Deeply Loved: Receiving and Reflecting Empathy in the Midst of Grief

Welcome to the When Grief Comes Home podcast. We're glad you're here. This podcast supports parents who are grieving a spouse, partner, or child while helping their children who are living through the loss of a parent or sibling. With personal grief stories and professional guidance, we offer parents practical tips for supporting their child who is grieving while caring for their own grief. 

When grieving, we desperately need what therapist Kristi Gaultiere calls "oxygen for the soul" – empathy. Not quick fixes or sympathetic platitudes, but the profound healing that comes through being truly seen in our pain.

In this illuminating conversation, Kristi unpacks why empathy transforms grief by allowing us to breathe through unbearable moments. Research shows that when someone responds to our vulnerability with genuine understanding, our whole body responds – energy increases, fatigue decreases, sleep improves, and our ability to concentrate returns. Without this empathetic connection, we remain isolated in our pain, unable to process our grief effectively.

Kristi walks us through her practical Four A's framework for offering empathy: Ask curious questions, Attune completely to the person, Acknowledge the unique significance of their loss, and Affirm their strength (but only after the first three steps). She clarifies crucial distinctions between healthy empathy and codependency, explaining how true empathy empowers while codependency drains both parties.

For parents navigating their own grief while supporting children, Kristi offers wisdom about self-empathy and befriending our emotions. When we judge or shame ourselves for feelings like anger or sadness, our children learn to suppress their emotions too. By modeling acceptance of our grief, we create safe spaces for our children to process theirs.

Most powerfully, Kristi reminds us that our wounds can become sources of healing for others. Through our grief journey, we develop deeper capacity for empathy – turning our pain into a gift that helps others feel less alone. Whether you're grieving, supporting someone who is, or simply want to become more empathetic, this episode offers practical wisdom and heartfelt guidance for the journey ahead.

Order the book When Grief Comes Home https://a.co/d/ijaiP5L

For more information on Jessica’s House or for additional resources, please go to jessicashouse.org 

Transcript

Welcome to When Grief Comes Home

Gary Shriver 0:00

Hello and welcome to When Grief Comes Home, a podcast dedicated to parents living through loss while supporting their child. Let's meet the team.

Erin Nelson 0:11

I'm Erin Nelson, founding Executive Director at Jessica's House.

Colleen Montague 0:15

Hi, I'm Colleen Montague, Program Director for Jessica's House and a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist.

Brad Quillen 0:21

Hi, I'm Brad Quillen and I'm the host of When Grief Comes Home.

Gary Shriver 0:25

This podcast goes along with a book of the same name. The book When Grief Comes Home is a gentle guide for parents who are grieving a partner or child, while helping their children through the loss of their parent or sibling. When Grief Comes Home is now available at all major book retailers. Comes Home is now available at all major book retailers. Now let's go to the team as they share grief resources and coping skills, heartfelt stories and insights to support parents as they raise children who are grieving. Together, you'll find strength as we learn to live with loss and find ways to heal.

Brad Quillen 1:01

Hello. I'm Brad Quillen, joined by my co-hosts Erin Nelson and Colleen Montague. Today, we're honored to have with Kristi Gaultiere, a licensed marriage and family therapist who, along with her husband Bill, have been counseling and ministering to people for over 30 years. Erin, Colleen, let's jump right into this podcast. Erin, you want to start us off?

Introducing Christy Galtier and Soul Shepherding

Erin Nelson 1:26

Well, Kristi, we are so glad to have you today and we're so excited about this new book that you wrote with Bill and it's called Deeply Loved, and you and Bill have a ministry called Soul Shepherding, and we're just so glad to have you here on our podcast today.

Kristi Gaultiere 1:45

Thank you so much, Erin and Colleen. I'm thrilled to be with you and so grateful for those that are tuning in to listen, and it's my honor to share what I have been so blessed to know and has helped and been so healing for me personally.

Erin Nelson 2:01

I also just really resonate with the healing that can come when you have a person's empathetic presence in your life, and what a difference it makes to be really seen and loved and be met with empathy. And so in our listeners we have so many people that are tuning in because they're grieving, and so we'll talk a little bit about that and how this empathy can really be healing for them, and so we'll go ahead and get started. But I just wanted to ask how have you seen the ministry of empathy bring comfort to those who may be grieving?

Kristi Gaultiere 2:42

Well, it's a tremendous comfort because we have studied much about empathy and even the way that our body responds to empathy. There's been studies one of the recent continuing education courses that I did was on neuropsychology and it was showing that when we are vulnerable with someone, if they don't respond with empathy, the shame centers of our brain actually light up and there are all kinds of emotional barriers that actually will get in the way of our grief if we are not having a safe place to process it and a safe person who will attune to our emotions, who will listen to us with interest and who will respond with accurate and healing empathy. But when we receive that empathy, it is so empowering for us and so freeing for us. Oftentimes, just even in my own experience, because I too am a person working through grief I, in the last three years I've lost my brother, my mother and now my brother-in-law from cancer, and my brother-in-law actually is still under treatment, but he has stage four pancreatic cancer and it's not looking good. And in my own grief, as I share my grief, as I'm journeying with them, as I've been intimately involved in every phase of their process, from diagnosis through treatment and after their passing, is I share my grief.

