Stages of grief

It is generally accepted that there are a number of Stages of Grief:

• Denial
• Anger
• Bargaining
• Shopping
• Depression
• Acceptance

What? Shopping is totally a stage of grieving! I know cuz I'm in it! I have grieved a number of times in my life, and each time there's a period of mourning where I spend money like I have it. I'm sure it started when my grandad died, and my mom inherited some cash and set the example*, but the first time I really remember grief-shopping was when Josh and I broke up I went to my mom and said, "Mommy, Josh dumped me, I wanna go shopping." At this point, shopping became a coping mechanism. Now, however, I'm surprised I haven't completely gone off the deep end!

I'm still pretty wrecked by my dad's death, but years of only having enough cash to get by have put me into a mindset where I'm a little more careful with it than I used to be. And while none of the things I've purchased will replace my dad (nor are they intended to), I can justify spending this money because I earned it. I earned it hard. And while I've often joked about getting my car "the old fashioned way"**, this new revenue stream came in the REAL old fashioned way.

We all grieve differently. My siblings are taking it differently than I am, and differently than each other. I know we're going to become closer through this, because we're all each of us has left of Dad. I love my siblings, and I wish we were already closer than we are, but there's still time for that. Me living in SnoCo hasn't exactly helped things either, but since I'm moving back to Seattle (and my sister & her mom are going to be moving slightly north for her to go to college), maybe we'll see each other more. Hopefully we'll see each other more. Madame K works in Seattle afterall, me living there would just give us extra reasons to get together I hope. I'm sure pulling family closer is a stage of grieving too.

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*It's called parenting.

**Starts with a b and ends with a job... also, not actually my car.