Updated Oct 28th, 2024

Squirrel at the Birdbell

A Little Story About the Importance of Fully Healing After Big Loss

“Slowly, slowly the wound to the soul begins to make itself felt, like a bruise, which only slowly deepens its terrible ache, till it fills all the psyche.”

— D.H. Lawrence, “Lady Chatterley’s Lover”

I was widowed at the age of thirty-two.

The day after my husband, John, died, I was heading from the living room back upstairs to have a shower when I thought I saw something strange in the front yard. At first, I thought it John’s black work sock hanging from the birch tree. But that didn’t make sense. Mind you, nor had the fact that I’d spent the previous day in the ICU unit, holding his hand as he died of a brain injury (as the result of a preventable fall at an unsafe workplace).

Overnight, my life had turned into the kind of kid’s book where you have to find ten things wrong with a picture, like a person walking on air or a house with no door.

Or a childless widow.

I walked over to the living room window to take a better look. It wasn’t John’s sock in the tree…it was a squirrel hanging upside down, stealing seeds from the birdbell.

“Googie?”

I hadn’t heard my childhood nickname in years. I turned around to face my brother, Doug.

“Yeah?”

“Are you OK?” he asked.

I managed a small smile. “Nope.”

“Sorry,” he said, sheepish. “Dumb question.”

“I’ve never seen a squirrel at our birdbell before,” I said. “I thought it was one of John’s socks!”

Doug looked at me a moment, concerned. Then he said, “I uh…I don’t want to rush you but there are an awful lot of things we’re going to have to deal with today.”

And a squirrel at the birdbell, I gathered, wasn’t one of them.

In the shower, I used John’s shampoo, conditioner, and soap…personal items he’d never touch again. After a few gut-wrenching sobs, I stepped out of the shower and saw his towel hanging on the peg. It was only two days earlier that John had used that towel. And since that was one of the last items I’d seen him touch, I didn’t want to disturb it. So I reached for my own towel instead and wrapped it around myself…which is when I noticed my little pink packet of birth control pills on the counter.

I picked it up and stared at it — but it wasn’t a pink packet of pregnancy prevention pills I saw. I only saw, with sudden clarity, the reality of my new situation…and it was black. And that’s when I felt something start to give way inside me. And the wave of emotion became too much to handle.

“I THINK I’M GONNA NEED SOME HELP IN HERE!” I heard my words but didn’t recognize the strangled voice.

My sister-in-law appeared in the bathroom doorway. She took one look at my face, then gently led me from the bathroom to the bed. I sat down, shaking, and she sat beside me.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“Nope.”

“What happened?”

I held out my hand and showed her the packet of birth control pills.

Her eyes widened. “Oh. Oh dear.”

“I can’t handle this,” I heard myself say.

“Maryanne…”

“He’ll never touch me again,” I said.

She watched me carefully, holding her breath…holding space for me as I slowly began to realize some of the more intimate ramifications of John’s death.

“We will never make love again,” I said softly.

A tear rolled down my sister-in-law’s cheek. She knew where this train of thought was headed.

“We’re never going to be parents,” I whispered.

And then she held me as I cried and cried for all that would never be for John and me.

A few minutes later, she took a deep breath and said, “I’m going to tell you something you probably don’t want to hear.”

I lifted my head.

“The only way you will ever get through what lies ahead,” she said quietly, “is to focus on what is, not on what should be.”

She was absolutely right. I was going to have to learn, very quickly, how to focus on all that I did still have — versus dwelling on all that I’d lost. However, at some point, I would still have to go through the incredibly difficult process of fully facing — admitting to myself — the enormity of our loss…before I could move on to truly accepting it.

For as you may know, accepting the unacceptable does not happen overnight.

I am extremely grateful that the realization that John’s death meant we would never have a child together didn’t even occur to me until twenty-four hours after he was pronounced brain-dead. In hindsight, I suspect my mind was protecting me from this rather obvious fact. Because we can only handle so much at any given time.

And when we can’t, we must ask for help.

I also suspect that seeing the squirrel at the birdbell that morning, after mistaking it for one of John’s socks, was a “sign” of sorts…a spiritual heads-up, if you will, that something significant was about to happen. Because the horrific emotional pain I subsequently experienced, when I saw my birth control pills, wasn’t just a painful moment of realization — it was also a warning cry from my soul to PAY ATTENTION TO THIS! The spiritual equivalent of a neon flashing sign.

For when John died, I hadn’t just lost a husband. I’d lost my best friend, my soulmate, and the father of the children we may have had together.

The magnitude of what I’d lost — and what John had lost — would not only have to be fully faced…it would also have to be fully felt. And since this is about as pleasant as sticking a knitting needle in your eye, I get why many people do everything in their power to avoid it — or try to power through the grieving process as fast as possible.

But here’s the thing: when we don’t deal with our deep, deep hurt, it doesn’t just dissolve away with time. It will appear again and again — in one form or another — on the surface of our lives, our health, and our relationships.

I think this passage from the book, “Lady Chatterley’s Lover,” by D.H. Lawrence is a perfect description of what is going on below the surface in the aftermath of a significant loss and/or traumatic incident:

“And dimly she realized one of the great laws of the human soul: that when the emotional soul receives a wounding shock, which does not kill the body, the soul seems to recover as the body recovers. But this is only appearance…Slowly, slowly the wound to the soul begins to make itself felt, like a bruise, which only slowly deepens its terrible ache, till it fills all the psyche. And when we think we have recovered and forgotten, it is then that the terrible after-effects have to be encountered at their worst.”

In other words, even though time may have passed since whatever it was happened to us, the hurt that we experienced — the wounding of our soul — may be just starting to make its way to the surface. We need to acknowledge the enormity of our personal loss — a person, a dream, a future family, a home, a pet, a lifestyle, a career, a family, a business — and honour the immense impact it has had on us.

Then we must choose wisely how to handle our hurt, so that we can move forward with our lives, creating a beautiful new future that is not defined by what, or who, is missing, but rather by all that is…and what can still be.

Healing fully takes time, honesty, effort and patience…but I suspect it is the only way to become whole again. And maybe, just maybe, we experience the losses we do partly because the process of healing leads us to where we — our soul — needs to go next.

Maryanne Pope is the author of “A Widow’s Awakening.” She also writes screenplays, playscripts & blogs. Maryanne is the CEO of Pink Gazelle Productions and Co-Founder of the John Petropoulos Memorial Fund. To receive her blog, “Weekly Words of Wisdom,” please subscribe here. And be sure to visit our PinkGazelleCards Etsy shop.