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Description

Happy melancholy holidays! In this special crossover episode, Last Day host Stephanie Wittels Wachs sits down with grief expert Claire Bidwell Smith to talk about this past year – as moms, as professionals, and most importantly, as human beings coping with the inevitable grief that creeps up around the holidays. Join us for a conversation on finding meaning, and how to make joy a priority this coming New Year.

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Resources from the show

• Listen to Stephanie’s podcast and Lemonada original, Last Day 
• Read “My Brother” by Jamaica Kincaid

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Follow Claire on IG and FB @clairebidwellsmith or Twitter @clairebidwell and visit her website: www.clairebidwellsmith.com.

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Transcript

SPEAKERS

Claire, Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Stephanie Wittels Wachs  00:09

Hello, friends, it’s Stephanie. And I wanted to give you an update. First of all, that over here and Last Day land, we are deep. I mean, deep in the weeds making season three. In fact, I am hopping on a plane in 48 hours to go do some real live reporting on the ground. But in the meantime, I miss you. And I wanted to drop a little holiday bonus episode in the feed. So today I am joined by Claire Bidwell Smith, renowned grief expert and therapist, mom, author, real talker and host of The New Day podcast also from Lemonada. So here is a fun fact, New Day was a show that grew out of season two of last day. The idea was born out of this thing we heard Janice Whitlock say over the course of the season, Janice from Jed Foundation. And it was whenever we got into these big existential questions around suicide and hopelessness, and it was how do we create a life worth living? So as you know, my audience we talk a lot about death on last day, but it inherently brings up a lot of pondering about life, and how we get through it in the face of all the hardship and trauma and grief and loss and, and, and, and, and, so New Day is a really beautiful and important show about how we find joy, how we create meaning, how we live better. So today you are going to hear Claire and I talk about melancholy and the infinite sadness, not the Smashing Pumpkins album, the state of existence. How you cope with that inevitable grief that creeps up around the holidays when you’ve lost someone that you love. We talk about these weird and wonderful and very similar lives that we’re leading and we talk about how to make joy a priority. This was a conversation I needed to have in this moment and I’m so grateful that I got to have it with Claire. Also I nearly made our producers not air this episode because I am just fully unhinged in parts just true unbridled Stephanie Wittels Wachs coming in hot. But ultimately, I am glad to share it with you, it is a really fun conversation. And of course I cry. Enjoy.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs  02:53

Alright, so Claire, I am going to blatantly steal my favorite thing about your show which is that you start every interview with a very specific question. So Claire Bidwell Smith, how are you actually doing today?

Claire 

I’m actually doing like so, so, it’s getting towards the end of the year, I have so many clients for grief. And I can never say no to people in need. And they’re in so much need at the end of the year. So much stuff comes up for everybody. And so I just have a really heavy caseload of like number of clients and heavy stuff and so I’m taking next week off to kind of recharge but right now I’m getting a little just like, tired. I can’t hold it off.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

I hear that. I mean, one thing I love about you is your focus on anxiety like that is that is my primary source of misery as a human, lifelong, lifelong friend, lifelong companion. And I feel like now and when I’m in like an anxiety space, and I’m worrying, I feel like a fluorescent light. And I’m just like flickering. That’s how I feel internally. And I can acknowledge cuz I’ve had enough therapy in my life. When my anxiety is like at the driver’s seat, like at the wheel, and right now it is through the fucking roof. Like I I’m just like, I’m like an open nerve, you know? So you wrote a book on anxiety?

Claire  04:32

I did. I have it all figured out. No, not really.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

And you know, when it happens, it’s just like, oh shit, it’s like the monster under the bed. And I can feel when it’s starting to come up. And I’m sure there is some connection to the fact that we’re encroaching on holidays and I want to talk about that with you and all that but it’s like who it’s exhausting to feel it’s exhausted this anxious and I feel like I can’t tap into my like emotional clutter. When I’m buzzing this sharply.

