Mountaintops and valleys

Describe a time when you quickly switched from feeling at the top of the world to sinking all the way down (or vice versa). Did you learn anything about yourself in the process?

Sometimes I look at my old Facebook posts, just ‘cause. The last time I did that I realized the same week my grandmother died was the same week I got my first acceptance to graduate school. It was weird seeing the contrasting posts: one day I was awash in grief over the death of my last grandparent and a couple days later I was SO hype about hearing that first ‘yes’. I think if I was looking at someone else I’d think it odd but I deeply felt both and a range of other emotions that week (my uncle died two days after that acceptance call). So on one hand I was mourning the sudden loss of my relatives. And on the other I was ecstatic that my long-awaited goal of going to journalism school was starting to take shape.

The next week, my sister and I joined my mother and the rest of our family in the Caribbean to bury our loved ones. This was my first time dealing with death and grief first hand and that was surreal. I remember the morning of the funeral, all of us laughing during breakfast at a funny YouTube video and just chatting. Then someone called the house to speak with my mom and all of a sudden she just started sobbing. That day, in fact that whole week with my family, was a lot like that: deep, tangible grief, broken up with bright moments of reunion and hilarity with my family (didn’t realize I come from a family of jokers, lol). It was up and down and I learned personally that we can’t dictate what grief and mourning looks like. And that it’s possible to be very happy and very sad at the same time. It sounds strange, but it feels quite natural as you individually learn to manage the highs and lows of life.