Where Should We Begin? with Esther Perel - Esther Calling - Grief is Like a Fingerprint

Episode Date: December 2, 2024

This episode contains discussions of a death by suicide. Please take care listening. Recently, on Where Should We Begin, we've been focusing on the things we sweep under the rug in our relationships���conversations that we have a hard time having with ourselves let alone with others. This week, Esther talks to a woman stricken with grief--one year ago, her sister and father died in quick succession. Her remaining family was torn apart and she feels left to pick up the pieces on her own. Esther walks her through how to make space for the immeasurable grief. If you have an individual question you would like to talk through with Esther, please send a voice memo to [e-mail]. If you would like to apply for a couples session with Esther, please click here: https://bit.ly/40fGHIU. Esther’s two new courses on desire are now available inside The Desire Bundle. Go to https://www.estherperel.com/course-bundles/the-desire-bundle to learn more about Bringing Desire Back and Playing with Desire. Want to learn more? Receive monthly insights, musings, and recommendations to improve your relational intelligence via email from Esther: https://www.estherperel.com/newsletter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the recent episodes, I've been focusing on courageous conversations or conversations actually that we typically avoid or things that we sweep under the rug or conversations we have in our own head sometimes instead of actually with the person with whom we should be having the conversation with or conversations that are in our own head because we no longer can actually talk to the person with whom we would like to have this conversation because they're not there anymore. And so this episode is about grief, it's about loss, it centers around the death of an older father which seems to be part of the normal order of things.

Parents go before their children. But then also the death of a sibling by suicide, which feels like a massive interruption in the fabric of life, in the thread. And as you listen to this episode, I want you to please take care of yourself. Know that this is about grief, but also about how this can actually become not something that we sweep under the rug and avoid or get pissed at internally, but that actually we begin to understand that there are many parts to a conversation and we sometimes only inhabit one piece of the larger story. And other members of our family or our circle will actually highlight those parts. And it's not because our parts are the truer ones and they should switch.

It's because the complexity of some of the large human experiences are multifaceted. And we have a way, each of us, to just express one piece of the facet, as it should be. So, let's listen. All-in-one CRM marketing and operations platform that helps you make more money and more magic for your guests. It gives your staff the tools to deliver service that keeps your guests coming back for more. From direct reservations to smart table management to targeted text and email marketing, Seven Rooms helps you grow your brand and your covers and not your workload. Learn more at sevenrooms.com.

Seven Rooms. Make magic, make money. Support for Where Should We Begin comes from Autograph Collection Hotels. Autograph Collection Hotels offer over 300 independent hotels around the world, each exactly like nothing else. Hands selected for their inherent craft, each hotel tells its own unique story through distinctive design and immersive experiences, from medieval falconry to volcanic wine tasting.

Autograph Collection is part of the Marriott Bonvoy portfolio of over 30 hotel brands around the world. Find the unforgettable at autografecollection.com. Shall we listen to your question and then if there's anything you want to add to it? Sure. We can tweak it? Okay, let's do that. Yep. The question that I would love to talk to Esther about is understanding grief. And the context is that my dad, two years ago, died, he was 86.

my dad two years ago died he was 86 and he died of old age and dementia and then three months later my little sister died from suicide and she was 35 and she has three kids, little kids. And so I feel like I've gotten this like crash course in grief since then and I think that grief is an intelligence and part of life and a part that's not really like exalted or well understood or like acknowledged, at least like in Western society. And so I think it's an intelligence,

but then there's this paradox where I find myself trying to connect with other people and like getting out of my shell and sharing about it. But then a lot of sometimes I feel lonelier after that and I just experience these feelings that feel ugly. I have contempt for other people and I just think their problems are so stupid or so small and that they should just get over it and feel bad for me and because

my I just want someone to like give me a gold medal for having the most pain and that doesn't like seem intelligent to me. And so just kind of that paradox is something that I would love to just talk about. Taking a moment to sit with this very profound and big question. What's it like for you to hear it? To hear your own question. It makes me sad. It's like I'm listening to someone else. I'm disconnected even though I'm the one whose voice it is. Disconnected from? Pain.