Claire

sharply Yeah, what I do, I’m anxious a lot as well. And I tend to run anxious. That’s why I understand it so well and sympathize with it so well, but when I’m in that really buzzy place, I think a lot about why, you know, there’s we have so much coming in all the time, we’re looking at our phones, before we wake up in the morning, were reading about what our best friend had for breakfast and what the President said last night, and like,  just so much information before we are out of bed. And so just thinking about that, like, that’s kind of impossible. We can’t do that. We can’t keep that up, or we’re going to end up in an anxious buzzy mess. So thinking about how much you’ve downloaded today? Like how much have you downloaded into your system? What have you downloaded, taking a minute to kind of take a step back from it to like, de-download, like, get rid of some of it. And then the other thing that I find helpful is recognizing that what I’m anxious about is uncertainty. It’s things that are uncertain. It’s things that are unknowable, it’s things I can’t control or change. And so when I recognize that, then I just really start weeping. But then that’s where the relief is.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs  06:09

Totally, totally. So I feel like I was excited to talk to you because we have similar roles that we play in life, both podcast hosts, moms, working women, writers, empaths, deep feelers, anxious message, big grievers, huge griever here, yeah. Where we like, need to have our shit together enough. Because, I mean, you’re professionally offering advice to people. I mean, I have a theater degree, I still offer advice. People do that as part of my job. And but we have to be flawed enough to be relatable. And then we also have to just candidly share the saddest moments of our lives like with total strangers.

Claire 

It’s tricky, right? It’s a tricky little formula.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

Who then I’m sure you have the same experience, end up writing you all of their deepest, darkest shit, because they trust you because you’ve been vulnerable with them, and they reciprocate and they’re vulnerable with you. And then you also have to manage the day to day, like, minute to minute chaos that’s happening in houses with small people. Okay, so, um, it’s just a lot.

Claire 

All of those things. Yeah. All of this.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Yeah. I mean, I just want to talk about it, like, how do you? How are you walking the line between all of those things?

Claire 

I think I’m letting myself be messy. I’m letting myself break rules or not adhere to things all the time, because I just can’t if I hold myself to these really strict standards, or ideas about who I’m supposed to be, I’m going to fail over and over. And I think it’s okay to fail. But this way, I’m just giving myself a little more allowance for it. And I’m just letting myself be human. Like last night, I finished working, which meant seeing a lot of clients, and then meetings at like 6PM. And I went upstairs and I just burst into tears. And I laid on the couch crying while my husband made dinner. And my toddler kept patting my face and asking me what that stuff was, which is probably mascara. And I was like, and then after like 45 minutes, I got up and I was like, okay, cool. Let’s watch a movie guys. And we did. And then I went to bed. And here I am again today. And so sometimes it’s like that sometimes it looks really good. Sometimes it doesn’t. I don’t know, I think it’s okay, I think I have a big tolerance for being human. Because I spend so much time talking with people about how human they are and how flawed they are.

Claire

So you feel like you do give yourself that same sort of permission to be as human and as flawed as your clients or your kids or whomever you would love in your life.

Claire  08:49

I do. But I also have a lot of I have a lot of integrity about my work. And my work is really important to me. And I think I do really good work. And I am very conscientious about it and think about it a lot. And I’m organized about it. So I feel like as long as that is still occurring, then I can go ahead and cry on the couch afterwards, you know, whatever. But if I start messing up in those areas, you know, messing up my schedule, or just feeling like I can’t, I don’t have the bandwidth for my clients. That is when I would need to take some action to figure out what’s going on.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

And what would that look like if you like has that happened before where you’ve hit a wall where you’re like, I can’t do this?

Claire 

Not really. I mean, I hit places where I’m like this week, I’m in a place where I’m like, I need a break. But I have taken all of next week off. So like I know that that’s coming and so, yeah, places things like that. I need to go get a massage. I need to you know, go have some fun. Yeah, I need to sleep a lot. You know those things.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

I often think like the big joke in my family and if you ask my kids, they’ll tell you is that my dream is to just work at a plant store, like work at a nursery and just be among plants and just not have to talk to any humans all day just to water them and have them thrive under my care. And like I say that and it’s this big joke, but in reality, I know that I could never fucking do that because I have this need to do too much all the time  and to like be busy and to be stressed and to be like, in the depths of like the despair that the human race is experiencing at every fucking minute.

