Welcome And What Grief Gets Wrong

SPEAKER_00 0:06

Welcome back to Healthy Mind Healthy Line, the show where we talk honestly about what it actually takes to keep showing up for ourselves, our minds, and our lives. I'm Yusuf and today's conversation is one I'll carry with me for a long time. Our guest is Katie Rezu, an author who has written openly and unflinchingly about surviving the unsurvivable. The kind of laws our culture would rather scroll past. Katie is here to talk about grief and addiction. About the things she's lived through and the things she found that generally helped. About the strange sacred clueless of birth and death. And about what it means to keep loving someone after they are gone. By the end of this episode, I hope you walk away with permission to grieve in a way that is not tidy, is not quick, and is not for anyone else's comfort. But you're on. With that, uh welcome my guest Katie to the show.

SPEAKER_01 1:15

Well, thank you. It's lovely to be here.

Writing As A Way To Survive

SPEAKER_00 1:21

So Katie, before we go into the deeper parts of this, I want to start somewhere a little softer. You write you have put words to things most people cannot. So what was it that first told you even before all of this that writing was going to be the way you'd make sense of your life?

SPEAKER_01 1:46

Well, I've always loved reading books. I loved Judy Bloom when I was tiny. And growing up, I just found a lot of comfort in characters and literature that could express something that I was going through, even if it wasn't exactly the same. The situation wasn't the same. I loved Marcus Luzek's The Book Thief, and still to this day I think about sections in there. So I always knew that words were powerful and they could heal people. And during this time, I I really found I needed to lean on poetry and writing.

SPEAKER_00 2:33

Okay.

Refusing The Clean Grief Narrative

SPEAKER_00 2:35

And Kiti, there is a misconception I think a lot of people carry about grief. That there's a clean version of it. You know, a version where you process, you heal, you move on. But but your experience seems to point to something much more honest and much more messier than that. So I'm curious what you wish more people understood about what this kind of loss actually looks like from the inside.

SPEAKER_01 3:05

I like that word messy. It is really messy. I don't know. I think right now we're living in a world where everybody likes to believe. Well, I mean, I'm not speaking for everyone, but a lot of people, at least I used to want to believe in that Instagram version of myself. Like I could work hard. And no matter what I did, as long as I tried my hardest, I could achieve, you know, the best version of myself. And, you know, my husband and I both went to Yale. I know that hard work does pay off, but that's not the whole story, right? The whole story is that bad things happen and they don't happen for a reason. And I feel like I've been fed a version, or at least I let myself believe that good things happen to good people. And I don't know that that's true. I think that sometimes bad things just happen. And so in my grief, I've I feel like I'm half here on earth and half of me is with my son. And I am trying to leave lead the most honest life I can. And so I'm I'm really, I tell people uncomfortable things because uh, like for example, last night we were we were at an exercise class and somebody said, Oh, where did your husband go? And I said, Oh, he he could only do half the class. And I thought, if you ask again, I'm I'm gonna tell you the truth, right? And she was like, So where did he go? I was like, Okay. Well, he went to a support group. I didn't tell her it was for, you know, people who lost a kid or people who are dealing with addiction. But my job right now is to be as honest as I can be. And grief is messy and you have to take care of it. And this is who we are now. We're not we're not people who believe that life is just easy, that that you really have to work at it, and that bad things really are real.

SPEAKER_00 5:24

And what's the hardest part for you when someone tries to fit your grief into a framework that that just that just does not fit it?

SPEAKER_01 5:35

I know it's so it's it's so interesting. I mean, people always like if somebody asks me like, How are you doing? I'll say fine, and they're like, Oh, you don't seem fine. And I think, okay, do you really want to know? I mean, not that I'm like miserable, I don't want other people to think, oh, my whole life is terrible, because I know there are other people out there in the world who are suffering, and I'm not the first person to lose a child. And plenty of people have it much worse than I do. And the world I have right now is not super great sometimes. I mean, there's a lot of pain. And so being honest about that is really important to me.

