Jennifer Levin
Hi everyone and welcome to the newest episode of Untethered. Today's conversation centers on what it means to sit alongside people in the aftermath of sudden and traumatic loss, as a volunteer, a facilitator, and a witness to some of the hardest days of a someone’s life. I am joined by Caralee Hudson, a retired ICU and CCU nurse who now volunteers alongside her husband Steve as a grief group facilitator for individuals who are living in the aftermath of sudden and unexpected loss. In this interview we explore what makes sudden and unexpected loss its own category of grief, the guilt and anger that so often accompany it, the sacred space that forms inside a grief group, and what years of sitting with grieving people has taught her about living her own life with intention.
Jennifer Levin
Okay, Caralee, I am so pleased to have you here with us today. Let's start off by just having you introduce yourself.
Caralee
Hey, well, my husband, Steve, and I are longtime residents of Western Washington. We have three married sons and six incredible grandchildren, ages 16 to 27. I'm a retired RN and pretty active in volunteering at my church. I'd say my hobbies are like a one time a year project with making very individualized Christmas ornaments for my grandchildren and each of my daughters-in-law. They're called nut babies, which seems like a strange name, but it's a half a walnut shell, which becomes the bed for whatever character I put them in, and so you know, like, started with my first, our first grandchild, and it went from Pooh Bear one year to Blue’s Clues to Spider-Man to finally a Snowman with a graduation cap, so they can kind of see the story of their life through the nut babies I make each year, I think. Oh, they age out at 21 so eventually there's not all these little, you know, specific markers of their life, but I've probably made over 200 of them in the years that since I started. So, anyway, they seem to really appreciate getting them, and then I have a recent interest in acrylic painting, so that's a kind of a new, a new avenue for me,
Jennifer Levin
that is very cool. I'll have to get some pictures of the nut babies from you. Well, it sounds like you are very busy, and I know that your volunteer work is something that's very important to you, and that's what we're going to focus on today. So what led you to start supporting individuals who've experienced a sudden or unexpected loss? What got you interested in this initially?
Caralee
Okay, well, first of all, we volunteer with Support Seven. We, Steve and I, do a 12 hour on call shift every week, and I, our leaders, Shannon Sessions, you had her on your previous podcasts, so your listeners may know a little bit about that, but if not, Support Seven is part of the chaplaincy service for South County Fire and Rescue in Snohomish County, and we come alongside individuals who, it's the worst day of their lives, so whether it's fires or accidents, might be drownings, overdoses, suicides, homicides, and so Support Seven is there with their chaplains or with incident response team members, and so we've been doing that, and there was a frequent, you know, there was certainly been a frequency of very traumatic deaths, it seems like with increased suicides and overdoses, etc. and so there was grief companioning was envisioned by Shannon and our and Cindi Sinnema, and it was just that felt like there was a need there in the community for people to have somebody to go through grieving with them, and so they did a conference, an all-day conference in 2022 and it was just all of the volunteers for Support Seven were encouraged to attend, and so we learned a lot through that, and then they were mentioning at the end of the conference that if anybody wanted to learn more about this and train up for being either a one on one companion or be a grief group facilitator, there would be further training in January after the holidays. We came home and my husband, Steve, asked me if I had signed up for that, and I said no, I think I have enough on my plate right now. I don't, I don't need to do one more thing, and he said, well, I signed up, like I was completely surprised, because he is an introvert. This is not something he would typically get himself involved with, but I was, I was pleased, and thought that would be, he would be great at it, but I was, you know, kind of surprised, but it things got even busier for me as I have a little stepmom with memory issues, and I was needing to put her in assisted living, and just so I was not at all planning to do this, but the first Saturday of training came around, and he was, and I, my Saturday. Was free, so I thought, well, I'll go, and I'll, I'll be supportive of this, you know. This is great for him, I'll be supportive. So I went to the all-day training, and of course, the first question they ask is, you know, what brought you here? And I go, he did, I'm not planning to do this. So, the month later, the next training comes up, and my Saturday is free, and so I thought, okay, well, I'll just keep going and supporting him, and I think that happened three times. Funny, they were passing around a clipboard to say, you know, which do you want to do, one on one or to be group facilitator, and I really had to think long and hard and pray about it, and I just kind of went through my journal, and just realized that there was just... it seemed like I was being prepared for this, and so I ended up signing up as a group facilitator. I have led lots of group discussions and things in the past, and felt comfortable with it, but anyway, that's how I got started with it, and it's been, it's been great to be involved with, with that.