Kristi Gaultiere 4:12

I notice a huge difference when somebody rushes to give me sympathy, maybe oh yes, I know exactly how you feel and they start to talk about themselves and it just kind of shuts me down and I feel like I need to show up for them. Or if somebody begins to give me advice well, you know what really helped me when I went through that is it kind of shuts me down, shuts down my emotions. But when somebody really attunes to me with empathy and says I'm really sad for you, tell me more, and they're interested and they're tuned in to my nonverbal communication, to my emotions, and they begin to use words to mirror back to me, using their own words, that I know, like, oh, this person understands and get it. Oh, I think they know something about grief. Oh, you know, I'm feeling like they really care. I'm not feeling so alone. Oh, this burden is feeling lighter. Oh, I'm open. I'm beginning to get some new insights.

Erin Nelson 5:11

It changes everything. It changes everything and you can really feel just the genuine nature of being met with that reflection. And here at Jessica's House we talk so much about reflection and what it means to welcome someone wherever they are in their grief, and we can reflect back their words and mirror kind of their energy to just be with them and that's really kind of the heart of what we do every day. And so thank you so much for sharing a little bit more about how somebody might be met with empathy.

Kristi Gaultiere 5:46

It's so important and we kind of know the old adage I don't care what you know if I don't know that you care. And empathy is a way of feeling like somebody cares. If somebody's giving me empathy, I know they care and then I'm going to be more open to what they know. And I think the way that you at Jessica's House give empathy to the people that you're caring for, and even, I'm sure, the people that tune into your podcast and read your book, receive empathy from you. It helps them to lean in to receive more from your expertise as well.

Erin Nelson 6:21

Yeah, and it's just. There's something about a movement of healing that happens when you receive that empathy, and I think even for the person that is giving the empathy and is present, there's just something about the flow of that that can just because you know so much of what you talk about in your book is that it really comes from God. So you're really in that flow of God and how he's inside of you and how you're able to bring that to someone. That's right.

Kristi Gaultiere 6:57

In 1 John 4, verse 7, we read that we love because God first loved us and we empathize because God first empathizes with us. We have a God, a Savior, in Jesus Christ, who came to empathize with us. Hebrews 4.15 says we do not have a high priest who's unable to empathize with us, but one who's been tempted, tested, tried in every way we have. He became human and understood. He experienced the grief and loss of his father Joseph, his earthly father, at a young age, and of his cousin, john the Baptist, and he lived in a time where there was so much grief, under Roman occupation, and he was poor and he knew so many griefs and was well acquainted with grief. Even scripture tells us, and so Jesus has this personal empathy for us in our trials, in our loss, in our pain. He knew pain.

Erin Nelson 7:56

Yes, he did, and he's our best model to really watch how he lived and to embody that. That's right.

Colleen Montague 8:06

Kristi, you describe empathy as oxygen for the soul. Can you help our listeners who are supporting grieving children and families understand why empathy is so crucial during times of loss?

Kristi Gaultiere 8:19

Well. Thank you, Colleen. Research shows. There's a lot of research on the power of oxygen right now. It empowers us, it increases our energy. It reduces our fatigue. We sleep better when we're well-oxygenated. It improves our concentration and our performance. It's the same way with empathy. I can say that empathy empowers me, it increases my energy. It reduces my fatigue. I sleep better when I've received empathy because I'm not processing all my emotions and anxious dreams. It improves my concentration because I'm not distracted by all these emotions that are, you know, dysregulating me or that I'm trying to use energy to repress. My performance is better because I don't feel alone. I feel supported by empathy.

Kristi Gaultiere 9:01

You know, if you grew up in a smoggy city, you kind of adapt to it. You don't even notice the smog. I grew up in Southern California. When I married Bill and he moved here from the country, he couldn't breathe. It hurt his lungs to breathe because of the smog and I didn't know what I was missing because I'd never had clear air. But he did. And it's kind of like that with empathy. Many of us have been living in an empathy desert where we haven't experienced it. We don't even know what it's like. But then when we begin to breathe and receive empathy. It's like this oxygen for our soul and it's so helpful and empowering it makes such a huge difference for us.

Empathy vs. Codependency: Key Differences

Brad Quillen 9:42

Hey, Kristi, speaking of empathy, in your book you guys mentioned the idea that some people criticize empathy as it's being too soft or too easy. You know enables people to kind of stay where they're at, but how do you respond to that? Like, what do you and Bill say about that?

