EnchantedSage's advice column

I don't think I react to things the way I should,
I lost my father in 97 and I didn't cry all the much and I loved my father very much, then in 2002 I lost my Brother to A Car Crash, and I just don't think I was as sad as I should have been I know you guys are probally think I am cold hearted and made of stone. I fear the same I mean I feel regular emotions like LOVE and anger, and Joy. But when it comes to sadness I just kinda of go numb is something wrong with me, or am I just worrying too much?

I am sorry to hear about all the loss you have had to endure, and I think you might be too hard on yourself regarding what you perceive to be inadequte emotional responses to sadness.

Everyone reacts differently to extreme emotional situations. Some people cry hysterically and show their pain and grief outwardly and some deal with their pain more subtley. A noticeable expression of grief (or lack thereof) for the loss of a family member is in no way a measure of how much that person was loved.

It sounds as if you may have an internal defense mechanism that kicks in when you are faced with intense grief allowing you to become numb just to get through from day-to-day. If you were completely unable to feel any emotions, then I think you would have serious cause for concern. However, since you say that you experience feelings of love, anger and joy then you are clearly not completely closed-off from your feelings.

Although, I don't necessarily see an issue with the level of sadness you experienced, I do think it's important to make sure that you didn't simply "bottle up" or "stuff down" your feelings instead of dealing with them at all. If that is what happened, then I fear that those suppressed emotions will find ways of creeping up into your life in the future and probably at inopportune times. If you haven't already participated in grief counselling, you might want to give it a shot.

If you believe that you are not dealing with issues of grief supression and are just concerned that you weren't sad enough and didn't cry enough, then I think you need to cut yourself some serious slack. You shouldn't measure yourself against how you see others react. You are an individual and your grief process might be different from everyone else's - not more appropriate or less appropriate - just different. Again, I am sorry for your losses and I wish you the best in your quest for clarification about your feelings.

Kind wishes,

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(Rating: 5) Thank you very much

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