So you let her feel the feelings when she was asking the questions. And then another part of you today is trying to hold it together? Yeah. I had a sentence that I was remembering as I listened to your question. It's a quote by David Kessler in his book Finding Meaning, The Sixth Stage of Grief. It says, Each person's grief is as unique as their fingerprints. But what everyone has in common is that no matter how they grieve, they share a need for their grief to be witnessed.

And that doesn't mean needing someone to try to lessen it or reframe it for them. The need is for someone to be fully present to the magnitude of their loss without trying to point out the silver lining. What is your question? Why is grief so confusing? And why does it bring out? I think it's brought out the best and the highest in me and other people and also the worst.

Mm-hmm. Meaning that you get contempt and you get upset when people don't meet you, when you feel that you are in the gulf of this unbearable, unending pain and they're just living on a different planet. Or they try to, yeah, like be this overlying. And I don't usually want this overlying. I also love the way you said grief is this intelligence. It's telling me a lot of different things. There's another line that David has that I often think, because it's so… He says, you don't have to experience grief, but you can only avoid it by avoiding love.

Love and grief are inextricably intertwined. So when you think about this unbearable pain, it connects directly to two people that you cared about and loved deeply. And sometimes we think people don't understand my grief because they don't understand the magnitude of my loss, but sometimes it's because they don't understand the magnitude of my love. So you say, I'm surprised that I'm having nasty thoughts, primitive feelings that are unbecoming to me. They're not who I am usually. And this grief is kind of making me feel and say and do things that are unusual for me.

What am I learning from it? This is the intelligence, right? So yeah, grief is not always sweet, polished, well-behaved by far. It puts you in touch with the extremes. Yeah. Tell me more. I almost feel it's like when I've had those losses part of me died and is like still dying but then another part of me is like being born. And like my family of origin, I think, died as I knew it.

And it's still just kind of like a rubble of people trying to figure out kind of the new, I don't know if it's like a new baby that's been born. We're all just like kind of clumsy and we're all handling it differently. But then I guess the parts that I like are the extreme things that I didn't do before are that I'm I just have like a new sensitivity to other people, to like I notice faces and like facial features. And I like to think that I like scroll on my phone less. You know, and it's all, it is like this

primitive thing. I notice animals. I notice like the wind. I never noticed that before. But- I have developed an uncanny awareness in the details of the world around me. The human world, the animal world, the natural world, the spiritual world. I notice absence and I notice presence. I notice joy. I notice pain and suffering. I notice calm. I notice agitation. I notice security. I notice fear. But it will, yeah, and the, like the mystery, I don't think I've ever been one that accepts a lot of mystery, but there's just so much uncertainty and impermanence. And it's beautiful and it's also just painful sometimes. Incredibly fragile. Yes. incredibly fragile. Who is left in the family of origin and who is the chosen family? There may be more than one.

The chosen family, my husband and two children. I have a toddler and then a seven-year-old and then my family of origin, my mom, and two older brothers. And are there other members of the chosen family that were very connected to your family of origin? Extended family, friends, neighbors? Yeah, yes. And have there been rituals that have brought all the people together? Because the person died, but the relationship didn't die. The only thing I can think of is the funeral.

And since the funeral? No. Neither for your sister nor for your father? No. And is that something you feel a need to do? Yes. Okay. For both of them, separately, together, one of them? Probably both of them. Separately or together? Separately. I chose to not attend a family reunion that was like six months after she died. They like released lanterns. So I guess everyone went to that except for me and my chosen family.

