How to process grief without living in survival mode | Losing my mother | Talk2Tamara

How to process grief without living in survival mode | Losing my mother | Talk2Tamara

In this deeply personal episode, I share my journey of navigating grief and loss after losing my mother. From her sudden illness and multiple surgeries to the devastating diagnosis of cancer, I explore how grief showed up in unexpected ways throughout the entire process—not just after her passing.

🎙️ **What You'll Learn:**
• The real story of my mother's illness and how it changed our family forever
• How grief manifests differently for everyone, even before losing someone
• The five stages of grief and how they showed up non-linearly in my life
• Why surviving in "survival mode" prevents true healing
• How unprocessed grief shows up as anxiety, physical illness, and other symptoms
• The importance of sitting with your emotions instead of running from them
• Practical insights on moving from anger to gratitude and acceptance

💔 **Key Insights:**
This episode dives deep into the emotional toll of caregiving, the loss of identity, and the journey toward healing. If you've experienced loss or are currently grieving, this conversation is for you. I discuss how I escaped survival mode and learned to process my grief in healthier ways.

⏰ **Timestamps:**
0:00 - Introduction & My Mother's Story
16:08 - The Diagnosis Journey
28:18 - Unexpected Turns & Medical Complications
5:34 - The Physical Impact & Identity Loss
23:48 - Living in Survival Mode
26:52 - How I Coped (& Why It Didn't Work)
28:46 - The Five Stages of Grief
29:14 - Denial & Putting On a Brave Face
30:38 - Anger & Why I Suppressed It
31:05 - Bargaining, Depression & Numbness
32:35 - Finding Acceptance After 8-9 Years
33:27 - Key Message: Process Your Grief

🔗 **Resources & Support:**
If you're dealing with grief, consider journaling or meditation to help process your emotions. Remember: grief is not linear, and there's no "right" way to grieve.

👉 **Subscribe** for more real conversations about life's most difficult moments.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

She was like my person. She was the person that I would call every day to discuss about my friends, about my husband, about my kids. And as I got older and I got married, our relationship became really like the mutual friends, not really mother-daughter, but more where she told me about her life and her struggles, and I told her about my life and my like struggles. So it was a very different relationship, and I only realized that that was very rare and special when she was gone. Hi, I'm Tamara, a therapist and coach that's exploring relationships, emotional health, faith, and real life challenges that many of us were taught to keep private. Together, we'll talk honestly about the questions, the struggles, and experiences that many of us carry quietly and finally give them a place to be spoken out loud. You are listening to Talk to Tomorrow. Hi, everybody, and welcome back. So today I really want to talk about something that was such a big part of my adult life for many, many years, and that was grief and the loss of my mother. So this episode is really to tell the story of my experience of going through the illness with my mother, and then the aftermath of what that looked like for me after she passed away. So this is also the kind of grief that because she was sick for a very long time, which I will, which I will get into soon, the grief didn't start when she died. The grief was really there throughout the entire process. And I'll kind of go into why that, why that is, like a little bit later. So, but first I really want to go back. I want to go back and tell you a little bit about my mother and who she was. So she was this larger than life person. Um she was really my best friend. She was the only person that really got, she got me. She understood, you know, my quirks and my challenges. Um, and we were the most, the most alike. From everybody in the family, um, I would say that me and her were really very similar. Um and so she was like my person. She she was the person that I would call every day to discuss about my friends, about my husband, about my kids. And as I as I got older and I got married, our relationship became really like the mutual friends, not really mother-daughter, but more where she told me about her, about her life and her struggles, and I told her about my life and my like struggles. So it was a very different relationship, and I only realized that that that was very rare and special when she was gone. So when you lose someone like that, you realize that like you're not only losing a parent, you're losing that like one person in your life that 100% gets you like nobody else gets you. So let me go back to how she was diagnosed and what her story was so that you can understand the process, that it wasn't just something very simple. So we were in Florida, and um, I was actually there with my oldest daughter, Gizzy. She was about four at the time. And my mother went to the jacuzzi, to the hot tub, and um she fell. She walked, she walked out of the hot tub and she fell um down the steps. And she was perfectly fine. Uh, you know, she she had some back pain, the ambulance came, they took her, they did some like um some tests, and she was fine. She was let go. She came home and for a few months she just wasn't feeling well. Like her back was still hurting her uh from a fall that happened, you know, months before that. And so she went to a back doctor. Now, I just want to also preface that cancer does not run in my