Claire  10:26

My fantasy, sometimes it’s a being in prison, honestly, because then I feel like I couldn’t do anything. All I could do is read and not follow the news. Like I would just read books. I read some book when I was in high school that was written by a guy who had been in prison and he was cataloguing his favorite 50 books because he’d read hundreds of books because he couldn’t do anything else. And I was like, wow, that sounds so great. And I still think about it a lot.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

But that’s interesting, because you it’s like, on some level, recognize that left to your own devices, you couldn’t actually like you would need somebody to restrict and to say like, this is all you’re allowed to do.

Claire 

No, I have a hard time not working. And I think when we have jobs like this, where we’re doing really, you know, good work, that’s helpful for others. It just gives you an excuse to work for, right? It’s tricky.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

My favorite episode of LAST DAY ever did was with Dr. Maté. Dr. Gabor Maté. Are you familiar with the doctor? Love him.

Claire 

We need to get him on new day. I’m going to talk to that guy.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Oh, yeah, you do? I’ll call them. I’ll tell them. I won’t call him, I’ll email him. He’ll come on the show. Do you hear me, Gabor, you’re gonna come on our show. So he came on my show. And I was planning to sit him down and say, listen, I know all of your work is about how people with addiction, like have childhood trauma. And that’s the root of all of it. And you know, you’re wrong, because my childhood was perfect. And my brother died. And what do you have to say for yourself, and like, I didn’t talk to him quite in that tone, because he’s a little intimidating. But at the end of the call, he basically had me in tears and had really explained to me that I do have an addiction, it just happens to be a socially acceptable form of addiction. I’m addicted to work very much. So like bona fide workaholic. And so when you’re being productive. But like, the impact of my being a work addict still has the same impact on my kids. They’re still like, I want more of you. They experience it as neglect, in a way, right? Like, I don’t know, if your family has this, I’d love to know, but my kids, I mean, my three-year-old, was doing a roleplay with me the other day where he like said, I can’t believe I’m telling you this, I can’t believe I’m saying this on a microphone. This is fucking, I’m gonna say it. I’m gonna say it. He sat on this chair on this very chair where I work all day long. And he was like, I’m going to be mommy and you be Harry. And ask me mommy, if you’ll play with me. And so it’s like, you know where I’m going? So I was like, okay, so I got on my knees and I’m like, Mommy, can we play? And he goes, No, Harry, I have to work. I’ll play with you later. Oh, God is right. I was like, holy shit. I am a monster.

Claire 

What a smart kid. He really knew how to turn that around on you. I mean, this is should I do with my clients? Like, that’s effective. Was it effective?

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

It was, yeah, it was effective.

Claire 

I mean, it dropped the mic and went to go play, right?

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

I was like, I mean true. It’s like it like cut a hole in my bloodstream. But even still, right? You can’t then this is what makes me empathize with like, what my brother went through and what a lot of people with addiction go through. It’s like, I can know that it’s wrong. I can know that it is destructive. I can know that it’s impacting people I love and still I do it.

Claire  14:05

I get that. My psychology is so tricky and having lost both of my parents that I have this […] neurosis around my parenting as a result and so I feel very uncompromising about my time with the kids. Like, I will kill myself to get in exactly five hours of work and then still make it to carpool pickup with cookies. But like to my own detriment, you know, because I’m so afraid of them not feeling like mom was there because of that’s my eternal, you know, trauma of losing my mom, you know, so I have my own pathology around it.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

That makes I mean, that makes a ton of sense. Whereas like, my mom is like, constant PTA president, you know, like, was always around and I feel this guilt of like, I’m not doing it like that. Yeah, and I could never do it like that. I’ve tried to be on the fucking PTA.

Claire 

I just become friends with the PTA people, but don’t actually be on the PTA. That’s too much. Come on.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

I know. I know. I tried. I’m like good for, you are all magical beings from another planet. It’s not my way.

Claire 

Go watch some Bad mom’s Christmas. And like, don’t join the PTA, though. That’s one of our annual Christmas movies, ever seen it?  Oh my god, like watch it when we hang up. It’s awesome. It’s really good. It’s really inappropriate.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

Okay, who was in that movie?