Why not? Because I was too painful to think about being with everyone and I felt too reactive. I'm not sure why other than my gut just said like, I can't go right now. But you were not against it happening. You just didn't feel, you felt too bereft to be there. Yes. Mm-hmm. And would your family understand if you said, I think I'm, I need something now. Yes.

And I would love for us to be on this together. Mm-hmm. And what would you want it to be? If you could design the ritual. Rituals is one of the ways that every culture and civilization has dealt with loss and mourning and grief. For my sister, it would be something with dancing and just kind of like a wild party. Yeah. With like karaoke. She'd always, you know, we're opposites in many ways, but she was always up for anything. She'd get

up at any restaurant in front of any number of people and just sing her heart out she didn't care what people thought in one way. So yeah something like that. We have to take a brief break so stay with us and let's see where this goes. Support for Where Should We Begin comes from Autograph Collection Hotels. Autograph Collection Hotels offer over 300 independent hotels around the world, each exactly like nothing else. Every hotel in this collection is inspired by a clear vision and a story that makes it individual and special. Guests are offered unforgettable experiences that leave a lasting imprint, from practicing medieval falconry on an Irish country estate to exploring ancient Costa

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Z-Biotics pre-alcohol probiotic drink is the world's first genetically engineered probiotic. It was invented by PhD scientists to tackle rough mornings after drinking. Here's how it works. When you drink, alcohol gets converted into a toxic byproduct in the drinking. Here's how it works. When you drink, alcohol gets converted into a toxic byproduct in the gut. But pre-alcohol produces an enzyme to break this byproduct down. Just remember to make the Z-Biotics your first drink of the night, drink responsibly, and you'll feel your best tomorrow. I really enjoyed the taste of the pre-alcohol drink and I felt like it helped me get a better night's sleep. Go to zbiotics.com slash Esther to learn more and get 15% off your first order when you use Esther at checkout.

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center will offer real protection all day, every day. So if you want cutting-edge cybersecurity backed by experts who monitor, investigate and respond to threats with unmatched precision, you can visit Huntress.com to learn more and start your free trial. Is her death by suicide a surprise for you or something you worried and anticipated or where does it sit with you? I mean, it was fully on all of our radar. She was, she'd been in the hospital, she was on all kinds of meds. So it didn't shock me on one hand, but on the other hand, it's shocking.

You're seeing something as you're saying this. I don't think, oh, I know she didn't want to die. I just think she was too sick and she wanted to be out of pain and so I think she must have well I don't know this is I'm just giving my meaning to the story but the only thing that makes sense is that she had to have believed that everyone would be better if she weren't here. You know, this isn't the first time she'd had really, you know, kind of scary depression. She'd been suicidal before, but it had worked out, and this time it didn't.

And you have tried to tell her many times this idea that we would be better off without you is so off. I miss you. I miss you deeply every day. Do you talk to her? No, I have written a few letters to her and my therapist like invited me to just have a list of unanswerable questions. I haven't done it in a while. But I mean, I see her.

I see her kids. She has three little girls. And I talk to them. And you talk about her? Yeah. Yeah, I do. I try to be present with her kids. I know that she, when she was healthy, you know, she could be present with them. And she was obsessed with them in a way that any mom understands. And even, you know, at the end, it just was so disturbing because she would, yeah, she couldn't be present with them. Her body was there, but she didn't want to be there. And I'm sure that her kids at some level knew that.

So I try to make eye contact with them and just be engaged with them. And do karaoke. Yes, I haven't done karaoke, but I should for them. And you dance with them. Yeah. Yeah, that's what she would do. with them. Yeah. Yeah, that's what she would do. Her death seems so catastrophic that I don't always remember my dad. I think that he died almost because, I mean, being more aware of just

like feeling almost primitive, like it's expected that your parent will die before you. My dad was 50 when I was born and so you know he already people thought he was my grandpa growing up and I just I think I knew inside he was gonna die. But then the out of orderness and that she my sister was younger she was the youngest. It was just so shocking and almost makes my dad's death look like happy. interruption. Do you have witnesses who can hold you, who can just let you go through it without rationalizing, without trying to make it into that matter, who just know this is so painful, acute at first, and lonely, very, very lonely, because it feels like no one can reach you there. And it doesn't end, to hold it, but we expand