Kristi Gaultiere 9:58

Well, thank you, Brad. That is important. I think there is a lot of misconceptions about empathy. One of the things that's a big thing that causes people to not appreciate or value empathy is, they think well, isn't empathy agreement? I don't agree with them. How can I empathize with them? But empathy isn't agreement.

Kristi Gaultiere 10:16

We define empathy as seeking to understand someone's thoughts, their emotions and their experience so that they know that they're deeply loved by God. And it's not that you're not empathizing with them, meaning that you are affirming everything that they believe. You're just listening to understand their perceptions, their experience. That and another thing, another reasons why people maybe have concern about empathy is that they're afraid that it's coddling someone. But empathy isn't coddling somebody else. It's not going to fragilize them. It's actually empowering and respectful to show that you care about this person. It's not rescuing people, not true empathy.

Kristi Gaultiere 11:02

These are mistaken ideas about empathy, and I mistaken ideas about empathy and I think that there's been a lot of confusion about that, because sometimes empathy is misused to manipulate people or even a political agenda, or sometimes people will use empathy to get some self-indulgence. One of the things that we write about in Deeply Loved receiving and reflecting, reflecting God's Great Empathy for you is the difference between self-pity and empathy and the difference between codependency and empathy, and there are some real differences, but I think there's some confusion about this that causes people to maybe be afraid of or distrust empathy, especially if they don't have that understanding. One of the things we say is that empathy isn't just gracious, it's also gritty. So we have a chapter titled the Grit and Grace of Empathy, because empathy really helps people deal with hard truths in their lives. It helps them to take personal responsibility so they can act with wisdom and with love. We have a formula that we write about in the book empathy plus truth plus responsibility equals growth.

Erin Nelson 12:16

How would you define the difference between empathy and codependency? What are some kind of like hallmarks of what that might look like?

Kristi Gaultiere 12:27

Yeah, it's such an important thing for us to consider. Codependency is more when we're taking on and feeling somebody else's problems as our own, versus empathy is putting words to what they feel. It's not taking it on, it's our responsibility. Codependency would be controlled by other people's needs, whereas empathy is letting other people be responsible for their life, but you're just joining them so they know they're not alone with what they're feeling. Codependency often comes from an insecurity or a low self-esteem, whereas empathy comes from being secure in God's love and joining him in his empathy for the person you're with. Codependency is matching somebody's mood or reacting to it, whereas empathy involves regulating our own emotions as we care for other people and as we attune to them. When we are codependent, we'll tend to deny our own needs and emotions, but we're In true empathy. We're able to accept our own emotions and needs because we have good boundaries. So we write about boundaries in the book because that's so important, and we write about stewarding your empathy, because you're not going to be able to be empathetic with everybody in the whole world all the time, so we need to steward it, we need to have boundaries on it. We need to be intentional with where we're giving our empathy.

Kristi Gaultiere 13:50

Codependency rescues people from their problems and empathy shows tender concern for their problems, but it doesn't rescue them. Codependencies can be something where we're trying to make other people feel appreciative. And with empathy, instead of trying to get appreciation for being empathetic, we are accepting people with no strings attached. We're not expecting something in return. We're not trying to get our own name out. In codependency, we slip into doing too much for other people and in healthy empathy, we respect our own needs, limits and boundaries. In codependency, sometimes we can be striving to be very heroic and in empathy, we want to be trusting Jesus ultimately as the greatest help and we're just joining in His. So we write about three-way empathy God's empathy, self-empathy and our own empathy empathy that we give.

Erin Nelson 14:50

Thank you. It's so helpful to really see the difference between the two, because I feel like sometimes those lines can be easily blurred, and to see that and to really make the difference, really be able to identify the difference between codependency and empathy is just so helpful. So thank you so much for writing about that. You also wrote about the four A's of empathy, Kristi, and how, when you think about the four A's of empathy, could you share with our listeners how those might really help in when they're grieving or when they're suffering.

The Four A's of Empathy

Kristi Gaultiere 15:29

Yes. Well, the four A's of empathy are simply ask, attune, acknowledge and affirm. Now let me unpack those a little bit and apply them to grief, as you asked. When we ask somebody, we're going to be asking them really good questions, like, maybe you're going to be asking them I'm wondering how you're processing this grief or this loss that you're journeying through. Would you want to share some of what you're experiencing today? I would be honored and happy to listen and to seek to understand your grief journey. So you're inviting them to open up, to let you in, and when they do begin to share, you're continuing and you're listening with curiosity and you're continuing to ask good questions, to invite more sharing and more curiosity, to seek to understand.

