In this interview for Thrive Global, psychoanalyst Robert Stolorow explains why we should not seek to heal or fix the grief we experience from trauma and loss, but rather lean into the pain. He also critiques the pathologization of grief as well as the notion that there are stages of grief.
“…I don’t use a term like “healing,” because when a wound heals it goes away.
Although it’s kind of abstract, the term that I like to use is integration. It’s seamlessly woven into the fabric of who you are. Having had that terrible loss years ago, and I’ve had another one since then, being bereaved is part of my identity. It’s part of who I am. I think I can be very helpful to people because of it—I don’t have to flee from it, I don’t have to avoid it, I don’t have to evade it.”