Claire 

I don’t know, that Mila Kunis and Christina Applegate.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

All right, I’m gonna put that on my list. That’s gonna be my therapist recommendation. Thank you. So this is actually a good segue, because not the bad moms. But the thing about your parents, so when I heard your episode with BJ, I truly like I had a personal moment of like, mic drop, I just I had to sort of stop in my tracks. Because you set this thing where you were like, you know, the parents you know, it’s like the script, the script of your tragedy, the script of your trauma. It is a thing that you have to share again, and again and again, because you have built your sort of career and your work around it. And your impact on the world is so tied into it. And it was just really relatable because I have also built an entire thing on the backs of on the back of my grief. And lately, like, I love it when you said that. And I was like, holy shit. This is just like an unbridled moment of authenticity from you like it was so it just resonated so deeply. And I, oh my gosh, well, because I’m so fucking sick of telling this story. I have gotten to this point where like, I’m, I’m like, so done with it. And I don’t have any new things to say. I don’t know what else..

Claire 

I can’t even say the sentences in a different way anymore. It’s like the I say that sentences, the exact same words and cadence. And even when I try, I can’t it’s just become so rote. And it’s not that it’s not still there. And I can still touch into it. But it’s become this thing that’s different than anything else. I don’t know.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

I mean, that’s exactly right. I’m like, oh my gosh, I am. I am now saying the script of the story. And I can’t even break out of the script of the story. And I’m hearing myself, and I’m like making myself kind of like grossed out by it. Or I don’t know, I don’t know, I’m not being very inarticulate right now. Because it is a very inarticulate thing to talk about. I don’t know. There’s just something that resonated with me. And I don’t know how you navigate that?

Claire  18:20

Well, I think acknowledging it, I think talking with other people who have gotten into the situation themselves talking with you, talking with BJ about it, and just trying to remember all the time. I mean, that was what I was saying with him. It’s not lost on me that I’m telling this story that feels very disconnected at this point from me, because it’s become its own thing. Yet people are coming to me because of it. And they’re often in the throes of it and it’s so they’re in such a different place. And I can like rattle off, here’s my story, my parents died. And it totally fucked me up. And now here I am, you know, therapist, Claire Bidwell Smith, but that I never want that to be, you know, what’s really going on? Because I just feel I care a lot about the people that I’m working with, I don’t want to lose touch with that story. But I think it’s an. There’s no way to not have this happen to a certain degree when you do this much work around a thing like that. But I think checking back in with it, talking about it. I think it’s for me, sometimes it’s important for me to actually go into my grief in new ways. And that sounds weird, but that keeps me from letting the story disconnect entirely, you know? So I’ve had some moments like that recently where I was thinking about my mom recently and I was I think we always understand that people were that we lost in new ways all the time as we grow as we evolve as we mature as we hit different life experiences that we can see them and the loss and new ways and I was just thinking about the older my daughter’s get, I can think about my mom’s experience of being with me and saying goodbye to me having cancer and I was really thinking about that and I really let myself feel it and really let myself cry and it felt like new grief. It felt like new understanding of her. And that felt important. You know, I don’t want to feel like I’m just, I’m over this whole thing. And I’m fine now. And I’m this other person now, who does this kind of work? No, it’s all still tangled up in there and I want to have access to it.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs  20:14

Yeah, that’s, I think my biggest fear around it is that I, I don’t want to in my own sort of annoyance that I have to keep telling this story, to detach from it. And to disconnect from it, right? Because it’s so and I think, you know, what, I think as I’m saying this to you. There are moments where this does happen. It’s just not in public. It’s like that’s it right is that the wrote, the script, the story is very much scripted at this point, because you’ve told it so many times. The private moments where I hear something, or something comes over me and I can personally like, cry and grieve alone is still very, very special to me. It does happen. You’re right, it does.

Claire 

Yeah. So remembering that, and then remembering why you’re telling the story in the first place, too. I think it’s important. Every once in a while, I get like a nasty comment somewhere on social media. And it’s someone like, oh, you’re just..

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

I’ve ever experienced that. No, everyone loves me shamelessly. I’ve never gotten any criticism whatsoever.

Claire 

But it was I get that it’s the one the same comment that I get here and there. And it’s, oh, you’re just monetizing on your parents deaths. And it’s because I talk about them so much. It’s because I share the story. But then the reason I do that is because so many other people are struggling to talk about their stuff. And they’re struggling to talk about their pain and their shame and their guilt and all of those things. And I, I listen to that person who says that thing, and they’re doing exactly why people are afraid to talk about pain and grief. You know, this is why people are afraid to talk about their pain and grief because of people like that, who say things like that. And so it really frustrates me and I continue to talk about my story and share my story and share the details of it. Because it enables other people to feel okay about sharing theirs. And so remembering why you tell your story, you know, coming back to that?