Kristi Gaultiere 16:26

And then the second A as you're listening, you attune to the other person's emotions. In other words, a lot of times we in our society will ask somebody a question how are you? And as they're answering, we're kind of looking past them to what's going on behind them or who else is in the room or who else wants to talk to us, and they're not going to open up and trust us rightly, so they know we're not attuned in to them. So, with empathy, we really want to attune to the person's presence and we want to notice their nonverbals and we want to be fully present with them to you know, what is the emotion that they're feeling? What is this experience like? And then we want to try to check it out with our own words, like and then we want to try to check it out with our own words Wow, it seems like maybe they're in the bargaining season of a phase of grief. So maybe we say, oh, wow, it seems like you're really wrestling with some hard questions and even some regrets and wanting to try to make more sense of what's happened to you. Maybe we're putting some words to what we're hearing from them in this wrestling, in the bargaining season of grief if that's what it is. But it shows that we're attuned to what that's like for them.

Kristi Gaultiere 17:42

And then we want to number three acknowledge the significance, specifically for them. So, for instance, Erin, if I was listening to you share your story and I'm empathizing with your story I would probably acknowledge the significance of your grief with your most recent loss of your adult son, that that grief is different from the grief when you lost your husband, right, and I would acknowledge the significance of that grief for you uniquely. Yes, so it's showing when I'm acknowledging the significance, I'm acknowledging the personalness of this to you and that there's something significant of why this is really hard for you. You've experienced loss of two situations where it was sudden, it was unpredictable, it was out of your control. That's significant for you. There's some trauma there for you in your grief, and so I would want to tune in to your unique significance in your grief, around your experience.

Erin Nelson 18:49

Yeah, and that tuning in it just feels so honoring, just because you're naming something, that I'm feeling, because you're noticing something and it really just helps, like my grief, feel honored and seen and so just that's that leaning in of that empathy that makes such a difference.

Kristi Gaultiere 19:10

Yes, that's right. Another way I might acknowledge significance for you, if I was having a conversation with you about your experience with grief, is to say, wow, you know, grief triggers grief. So when something triggers grief for you, the amount of grief it triggers is going to be bigger because you've experienced so much grief. So if it's somebody who's sharing a small loss like I lost a sales deal that's still. You know, there's still I care about. I'm going to empathize with the grief, but I'm going to want to acknowledge the significance. If somebody let's say we're together and somebody shares their bum they just lost a sales deal and somebody else shares they just lost a child Well, this is a much more significant grief, doesn't discredit the disappointment for the person who lost the sales deal and I want to understand what losses go with that and what they're feeling. But I also want to be sensitive to how it feels for the person in the room who just lost a child. Yes, yes, so we're acknowledging the significance. That's appropriate, because not all of our emotions and experiences are equal in the weight or in our experience of the grief.

Kristi Gaultiere 20:21

And then the fourth A is we want to affirm the strength of the person that we're giving empathy to, and it's really important that we keep this forth. If we rush to this and we do this too soon, we will shut down the emotions of the person that we're listening to, that we're giving empathy to. So sometimes we will be quick to affirm somebody's strength because we're wanting to protect ourselves from the pain of empathizing with them. You know it costs us something to really enter somebody's pain and somebody's grief, and so if you find yourself rushing to affirm, you might tune into yourself because what's going on here, what am I defending against?

Kristi Gaultiere 21:02

And it's really most helpful, most loving for the person that we're giving empathy to, if we could hold that affirmation to the very last to make sure that they really feel listened to, they really feel understood, they really feel empathized with. And we might even ask them you know, thank you for sharing, is there anything more that you'd like me to understand before? We would then affirm. And then at the end, to affirm is important because if somebody allows us to empathize with them, they've been vulnerable, they've shared something personal, something painful, and so it really helps us when we've opened our souls to that extent and been that vulnerable, if somebody can affirm something good in us and so just something like even affirming their courage to share, or affirming their persistence to get out of bed in the morning in the midst of this terrible grief, or to show up to Jessica's House and to get involved in community, which is so hard when you're depressed. Those are the kinds of things we're talking about, when we talk about affirming a strength that's so good.

Erin Nelson 22:03

Thank you.

Colleen Montague 22:03

I love what you're saying, Kristi, about how you can't rush to the affirming. You know and that really goes along very well with a lot that we talk about here of just not rushing somebody to to that you know part of it, or you know, I know you can do this, like you can do hard things. You know that that is not super helpful. You know, if you're not doing all of the other things as well as like the acknowledgement and really attuning to, you know what they're showing you and just I love that you're saying that. You know you also talk about self-empathy in your book. Can you share with us why it's important for caregivers who could be parents, counselors or other family members to really practice empathy towards themselves when they're also supporting a child who's grieving?

