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Writer's picturejkdorfield

My Body Had Been My Dog Before My Son's Suicide

Updated: Dec 1, 2024



photo: holding my son's lifelong lovie Tucker while holding my dad's hand at Julius's home funeral


trigger warning: this piece includes suicide and corpse references


“Remember, you’re not your body: your body is your dog” remained one of my favorite and oft-quoted teachings, but one I’d never guess would make grieving my son’s death both easier and more complicated.


I’ve wanted one day to start writing about my healing work, to help others understand it and me, and lately also try to convey the “unimaginable,” as I’ve heard it called, of experiencing our teen son Julius’s suicide a year and a half ago. Doing justice, especially to the latter–like when grief’s waves still swell and dash me against rocks or when our son still makes his presence known and brings me to my knees–feels like one of the tallest orders of my life, leaving me overwhelmed yet yearning to rise to the challenge, if even with the hope of connecting with more kindred spirits, perhaps such as yourself. An elder teacher, Kathy, a widow herself, advised me to let go this publishing pressure on myself, that ritual drumming and prayer should suffice for some time. But I’ve watched my mentor Deb vulnerably teach what she’s learning, so there is where I too can begin, in medias res, in the middle of things. 


It was another beloved teacher, Brice–spouse to Deb, qigong instructor to me, and dog lover too–who coined the body quote. It was his way of helping us dis-identify from the body as who we think we are and reposition as the body’s caregiver. I remember Brice extending this body-as-dog metaphor to explain that we can feed and groom the body well, run it for exercise, throw it sticks for play, love it as perhaps our most loyal ally, but not treat it unkindly, blame it for falling ill, or otherwise project our own stuff onto it. With this metaphor, the possibility of who we truly are instead becomes the loving observer of the body and all it entails.


The essence of this metaphor, already internalized, was one of my many advantages in coping early on with the despair of our son’s death: in welcoming home his body for a home funeral, getting to bathe it, cradle its stiffness, note the abrasions around its neck from his exit, brush its long hair one last time, observe the blackening of its extremities and odor lifting, readying me to bury it in the forest beside our home. I could detach more easily from his body. 


Another of my many advantages, thanks to this metaphor, was that I already believed who he truly was–what we may call soul or spirit–continued on, beyond his body. I remember my first day alone in the house since his death when somehow, through the density of early grief, I could sense his presence come to me where I stood in the kitchen, making me fall to the floor with my arms open, sobbing. With my body's help, I learned to pick up on the tingling sensations to my left leg and arm that he seemed to use as his calling card to let me know he was with me and wanting to stay connected. 


But my most significant advantage in coping, beyond what I could have ever hoped for, was that my mentor Deb, by virtue of knowing him before his death, could hear him since. Days after his death, he woke her in the wee hours, trying to turn her face toward him, determined to get messages to us. Deb offered one of the best gifts of my life, hosting by now eight conversations among us–Julius, his dad and my spouse Jonathan, and me–over these months. Herein we got to do the post-crisis resolution together and answer the questions our broken hearts were desperate to know: Are you ok? Where are you? WHY did you do this? What did you experience before and after?  What messages do you have for whom? What is your existence now? What do you still want us to know? (I'd like to write about these life-altering conversations with our son one day, even if doing so risks misunderstandings, especially in our small Southern Baptist community, when what I most want to offer is heartfelt connection, across even differing beliefs.) 


These soul-affirming connections–along with grief-induced agitation–buoyed me through the first year. But please understand: I was also an ardent student of grieving.  Thanks to another mentor Katherine’s Fellowship in Death & Grieving that I’d uncannily completed shortly before Julius’s death, I was already schooled up, as if circumstances were priming me. That first year plus, I'd been diligently, transparently grieving: letting my heart break open, welcoming whatever and whenever emotions arrived, allowing even contradictory ones like despair and pleasure at the same time, feeling them the whole way through rather than stuffing them, keening, rocking... This Enneagram 3 achiever part of myself also planned FIVE community grieving events that first year, most in support of my son's peers, but which provided a benevolent outlet for the mania. How in touch with my body I'm remaining through my grief, my mind concluded.