Stephanie Wittels Wachs  22:22

Well, I think, I mean, for me, once I lost my brother, I couldn’t live my life anymore the same way, it wasn’t an option. It just, it changed me so fundamentally, like it changed the wiring of my entire being. That like going back to who I was, wasn’t an option, not sort of, I mean, I’ve always been an artist, I’ve always been a storyteller about this is I translate the world creatively. That’s like what I’ve always done. So it’s like, I didn’t know how to not take the pain and then integrate it into what I’m doing. And then it like snowballed, because like you said, people want to hear this. They want to not feel alone. And if you’re offering that it’s like, unfortunately, people are continuing to die every day, even though we’re you know, I’m six years out.

Claire 

which one, which lost? I’ve got a lot of numbers going.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

You know, it’s like it’s not, if somebody is experiencing that for the first time, you could be saving them that day, you are the source of inspiration, and you’re the source of like, I can get through this. I can get to tomorrow. Sometimes it’s just hearing that somebody else got to tomorrow. I mean, I remember when I first lost him and I was like scouring the internet for any content I could find on sibling loss. And I found this one woman who had written a bunch of essays and like I did exactly what people do to me, I flooded her DMs with like, oh my god, this happened to me, I just read your piece your me, we’re the same, you know, and she was so gracious to respond. And I still have a relationship with her today. But it was like, that need to be seen by the person who has experienced what you have experienced is huge.

Claire  24:15

And I’ve had I’ve been that person to you know, I remember oh my god, poor Dave Eggers. Like I remember. Just like, we’re talking like book signing line, you know, and like, God, I mean, there were enough women there with crushes on him, but like I had this like dead parent connection. You know, like, I just was like, he’s a writer, and he’s cute, and he’s got dead parents. They’re just crying. You know, like, I’ve totally been there, I did it with Jamaica Kincaid too, another writer that I love. And I had read her book called my brother about losing her brother and I went to this book signing in New York and I asked her to sign my fucking journal. So gracious, Dave got really flustered. He was like, what can I give you? Water? Do you want a pen? And I was like, no, I just want you to love me. And so I always feel like I’m always so gracious to other people too, because they do the same thing. You know, I get these emails that are like three pages long, that will just outline every single aspect of their story that’s similar to mine. And I just totally get it. Like, I love them for it. You know?

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

I know. I know. Same, Same, Same, Same, totally. Unless I haven’t responded to your DM. And the only reason is because I love you. But I also like dying inside. Like, I’m just so tired and I have to watch four hours of reality TV to make that feel okay. So that’s what I’m doing. Alright, so I want to talk about like, the holidays for a second, okay. Okay, because we’ve got COVID I’m sure you saw yesterday, like overdose deaths are now over 100,000, just 30,000 more than they were three years ago. Suicides are up, deaths of despair are rampant. So many of us have suffered, like significant loss very recently for many people. And I think that what people struggle with what I struggle with, what I know, a lot of my friends have is like, what we thought life would be like, and the expectation of what things will be like, and then when they’re not. It’s really hard when you lose somebody, I mean, I am sure that you can relate to this, like, your parents are supposed to be at Christmas. Your parents are supposed to be at Thanksgiving, they’re supposed to be playing with your kids, they’re supposed to, you know, I went to my niece’s Bar Mitzvah the other weekend, and it was so wonderful. And I couldn’t help but think like, oh, I’m never gonna get to do this with my brother’s kids. You know, it was my husband’s niece, who was also mine, but it’s like, there’s always this absence, I think, and it can pop up at any time. But it is especially profound and hard during this time of year where you’re supposed to be having fun, dammit, and where you’re supposed to be joyful and cheerful and celebratory, because you have such a specific expectation. And it just, it’s hard to walk through that. Yeah. So, I don’t know, I want to just sort of chat with you about how do we deal with that reality without, like, ruining other people’s holidays? And I’m not, you know, like, and there is beautiful, wonderful stuff about it. Sure. But like, I just feel like a lot of us are bringing some dark shit to the season. So what say you, about that?

