Dealing with Grief as a Witch

A few months ago, I lost my mother. She had a disease called corticobasal degeneration, which is similar to Parkinson’s Disease. She was diagnosed with the disease years ago and had been declining over time, but her death came along unexpectedly.

Now, in my late forties, I have dealt with a lot of loss – grandparents, great-grandparents, uncles, an ex-boyfriend, friends’ parents – but nothing prepared me for losing my own parent. I was close to my mom, and she was truly a wonderful human being, kind and generous, loving and giving. The grief at times has been numbing, painful, exhausting, and overwhelming, sprinkled in with loving memories and relief that she’s not suffering. Over time, the grief has become a little more manageable, and I have an amazing grief counselor who is working through this with me. I know this is a loss I will never “get over”, but I’ll learn to reconcile it and live with it. And I am now a big advocate for the grieving process. Too many times, our society, especially in the US, gives us a week or two to mourn and then expects us to move on. It’s uncomfortable for some people to talk about death or be around the grieving. But you know what? I’ve learned that this stuff takes time. Our society needs to quit reinforcing unrealistic expectations of us when we are in grief. If you know someone who is grieving, be patient with them, take time to listen to them because talking about the death is helping them work through their grief. If you are in the grief process, don’t place any expectations on yourself. Take your time, do what you need to do, feel what you need to feel, and I recommend talking to a grief counselor to help you understand all of your feelings.

Dealing with loss is challenging enough, but as a witch, I also feel this pressure to be okay with death, that it’s a normal process, a cycle of nature. But I’m not okay with it! Witch books tell me my loved one may be reincarnated or will go to a place like Summerland (or some other witchy heaven). But you know what? I’m not sure what I believe happens after our physical death here on Earth. In the first few days after her death, I panicked, trying to figure out exactly what I believed, to pinpoint what happens when you die. I did a lot of research about witches and death, and there’s not a whole lot out there, and what is out there is often conflicting. There are some specific sects of witchcraft that have more concrete ideas on what happens after death, but as a secular, eclectic witch, I’m still trying to figure it out. I know in my heart, I will be reunited with her spirit one day, maybe not as we were in this lifetime, but in some way, and for now, I’m okay with that.

One of the biggest obstacles I faced through the process was my very conservative, Christian family, although I love them very much. I was raised Southern Baptist (no rock music, no dancing, etc.) and I can’t think of one member of my family, even my extended family, who is not a conservative Christian. It’s sounds unbelievable, but it’s true – aunts, uncles, great-aunts, cousins – they all are very devout in their Christian faith. Now, I am going to admit something very big here. I am still in the witchy closet with my family. Yes, I’m in my forties and I’ve been a witch for over 20 years, but my family does not truly know that I am a witch. I am not ashamed to be a witch, and I feel like my craft is loving, nurturing, and giving. But my family is so devoted to their faith, and I love them so much, I did not want to cause a rift in the family. Some people may not agree with this, but I found it was easier sit through a few prayers every now and then (while thinking my own prayers in my head) than to cause unbelievable stress to my parents, who would have spent sleepless nights fretting over how to “save” me – I’m talking like interventions and constant proselytizing. It’s been a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy with them. My family knows I don’t go to church and we just don’t discuss it, which is fine with me. My witchcraft is my own thing, and it doesn’t need to be shared with my family.

But one of the biggest frustrations around my mom’s death was the constant talk about God and how this was HIS plan for my mother to die. There were many prayers and visits by my parents’ pastor while my mom was in hospice care. And I’m okay with people praying for other people; I feel like they are truly adding positive energy out there into the universe. But the constant talk of God’s “plan” for my mother’s life and death filled me with anger – how God “allowed” her to suffer and because she was saved, she would have eternal life with him. Now, I’m usually very tolerable of other religions than my own, but it was overwhelming having family and friends of the family keep telling me over and over about God’s plan for my mother and how thankfully she was saved. It felt like her life amounted to no more than her religion, and she was so much more than that. Which leads me to my next obstacle….the funeral.

You may not know this, but in the South, many Christian funerals have very little to do with the deceased and run more like a sermon, proselytizing to the friends and family who come to say their farewells. (To be fair, I have gone to funerals of other religions who did similar services, trying to convert you to their religion, and I have gone to some Christian funerals that didn’t really preach at all.) According to my dad, it was my mother’s wish to have the sermon-type funeral. I was upset, because I wanted my mother’s life to be celebrated for the woman that she was, not for her religion. But when the pastor came to talk to the family about the service, he asked us to share stories about her. We talked for two hours about our mom, how she was the neighborhood mom, how creative she was, how caring she was, how she was the PTA president for years, how she did my brother’s paper route when he broke his leg and more along those lines. I felt better. I wanted people to know how wonderful she was (as if they didn’t already know). But when it came time for the funeral, all of those stories vanished. The only stories that endured were the ones about how she taught Sunday school, or the story of how she was “saved”. For most of the 45 minute service, it was how my mother served the Lord and how if you aren’t saved, you are doomed to hell. I think my stepdaughter summed it up perfectly after the service when she came up to me, knowing that I wouldn’t be happy about the service, and said, “Holy church service, Batman! What was that?” And my eight-year-old son asked me for days if he was going to go to hell because of the things “that man” said at his Grammy’s funeral. I was angry. I didn’t shed a tear at the funeral. And then we weren’t able to have a graveside service after that because a HUGE storm rolled in for hours. So for me, I wasn’t able to feel any closure from the funeral experience.

But there is more to this. With the help of my counselor and a book called “Understanding Your Grief” by Alan Wolfelt, I have decided to create some of my own witchy rituals around death.

• I am currently planning a solo ritual/service that I will do in nature to honor my mother and all of her gifts. This will be my own funeral service for her.
• I read about how other cultures create a vessel to contain their grief and retrieve the vessel on a regular basis when they want to mourn. I am working on creating my own vessel for that purpose.
• I plan to honor my mother on Samhain with a little ritual and a small shrine.
• I am also journaling about the experience and my grief, which is helping me to work through it and recognize what overwhelms me.

I will also still be researching and journaling about what I think happens after you die here on earth. But I think the most important lesson I learned was to embrace the grieving process. Don’t stifle it in yourself or in others. Don’t have any expectations for yourself or for others. Let it run it’s course, whether it takes months or even years. And you can create your own experience outside of the normal funerals and services.

-Amanda