I had originally planned to write this month’s blog about S.A.D. (Seasonal Affective Disorder). However, sometimes life has a way of changing our plans, and following my own personal experiences during August, I felt drawn to write instead about loss, grief and endings.
August was a strange month for me. It was a month filled with loss, endings and new beginnings, all happening at the same time.
A very special loss
At the beginning of August, a very much-loved and close family member passed away.
My aunt was so much more than an aunt to me. When we were growing up, she was like an older sister. She was one of my biggest cheerleaders and someone who had always been there for me and our family.
Her loss has been difficult, and I recognised that I needed to take some time out to process my grief rather than simply carry on as normal.
As a therapist, I understand that grief is not something that follows a neat timetable. Knowing this professionally doesn’t make experiencing it personally any easier.
Grief is deeply personal. We all experience it differently, and there is no right or wrong way to grieve.
Another ending
Then, towards the end of August, another chapter of my life came to an end.
I said goodbye to the building in Station Road where I had worked for 13 years.
That building had been a huge part of my working life. I started there as a student counsellor and then volunteered for ExploringU Counselling and Just Talk. When the organisation eventually closed its doors completely in 2023, a colleague and I took over the remainder of the three-year lease.
Over those years, so much happened within those walls.
There were tears, laughter, difficult conversations, breakthroughs, uncertainty, hope and change. The walls had heard so many life stories.
But sometimes we have to recognise when something that has been an important part of our lives is no longer serving us in the same way.
Last year, I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, and I was finding the steep stairs at the building increasingly difficult. The winter months also began to have an impact on my ability to work there comfortably.
Eventually, I had to accept something that was difficult to acknowledge: the building I had loved and worked from for so many years was no longer the right environment for me.
After conversations with my colleagues, the decision was made that we would not continue in Station Road beyond 31 August.
It felt like the end of an era.
When grief overlaps
Interestingly, during this time, I was also working therapeutically with clients who were experiencing their own losses.
There is a saying in the therapy world that we get the clients we need at the time. During this period, several of my sessions naturally became focused around grief, loss and the different emotions that can accompany endings.
It made me reflect on how grief can appear in many different forms.
We often associate grief with death, but grief can also follow the end of a relationship, a friendship, a job, a home, a particular stage of life, or even the loss of the person we once believed ourselves to be.
Sometimes there can be more than one loss happening at the same time.
At a gathering with some of my colleagues from Nightingale Therapy and Placement Services, we came together to say thank you and goodbye. One of my colleagues asked me how I was feeling.
My honest answer was:
“I don’t know where my grief is. I don’t know whether it’s for my aunt or for the end of a chapter in my career.”
The more I thought about it, the more I realised that it was both.
And perhaps that is one of the things about grief that we don’t always talk about. Grief doesn’t necessarily stay neatly in separate boxes. One loss can bring another loss to the surface. Emotions can overlap, and sometimes we don’t immediately understand exactly what we are feeling.
And that’s okay.
The stages of grief
You may have heard of the five stages of grief, originally associated with Elisabeth Kübler-Ross. They are often described as:
Denial – struggling to accept that the loss has happened or feeling numb or disconnected from what has happened.
Anger – feeling frustrated, angry or asking “Why me?” or “Why did this happen?”
Bargaining – thinking about “what ifs”, wondering whether something could have been done differently, or wishing things could somehow be changed.
Depression – experiencing sadness, emptiness, loneliness or a sense that life has changed significantly.
Acceptance – beginning to acknowledge and accept the reality of the loss and finding ways to move forward.
However, grief is not a straightforward journey through these five stages.
We don’t necessarily experience them in order and we don’t all experience every stage. We can move backwards and forwards between emotions, sometimes within the same day.
Grief can be messy, unpredictable and exhausting.
And sometimes, just when we think we are beginning to feel okay, something unexpectedly brings those feelings back.
Finding my own ways to grieve
I have found that giving myself permission to grieve has been important.
One of the things I have done is spend time going through family archives with my mum. Looking through old photographs and memories has brought sadness, but it has also brought laughter and some very happy memories.
I also created a memory album filled with photographs of my aunt throughout the years.
Creating it gave me an opportunity to think about the love, encouragement and support she gave us and to remember the many wonderful times we shared.
For me, remembering has become an important part of grieving.
At work, I also needed to say goodbye properly.
I went back into the building and simply sat there for a while.
I reflected on the colleagues I had worked alongside, the experiences I had shared and the many clients whose lives had passed through those rooms.
I took photographs of the outside of the building too.
It might seem like a small thing, but those photographs and memories are part of my history. They represent an important chapter of my life and career.
I didn’t want to simply walk away and pretend it hadn’t mattered.
Because it did matter.
Making space for something new
But alongside the sadness has been something else.
Excitement.
I had already found my own little working office in Great Cornard, and thankfully my clients have taken to the new space. The transition has been much smoother than I might have imagined.
Now I have my own therapy room and the opportunity to create a new working environment that feels right for me.
A new space.
A new chapter.
New memories waiting to be made.
And perhaps that is what endings can sometimes offer us.
They create space.
Space to reflect on where we have been.
Space to acknowledge what we have lost.
And eventually, space to consider where we might want to go next.
We can lose parts of ourselves too
Over the years, I have experienced other forms of loss.
At times, I have felt that I had lost a part of myself – perhaps the person I once was, the things I could once do, or the expectations I had for my life.
Accepting that loss wasn’t easy.
But eventually I realised that I didn’t have to become the person I used to be.
I could reinvent myself.
I could discover different strengths, different possibilities and different ways of being.
Perhaps I wasn’t going to find the exact same version of myself again.
Perhaps I could create a new version.
A version that had grown through the experiences I had been through.
A version that was different, but in some ways stronger and more compassionate.
Life, loss and new beginnings
August reminded me that life doesn’t always happen in separate chapters.
Sometimes one chapter is ending while another is already beginning.
We can be grieving someone we love while also feeling excited about something new.
We can miss what we have lost while being grateful for what we have.
We can feel sad and hopeful at the same time.
Both things can be true.
The cycle of life inevitably brings loss, change and endings. Some are expected; others take us completely by surprise.
We cannot always control what or who we lose, but we can give ourselves permission to feel, remember, reflect and grieve.
And when we are ready, we can begin to look towards what comes next.
For me, August has been a reminder that endings don’t necessarily mean that everything is over.
Sometimes they are simply the point where one chapter closes, and another begins.
My aunt will always be part of my story.
The Station Road building will always be part of my professional journey.
Neither needs to be forgotten simply because I have moved forward.
I can carry the memories with me while making room for new ones.
And perhaps that is what healing can sometimes look like – not leaving the past behind, but carrying the love, lessons and memories with us as we step into something new.
Here’s to new beginnings, new memories and the chapters still waiting to be written.