My journey of grief started with a phone call.

I stumbled out of bed, enveloped in the 4.20 am darkness and fog of sleep, to silence the shrill, insistent ringing of the phone.

A disembodied male voice, low-key and caring, told me we needed to get to the hospital ASAP because my son had been admitted with severe injuries. Sleep dropped away from me like a discarded dressing gown as my mind scrambled to comprehend his words.

What accident?

How did it happen?

How bad?

I needed to know, but he wouldn’t provide further information. He kept repeating in the same low-key, concerned tone: ‘Get to the hospital; the doctor is waiting. They will explain.’

I had just received the phone call that every parent dreads. My wife and I drove down Beaufort St. in the silence of pre-dawn. It was that lull between the young people stumbling out of nightclubs, wide-eyed and intoxicated, with the thump of music still echoing in their ears, and before the early workers, with sleep-filled eyes, clutching coffees to wake themselves, tumbled out of buses to start their day.

The sliding doors closed softly behind us as we entered the hospital. We had arrived in the foyer of our new lives. It was the 18th of January. It would be the 18th of February before we left this foyer, with each of our paths taking us on different journeys.

He lay there, all 6’2” of him: our son, my son.

The hospital was the foyer of endless waiting—the foyer of endless waiting that took me on the journey of grief.

The Many Griefs of Men

We will all experience grief, and the number of situations where we experience grief as men increases as we grow older. The death of parents, siblings, close friends, the breakdown of relationships, the loss of jobs, or health. Grief comes to us in many forms, and for many of us, it sticks like barnacles, tightly closed, unspoken and unprocessed.

While it is a generalisation, it is true that many of us, as men, are not good at journeying with grief. Some of the reasons for this are:

• societal and our expectations around being strong and staying in control. These expectations were hammered into us at an early age, often by our fathers and those men we looked up to. We accepted their lessons, swallowed our tears, choked on our grief and built an armour of control.

• We don’t have the words to describe what we are feeling, so because we can’t describe our emotions, we focus on what we can do, which is most likely distracting ourselves with work or with alcohol to numb the pain.

• We view grief as a problem to be solved. However, grief is never solved as a problem. Grief is a journey. It is a journey into a maze of confusion, pain and bewilderment. A journey we can only walk, one step, one day at a time.

• We often have fixed ideas of what grief should feel like and how we should grieve. When our grief is different or we aren’t sure that what we are feeling is ‘right’, we often shut down and deny what we are experiencing as grief.

In times like these, men’s mentoring services can provide essential support, offering guidance and understanding from those who have walked similar paths. As I have grieved and continue to grieve for Matthew, I share a couple of the lessons I have learned.

The Chaos and Complexity of Grief

Grief is often chaotic and complex, and that is okay.

The chaos of grief

Elizabeth Kubler-Ross is well known for her five stages of grief – denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. Kubler-Ross’s initial work was based on people who were dying rather than those who were grieving. Although they are now used universally for grief, for the man who is grieving, they have limited use and may not be relevant. For example, in my situation, there was no chance of denial as we kept vigil, waiting for Matthew to die, and who would I bargain with? A God I no longer believed in?

Grief is chaotic in its strength and force, which is why, as men, we often want to control it. When we have learnt to be in control all our lives, we struggle with the sense of being caught in the whirlwind of grief that is upending our world.

We want to understand grief because we think if we understand it, we can tolerate it. However, grief must be lived with and endured. It is only understood in hindsight.

The complexity of grief

Grief is complex because our relationships with those who have either died or from whom we have separated are also complex.

Where a man has had a reasonably good relationship with the person who has died or in the case of a separation and divorce, where it has been relatively amicable, grief is generally more straightforward. However, where there is anger, frustration, guilt and perhaps shame, these emotions can add complexity to the grieving process.

This complexity is most often seen in relationship breakdowns and divorce. Ironically, at a time when the emotions of anger, blame, and hurt are at their highest during a relationship breakdown, there is little to no discussion about grief and understanding grieving. My divorce after Matthew’s death was reasonably amicable, yet there was no discussion or assistance to help me understand the grief that arises when leaving a relationship and a marriage. In the years since, when supporting men going through their relationship breakdowns, this lack of understanding of the grieving process continues to be played out in court rooms and court-mandated counselling for “angry men”.

Men who are hurting will be angry; men who are fearful and uncertain about what will happen will often be angry. We have learnt as men to hide our fear, sense of uncertainty, and pain under our anger. For a majority of men going through separation or divorce, their anger masks an underlying grief that is complex for them.

Personal growth for men often starts with facing grief head-on and embracing the painful emotions rather than suppressing them. Through structured men’s mentoring support, we can better process the complexities of grief and move forward with renewed strength.

The Archaeology of Grief

Grief is multi-layered. Current grief brings to light past grief that has been buried and hidden away—grief that remains unresolved because we couldn’t tackle it at the time it occurred. There are various reasons we may not have been able to address past grief. Perhaps we didn’t know how to process that grief, it felt too overwhelming, or there were no safe spaces where we felt able to grieve. We bottled it up, secured the lid tightly, and buried that bottle deep within the recesses of our unconscious.

Major trauma and grief, like the death of our children, bring these unresolved griefs to the fore once again.

Matthew’s death excavated my grief over the long-standing dysfunctional relationship I had with my father. The bedrock of our relationship was distrust, disappointment in each other and suppressed rage towards each other.

My father never spoke to me of his upbringing in Ireland, but I often wonder what he experienced that filled him with such suppressed rage. I learned early to tread lightly around him to avoid sparking his anger. Occasionally, a truce would be called, and our relationship would move into periods of wary warmth only to descend into the swamp of frustrated rage with each other.

All my hopes, the desire that I had given Matthew the platform on which he could go and build his life without the restrictions of religion and fears of fundamentalism of my upbringing, were smashed. The grief of his death was mingled with the grief of the lack of relationship with my father and the sense of loneliness.

Finding Your Way in Grief

Your grief is unique to you, but this does not mean you have to endure your grief by yourself. My experience in grieving Matthew’s death has taught me.

• While I carry the burden of my grief, I do so in a community of men carrying their burden of grief. We are a community of grieving men.
• When we do not share our grief and accept the false belief that somehow, we are weak or there is something wrong with us to feel as we do, we are killing ourselves with our unspoken grief. Weakened immune systems, high blood pressure, heart disease, chronic fatigue and sleep issues, headaches and muscle pain are a few of the physical impacts of unresolved grief. In terms of mental health issues, anxiety, depression, emotional numbness, and increased risk of substance abuse are a few of the risks we expose ourselves to.
• It is not a weakness to share our grief; it is wisdom. Grief isolates us; it convinces us we are alone, that no one will understand what we are going through. This is one of the lies of grief that keeps us stuck. When we risk sharing our grief, we realise we are not alone and there is a deep collective wisdom we can draw from. The collective wisdom of men who are walking the maze of grief

Overcoming grief and loss is a profoundly personal journey, but it is one that we do not have to walk alone. If you are grieving and would like to talk to someone either as a one-off or for a few times, let me know.