A Metaphor For Living

The Roller Coaster Metaphor

 

I am always surprised when experiences collide and shape my understanding of the world. I love being able to look at the past through a new lens, lending meaning to my current life circumstances while at the same time, helping others. This is the case of the roller coaster.

 

The first story I sold to Chicken Soup for the Soul was called “The Roller Coaster.” It was published a volume titled “The Power of Positive.” In that story I shared how resolving my fear of roller coasters helped me address other intimidating situations. It is a true story. 

 

But this past weekend, my roller coaster experiences emerged in two very separate conversations as a metaphor for grieving.  (I started to write the grieving “process” but I think it more a journey than a process. More like a roller coaster.)

 

Saturday, I talked with a new writer friend. She lost her husband suddenly two years ago. A logging accident. Then on Sunday, two of my friends from Kosovo called me for my birthday. One is a psychologist. He is returning to America to resume his therapy practice. We touched on the subject of dealing with grief.

 

I run into armchair psychologists all the time. Unlike my friend who is an honest-to-goodness trained and licensed practitioner, many well meaning people offer their limited understanding of grief as if it were written in stone. Dustin listens. Other people talk.

 

What do these well meaning people say to me? All sorts of things about how long grief should last, what I should do to “get over it,” and advice on remarrying.

 

And those who have had a college psychology course have ALL the answers. If I say something about missing Tom or something along the lines of, “Sometimes it seems like yesterday,” they tell me I’m in the denial stage. They are, of course, referring to the Kubler-Ross model of the five stages of grief. It is a flawed application of stellar qualitative research looking at how people who were diagnosed with terminal illness dealt with their own death sentence.

 

I am not in denial. I am not angry with Tom or God or anyone else. I am not set on bargaining with God to bring Tom back nor am I depressed. The only one that comes at all close in my journey is acceptance. But then I have read the Bible. I get it.

 

I digress. The thrust of this post is about the roller coaster. I think it to be the best description of the journey of grief I can find.

 

According to my quick Google based research, there are over 2400 roller coasters in the world. Nearly a third of those are in the US. A roller coaster can be found on every continent except Antarctica. 

Roller coasters, it would seem, are a shared experience. Yet each is different.

 

Just like grieving. We all land somehow in the front seat of grief at some point in our lives. We feel pretty okay climbing up the steep hill, but scream and dig our fingernails into the handle bar as we plummet toward the unknown. And about the time we think we have it figured out, the coaster makes an unexpected turn, jerking us in a totally different direction. 

 

Everybody grieving is on a different roller coaster. Every one has a front seat. Some of the coasters may be longer than others. Some leave the passenger hoarse, breathless, and shaken. But in the end, if we’re lucky, we walk away whole and ready to face the next life challenge. 

 

If you know someone who has lost a loved one, listen. Climb in the roller coaster car beside them. They don’t need your advice. They need someone to grab the bar with them and scream.