Kristi Gaultiere 22:53

That's right and deeply loved our book. We write about three-way empathy receiving empathy from God, from other people, and agreeing with it. That self-empathy. And sadly part of my story is that for many years when somebody gave me empathy, I spoiled it. I wasn't agreeing with it. Inside, I had messages of self-rejection going on no, I'm just too emotional, no, I'm just too sensitive, no, I just need to be stronger. So it was kind of like having my foot on the gas pedal, on the brake. At the same time, there was this internal resistance in my soul when somebody was giving me empathy, kind of like well, no, I don't want them to view me as weak or fragile or needy, and so I wasn't like really appreciating it and opening up to be vulnerable and I wasn't agreeing with it.

Kristi Gaultiere 23:44

We call self-empathy Agreeing with God's grace. It's not saying poor me, it's not self-pity. Self-pity is false sympathy and it's a it's, it's suedo, it's. It's not healing, it's not helpful. Self-pity it's that stirring up negative emotion or playing the victim, having a pity party. That's not self-empathy.

Kristi Gaultiere 24:05

Self-empathy isn't trying to hug yourself or find answers within yourself. No, it's not trying to hug yourself or find answers within yourself. No, it's agreeing with God's love for you and coming from him and from ambassadors of him, other people. So without self-empathy, we don't appreciate the empathy that God and others give us and we have unconscious resistances to it. And these unconscious resistances, they lead us to isolation, to surface relationships and then they keep us from being able to give empathy to other people or doing it in a really codependent way, where we're trying to passively get some connection only through caring and enmeshing with other people's needs. So we say at Soul Shepherding, you'll get help when you and I join God in caring for you. You and I join God in caring for you. That's the three way Empathy and self-empathy is the piece of that. So we have empathy exercises in Deeply Loved and experiences and tools for you for receiving empathy from God and self-empathy, as well as giving and receiving empathy interpersonally.

Colleen Montague 25:11

I love that as well and you know a lot of what we're trying to help our kids here and parents to recognize is just how they're doing, you know, to be able to recognize these different emotions of grief, and so I feel like that self-empathy that's part of that step of recognizing it and acknowledging it, letting it be instead of, like you mentioned, just pushing it away or feeling like you're not allowed or it's not okay to feel that way, but just really opening yourself up to the process in that, yeah, it's a silly illustration, but let me share a personal story.

Kristi Gaultiere 25:46

So I was traveling where we lead soul shepherding retreats, and of course we would love anyone in your community to come on a retreat these are soul care retreats. And as I was traveling I had a heavy backpack. And the next day, when I woke up and was getting ready to go teach, I was like, oh man, ouch, my back, my shoulders, my neck, they're sore, they're stiff. What's going on in here? And I tuned in with self-empathy what did I do to myself? How did I get myself so sore? And I realized, oh, my backpack. Well, what's in my backpack? And I began to look at my water bottle, books, my leader's guide that I use for the teaching, my computer. Oh yeah, that was heavy.

Kristi Gaultiere 26:33

And I had some self-empathy. Okay, Christine, you carried a lot of weight yesterday. So go gentle with yourself, don't work out today. Give yourself a rest day. Give yourself a rest, let yourself kind of massage those muscles a little bit, drink extra water today, stretch, roll your shoulders a little bit. I had empathy for what I had bared and this is very much what we need to do, because oftentimes in our workload, in our life, in our responsibilities, we're carrying a heavy backpack and we might just be shaming for ourselves. Why am I so tired, or why am I so irritable, or why can't I focus on my work? Well, that's not self-empathy. Instead, we need to maybe take a minute to reflect. What am I carrying? What's going on in me? Can I have some empathy for that? Wow, that's really heavy. Yeah, that's having an impact on me, even physically.

Colleen Montague 27:24

It's a great analogy, very good.

Erin Nelson 27:27

Yeah, I really like that, Kristi. And something else I really appreciated was a story that you told in the book about having your little granddaughter over and she was spending the night with you and she was crying and really sad and you were trying everything and then you just stopped and you looked at her and you said you miss your mommy, and so you put that into the room. And what does it do? When you align with what you're seeing and you really speak what is into the room and bring that kind of empathy, how does that change what is going on?

Kristi Gaultiere 28:09

How does that change what is going on. It totally changed everything with her because she realized, oh, gigi understands, gigi gets it that I miss mommy and that I'm sad about that. I don't have to try to get Gigi to understand or get more attention or cry about it. She just settled right down and she just leaned into me. She was able to foster greater trust and bonding for her with me, that I understood she missed her mommy and that was okay. And, yeah, mommy loves her so much. And it's sad, Ellie, that your mommy can't be with you right now and I understand that and mommy's going to be really happy to see you tomorrow. But it's hard right now, it's hard tonight, to not have her. Yeah, and as I named, that she could receive my empathy, that you're no longer trying to distract her or make her feel better, because it was kind of unfixable in that moment.