Claire  28:11

I recommend over eating. It’s so hard. There’s so much, no, all of the things that you mentioned, like this time of year, everything that’s happening with I mean, there are so many people that are still isolated, still, in so much despair have gone through so much loss, health crises, job crises, I mean, and then our individual lives and losses, throw in a bunch of family members. And it’s really, really hard. And then like, you’re right, those expectations we had about our life. I mean, I think those deserve their own grief. You know, I really think that we have to just simply grieve the life that we thought we were gonna get to live. And the holiday that we thought we were going to get to have. I remember my first Christmas after my mother died. My dad gave me a frying pan. Like that was it, my mom had like, done Christmas, like huge, big deal Christmas every year, and you know, filled up all the stockings even after, you know, we didn’t believe in Santa anymore, and all the stuff and then then then there was this first year after she was gone. And it was like me and my dad and he was drinking a glass of scotch and gave me a frying pan from Costco. And it was like, holy shit. This is my new life. Like, you know, it was really bleak.

Claire 

That’s like making me cry. That story is like..

Claire

No, the best part is that I still have that damn frying pan and I love it and I use it all the time. And it now I know that he’s dead it really like means a lot to me, that frying pan.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

Oh my gosh. I mean, I also as a 40-year-old woman like love a good frying pan like that actually would be a perfect gift. I was 18, so yeah, not appropriate. Like, you know, 40-year-old Claire into the frying pan totally 18-year-old Claire, I could see like not so much.

Claire

But like yeah, it’s moments like that where you’re just like, wow, this is not what was supposed to be happening. And that’s really hard and I think it’s like letting yourself sit with that, letting yourself acknowledge that not fighting it, you know, and not fighting the sadness and the anger, and the anxiety that comes with that kind of change, but just letting it happen and being in it. And I think that we need a lot of support when we’re going through that I think we need to find people, we can talk to you, whether it’s a friend who’s also gone through loss, and their Thanksgiving is going to be fucked up this year, too. Or, you know, you’re in therapy, or you’re doing a support group, all of those things, I think can really help bolster those moments. And then taking time I think, to like to do something even just for yourself that does honor like what you thought it was supposed to be like, what’s one little thing that you can do this, whatever holiday it is that that is meaningful to you and does hearken back to what things were supposed to be like? Those are some of the things I think about.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs  30:53

I love that. I think it’s I mean, that makes a lot of sense that pushing it down and pretending it’s not there isn’t helpful. It’s not going to help.

Claire 

Right, fighting it, like oh, no, it’s totally okay that I got a frying pan. No, it’s not okay, it’s sucks. And like, I’m gonna cry about it, and my mom would be really pissed that that’s the best my dad could do. And I’m going to acknowledge all of that, you know?

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

I think it’s also I mean, for me, I feel like there’s a lot of energy to make the holidays good for the kids. But like, I can see my parents just feeling so sad on these days. And like, there’s an energy. We’re laughter’s like, we’re jokers. We’re like we’re all having our own little stand-up comedy shows constantly. And everyone’s like, trying but there’s like this layer of like, it’s just not enough. It’s just not the same. And yeah, I can tap into that sorrow. And it feels like, I honestly feel like it makes me sadder for them than even for me, you know?

Claire  32:43

And that’s super real. And I think that that has to be a part of it, too. Like, let yourself grieve for them. Let yourself cry for them.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

I know. It’s so sad. This is the impact you’re having. I’m like, I never flipped. I tell you the beginning. I’m not I haven’t cried. You’re making me cry.

Claire 

But yeah, I mean, let yourself like, I think we try to make this stuff okay. Like, let me see how I can. What can I say? That’s funny, that’s gonna make it okay to like, make my parents feel better. No, it’s not going to, you can still say something funny, because it is good. But yeah, it’s not gonna make it okay that he’s not there, you know, and it’s not gonna take away their sadness. And, yeah, it’s so hard.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

Do your kids talk about your parents? I mean, they’ve, I mean, you talk about them so much. So they must be very alive for your kids, in a way.