Jennifer Levin
What makes you stay? I mean, these are tough times. What makes you start to support people who've been through these horrific life losses? What makes you stay?
Caralee
Well, grief by nature, of course, is really heavy stuff, and the stories can be hard to hear. Situations can be messy, and a lot of times when I'm reading through the people's intake information, it's like I question myself, am I, am I really up for this? Do I do I know what I'm doing, but inevitably the groups are just great, and you know, I think to say it's rewarding seems trite, but I find a very fulfilling sense of helping someone walk that journey of grief, knowing that they're not alone, that I'm making a difference, that I'm giving somebody support and practical tools, and you know the other facilitators of these grief groups have used the term we feel invited into a sacred space,
Jennifer Levin
I understand that term. Yeah,
Caralee
You understand that. Yeah, I mean, and a lot of times, sacred is used like in a religious sense, but I think it also means a place set aside specifically, and so it, you know, not everyone is invited into that space, not everyone can be trusted, but they trust us, and they trust us with their story. They trust us with their hurt, and so it really is an honor to be invited into that space with them, and to share in their grief and grieving, so we don't take it lightly, and it, yeah,
Caralee
there's something about it that feeds your soul to be in
Jennifer Levin
that, yeah, yeah, I can connect sudden and unexpected loss is its own category of grief, I mean, anyone will tell you that. Who's experienced it, and you know if you haven't experienced it, it can be hard to even understand what this type of a loss is like. It's very different from anticipated or expected or a natural loss. What have you witnessed in your work that speaks to how a sudden or unexpected loss is so different?
Caralee
Well, I would say most of all, sudden loss seems extremely difficult, I guess, because they didn't have a chance to say goodbye, and, and that's especially with suicide, death by suicide, and there's this, I think it makes it difficult for them to be a part of other grief groups, because they, everybody else got to say goodbye in an anticipated death, but they didn't, and so, in being in a group like that, they sort of feel different, and then there's sort of this unspoken thing. Well, at least you didn't see your person suffer like we did, like somebody going through a cancer death, and so it's, it's a little difficult for them to feel comfortable in a group, and so there's that difference. I think often the people with unexpected deaths have a sense of guilt. What could I have done to prevent this? Why didn't I see the signs? Why did I let my child go with that friend the day of the accident, so there's just a lot of guilt over things, and then a lot of times there's anger at their loved ones that may be hard for them to admit. I asked in a past group, you know, how many of you are angry at the one you lost, and every hand went up, I think, all except one, and it was they were angry at that person, like, why didn't you tell me that you were in this much pain with your life? Why did you do this to our family, especially to the children? You've just, you know, turned everything upside down, didn't you realize that you left me with such a mess to untangle with the finances, and on and on, and so there's this anger, and sounds like you're talking,
Jennifer Levin
I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt, sounds like you're talking a lot about suicide in particular here,
Caralee
Yeah, suicide in particular, but it has to do with a lot of them, will have their, their child died of overdose too.
Jennifer Levin
Yeah,
Caralee
why did you get, why did you get into that lifestyle? Yeah, I think maybe I was just focusing on suicide, but yeah, but it is, you know, there was, they were angry at, you know, this life of habits and not getting clean, and you know, just, it could have been prevented, that kind of thing, and so they're frustrated with that, and you know, I think all grievers have some anger, that's just, you know, often considered one of the phases of, of grieving is anger, maybe angry at the medical system, angry at the unfairness of somebody having to die so young or suffer so much, but this is anger, you know, at their particular person that they lost, and there's this conflict between loving and yearning for their presence, and yet feeling angry, and then feeling guilty over feeling angry,
Jennifer Levin
I've seen a lot of people who don't feel safe feeling angry, and it takes a while before that anger comes out, because the sadness is so overwhelming that they can't get to the anger, or they feel like if I express anger, I don't love them. It takes away from the relationship.
Jennifer Levin
I'm so glad that you are. That's something that you're able to explore with the people with, because anger is a healthy part of grieving.