Erin Nelson 29:18

There was nothing that anyone could do to bring her mommy back, but you could be with her in that moment. And it makes me think so much about the children that we're serving every day that just need that kind of empathy to just say you know you miss your mommy, you miss your daddy, your brother or sister, whatever it might be, and to come into that moment. And we know that we can't fix it but we know that we can be with. And so you're really in this book, deeply Loved.

Self-Empathy and Three-Way Healing

Erin Nelson 29:49

You're putting words to that and what it means to come into a space where you're not afraid to name it, you're not afraid to enter that moment with a child, and it really makes a difference here at Jessica's House is kind of the anger that can come in with an experience of grief. And you know, something that really struck me is that you talk about anger as kind of this idea of it's you're trying to will like to make what is wrong right again. And I think about our families that we're serving and the listeners today that are listening today and how that might show up as energy and that anger that you know. You feel so disoriented because you know your life was right and now it doesn't feel right anymore, and so there's anger that comes up. What can you say about the energy of anger and how we can express that and how empathy can help when we're feeling that way?

Kristi Gaultiere 31:02

Yeah, it's so important because anger is a phase of grief. It's an appropriate one.

Gary Shriver 31:07

You have good reason to feel angry.

Kristi Gaultiere 31:10

So we do have a chapter on governing anger with love and we talk about the benefits of healthy anger and deeply love. You know, anger is a way where we are trying to solve our problems, reverse an injustice. It's a way that we're trying to strengthen our boundaries to be safe and protected. It's a way that we're trying to strengthen our boundaries to be safe and protected. It's a way that we might have anger against ourself and then feel shame and depressed anger turned inward. It's the kind of thing where understanding our anger can help us in processing forgiveness. It's an important part of the forgiveness process, in processing forgiveness. It's an important part of the forgiveness process.

Kristi Gaultiere 31:59

So we have an anger assessment and we explore the psychology of anger and misinterpretations around anger and the cycle of anger. You know, when there is an offense or something that's happened to us and our response is feeling hurt and angry, it's normal. It's not something to judge or to be concerned about, but to understand, and then the physical aspect of that are stress hormones and then we may have some angry reactions and then feel guilty about that and then that sometimes can even increase our anger. And so to be able to understand all those parts of our anger is really, really important as we work it through. Oftentimes. One of the things we set up for you is an experience to work through the forays of empathy for your anger and as you do that, it can be very relieving of anger. Empathy can disarm anger.

Erin Nelson 32:52

Yeah, really entering into there's no shame, and even feeling some of these emotions that maybe you've never felt like were welcome and accepted, and so anger is one of those that, yeah, you're like you're speaking to, that people can feel shame about. So, thank you.

Brad Quillen 33:17

Hey, Kristi, this last weekend I was attending a graveside and I picked up a friend of mine and we were headed to the graveside and we were we're just kind of briefly talking as we were driving out and he just said, Brad, I never know what to say or what to do with these things.

Gary Shriver 33:27

And he's just so.

Brad Quillen 33:28

I just don't even like going, you know, and I said, well, I just said to him, I said, rick, you know, what I've learned over the years is not a ton of things we can do, but we can show up and that's one of the things that we, we, we can do today for our buddy. And so I know in your book you talk about some practical tools and deeply loved on what are some of those things people can do? Because I think a lot of people are like I don't, I'm not a counselor, I'm not a, you know, I don't specialize in that, but how can people just just help and show up for folks?

Kristi Gaultiere 33:56

Yeah, well, one of those ways is just to recognize the power of showing up. Research research study that we cite in Deeply Loved, shows that 74% of people don't feel belonging in community. And you know, and relationships really matter to us. We need them for our health. We were created as relational beings or created in the image of God, who is relational, and so we wanna help people know they're loved and cared for by showing up, by asking how they're feeling, and be in a mirror to reflect back their emotions and ask questions to seek to understand as you listen. You can shoot up little prayers, you know, lord, care for my friend, show me how to join you in helping them and loving them and other practical tools.

Kristi Gaultiere 34:43

We provide empathy 10 empathy practices. We provide also some really helpful things like how to connect with Jesus' emotions there's 39 emotions we find in the Gospels about Jesus and that's been so helpful to me when I am feeling emotionally upset. If I can connect to a time when Jesus experienced the same pain, the same suffering, the same emotion I'm feeling, it helps me to feel his empathy, receive his empathy and his love for me in that place and then ways of learning to be able to ask other people for empathy and finding a safe place and an empathy friend. That's something that is important that we cover how to find an empathetic friend. We also have exercises on mindfulness and breath prayers that can help you to be able to self-regulate and to calm. So these are just some of the different tools that we have that will help someone be able to walk through what they're feeling, what they're experiencing in their season of grief, and receive that three-way empathy that we write about Kristi.

