The Shape of Grief

I've been thinking a lot about grief lately. Back in the days of my psychology training, we learned that grief follows a predictable pattern and happens in progressive stages:
Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance (based on the work of Kubler-Ross.

That's not the tune my grief over my father's recent death dances to. For the first week after he died, I was just plain exhausted. This was a completely physical experience. Being with him in the hospital for ten hours a day for two weeks with all chakras wide open left me empty. Once I got home, I lived on the couch.

I guess I expected that I would cry most of the time. Dramatic meltdowns of wracking sobs eventually tapering down to trickles and sniffles. Or at least an hour's worth of steady tears running down my face. Didn't happen.

What did happen was that I would stumble over some flicker of a memory from his hospitalization at random, incongruous moments. While riding the exercise bike or cooking scrambled eggs. I would suddenly be abducted by this memory - staring into his blue eyes; wiping slow tears from his face; hearing doctors use words like failure and damage; watching his chest rise with his final three breaths.

These snatches of memory would prick open some swollen balloon of sadness, and deep sobs would would burst out. Sobs from the chest, that lasted a minute, maybe two. Then back to pedaling or cooking.

It's been a little over two week since he died, and even though I was by his side, I still don't know how to know that he's dead. I don't know how to let his death change my world. Is this strange?

Thinking about grief has also led me to ask what are the social allowances for grief.

We are expected to grieve over a death or a divorce. But we are not given a mourning period for serious illness or chronic pain. After diagnosis, we are expected to jump on the treatment treadmill and keep running after the magic pill. My father was praised for being such a fighter and for not complaining about his infirmities. Is it ok to cry about losing the pieces of life illness and pain take away? Is it ok to mourn for the trip to Paris you won't get to make or the mountains you'll no longer climb? Is it ok to cry because illness had made you too tired or pained to love your family and friends in the way you want to?

Must we be uncomplaining soldiers fighting the good fight? Or can we make room and rituals for grieving over the losses of illness and pain.