around it rather than getting through it. And it takes time. And it takes rituals that celebrate her, that mourn her, that give meaning to who she was, not just to her absence. And some of those primitive feelings you have are all quite normal. Because we are angry that this happened. It's unfair. It's stupid, it feels, how can I accept this? It can't be true. I still can't believe it. So we have the denial, we have the anger, we have the problem to accept it. And then we do, yes, she was struggling and it wasn't totally surprising, but if this, if that, and we circle around and circle around.

And if she was here today, she would say and she would think and she would smile and so she goes, but the relationship stays. It's actually not that confusing, as you were asking. It's about, wow, this thing takes me to places I never knew existed inside of me. From the acute awareness to what, you tell me. Well, I don't know, rage. And the rage says, my pain hurts more than yours or yeah, your problems are small. You bug the shit out of me. Go away. Good. Keep going. There's many parts in you. This is one, the rage. He looks at people,

he says, this is what makes you struggle. Want me to show you mine? Yeah. But then the same, another part in you, sorry, not the same, another part in you Another part in you, sorry, not the same, another part in you recognizes those who don't know sometimes how to express it and zooms into that pain and says, I see you. That's part of that hyper awareness. Right? Mm-hmm. And what does that part say? That this pain, like your pain's mine.

Yeah. Is there another part? Yeah, this is this beautiful dimension I've never known about. And sometimes I wouldn't mind not knowing about it. And in a way, like, the realization that I don't think any of us have as long as we think sometimes. And so, just less pretending, more honesty. So I don't just feel the fragility, I also feel the preciousness. Treasure it, savor it. Don't take it for granted. Don't waste it. Don't just walk like a ghost through it. Value it.

Appreciate it. Hold on to it. Fight for it. Keep going. There's an author, Julian Barnes, do you know him? You probably know the book that this is from, but he has a metaphor about that we don't emerge from grief like a train coming out of a tunnel, strong and fast, and into the light. We are more like a seagull that comes out of an oil slick, tarred and feathered for

life. And sometimes I feel like the train. And sometimes I feel like the seagull. It's beautiful. We are in the midst of our session. There is still so much to talk about. So stay with us. Support for Where Should We Begin comes from Quince. One of the simple pleasures of cooler weather is snuggling up under your warm sheets.

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do you know where this session landed? So I go back to the couples and I ask them for a follow-up which they share with us and which I then share with you. And just like our relationships, what you say isn't as important as what you do. So I've heard you say how much you enjoy the program, how much it adds to your understanding of your own relationships. But now it's time for me to do an offer and an ask, which means click on the subscribe button to the Where Should We Begin show page. I'd love to see you in Esther's office hours. Do you want the ritual about your sister to be you with her and a few of the people who

knew her, or would you actually like, I want to bring together other people who have experienced loss? I think the circle of people that knew her. Okay. There's a lot of them. Okay. And what has stopped you from doing it, if anything? Contempt and rage at them, some of them.

You say this with a smile. It's embarrassing, but there have been certain people that have been great and other people that I know would want to be included. And I don't know why it's like I'm a predator that's like picked them because I, you know, I feel offended at things that they've said or that they've dealt with this differently. So I get them invite everyone but them. So the part of you that has experienced these peaks of contempt, give me one. Someone right after she died telling me that she knew that my sister was in the arms of Jesus. Just, I don't know, it hit