Caralee
Yeah, yeah, and I think in a group it's, it's helpful for them to realize that this is a typical emotion that the others are feeling too, and it's not unrealistic for them to feel this way. And so I think it's very helpful in a group for them to explore these emotions and to realize that both loving and yearning can be side by side with the anger as they continue to work through all of it,
Jennifer Levin
Yeah, yeah. Um, one of the other things you talked about, with, you know, the inability to say goodbye, is also there's just such the not only did they not get to say goodbye, but for many people, there's that shock or disbelief that this just even happened,
Caralee
right?
Jennifer Levin
So that's such a difference with an unexpected loss. When you think about the groups that you have led or are leading, do you have any particular experiences that stand out for you or your participants that just kind of have been tucked away in your heart?
Caralee
Yes, this is a group of about a year or so back, and, and I don't want to betray any confidences here, but this, the man had, he was from a culture that didn't express, men didn't express grief, and their daughter had died, their teenage daughter had died by suicide, and he struggled to even get through the story, struggled with his emotions, etc. And you know, they had no extended family in the area to come along and be supportive of them, and so it was, you know, they just really had a very, very traumatic time after her, after her death, and so he had told a story, and we, our meeting ended, and I had just a really wonderful co-facilitator who was so in tuned and just intuitive in her responses to people, and she said to him, "Would you mind if I gave you a hug? And he agreed, and when she hugged him, he just broke down and sobbed and sobbed and sobbed, and he said I haven't hugged my mother in 37 years, and so there was this sense of needing just this physical contact, for one thing, and you know that reassurance, and then just the permission to express his emotions in this way. Well, it changed the dynamic of the whole group really, and we, the group, became huggers. They realized that every, every week they were missing out on hugs, and so it became, you know, just a kind of a ritual at the end of our sessions, just to hug each other, and that was just a really meaningful time, I think of another time, you know, or a lot of times I should say, when I start a group, I on the first night I will ask, how many of you struggled to get out of out of your car and even come in to the meeting, and I'll usually get a few hands, if not all of them, because they don't know what to anticipate, and, and so they're hesitant, and then I'll say, look around the look around the group, these people get it, they will understand what you are going through better than anybody else. Your family and friends may have moved on, but these people get it, and then just recently we had a lady who, you know, the first night is pretty heavy as they tell their stories and everything, and at the end she said, "Oh, I just can't wait till next week. And it was just, yeah, and so you know, just that permission to come and really express emotion with, you know, just freedom, and to have this heavy weight lifted, and that's usually the sense, even after the first night, after a really heavy night of telling their story, and yeah, it's those are just really impactful moments that just kind of stay with me.
Jennifer Levin
Of course, I mean, the space that you provide is such a gift for people to be witnessed and acknowledged, because society as a whole, we're not very good with grief, but especially a traumatic loss, because it scares other people, and so the work that you and Steve do provides that space, and that's what she was saying. I can't wait to come back to this space. Speaking of Steve, your husband, you mentioned you do this work alongside him. What is that dynamic like? And how does sharing space with him, you know, what is that experience like for the two of you?
Caralee
It's been. it's been really very positive, like I say, he trained to be a one on one companion, but men have not been, men are not very eager to sign up for things, and so he had not, it's just recently that he's had some, some men who've agreed to one on one companioning, but in the meantime, it was about two groups back, or I guess it was the previous group. My co-facilitator, who was going to be with me, got COVID very first night, so she wasn't going to be there to hear any of the stories. She wouldn't have really had a chance to connect with the people, and so my mentor said, you know, would Steve be able to attend? We like to usually have two people there in case somebody has a difficult time being, you know, staying with the group, maybe needs to go out a little bit, you know, catch their catch their breath and stuff, and we just like to have somebody nearby to know that they're not, they're not in this alone. So, anyway, Steve agreed to that, and he was just a quiet presence with the group, and I think people just enjoyed having him there. This is his second round, and he's, I'm giving him some assignments, as far as working, mostly talking about the journaling and getting people to talk about what they've journaled, and then he gives the new assignments, but it's been really awesome in that when I come home and I have this heaviness, I have someone who I can talk to, because there's not a break in confidentiality.
Jennifer Levin
Yeah.
Caralee
We can talk things through, we can process it together, maybe strategize about, you know, maybe what we should include in the next meeting, so that you know we're helping somebody specifically. So, yeah, it's been really great to have him there and have him on board with, with it, and I think he's found it to be meaningful too.
