The effect of cumulative grief
We all have photos of old rellies like this one. My grandmother 2nd from the left, and her 3 sisters that she was very close to all her life. I can say all her life, as she outlived every one of them, and 4 brothers and one baby, and her parents. Parents are part of the natural order, but you don't think of losing your brothers and sisters until you are very old, that is if you think about it at all. At age 95, her last brother died and the final year of her life was very sad, she had outlasted them all in a race she didn't want to win. She was an excellent athlete in her youth but this was a race that she didn't enter, and didn't think about until it was really too late. Not that it would have changed anything, and with her nature she would have voluntarily taken on the mantle of grieving 7 siblings rather than have one of them do the same. This year, 2016, has seen most of the world suffer what she did. Cumulative grieving. I...