It cuts like a knife

 When you lose your child, it cuts like a knife. The wound it opens is extremely painful, probably like no pain you have ever experienced before in your life. Any wound usually creates pain and requires time to be able to heal. Pain is a natural consequence of trauma to our bodies. Pain is not a pleasant experience and our initial response to it is to try anything to make it go away. It also generally brings with it fear and anxiety which tend to hinder our ability to breathe deeply. Shallow breathing tends to add to our fear and anxiety which exacerbates our pain. If we can try to remember to try to breathe deeply, it will definitely help with the fear and anxiety, but the pain of the loss will still exist. In early grief, any coping mechanism that will give us some relief is probably okay as long it is not hurting yourself or others. There comes a point in your grieving, and the timing of this is different for everyone, when you must make the decision that you want to heal and not continue to suffer, Suffering is different from pain. Pain is an involuntary reaction to the loss of our loved one, but suffering is a voluntary action which is just trying to resist or hang on to the pain. You must find the strength to sit with your pain and follow it to where it will lead you. This is the only way you will be able to heal. The more you try to resist the pain the more you will suffer.