Colleen Montague 35:55

what would you say to the friend or the supporter who's just? They don't even know where to start because they're so afraid of saying the wrong thing or doing the wrong thing?

Kristi Gaultiere 36:05

Yeah, well, that's understandable and I appreciate their earnestness and wanting to be helpful and to be loving. And you really don't have to say much If you're afraid of saying the wrong thing. You could just be quiet and you could just listen and you can just really seek to open your heart, to be present with the person. And that's going to go a long way to be present with the person, and that's going to go a long way. We don't have many safe places to be able to show up and be emotionally honest and share with somebody else, and even just the gift of giving somebody the chance to listen to themselves, process out loud. That's one of the reasons why at Soul Shepherding we have spiritual directors that can meet with people on Zoom at any time. You can go on soulshepherdingorg and you can book an appointment with a spiritual director right now and you can have a safe space of somebody who will listen to you, process out loud.

Kristi Gaultiere 37:00

And oftentimes when I'm meeting with my spiritual director and I'm sharing and I'm processing out loud, I'll realize, oh, I didn't even know, I felt that, I wasn't even aware, I was feeling that until I heard myself say it. And even there's times when I'll hear myself say something when I'm processing with my spiritual director and I'll be able to kind of self-correct. You know what? Oh, you know what? That isn't really right. I'm kind of like off in my thinking there. I don't even need them to say anything because I'm just just that gift that they're attuning with me. They're present with me, they're praying silently for me helps me to be able to agree with and receive that three-way empathy. And so don't worry if you don't feel like you have any expertise or you don't know what to say. That's not what's actually the most helpful. It's most helpful just to know that you're present, that you care, that you're with them, that you're listening.

Colleen Montague 37:50

Yeah, good, like you're with them, that you're listening. Yeah, like you said, it all goes back to that attuning element of A. It's just that it doesn't always have to be with words. So much of it is your posture and your body language and how you show them you really are seeking to be alongside them and to understand.

Kristi Gaultiere 38:06

Yeah, and also to let them know that even if you hit a point where you hit your limit, you start to get overwhelmed or you start to shut down, that you can even just say to them you know, I'm sorry, I'm recognizing that I'm starting to, you know, get a little overwhelmed my own emotions, or I'm just feeling really tired. I just want you to know that's not about you and I really I really love you, I really care for you. I really want you to get this kind of empathy and care. I'm sorry I can't continue to give it to you right now, but I'd like to another time. I'd like another chance to come back, or I'd like to refer you to this space where I know you can get more.

Colleen Montague 38:45

That speaks to having good boundaries around empathy and knowing your own limits. And, yeah, very true.

Kristi Gaultiere 38:52

Because sometimes we won't give it because we're afraid of hitting that point. So we write about that and how to give empathy without getting drained in the book.

Erin Nelson 39:02

I really like that, Kristi, because you mentioned earlier just like being with yourself as you're with someone else, and you can learn to do that, to do both of those at the same time. That's right. In the book you mentioned one of my favorite authors, Henri Nouwen, and his idea of befriending emotions, and many of our listeners are parents who are grieving while raising children who are also grieving. And how can our listeners learn to befriend their emotions and then also model that for their children, even in the midst of grief?

Kristi Gaultiere 39:41

Yeah, that is so important that we're able to accept our emotions, not shame ourselves for them, not judge ourselves for them. Because if we're doing that for our emotions, our children are going to pick up on that and they're going to hold back their own emotions and figure well, if mom's judging herself for her emotions, she's judging me for mine. If it's not okay for mom to be angry, it's not okay for me to be angry. If it's not okay for mom to be sad, it's not okay for me to be sad. So we need to really realize that the kids are very kids, are very attuned in to their parents, and so it's crucial that we learn to befriend our emotions and our grief, that we accept them. And you know, one of the key things that has helped me to do that is to receive empathy from somebody else who can befriend my emotions, and to agree with Jesus, who befriends my emotions.

Kristi Gaultiere 40:34

And look at the way Jesus befriended his own emotions. He lamented himself. He didn't gloss over pain and pretend everything was okay when it wasn't. He wept over the tomb of his friend. He cried over Jerusalem. He felt the weight of sorrow. He didn't rush to fix it.

Kristi Gaultiere 40:52

Grief wasn't a threat to his faith. It was an expression of his love, and he accepted help from other people. And so that helps me to recognize that Jesus, even being the Son of God, didn't try to do life alone. He received friendship and hospitality and prayer and financial support. He let people care for him, he humbled himself and trusted. Then I can do that. Or if I look the way that he processed his emotions and prayers and poured out his heart to his father when he was overwhelmed, he didn't just say he shouldn't feel that way, he said what he really felt. He let his Heavenly Father into the depths of his pain and found strength there. I can do that too. And he didn't live without limits. Jesus set boundaries, and we have a whole Bible study on that in the book. He knew his limits. He didn't apologize for his need to rest. He regularly withdrew to quiet places away from the crowd so he could rest and pray and be with his father. These are kinds of things I can learn from him and I can do as well.

