Finding the Motivation to Write Through Loss & Grief

Today, I will talk about writing through loss and grief. This one is hard one for me to get down on this digital paper simply because I’ve never really extended myself in such a way that I will do right now. I’m a serious introvert, private, and I don’t even know if anyone will even read this, but this is my space. Writing has been a healer for me, even though right now, I have a love/hate relationship with it. And, others may be able to relate and may be able to share their own experiences. So here we go.

My writing journey in 2020 has been quite a rollercoaster… and difficult. It has been a clusterfuck of amazing movie-like ideas swirling in my brain with a chest full of excitement for the possibilities of a completed YA trilogy, yet, nothing ever really gets written. For a while, I couldn’t bring myself to write. I would simply have the positive intent to write, open my laptop, and then close it after feeling intense indifference. And I would just walk away with a brain full, ideas locked in a cage. I couldn’t bring my dreams to life the way I did for Looking Beyond the Ordinary and even, the 2^nd novel in the trilogy.

After doing some reflecting, I understand now that this struggle and this attitude, was and sometimes is, a result of high functioning depression and high functioning anxiety due to grief and loss… all on top of a global pandemic when you’re locked in the house and left with nothing but your thoughts.

On November 24, 2019, my world was turned upside down. My husband and I had just gotten married and we were just coming down from our honeymoon phase. But a new reality had hit us that brought our spirit of togetherness back to that honeymoon high… we were having a baby! 

I was swarmed and filled with love, knowing that our future child would have the best parents this world could offer. We were so excited. We had names picked out. We were discussing what we would do for childcare. I was on the verge of graduating from my Masters’ program in early December, so it was perfect! We grinned every time we passed baby clothing in grocery stores. I bought my parents Gigi and Pops gifts for Christmas so I could surprise them with an announcement that they were going to be first time grandparents. We had announced to my husband’s family that I was pregnant.

And then, November 24, 2019.

That was the day we lost the baby. I haven’t been the same. Little to no one knows about it because… it’s simply just a lonely experience, and one you don’t want to talk about. It hurts and cuts deep when people ask if we’re going to have a baby, or if we are planning on having one. Or when people say they’re waiting on us to have kids. The entire experience still haunts me, and writing has been a combination of healing and a trigger for avoidance.

The second book in the Looking Beyond the Ordinary trilogy is a very dark one. Much of it was written before the miscarriage, but some of it was written after. Some of the darkest chapters in the book comes from my own dark place after the loss. And maybe that’s a good thing. Maybe that’s the emotion I’m seeking to evoke in my readers. And maybe that’s what makes a book good – the author being in such a place where you feel the rawness and the emotion of what’s happening and the world you’ve put the characters in. So… in that regard, I am grateful for that. I am grateful to be able to use a mood and situation for my own creative prowess up until a point that an entire novel gets finished.

But from March – June, as I began writing the third book in the trilogy, which has less of a dark tone, that’s when I felt like I couldn’t get anything done! I would go for walks, drives, sit in the dark and daydream, and have all the ideas in the world. Then, I would get to the computer to write, and it just wouldn’t happen. And I would walk away for another of that same cycle to happen for the next 6-8 weeks.

Our baby would’ve been born July 21,^, 2020. And since then, we’ve lost another child. It’s been hard. Damn hard. Can I say I have grown since our losses? Maybe. I’m in a better place most days than I’m not, but to say that I’ve healed and completely moved on would be a lie. The great thing!? I am writing more. Chapters are now flowing like it never has, finally. And it’s not a one day occasion. It flows whenever I open my laptop. That counts for something.

I say and share all of this to say… through loss, grief, and difficulty, writing may be hard. It may be damn hard. You might even hate it. And maybe, you’ll be writing the best emotional scenes you will ever write in your life. And each experience you have with writing in the midst of loss and grief are okay. Is it frustrating? Hell fuckin’ yeah. All I wanted to do was feel normal again and write. But the grieving process is just like the writing process. It takes time. Right now, in the 7 stages of grief, I’m teeter tottering between anger and depression/reflection. Stages 5 and 6. Not quite at the final stage of acceptance and hope yet, but I feel myself growing every day. And the fact that when I do get into a writing groove, I’m writing like I was writing 2 years ago again is the silver lining I’ve been waiting to see.