family. There's nobody that is like predisposed to it. So there was no reason why we would think that this would be cancer. So she went to a back doctor, and the back doctor said that you need to get um spine surgery. So, and they and they need to put a small rod into the back. So she did that surgery, which was very invasive. Um and she went home. And for months after, she still was not feeling well. And so she went back to the back doctor, and the back doctor said, you know what? I think that this that the that the rod was too small, and we're now going to put a bigger rod in. So she went for another like surgery. And again, these surgeries are really, really um invasive. They're the recovery is very hard, very long. So it's not just like a simple outpatient kind of procedure. And you know, you go and you do the surgery and you need and you need to recover. So she went and she did that. Now, if you would know my mother, she was five, seven, tall, thin, um, beautiful. Like she looked like a Barbie and she was known for like her, she was known for her beauty. Inside for sure, but outside, she was just really physically beautiful. Now, when she did the surgery, because of the way that the surgery, I guess, that the that the rod was put was put in, it basically collapsed her back. Um, and she shrunk about five or six inches. And her organs would also be kind of like popping out of her, of her body. So her whole body shape changed. Um, she shrunk, she got short, and everything was like disproportionate to her, to her body. So not only did I have to grieve, you know, a mother that looked a certain way, but she herself had to go through this like really, really hard process of being known as somebody that was like beautiful and tall and thin to now a person that looks a little bit strange. Um and she had to develop a new identity for herself. And I would say that that was probably one of the hardest things for her, like not even so much the illness, but really kind of experiencing um this loss of self. And and but she never really spoke about it. But we but we know that that's something that really mattered to her and like it really bothered her. And so um, I would say about a year passed since she did the second surgery, and she was 52, by the way, at the time, just for a reference, which is not that much older than I am right now. So I'm telling you my age. Um and she she still wasn't feeling better. She just like wasn't feeling well, her back was still hurting, and she was talking to my to my aunt, and my aunt said, you know, why don't you go to this doctor? He's not uh, he's I don't, I forgot what type of doctor. Um, but he is really good at diagnosing, and you should go to him. So she makes an appointment and she goes to him. And at this point, she's having a hard time walking. Um, she's she's weak, she's just like not feeling herself. And she goes into the doctor's office, and within five minutes, the doctor says to her, Um, Did anybody ever test you for multiple myeloma cancer? And she said, I don't even know what that is. And he's like, Can you take this blood test? Um, a few days later, she gets the results back. She was positive for that type of cancer. And I believe she was in stage four. I I don't honestly, like a little bit of the details are fuzzy to me, but I do believe that she was in an advanced stage of cancer, and she needed to be um checked into the hospital. And I would say that about 10 years, I would say that like right after that, the next 10 years was kind of, I would say almost a blur, but really not, because I remember it pretty vividly. Um, and I'm sure my kids remember it vividly as well because they were going through it, but they they were definitely on the younger side. Um, but that was a string of hospitals, surgeries, stem cell transplants. She got an infection. I mean, every single thing was revolved around my mother's illness, um, her care. We went into full um, I guess, survival mode as her as her kids. I am one of four. So we each played a different role in her care, in her caretaking. My brother was in charge of the doctors. Um, we were in charge of like the food and the visits and stuff like that. Um, me and my other siblings. And that was pretty much our life for about 10 years. Now, I just want to explain to you that I was um 25 when my mother was diagnosed. I actually think maybe I was a little bit younger. Um, so I was really at the beginning stage of my life. I was married for about five years when she was diagnosed. And um, you know, I had to be the, I had to be taking care of my mother, who was sick. I had a young daughter. Um, during those 10 years, I was pregnant with my son and my other daughter, my three kids. And it was a very impossible kind of situation, you know, trying to be the good daughter, trying to be the good wife, trying to be the good mother. And I know, you know, that we did the best that we could, but I'm sure that my kids may have resentment towards towards the fact that I wasn't around a lot and I was, you know, in the hospital a lot. And of course they're not faulting me for sure, but that was just my reality for the those 10 years of my life. Um, I remember the day that I found out. Um my I was in Florida with my husband, and my mother actually called my husband to tell him so that he can break the news to me. Because I guess she couldn't, she couldn't do it, she couldn't bear it. I don't know what it was, but you know, he she wanted him to break the news to me. And we were sitting at a restaurant, and my husband was like making these like, you know, nervous kind of faces. And