully, Marty’s father. Lane’s town is restoring the clock tower from the damage of the lightning strike in 1955. Aha, that’s the year the Doc Brown’s time machine gets stuck.  So many details from the present are shown in the past and vice versa. It’s fun and fascinating to watch…very satisfying to see the great payoffs.
I hope my explanation helps you understand how to use setups and payoffs to create and release tension in your stories. If not, I believe reading the resources listed below will help you get the idea embedded in your mind so that you can use it to make your story better by keeping your readers on the edge of their seats. I listed the resources beginning with the ones I found most useful. All of them were useful.

Look at your favorite book or movie, one you’ve read or watched many times. What are the significant setups and payoffs you remember from it? Things that scared you and things that eased your mind. Please share. 

Resources in the order I found them useful. The most useful is at the beginning.

  1. Copyblogger. “Open Loops:” https://www.copyblogger.com/open-loops-2/ Use the Movie Up
  2. Save the Cat. “Examples of Great Set-ups and How They Pay Off:” http://www.savethecat.com/tools/examples-of-great-set-ups-and-how-they-pay-off
  3. Writer with Tools. “Setups and Payoffs: What are they?” http://writeswithtools.com/2015/04/13/setups-and-payoffs-what-are-they/
  4. Copyblogger.The Blockbuster Secret to Seducing Your Audience:” https://www.copyblogger.com/open-loops/
  5. The 15 Minute Movie Method. “Setups and Payoffs:” http://15minutemoviemethod.com/setups-and-payoffs
  6. Elizabeth Amy Hajek. Elenatintil Blog. “Fast Writing: Tracking Set-ups and Pay-offs:” http://elenatintil.blogspot.com/2017/06/writing-set-ups-and-pay-offs.html
  7. Actionromanceintrigue. “Screenwriting setups and payoffs are best as cause and effect:” https://actionromanceintrigue.com/screenwriting-setups-payoffs-cause-and-effect/
  8. Back to the Future wiki. “Setup and Payoff:” http://backtothefuture.wikia.com/wiki/Setup_and_payoff
  9. LinkedIn Learning. video. Writing: The Craft of Story. “Story check (Setups, payoffs, and the clues in between):” https://www.linkedin.com/learning/writing-the-craft-of-story/story-check-setups-payoffs-and-the-clues-in-between
  10. Reddit. “What are some of your favorite setups and payoffs?” https://www.reddit.com/r/Screenwriting/comments/2nrz71/what_are_some_of_your_favorite_setups_and_payoffs/

 

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Never Give Up
Joan Y. Edwards, Author
Copyright © 2017-2019 Joan Y. Edwards
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Will this little duck’s song save him from Mr. Fox?
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