SPEAKER_00 6:16

Yeah. You know, that is such an important thing to me. Because so much of the pain of this kind of loss is not just the loss itself, it is the loneliness of giving in a way that the world does not make room for.

Opioid Death And Unwanted Optimism

SPEAKER_01 6:33

Yeah. I've been told many times, like, well, I'm sure there's something good that will come out of this. And they're right, something good will come out of this, but it's also okay to just acknowledge that something horrific happened. And my son died of an opioid addiction. And we don't need to sugarcoat it. Nobody needs to tell me, oh, you know, just wait in a few years, you'll understand why, you know, this happened. Bad things do happen. They're happening all over the world. And I don't know why we humans kind of at least my my group of friends or people, and I used to be the same way, wanted to just hold on to it's gonna get better. And maybe it's not gonna get better. I'm gonna be okay, but that's that's just honest. It's it's it's not gonna get better.

The Trimesters Of Grief Metaphor

SPEAKER_00 7:33

And you've written something that really stayed with me. That grief and pregnancy can mirror each other in surprising ways. Wow. You know, that means that birth and death are cosmically very close, even though our culture knows how to celebrate only one, right? So can you please walk us into what you mean by that?

SPEAKER_01 7:59

Well, I found, I mean, when Nicholas passed, he was 25 and he was found alone in his apartment by the police. I was horrified that that happened that way, that I had brought him into this world, and if if he had to go, which I would do anything not to for that to happen, but I wanted to be there at the end. And they birth and death are cosmically related. I mean, my husband and I were there, and we looked at him before he took his first breath. And then to see him there at the moratory where he wasn't breathing anymore. There is something to be said about that. Well, I found that my grief really neared my the trimesters of pregnancy. And with each trimester, there were new horrific things and also beautiful things that made me feel even more connected to my son. The first trimester of pregnancy and of grief was a lot of feeling sick to my stomach, and my head just felt like it was a billion times too big, and I slept all the time. And then the second trimester, everybody just kind of went on and left me alone, and my husband alone too, and my two kids. And, you know, I'd go to the grocery store and everybody would be moving on, but I would be amazed that, you know, I was still growing this grief. And I think of my grief as kind of like the placenta that Nicholas and I made, you know, this grief is something that Nicholas and I made together. And then it was a period, it was a pretty dark period, and we started going to support groups, and I started seeing a lot of people stuck in that second trimester, and maybe that's where they need to be, but it wasn't something I wanted to be. I didn't want to be still going to support groups in 14, 15, 20 years from now, still really lost and alone and trying to not feel guilty for finding a little bit of joy. And that's kind of when the third trimester happened. And although I wasn't showing on the outside, I let everyone know. I start writing poetry and posting it on the internet. And anybody who would ask, I would tell them. And Brene Brown says something very wise. She said, you know, that people have to earn their right to learn your story. And I would let anyone know my story. They didn't have to earn it, but it felt good to kind of shout it from the hilltops and say, you know, there's this big, beautiful life, and he deserved to be known. And then, right about then, I read an interview by Nick Cave, who's a musician and a father of two sons that committed suicide. And he said that he had to ask his grief to sit next to him and not sit inside of him, which sounds kind of woo-woo and crazy. But I did that. I delivered that grief. I said, okay, grief, you I it doesn't mean you don't count, but I need you not to be right in front of my face at all times. And now I picture my grief as being kind of like a baby orangutan with crazy hair. And some days it just rips up the whole house, and other days I'm able to like put it in a baby carrier and walk with it. But Nicholas was here, and I, if I was gonna, I mean, I have some choices now. I can pretend he he didn't occur, but that would kill me. I can kind of get lost in the second trimester and just lay in bed and spread his his old smelly clothes around me and I can smell him. And sometimes I do do that, but also I I'm here for a reason. I don't know exactly what that reason is, and maybe it's just to talk and tell people about grief and that there is a way to live with it, or maybe it's to talk to people who are addicts and who are dealing with addiction and just tell them that they're loved and that it's not a moral failing, that it's not a problem with willpower. It's we're just not treating people with addiction correctly.