I'm like, what's going on? You know, what's happening? And he's like, well, you know, and then he just kind of said it. And I remember right after that, we went to see a movie, um, I Am Legend, which by the way, every time I see that movie, I'm like, I have knots in my stomach. And during the movie, I kind of felt like this out-of-body experience of like, this can't really be happening to me. These things happen to other people. Um, this is not my life. This is not going to be my reality. And I was very much in denial about the whole thing. And I came home and um I went to my sister for Chavez. And um I remember just sitting on her steps that she has going towards the basement, and both of us just saying, like, this is not happening. This is not actually like I was waiting for it to be this like like nightmare that I'm gonna wake up and be like, call my mother and be like, oh my gosh, the craziest story happened. So experiencing that and really um going through that as such a young person, uh, you know, and I actually think it's interesting because my daughter's about three years um younger than I was at the time that my mother got diagnosed. And when I was thinking about it recently, I was like, wow, I I didn't realize how young I actually was when this happened and how I had to grow up really, really quickly in order to kind of become this caretaker. Um and and of course, like, you know, I wasn't the only one there. I I had plenty of help. Um, you know, my family was great, and we all really stepped up and we did what we could. But at the end of the day, like I was still young and I was in my 20s and my my prime years of my life. And if I'm really honest about it, I was very angry, um, very angry at God for kind of like putting me in the situation. Um, I was angry that I didn't get to live a life like my friends did. I remember any trip that I would plan, I would have to have some sort of insurance on it because I never knew what the next crisis was going to be. And there were many crises. It was always something or another, you know, breaking something, uh, you know, just really um experiencing, you know, different infections, different things happening, her not feeling well, her emotional health as well. And so, and and my mother is also the type of person that never wanted to be a burden. Like she is the absolute last person that wants to be that person that like we are taking care of. She is the most, she was the most independent, fierce, amazing, you know, business um lady. Like she she just really was this uh, you know, breath of fresh air, and she was, she had so much life in her, and this was literally the last thing that she wanted to be. So going back to like me feeling, you know, angry, I was really angry that my life felt so heavy and everything felt so different for everyone else. And I live in a community where we're all pretty much the same age. So we all really were going through life at the same time. And I would watch like my friends kind of be able to live these so, so, you know, so to say, normal lives when every holiday, every vacation, every anything would always have to be revolved around what is who is going to take care of mommy, like who is going to be there, what does our schedule look like? We had a chat where, you know, everybody had different shifts, who's going to visit mommy, who's going to be, you know, there, who's going to be there for Shabbos, who's going to take care of the food, um, all of that. Like it was, that was like our lives for 10 for 10 years. But then, you know, and we talk about this when when there's like the five stages of um grieving. Then the part came where I felt very guilty, right? I felt guilty for the fact that how can I be angry when my mother is suffering so, so much? Like, who am I to even, you know, be upset that I can't go take a vacation without insurance when I am not the one in the hospital bed? So there was a lot of guilt and there was a lot of shame for the way that I felt about it. But I was really, I was really angry. I was young and I was really angry. Um, but I did, I would just like push down my emotions a lot. And when you push down your emotions, as I learned later on in life, they really don't disappear. They stay there in different different ways. Um and, you know, throughout the 10 years also, she would, we used to like laugh about the fact that she was a woman with nine, with nine lives. She always liked uh cat eyeglasses. So we used to make fun of her, not make fun of her, but we would laugh with her, you know, that she's like a cat and she just would never and she's never gonna die. Um, because the doctors would constantly say throughout the 10 years that she has a month to live, she has two weeks to live. So before we before even grieving her actual death, I grieved her so many times because there were so many times where they were the doctor said, she's not going to make it. You have to, you should say your goodbyes. I mean, I could count on my on both hands the times that we ran into the city to go to go to the hospital because they said she only has a few days left. And then she didn't, and then she had a year left, and then she had another two years, you know. She was just a fighter and she would fight till the end. So, you know, um, so every time they would say that she's dying, there was a part of us that was like, we just didn't really believe it, right? Because every time she just proved them wrong. And it was the a few weeks before she died, it was Thanksgiving. And we actually went, we all went to visit her. And she um, I guess she was