Did you notice how many rock stars died at age 27? Ever since my aunt committed suicide at 38, it’s gone down somewhere in the back of my mind as suicide year. Not that I’m planning it for a moment, it’s just I’ve kind of measured my life up to and hopefully past that age ever since it happened (I was 23 when she killed herself).
Coming up to 38 later this year makes me think specifically about the depression which she suffered from. But what is depression? Some say it is anger turned inwards. Well, that would explain how it can result in suicide, murder of the self. I was always angered by her treatment as she saw a psychiatrist and was given drugs but I’m not sure how much proper psychotherapy she got. I think that, ok they were trying to help, but there was a lot in her childhood and teenage years that went wrong and saying someone has a condition kind of puts the blame onto them instead of trying to help them to come to terms with what was done to or taken away from them in the past.
In the New Black Darian Leader shows how we have redefined natural human grieving and mourning and tried to turn them into a medical condition called depression. It makes me realise how much better the conventions for mourning are in Indian culture. A year without festivities or celebration, sometimes on a vegan diet, a defined time to mourn (sometimes the mourning of widows goes on a lifetime, that is not the sort of mourning I am advocating in any formal way). But here in the West, it’s the other way round, nowadays anyway. You are expected to pick up your life before too long after a bereavement. For example, when it comes to a miscarriage, people often don’t even tell anyone they had been pregnant and that they have lost anyone at all.
In therapy we almost have a touch of what is now only to be found in the East – you are encouraged to mourn what you have lost or what you never had (e.g. if you never had a father around) and work the feelings through, rather than clinicise it and take drugs. I think this is the way forward. The same with childbirth. In South Asian cultures, women often return to their parents home for 6 weeks so they are relieved of their normal responsibilites. Here in the West, a woman can give birth and find herself loading the dishwasher and taking the kids to school within 48 hours. But who is in the better psychological state 6 weeks later?
Thanks for this read. Your positive, do-something-about-it approach is great.
I agree with the mourning thing. I’ve thought a lot about mourning over the past year and the different styles of mourning and dealing with grief. I think having a year to process the death of my mother-in-law has been really good for the family. However, it’s been tough too. I’ve had some people describe this year as punishment. Although I wouldn’t go so far to say that, I do think we’ve gotten to a point where we’re ready to move on in a way. We’ll never forget Tri’s mom but I think we all want to start being happy again. But we still have another two months of this official mourning period left.
The thing I like about western funerals is that everyone talks about how much they loved the person who died, about how great he/she was and what an impact he/she made. Because of this, funerals turn into not just a time to mourn but a time to celebrate life. There is nothing like that that I know of in the Hindu tradition.
Hi there It does seem long but you actually feel better quicker if mourning is given a year. I noticed that after a year my mother in law seem to feel resolved about the past.
interestingly there’s an astrological correlation in these dates you mention… I’d say the age 36-37.5 is the time when people with certain planetary arrangements have to watch out for great stress. Unlike genetics, planetary alignments are totally unique to the individual and they have nothing to do with family members –meaning that while 38 will remind you of your aunt, it won’t affect you in the same way.
” I think this is the way forward. The same with childbirth. In South Asian cultures, women often return to their parents home for 6 weeks so they are relieved of their normal responsibilites.”
If they can afford to do so.
” Here in the West, a woman can give birth and find herself loading the dishwasher and taking the kids to school within 48 hours.”
Indian women who are not of the priveleged classes that can afford to take off time, are often back to working in the fields or on the construction site or cleaning a memsahab’s home immediately after popping out a baby.
Good point. However, I think what happens in the West is crazy. Technological advances and increasing wealth have made people think they can cope alone and they may move some distance from family and do more (e.g. work and have kids). Thereby reducing the benefit of all that technology. I mean look at the workplace, where there might have been 5 or 6 typists, now with word processing it’s all quicker and easier so there might be one and she is likely to work harder than the others did. So technology has not helped in the way it might have – to create less work!
Having children later, means the grandparents are older too and less able to help. And smaller family size in the previous generation means for example you might have no sisters (like me!)