SPEAKER_00 12:42

Wow. I know what you are describing is so quietly profound. We are made beginning sacred and ending shameful when really they are just two sides of the same threshold. I think hearing that reframed alone is going to land for someone listening today.

SPEAKER_01 13:06

I hope so.

Support Groups And Addiction Shame

SPEAKER_01 13:08

I I feel like there is a lot of pressure for people who are grieving to kind of go away and like leave leave everybody else alone, like go be sad somewhere else.

SPEAKER_00 13:19

No.

SPEAKER_01 13:21

A lot a lot of times people say, you know, good for you for going out of the house. As if I'm supposed to not go out of the house. I don't know. I agree. It's unit's uncomfortable. It's uncomfortable to talk to the mother of somebody who lost a child, especially to addiction or to suicide. That would be, you know, I mean, people say it's unimaginable. And I'm like, well, I don't really need to imagine it. Something that's really helped me that I found that has really helped me is to see other people and see that they have lived through it. My husband and I joined a bunch of support groups for people who've lost kids, and there's a bunch on Zoom. There's lit Love in the Trenches, and that's for people who've lost kids to addiction or compassionate friends. There's a there's a billion. But in any ways, sitting in a room with people who've gone through the same thing and and seeing that they they can carry it and and also have a life, it it was really powerful just because I I didn't know anybody who had lost a kid. Or if I did, I I shied away from them. I did the one thing that's been hurting my feelings is I ran away from them. There's something really beautiful about looking into the eyes of a mom who has lost a son the same way that I lost my son. And the two of us just have that connection. One of the mothers in my lit grip group said, and she's somebody who's very professional. She looks like she could be a lawyer. She's just somebody I I look up to, and she said, you know, her son was homeless. And she said, he came from a good family. And by good, I mean he was loved. And that's true for all people who are struggling from addiction. And yet I'd forgotten that, and I think that a lot of people forget that.

Love After Death And Daily Nudges

SPEAKER_00 15:29

Katie, you raised this question that has stayed with me. Whether you can still have a relationship with someone after they have died, not in a sentimental way, but in a real ongoing way. What has that looked like for you? Like, what does that relationship feel like now compared to the early days of grief?

SPEAKER_01 15:55

Can I ask you, have you had anybody passed and you feel like you had a connection with them beyond the veil?

SPEAKER_00 16:06

Oh ma'am, as of now, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:08

Okay, okay, that's fair. Well, honestly, I I think if I wouldn't have lost somebody, I would think that that would be a crazy thing to say. And maybe it is, and maybe this is just how I'm kind of tricking my brain. But I don't know, there have been some things that I feel like are undeniable. After Nicholas passed away, we went to Mexico, a place that's been really special to my family and on the beach, and both of my sons took their brother's ashes out on a paddleboard really far out and threw some ashes into the water. And when they came back, I said, Where's the container that those ashes were in? It was a glass container. And there were like one of my youngest son Joey said, Oh, I chucked it as far as I could. And I was like, so upset that he had thrown glass into the ocean, and we don't litter, and but I let it go. And later that night we went down to the water and the boys were gonna play soccer on the beach, and I had the dogs, and my husband came running up to us. My my husband and my middle son Max, and they had found the container, the glass container, and it had washed up on shore, and it was really heavy. So I don't know, maybe some people are like, oh, physics, that's how things work, but I don't know. I I feel like that was Nicholas trying to give me a nudge. And so I've been spending a lot of time in the mornings writing poems to and with Nicholas and remembering him and trying to find parts in my day that connect me to him. And I don't know if my poems are like automatic writing or autonomic writing, but I do feel connected to him and I do remember him during them. I feel nudges like, hey, this is something that was important to us, we should write about it. And so yeah, I I feel like you can I feel like there is still a connection.