Jennifer Levin
Well, I imagine that it also, you know, strengthens your, your marriage and your connection and deepens it.
Caralee
Yeah, I think it does.
Jennifer Levin
Yeah, one of the things that I've learned doing this work is it really helps me reflect on my life and my priorities and how I do things and what is important, and so, you know, I'd imagine that ripples into your marriage as well. You've, you know, in this work that you've been doing, you've walked alongside many grieving people, and I know you haven't experienced a sudden or unexpected death yourself. This work, what. What, how has that shaped you, and what has it taught you about living your life?
Caralee
Well, I was an ICU CCU nurse for a long time, 13 years, and then ended my career working in assisted living. So, I was very familiar with death and dying.
Jennifer Levin
Yes
Caralee
I did not know much about grief and grieving, and I have said that to a lot of my nurse friends, and they all shake their head yes, and go, you are right, we learned about death and dying, we know nothing about grieving really. So it, unless they've experienced that personally, and so I think that it shaped a lot of ways now how I approach people who are grieving. I realized some of the dumb stuff I've said in the past and have tried to change that and be more attentive to their needs, I think personally I've learned not to take life for granted. I can be very short, so I try not to make mountains out of mole hills and try to forgive readily, say I love you more often, you know, every one of those attendees on the day their world turned upside down, they thought it would, that day would be like all the others, normal day, maybe there was, yeah, and they thought maybe there was thing time, there was time to patch things up or let somebody know what they meant to them. So, I want to live with intention, and I think I think this has taught me that to be more intentional in how I treat relationships.
Jennifer Levin
Interesting, your career progression, because you, like you said, you started the first half as a nurse and then death, and now in your volunteer work you're getting to the other side of what happens after death and how we live with grief and so that probably wasn't an intentional switch but it's just that's come about for you and really powerful yeah - well you just do amazing work and we need more people who are willing to volunteer because it, the importance of being, as I mentioned earlier, witnessed is so powerful, and just having that presence. So, I always like to end with the final question of what advice would you give to somebody who's recently experienced a sudden or unexpected loss, sometimes I get overwhelmed because I know everything that they're going to be going through. They're a deer in a headlight. So, if somebody was just starting off right now, and this is something that's brand new to them, what would you...
Caralee
I would say, be patient with yourself. Grief will affect you in ways that you never thought that could be physically, emotionally, relationally. There's just things that that just get turned upside down, and I think you begin to question yourself, and it's just I think be patient with yourself, be gentle with yourself, make sure that you're taking care of yourself, and then I would say find a group, and because you need people around you who get it, and find a group, and go more than once, because you'll be at a different stage the next time, and our groups are open to the people who've attended. They can attend as many times as they need, and, like I said, they'll be on a different part of their journey, and maybe they didn't catch something the first time because it didn't seem relevant, but now they're now they're at a stage of their life where of their grief journey that this is much more relevant and will be more meaningful, and plus they have the chance to contribute to the others who are just new in the process, and I think that gives a sense of some purpose and meaning to what they're going through to now help the other people know that life will expand around this, this very big, tragic what feels like a giant lump in their life, you know. Life does expand, and there will be times of joy and happiness alongside of this, and so I think for them to attend later as almost an alumnus, it brings about some meaning and purpose in for them as well, and again, just be patient and gentle with yourself on this journey.
Jennifer Levin
Great, is there anything else you'd like to share with us today before we close.
Caralee
Well, I just have appreciated what I've learned from your groups, and every time you've come. So, again, I'm a learner in this. We're definitely not professionals, but we are learners and listeners. I think that's probably been a big thing for me, being an extrovert. I can talk a lot, but I'm trying to be a better listener.
Jennifer Levin
So important learners and listeners, yeah, great things for us. Carly, thank you so much for your time and your presence today, and for all the work that you and Steve do. So, thank you for being here.
Caralee
You're very welcome.
Jennifer Levin
Thank you, Caralee, for your honesty, your presence, and your generous willingness to share what you've witnessed and learned in this work. Most importantly, thank you for the work you do. I also want to thank you our listeners for being here and bearing witness to this conversation. If you are living in the aftermath of a sudden or unexpected death and are looking for guidance and support, I invite you to visit www.therapyheals.com to learn more, and be sure to check out our new WeCARE Loss Support Kits, designed to change the way we support people through loss. Bye for now.
