About That "Nobody Ever Tells You" Line

Lately, I’ve been hearing the phrase, "Nobody ever tells you" a lot.

Nobody ever tells you your brain goes on a vacation.

Nobody ever tells you it feels physically heavy.

Nobody ever tells you how irritating small talk suddenly becomes.  

I get it. When something shakes your world that hard, it can feel like there should have been a handbook. Or at least a warning label.

There’s actually quite a bit of information out there, but after the initial shock wears off, googling grief isn’t usually at the top of the list of things to do. Even if you read all the articles, books, and lists of what to expect, none of it quite prepares you for what it feels like in your own body.

Most people don't sit around talking about what grief does physically. It's not exactly dinner conversation. And even when it does come up, it's usually in broad terms that don't quite capture how disorienting it can be.

So, since you’re here… let me say it out loud.

When your person dies, especially suddenly, your body doesn't treat it like a sad event. It treats it like a threat. Your system ramps up. Stress hormones spike. Your brain is trying to make sense of something it didn't see coming, and it doesn't settle down just because the moment has passed.

That's why you're exhausted in a way sleep doesn't fix. You can sleep for hours and still wake up feeling like you didn't. Your body is working overtime in the background.

The fog is part of it too. You forget things, lose track of conversations, walk into rooms without knowing why you're there. I jokingly tell my family I'm a prime candidate for dementia based on the stupid things I forget. Your brain is busy trying to rewrite everything it thought was true, and it doesn't leave much room for anything else.

Sleep gets weird. Appetite goes one direction or the other. Your body feels off in ways that are hard to explain. Headaches, tight chest, tension that doesn't seem connected to anything.

It all connects. Broken heart syndrome is real; widow brain is real.

Then there's the constant sense that something else might go wrong. You notice things you didn't used to notice. You brace without realizing it. Your brain learned that terrible things can happen without warning, and it doesn't forget that quickly.

All of this can show up at once, which is why it feels like too much. You're trying to function, make decisions, show up for other people, and your system is still reacting to something it can't fix. That's where the disorientation comes from.

What catches people off guard is that it doesn’t heal the way an injury or illness does. Some people hit month ten and can't believe they're still this sad. Others swear they'll never marry again, then find themselves in a relationship before the year is out. Some feel like their brain will never work right again. Others can't function at all and wonder if they ever will.

All of those responses are normal, which is a frustrating thing to hear when you're living through it. You want to know which version you'll be. You want a timeline. You want to know when this massive physical and emotional overload is going to settle down.

What you don’t want to hear is that it settles at different speeds for different people. Most people want a timeline, something they can measure against. That’s how you end up with, “The first year is the hardest.”

No it’s not.

For some, the fog clears after a few months. For others, it takes years. Some of us learn to adapt to a brain that works differently than it used to and call that progress.

There isn't a quick fix, as much as we desperately wish there was. It's not something you push through in a few weeks or even a few months. For many of us, it changes us for good, and we spend the rest of our lives learning how to live with that.

Understanding what's happening doesn't fix it, but it can take some of the edge off. There's a reason it feels the way it does, even if it doesn't feel reasonable. This isn’t something anyone could have fully explained ahead of time.

You only understand it by being in it, and even then, some of it never quite adds up. You’re not crazy, you just broke a little, and it’s going to take some time to build a new you. The process is… ongoing.

With Grace for the Mess,

~Stef