SPEAKER_00 18:32

Yeah. Yeah. You know, that thing so beautiful and so radical about what you just said. You know, that love does not end where life does. That relationship can keep growing even after one person is not here anymore. And I think a lot of listeners are going to feed something soften in then hearing third day.

SPEAKER_01 18:58

I sure hope so. There's a poet, Andrea Gibson, and she was married to this woman, Megan Folly. And Megan says that Andrea is allegedly dead, and I want to use that with Nicholas because I don't think I understand where he is. And maybe somebody knows, but so far I don't think anyone knows. And I've found I found him in the strangest of places. Like we had this priest who was a former somebody who ha really struggled with addiction, and he talked to me about traps and how people who are deep in their addiction are in a trap. And it made it just gave me so much relief. And I felt like that was a message that I I feel like like Nicholas arranged for it to be there for me because I needed it so bad at that time. So yeah, I hope I hope somebody who's dealing with grief that's listening can hear that I don't know that maybe it isn't all over. Maybe there is something more, and maybe there's a it's certainly I wouldn't wish it on anyone. You know, I'd much rather watch my son get married and have children and have a big, beautiful life rather than get a message from a priest, but this is what I get, right?

SPEAKER_00 20:38

Yeah.

Where To Find Katie And Closing

SPEAKER_00 20:40

Katie for people who want to connect with you or just want to learn more about you. Where can they do that?

SPEAKER_01 20:46

Thank you. So I have a website, it's called katyrizzo.com. I can also be found on Instagram at KatieRizzo 007, so 007. And on my website, you can find all my links. I have two books coming out. One is called The Trimesters of Grief. It's available for pre-order on June 12th, and it's being published by Kohler Books, and Blackstone Publishing is doing the audio licensing, and then it comes out for real on October 6th. And then my book of poems is entitled None of Them Are You. And they're a bunch of poems from the first nine months of Nicholas's Being Gone, and that's coming out on the Day of the Dead on November 1st.

SPEAKER_00 21:36

Wow. Perfect. And to everyone listening, all these links are in the show notes, so just go and check those out. You're so sweetie.

SPEAKER_01 21:44

Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00 21:46

Okay. Yeah. I just had a I just wanted to ask you if you have any last message that you want to leave us with.

SPEAKER_01 21:58

I think I'd like to tell anybody who's listening who has a person in their world that's struggling with addiction, that it's so easy to isolate. And it's a disease of isolation. And Nicholas isolated, he didn't want anyone to know. He was so ashamed of it. There was so much shame there. And my whole family did too. Like we would never have told somebody, oh, you know, Nicholas is dealing with addiction, or and our worlds got really small. And I think that is true about grief too. I think it's a time I know I felt a lot of guilt. I felt a lot of shame about losing my son. I mean, isn't that a mom's job to keep her kid alive? And there's a lot of shame there. And I think that support groups do help a lot. And also just owning your truth that that, you know, addiction happens to people that are loved, and that grief happens to everyone. We're all gonna die. And that life can be beautiful and cruel, and it's okay to be honest about it.

SPEAKER_00 23:19

Katie, thank you so much for your honesty. You were brought into this room. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_01 23:26

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 23:29

And to everyone listening. If something in this conversation reached you, please be gentle with what comes afterwards. Breeze, especially the kind we don't usually talk about as a way of waiting for termination before it fully arrives. So if you need to cry, write, walk, sit in the quiet, do nothing at all. That is okay and that is not falling apart. That's coming home to yourself. And if you are carrying a story right now that does not look like the ones you see online, please remember. Life does not need to be photogenic to be sacred. Birth and death are cosmic kills. And so are despair and this has been Healthy Mind, Healthy Mind. Take care of yourself this week and the next, and the one after that will be here when you come back.