It feels like I lost a part of myself” is a widespread expression of grief. It may sound metaphorical, afterall, surely no person is part of another the way a leg is part of a chair, or a branch a part of a tree. But unlike other metaphorical language, this expression is accompanied by a power experience, it feels like we lost a part of ourselves. As a child I would come in from an afternoon of playing in the snow and as my toes would warm up I would cry, “It feels like they’re bleeding!” The feeling of loss is like that — it feels real. We know when we come in from the cold that our toes are not bleeding, and if we aren’t sure, we can check by looking. We can also check ourselves, by looking ourselves over, to see that we lose no parts of us when someone dies. Can’t we? Not quite. All that shows is that we lost no part of our body. Here I explain how the sense of loss present in grief is the loss to one’s practical, as opposed to bodily, identity.
- Tags
-