Claire 

They come in and out of places with it. Like there are times when they’re like, very sweet and compassionate about it are very curious. Then there’s times when they’re like, Oh, they’re rolling their eyes at me. Like mom’s talking about our dead parents again, you know, and my 13-year old’s getting really like goth and emo. So she’s suddenly she’s into it that I’m like, like in death and grief. She’s like, my mom’s like a death counselor. Like that’s cool now.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

Obsessed. I’m like, girl. She is intense. I love her. I love her very much. I don’t know her. But I look at her photos. And I’m like..

Claire  34:08

She’s pretty awesome. Then my middle daughter, though, she like gets a little anxious. Sometimes, she’s always like, she’ll ask me questions. She’ll be like, were you really sad when your mom died? And I’d be like, fuck, yeah. And then she’ll be like, are you gonna die? And I’m like, nope, not ever. But yes. It’s just like, I don’t know. It’s a lot, but I tried to have really honest conversations with them about it.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

What do you say? I mean, what do you say honestly, like, if somebody’s listening, and their kid is like, are you gonna die like so? And so? Do you say, oh, I’m never gonna die.  Do you actually say yes, I will die?

Claire

I do say I will but I say I hope to live for a really long time and be there for all of your things and whatever. But then I like to get into weird questions with them. Kids are so interesting around death and dying. They have a lot of like cool questions and answers. So if you just turn it around on them and you’re like, well, what do you think happens when we die? They’ve got some, like exciting answers that you can run with. And just opening up the space to have those conversations. I got a new weird conversation with my, the daughter, the goth daughter you like when she was younger, about like cremation. And I was like, yeah, I’ve got some ashes of my parents in the closet. She was like, can I see them? And I was like, sure. And we got them out. She’s like, can I touch them? And I was like, let’s do it. And she was like, how do you make ash and I was like, trying to explain fire. And she’s like, can we burn something? So then we’re at the kitchen sink, burning paper, and the smoke alarms going off. Like this has gone in the wrong direction. Probably why she’s like all goth out now.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

I love that for both of you. I’m gonna go make my kid now. Burn some paper in the kitchen and be like, these are ashes. We could do this to our body, no I won’t. I won’t do that. But that is a great story. No, but

Claire 

I think it’s really healthy to talk about death and dying to kids, because it happens to all of us. And then when it does happen, we’re not prepared because no one’s ever talked to us about it. And everyone’s been like, oh, let’s not talk about it. No, no one dies. I’m not going to die. No one dies, and then it happens. Yeah, we’re all fucked up over it. So I think we need to talk about it more. We used to have death in the home. People used to die at home, they would lay the bodies out in the parlor. And we would sit around for days, and we don’t see death anymore. It’s so medicalized, we don’t see it. It’s so shocking and traumatic and horrific now, and I don’t think that serves any of us.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs  36:31

Yeah, that’s so true. I mean, I’m dealing with this right now around sex stuff with my kid, I like tweeted out the other day, like, what are the sex books, cuz my seven-year-old is just all the questions, all of them, right? And I’m like, I am not going to do the thing where I don’t talk to her about it, right? And then she like, has all these questions, and then it’s like fucking her up in a different way. But I’m with you. I mean, I’m with you. I want to talk about all of it all the time, in a way that is appropriate.

Claire 

Yeah, I think it’s helpful. I think it’s more helpful than not.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

So I guess my last kind of, like, question for you. Big one. I feel like, this is such a weird thing to say, but I am so blessed. I got the best everything right, like about the roof. I got all the things and I should be very grateful. And I am very grateful. I also feel like I’m just always going to be a little bit sad. Like, there’s always gonna be, I feel like there’s some people that tap into their sadness more than others. And the underlying fact is, like, there’s just always gonna be like, some sadness there. Even though I have and I have and I’m grateful and I love it’s still like, well, it’s not, it’s not ever enough to fill that void. Right? And so I’m, I don’t know, I’d like I wonder like, how do you live in that space, you just accept that is that just like, this is what it is to be a human. And the older you get, like, the sadder you are and the more grateful you are like the happier you are, and more tired. Like, it’s, I don’t know, I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately about this idea of like living with a little bit of sorrow. I don’t know, does that resonate with you at all?