on a lot of like medication and different things. She thought she was somewhere else, I, you know, because of her delusions. And she was talking and she was happy. She thought she was in a five-star hotel in Florida. And she was like, wow, she's like, this is so amazing that like we get to go on vacation and tomorrow we should go to the beach. And she had a lot of um, you know, funny things. She had a wild imagination for sure. The things that she said during her illness when she was on the medication were very funny. We we talk about it and joke about it until this day. She was like in high, in high spirits. And the doctors were again telling us, you know, she doesn't have a long time to live. This is probably the end. You should say, you should say your goodbyes. And I remember leaving the hospital that night on Thanksgiving and being like, okay, like she's gonna prove them wrong again and she's gonna live. But like honestly, at that point, you were like thinking to yourself, and I guess also that guilt factor of, like, maybe she should just die. What is the reason that she should be alive to live in a hospital, to live with like surgeries, to constantly have blood transfusion? She didn't even have veins left to get blood from. It's like, is this actually a life? But then I thought to myself, like, who am I to decide that, right? I'm not God. I'm not her. She wants to live, she wants to be, you know, here on this earth. So this is not my decision. But like, in the back of my head, I was like, she should just go, right? She should, like, this is too much suffering. This is too much on any person, um, let alone watching my mother just suffer through this, through this whole thing. A few days later, we were doing our shifts. Um, and at that point, my mother was um not really talking. Um, they say that before you die, you kind of get this um like burst of energy and burst of real, I don't know, um, happiness. And then after that, you you lose your voice and you're not able to talk. And that's really kind of what happens. And that's what happened here. So on Thanksgiving, she was high, she thought she was in Florida, and then a few days later, she was not able to talk. The water was filling up her her lungs and she wasn't able to talk. And so I was um, I was doing a shift. Um, you know, I was taking over for my younger sister who was there, and she needed to go to an appointment. And I said, you know, I I knew that it was the end, but again, you know, this has been going on for years, and we're just like, we never know when it's actually going to be the end. So I was like, sure, you can go to the appointment. But I I felt like something was different that day. Um, I felt like something was really going to happen. And I was alone. I was completely and utterly alone. It was also, it was pouring outside in New York, like a real rainstorm. And um, my mother was really having a hard time breathing. And I would call the nurses in. Um, I'd be like, can you come and help her? And they would suction her kind of out. And um, you know, they would leave, they would leave the room. And I was sitting on the chair, and I turned to my mother, and I was like, you know, mommy, just like tell me, tell me what you want. Like, tell me what you want. And I remember like yesterday, I remember her opening up her mouth, trying to speak, and not being able to have any words come out. I was so emotional at that time. I was like, I just want to know what you want to tell me because I felt like she wanted to tell me something and she couldn't say it. And it It was probably the most terrifying, really, probably one of the hardest moments of my life. Um, because trying to look a person like your mother in the eye when they're dying and wanting to hear what they have to say, and they can't say it. And um, a nurse came in and said, Can you leave the room? Um we need to, we need to clean her up, and can you leave the room? And I left the room, and the nurse told me after she died, she said, she told, she told her at the time, you are allowed to go. You should go now. Like your daughter left the room, you should go. And they say that a Nishama needs needs to hear, a soul needs to hear that they are allowed to leave. And I think a really, really big reason for my mother fighting for as much for as long as she did, suffering for as long as she did, was because she wanted to be in our lives. She her kids were her entire life. She literally would do anything for her kids, for her grandkids. They were like everything to her, and she just didn't want to leave them. And I think that, you know, when the nurse told her that I'll be okay and you could go now, and I wasn't in the room, she then she passed away. And they came out and they told me that she passed. And I was alone in the hallway, and I I guess like collapsed to the floor. Um, the nurses came, they hugged me, and um I then called my husband, and I said she died. And he was like, I am on my way in, because I already called everybody to come in because I felt like this was the end, and there was insane traffic. And he's like, I'm coming, I'm coming, I'm coming, I'm gonna get there, you know, as soon as I can. And everybody came, I don't remember the time of how long it was from when she died to when people came and got to the hospital. But, you know, for that period of time, I think I I don't really think I was like here. I think I was like, again, one of these like out-of-body experiences of a person that I loved that I will never ever see again. And um, and they say, like, no matter how old you are, and I see that in