Erin Nelson 41:57

Yeah, really just practicing. Doesn't it take practice to continue to look to him and how he modeled this and just practice. And I know even on your soul shepherding website, there are so many practices that we could learn from as well.

Brad Quillen 42:14

Yes, Kristi, as we start to wrap up. I know there's been a. You've shared a lot and I'm very thankful because I've been writing notes over here as you've been talking. But if I could ask you to sum up or phrase what's what? What would you want our listeners to take away about empathy and grief? I know it's kind of a loaded question in some ways, because you've said a lot and there's been a lot of good stuff in there, but if you kind of wrapped it into one phrase or one kind of idea, what would you say?

Kristi Gaultiere 42:42

Well, what I would say is that I am sad for you and the grief and the loss that you're experiencing and the pain you're navigating for. And I have hope for you, because I've been through the journey and I've received the care and the empathy and I've processed through the phases of grief and I've come out as a wounded healer and that's going to be the opportunity for you where your pain and your loss and your grief can be redeemed and you're going to have a special and greater empathy for others' pain because you have an experiential knowledge now of the depth of pain and loss and grief and of the breadth of emotions and the complications of emotions and you're going to be able to articulate better in empathy for other people who need that care and that gift going forward. And that's going to become something that you're going to actually be able to look back for and find joy in as you journey with other people and as you see that you get to be part of their healing story.

Erin Nelson 43:46

Thank you so much, and where can our listeners just find more information about your work, and also the book Deeply Loved? And you have other works as well, and share with us where listeners can connect with you.

Kristi Gaultiere 44:02

Thank you. Well, at Soul Shepherding we love to provide resources and care and training care and training and so you can find out all about any of our other resources, our care of spiritual direction, our training in spiritual direction at soulshepherdingorg. And if you want more information about Deeply Loved the book, you can go to soulshepherding. org/ deeply loved book and you can purchase the book anywhere the books are sold. If they don't have it in stock, they can order it, and it's also available on Amazon or any major bookseller as well, because it is with a major publisher, so you should have no trouble finding and ordering the book.

Colleen Montague 44:42

That's great Kristi. Thank you so much for the wisdom that you shared with us today. I have some nuggets that I'm going to take with me that. I learned from you and I'm just eager to continue learning more, and I'm just grateful for the work that you and Bill are doing to help us all become better humans, not only to others in our life, but to ourselves too. So thank you Well.

Kristi Gaultiere 45:07

You're welcome and thank you. We're so grateful to be friends and partners together in this work. Thank you so welcome and thank you. We're so grateful to be friends and partners together in this work.

Erin Nelson 45:13

Thank you so much and thank you for being here and we're just grateful for all you do and it was so so nice to have this time with you, thank you.

Brad Quillen 45:22

Erin and Colleen. This is so good today and this is such a needed conversation. We could spend a lot more time on this. I know we all thought that going into it, but I sure appreciate being here with you guys today.

Erin Nelson 45:33

Thanks, Brad.

Brad Quillen 45:38

Erin, I know there's something you wanted to share with our listeners today, as we wrap up this podcast. Why don't you go ahead and take a moment.

Erin Nelson 45:41

Just as our listeners have given us really great feedback, I just want to say if you could just take a moment to rate our podcast and also write a review. It helps get it into the hands of those who need it most, and so every time you review a podcast, it goes up a little bit into ratings, and so if somebody just types in grief in a podcast search, they can find this podcast and, as we know that it's been so helpful for parents who are grieving, we want to get it into more hands. So please rate and review.

Closing Thoughts and Resources

Brad Quillen 46:19

Thanks, Erin, and let me remind you be sure to visit jessicashouse. org for more grief resources and if you have any other topics or questions you'd like us to cover on this podcast, we welcome your email at info@ jessicashouse. org. Be sure to join us for the next episode of When Grief Comes Home. Until then, we wish you well.

Gary Shriver 46:41

Jessica's House is a children's bereavement center located in California's Central Valley since 2012. We provide free peer support for children, teens, young adults and their families grieving a loss. The When Grief Comes Home podcast goes along with the book of the same name. The book When Grief Comes Home is a gentle guide for parents who are grieving a partner or child while helping their children through the loss of their parent or sibling. When Grief Comes Home is now available at all major book retailers and if you need grief-related support, please visit jessicashouse. org to download our free resources and be sure to follow Jessica's House on social media. If you have any questions or topics that you'd like us to explore in a future episode, just send us an email to info@ jessicashouse. org. Thank you for joining us and we'll see you next time for When Grief Comes Home.