something in me and felt like I just wish she hadn't upset anything. What did it mean for you, this? It meant for me that somehow it's good that people are with Jesus instead of with their families and their young children, people that depend on them. And I know she didn't mean like this, but it suggests that somehow this was determined. Yeah, determined. This was part of the plan. and that's probably not what this person meant but it just bristled me. I want to be someone who can just understand that people say things like that and they still should be able to be afforded like their own space. Maybe, maybe you will with time, but not yet, or not when this was said. Because this, the part of you that responded, that rage part, that part that says,

how dare you make this into something that was almost a good thing to happen. No, at the beginning you don't accept. So you don't accept, and the anger part and the contempt, they all come together to basically say, do not try to make this into something Do not try to make this into something that had a meaning or a purpose. Make sense. At some point, maybe later, somebody says something and you say, that's their view. That's how they go through it. But at first, it is a combination of emotions that knock at each other. It's a combustion.

It's confusing. It's not really confusing, but it feels confusing because it's intense, because it's a bunch of stuff coming from left field that you never knew existed inside of you. Like when we love. Like you do things, yeah, you do things that are not logical. And when we face sudden loss, similar things can happen to us. So I see this as developmental, I see this as part of the arc of the experience. I don't see this as,

this is it. You're not today where you were six months ago. You won't be in the same place six months from now. But you do want to create the ritual that you didn't have it in you at the time to participate in. And maybe you'll have one every year on her birthday, and you'll let a dove go out, or you'll do something that symbolizes all these things that don't have to be said in words. It can have music, it can have dance, it can have drums, it can have people stand up in a circle when they have something to say, and they're moved and called to say something, and then sit back.

And every time you see her three girls, you will see her in part, not only, but you'll see her and you are one of the main people through whom they will get to know her. Is she talked about? Is she spoken about between mom and your brothers and you? Not as much as I want, I think. I'm usually one to bring her up. I brought her up recently at this social event and I'm always unsure what my family thinks. But I think the worst thing is just to not even mention her, pretend like she never existed. I don't think they think that, but there's kind of an awkwardness when you're in settings or when people ask how many people are in your family or that's a chance to bring her up. So I usually, yeah, so this time I said,

we have a baby sister who's in heaven. And then I was too nervous to look at my family. When you come together for the holidays this year, how long will it have been? A year and a half since she died. Okay. We all have experienced her loss in our own way, like our own fingertips. But we can all be witnesses for each other in how we each are living with this loss. Shall we take a moment and just kind of check in with each other? A pulse check. Something where are you at with the big changes that we have just faced in our family? I know that we are not typically a family that speaks about these things,

but I also think that we have not typically experienced any of these things, and therefore, we need to breathe together, so to speak, to breathe her presence, her absence, as well as that, and acknowledge it, and celebrate her presence, her absence, as well as that, and acknowledge it and celebrate them and mention them and have them be absent, present, present, absent. Mm-hmm. Last Thanksgiving, her husband would talk about her and even though they were maybe stories that didn't highlight her strengths, it just felt good that we haven't forgotten her. Yeah. And then we were all-

Your family doesn't have to live like you. They don't have to feel the same as you do. There needs to be room for each person. Those who want to speak, those who don't, those who want to cry, those who don't, those who cry with others, those who cry alone, we're all going to be different. Each one highlighting different ways to experience and express grief. The most common one is those who say, let's remember, and those who say, we don't have to bring it up each time. Those who say, let's move on, and those who say, we don't have to bring it up each time. Those who say, let's move on and those who say, how can you? And they seem to each say, cancel each other out when in fact, both of these exist inside each of us. But in a family, sometimes instead of holding them

inside of us and holding those tensions and those polarities, they get outsourced onto other people. One person, one brother becomes the one who says, oh, come on, let's only talk about the children, the little ones, the future. The other one says, but what about the past? But in fact, they absolutely need each other. They are part of the holistic experience. Holding on, letting go, remembering, forgetting the past, the future, the joy of her life, the sadness of her death, her strength, her illness. If you fight your brothers, you do to them

what you don't like people doing to you. Because people become judgmental over how the other person is dealing with it, rather than, hey, we each have a different way, we are different people, we're holding on. Our grief is like our fingertips, or fingerprints, sorry. And I love that image because the fingerprints are as personal and unique to you. So tell me about your fingerprints, I'll tell you about mine. And then just listening. Yeah, make room. It's the collective of each person's individual way that actually begins to resemble the multiple parts of this experience.