my life now, you always need your mother. You just do. Um, and the relationship that I had with my mother was really, really special. Um, so it wasn't like something like I, you know, I could explain to anybody else for anybody to really understand what that relationship was. And um, I don't really remember the funeral. Um, I remember the Shiva very well. I remember going to my parents' house, sitting there with my family, um, hearing the stories about my mother. I remember the people that came, I remember the people that didn't come. Um and I would say after that, for a whole bunch of years, I don't really remember it, if I'm really being honest. I don't remember what I did or like what I, you know, how I got through it, but I know I definitely did get through it. And I think also um one of the things that happened like right after she died, was I, I guess, went into this state of shock. And I was like, I I went shopping. I and I don't really like to shop. Um, I bought glasses. I don't really wear glasses, but I bought glasses, maybe because my mother always wore glasses, so I wanted to wear glasses. I don't know. Um, and then I came home and I told my family that we are going to Philadelphia, and we're going on this trip to Philadelphia. They remember it well. They were like, why Philadelphia? And I don't know the answer to that question. I just felt like so much of my life was almost like robbed from me that I couldn't be with my with my kids and I couldn't be with my family, and now I don't even have my mother here, anyways. And it was all for nothing, right? Like the whole thing was for nothing because she's not alive. And so I was like, okay, let's just like go, let's go to Philadelphia. Um, I don't remember other trips I planned, but I think I was very much like also, I'm going to plan a trip and I'm not going to book insurance because I don't need to anymore. And I don't need to keep my phone on to hear the um, to hear, you know, what if she's in the hospital, if she's not in the hospital. And on Shabbos, I don't need to have my phone on. And that was like the story of my life for a very, very long time. I'm sure that you could imagine, you know, that being that this was like so long, that for years my identity was her illness. Um, it was really like that was like my whole life, right? It was like, okay, who's going to the hospital, who's um doing this? Really, like my own life didn't matter at that point. And we were really just living in the state of like, what are we doing? How are we taking care of her? And that was my life. So when she died and all that was kind of taken away, I was like, so who am I now? Like, what do I do now with with this? And I think that the way that I handled grief is just constantly moving. And I I think I still do it to this day. I'm almost positive I still do it to this day, where I just don't stop. I I need to, I can't be home for long periods of time, right? I have to, I have to go, I have to do, I have to feel accomplished, I have to feel productive. Um, I want to go on trips, I want to experience life, I want to live life to the fullest. And I think for a long time that really was, and probably is still today, is like me not really processing my grief and like sitting in the feelings. I have a very hard time just sitting in feelings. Um, I would rather just kind of do things to pretend like those feelings are not there. Um, but the feelings do catch up to you eventually. It really does. Um and I went into survival mode. And when you're in survival mode, you're really just not processing things, you're just getting through life. So when you don't process the grief, it shows up later. It shows up, it could be in anxiety, it could show up in a physical illness, which is what happened to me. I developed Crohn's after it. Um, and it controls how you respond to things. So unprocessed grief is really something that people don't talk about a lot. Um, but it is so real and so so raw, and it is something that so many people experience because we as humans don't really do well with kind of sitting in our feelings and sitting in our emotions. And we almost have to like retrain our mind and our body to be able to do to do that. That's why for somebody like me, and for a lot of people, meditation is something that's really, really hard to do. Journaling, like quieting your thoughts from your mind because you're constantly running your thoughts over and over again. So you're not really processing your grief because you're not allowing enough time to sit in those emotions. People talk about, you know, the five stages of grief. You know, there's the denial, there's anger, there's bargaining, there's depression, and then there's acceptance. And I think for me, the five stages of grief really showed up in very different ways. So it definitely didn't go in a linear way. It was up and down for sure, which is what I hear from a lot of people who have that, who have grief. So denial felt like this can't be my life. I remember um going to the supermarket and I would see people that were like my peers and my friends, and they would go into the store and they would like lean their head when they saw me. How are you? And the more that they would lean, the the worse they felt for me, or the worse I perceived that they felt for me. Right. And it was always this like, oh, like, there's the girl that just lost her, that just lost her mother. And I would be like, that's not me. Like I am, I'm normal, I'm good. And I remember I would see, I would see these people and they would be like, How are you? Be like, I'm