Then Year 2 hit. And with it, exhaustion. Then something unnerving: I noticed increasing resistance to connecting with my son's spirit, as if part of me kept him at arm's length. I tried to trust it, since all things must ebb and flow. But I also berated myself, wondering what had happened to this mother's heart. It persisted, days to weeks to months. Then something more unnerving: I noticed around May an increasing hostility rising, often inconveniently. The darkness and density of the grief swelled to what I recalled early on. I thought, Goodness, this is certainly in contrast to my idealized self image! I also suspected this circling, snarling part of me was another important, if belated, aspect of grieving, though its significance was yet to be revealed.


Days later, after a shaky wander to a forest spot, I noticed a thought, then a voice coming from me, one I hadn't heard before, or at least that distinctly. Listening in, I heard it accusing, repeatedly, "You took my son from me! You took him, you took him, took him...!"  Shocked, I heard more, then later journaled the gist: "I want him back! He was MINE! I conceived him, birthed him, fed him from my breasts, gave him everything! We were CONNECTED. I don't want to hear any more from this voice that's not my son! I WANT HIM BACK."  Snot, spit, and tears issued from her while she held court, bodily fluids reminiscent of early mothering. In humility I realized, I may be listening to my body, literally, for the first time. It took her sense of betrayal to get my attention. But the "you" she's railing against isn't the existential God, as it often is in tragedy; it's the plural "you" of my mind and soul. Her tirade continued: "You make your plans for your 'learning' and 'development' but you don't ask ME what I want! You made this plan with our son and you never considered what it would do to ME! I'm SICK of going along with your plans! You don't even WANT to take care of me, just want me to do what you expect. I hate you!" The plans she's referencing are what some call soul contracts before a lifetime, as to what events and relationships may best serve our soul's growth: a contract that Julius confirmed in our conversations, and a that could easily sound like my desperate rationalization. She concluded by letting me know she wants my "I" going forward to become instead a "we" and "us" that more rightfully includes her.


At this point I'll confirm what you and I both may have concluded: my body has announced herself as far from a dog, upending my old paradigm like a table. But then what…or perhaps who…is my body to me instead now? 


I remembered learning how a child’s suicide could destroy a marriage. Because of spouses projecting their guilt and blaming the other for the child’s death. Because of different, even opposing, grieving styles. I remembered how often I’ve counted among my numerous advantages through Julius’s death that Jonathan and I weathered this storm, maybe even bonded more tightly through its adversity. So could it be that while I’ve rested securely–even smugly–in my external marriage, against all odds through tragedy, I’ve remained blind to my internal marriage being in jeopardy? Could it be that my body may instead be my metaphoric spouse? To borrow an old trope, is she the dutifully compliant wife who rises into her voice only by virtue of betrayal? Does that make my mind–if you'll humor my dated stereotypes–the self-involved husband flattened by his wife’s uprising, even unflatteringly inconvenienced by this prospect of having to consider her needs? My mind feels it’s already challenged itself plenty by learning to negotiate with the soul Self, let alone now also my body in this expanding partnership. My body’s since let me know “wife” doesn’t work for her either, but that “sacred companion” does, as we proceed.


All this time I'd concluded I was ahead in the grieving game, given this enduring communication with my son's spirit. But this turn of events with my body left me wondering if I was instead behind, as if I was only now getting to the more visceral grief, where most may begin. As I sit with it all, I’m reminded of these illusions of “ahead” and “behind,” especially with profound loss, when there is no “getting over it,” only ebbs and flows of grief, now yet another part of me, perhaps always.


The Wholeness Energetics healing work I'm called to, both for myself and others, often involves a less exaggerated version of what I'm disclosing here: shock at learning about different parts of ourselves, that they may hold startling beliefs, and that these subconscious beliefs may be impacting our lives far more than we'd ever realized. Helping myself and others transmute these parts of ourselves and beliefs that no longer serve us remains a purpose of my life, even as my son's purpose in his life is completed and I'm piecing mine back together. 


In this story I've shared, I don't have this all figured out yet. Maybe you know the feeling. But I know that even though my mind feels chastened, and my body’s trust is to be regained, these parts of myself are on their way to renegotiating their sacred partnership… because they already have the smallest willingness to do so, which is all it takes to allow a big shift, I've learned. It would be my honor, to walk a path of your own with you, consistent with your personal beliefs, both those that you're ready to get out of your way and those that remain for your highest & best.


I'd welcome your adding your thoughts in the comments below. I'd also welcome hearing from you, and offering you some special time to learn if and how I may support your path and your healing.


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Brice Wilson
Brice Wilson
Sep 24, 2024

So beautiful!

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