Claire  38:14

I totally resonate. I think I was born with a little bit of melancholy. I think I was somehow born lonely. Honestly, I have been lonely for as long as I can. I can be in a room full of people, and I’m fucking lonely. Like, really lonely. It’s so confusing. But like BJ, in that interview that I did with him, too. He talked about how he had been a melancholy kid. And he felt like that was never acceptable, because he was a white male and a privileged, you know, neighborhood. And it wasn’t until he had his accident and was going through this kind of like, you know, physical trauma that people accepted that he could have melancholy. And I think that’s really interesting. I think a lot of us do have it, I think we do need to accept it. I strive to balance it. So, you know, like, I’m really accepting of my sadness, and my melancholy and my loneliness. But I also want to have like, a lot of joy too. I want to have both. I don’t feel like I have to pick one. I just want to have a lot of both like, and sometimes the sadder I get, or the more tired I get, the lonelier I get. I’m like, okay, I need to do more fun stuff. And so trying to have fun, and just like, stop trying to be so serious and solve all the sadness in the world. Like, no, I’m just gonna go have some fun right now I’m gonna have a dance party, or I’m gonna do this or just like, you know?

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

I love that it’s like carving out space to be sad and carving out space to have fun and be happy and joyful and both of those things.

Claire 

I don’t have to work so hard at the sadness that’s just there. I’d have to work sometimes to carve out the joy and the unhappiness but if I don’t work for it, it doesn’t show up like the melancholy.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

Oh my god, that’s so true. That’s is exactly it that you that’s just naturally there. The good parts you have to make a priority.

Claire 

And I think that’s good. And I, you know, I try to do that with thoughts too. I have a lot of negative thoughts; I have a lot of catastrophic thoughts. I’m always seeing the world through this catastrophic lens, like, what’s the worst thing that can happen, like right now, and I can think of like, 40 things immediately, like in this room, you know, yeah, and I dwell in that place a lot. So when I catch it, which I do more and more than I make myself think of like what are one of the best things that can happen right now. And I really force myself to do that a lot. And I’ve been doing that for a long time now. Just again, that trying to balance counterbalance, balance, all that heaviness or sadness or fear, and just balance it with good stuff, too. Every time I think about how I’m gonna die in a year, I think no, let me fantasize about being alive for like 25 years and I make myself do it with as much detail and like, emotion. It’s really interesting. You should try it.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs  40:48

Oh my god. I’m gonna do that because I’m a catastrophizer. Like chronic catastrophizing, I can catastrophize about anything, give me any situation. And I’ll tell you, all the terrible things that will happen.

Claire 

It’s amazing what I can come up with.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs 

It’s this skill. It’s a gift. No, it’s not a gift. It’s a miserable curse. But I love that.

Claire 

tried doing this opposite one, very time you catch yourself in like, I’m really good catastrophe thought that, like, make yourself picture like what’s the best thing that could happen right now?

Stephanie Wittels Wachs  41:18

I love that. I love that Claire. You’re so good. It was so nice to chat with you. I feel like you. This was exactly the right moment that I needed to talk to you. Good talking to you. Thank you.

Claire 

Thank you.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Okay, my friends. That is it. Thank you for tuning in. Happy holidays. Happy melancholy holidays. I hope you carve out time for a dance party. I hope you make space for daydreaming about all the good things that can happen alongside the catastrophic ones. And if you want more Claire, which duh, of course you do. You should go to New Day and follow, subscribe, tune in, listen to all of it. Happy New Year, everyone. I will see you soon.

CREDITS

NEW DAY is a Lemonada Media Original. The show is produced by Jackie Danziger, Liliana Maria Percy Ruiz and Erianna Jiles. Kat Yore is our engineer. Music is by Hannis Brown. Executive producers are Stephanie Wittels Wachs, Jessica Cordova Kramer, Lily Cornell Silver and Claire Bidwell Smith. NEW DAY is produced in partnership with the Well Being Trust, The Jed Foundation and Education Development Center. Help others find our show by leaving us a rating and writing a review. Follow us at @LemonadaMedia across all social platforms, or find me at clairebidwellsmith.com. Join our Facebook group to connect with me and fellow NEW DAY listeners at facebook.com/groups/newdaypod. You can also get bonus content and behind the scenes material by subscribing to Lemonada Premium. You can subscribe right now on the Apple podcast app by clicking on our podcast logo and then the subscribe button. Thanks for listening. See you next week.