good, yeah, thanks. And I would never really be like, you know, no, it's really hard for me. And I think also for a long time, I I didn't really think that things were hard. I just went into this constant productive, I have to do, I have to go, I have to be. So I didn't let myself stay in that place. Um, anger definitely was there, but I wouldn't allow it to be there. You know, I think that if I allowed the anger to come to me, I don't know if I would ever really move past that because I was so angry that the one thing in my life, the one person in my life was taken away from me. And I don't know why. Like, why, why did it have to be her? There's so many other people that you could take away. Why did you take my mother? Bargaining looked like hope. Hope that, you know, maybe this is all a dream, honestly. Um, a nightmare more. Um, hope that I will somehow be okay. Um hope that I will get through this. Like, I think that's what the bargaining was was for me. Um, depression really looked like numbness. I was just numb for a very long time. That's what survival mode really is. It's it's not really feeling your feelings, right? It's just kind of numbing them by, you know, um, I think for me, a lot of it was with food. And I talk about it on my other podcast about, you know, my issue with with food and weight and all and all that. But I think for a long time I was like, no, I like I don't care about myself. I don't really um care about life. I don't care about, you know, things and nothing really brought me true joy, but I pretended like it did. And I I was really good at it. I was really good at pretending that everything was okay. But inside I was really breaking. Um and it it was and is probably like the hardest thing of my life. Um I would say I'm about eight to nine years out. I think it's almost 10 years, actually. Um, and I would say I probably came to some sort of acceptance, but it took a very, very long time. To the point that when people talk to me about their mothers and what they are experiencing and what they're going through, or, you know, or they complain to me about their mothers. I used to be so upset. I used to be like, well, at least you have a mother. Like, what what are you complaining about? Um, and I would be so angry about it. But now I can listen to people talk about their mothers without feeling anything, without feeling this like jealousy that they have, that they have a mother and I don't. Um so grief is really not linear. Um it doesn't really go away. I would like to tell people who are going through things right now that it doesn't really go away. It just takes a very different shape. Um but I think the the message that I really want to leave everybody with is that it's you're not supposed to push away grief. You're not supposed to just, you know, pretend like it's not there because it will come back. It will come back to, you know, it's it's about really kind of sitting in those feelings and learning how to sit in those feelings and not really move forward from those feelings until you process it and try to let it go. Um, I think the first thing that needs to be done is to let go of your anger. Because if you hold on to that anger in in any aspect of your life, not only in grief, if you hold on to anger, you're never going to be able to get to the other side. You're never going to be able to see things in a different way because you're just so in that place and you're just so angry all the time that you don't see that there was beauty. Right. So instead of me being angry all the time, I think about all the time that I did have with my mother. I think about my trips, my trips to Nashville with her. I think about the time that we went to Elton, the Elton John concert. And I think about all the fun things that we did together and just the staying up, staying up and talking. And, you know, her and my husband had this relationship where they would talk all the time. And um, and and it and it was amazing. It was like, you know, it wasn't a typical mother-daughter relationship. It wasn't a typical mother-in-law, son-in-law relationship. And even, you know, even though my kids were young, they, the ones that were old enough to remember, they really, they, they really do remember her in this like most amazing light. So, you know, there was a very, very long time where all I remembered was her being sick. And that is where like my anger came from, right? I was so mad that like she had to suffer. I was so mad that that was my life also in a selfish way. Like, this is what I have to do now. I have to go to hospitals, I have to be busy with this. Like, I want to live my life. I'm in my 20s. Like, I want to be free. And instead, I my life was consumed with, you know, going to hospitals and taking her to doctors and, you know, like dealing with all those types of things. So I was so angry. And because of that anger, I just remembered all the bad things. And I remembered her being sick. And I think once I let go of that anger, I was able to remember all the memories that I had of her that were the positive ones. And I wasn't able to for a very long time. So I think that that put me into a place where I finally accepted. Um, and I and I was grateful for the times that I did have with her. So I think what I really want to leave you with is that the goal is not to move on from it. The goal is to figure out how to live with it and how to learn that grief is going to take you like over the edge, right? It's going to take you to a better place of where you can you can hold on to the memories that you had with this person that you loved.