No one has to take care of all the pieces. One person makes sure to bring it up at the table and the other one makes sure that we don't spend the whole evening about it. And instead of getting annoyed with the one who changed topic, it actually is good because it says we include but we also grow. Loss, you know, we tend to often talk about the trauma of the loss, and we don't always highlight that there is much more post-traumatic growth than there is actually post-traumatic stress in many instances, this being maybe one of them.

So when I find myself being, like when I look back since she's died, I think my level of critique of certain people or certain things is just like 10 out of 10. And I hate well in the moment it feels good, but I hate it. And so I don't understand that. It's because I'm critiquing myself, but I'm pinning it on other people. They are often expressing the parts of this that I do not express. Okay. And that is not, that is quite good because it's the collective of all the pieces that creates the universal human experience around grief. Who knows what your whole and your loss and your gap and your emptiness,

but we all hover around the same area. We know. I know that you know that I know that you know. We don't have to compare, compete. Who's the greater victim? Who suffered more? All of that. And so in the family, people will express different parts of the experience. It's the role distribution around it. This happens around many things in a family.

But in fact, they all belong together. If you didn't have one brother who said, can we talk about something else? You would have to deal with the part inside of you that has to begin to think when is it okay to talk about something else, or would have to deal with the part inside of you that has to begin to think when is it okay to talk about something else or even necessary. Because the complexity of these experiences is that they hold contradictions and multitudes. Shall we stop here?

Yeah. Does that feel like a good place? Yeah. Okay. I wish you special holidays. Thank you. And I think you're going into the holidays with this, hopefully, with this new frame in mind. Yeah.

Okay. All right. Thank you so much. You're welcome. Yeah. Okay. All right. Thank you so much. You're welcome. Bye-bye. Have a good day, bye. You too. Bye. This was an Aster Calling, a one-time intervention phone call, recorded remotely from two points

somewhere in the world. If you have a question you'd like to explore with Aster, could be answered in a 40 or 50 minute phone call, send her a voice message and Aster might just call you. Send your question to producer at Aeraparell.com. Where Should We Begin with Estera Perel is produced by Magnificent Noise. We're part of the Vox Media Podcast Network in partnership with New York Magazine and The Cut. Our production staff includes Eric Newsom, Destri Sibley, Sabrina Farhi, Kristen Muller,

and Julian Att. Original music and additional production by Paul Schneider. And the executive producers of Where Should We Begin are Esther Perel and Jesse Baker. We'd also like to thank Courtney Hamilton, Mary Alice Miller, and Jack Saul. Support for this show comes from 7Rooms. For the restaurant operators out there who want to create more regulars on the regular, check out 7Rooms. 7Rooms is an all-in-one CRM marketing and operations platform that helps you make more

money and more magic for your guests. It gives your staff the tools to deliver service that keeps your guests coming back for more. From direct reservations to smart table management to targeted text and email marketing, Seven Rooms helps you grow your brand and your covers and not your workload. Learn more at sevenrooms.com. Seven Rooms, make magic, make money. Support for this show is brought to you by Nissan Kicks. It's never too late to try new things, and it's never too late to reinvent yourself.

The all-new Reimagine Nissan Kicks is the city-sized crossover vehicle that's been completely revamped for urban adventure. From the design and styling to the performance, all the way to features like the Bose Personal Plus Sound System. You can get closer to everything you love about city life in the all-new, reimagined Nissan Kicks. Learn more at www.nisonusa.com slash 2025 dash Kicks. Available feature, Bose is a registered trademark of the Bose Corporation.