Grief: a Stoic Perspective

My wife and I recently had the misfortune of enduring our second miscarriage in a year and a half. I thought that I would take a few moments and write about what has helped me through both miscarriages in the hopes that I can use my experiences to help others. 

The first lesson in both the Enchiridion and the Discourses by Epictetus involves the Dichotomy of Control. This dichotomy divides everything into two spheres of control. The first being what I can control (judgement of external impressions and voluntary actions) and the second being what I cannot control (everything else including one’s own body). If something lays in the former sphere then I should act in a manner that is virtuous and in accordance with my nature as a rational being. However, if something is in the latter sphere then I should be as indifferent to it as the universe and Fortune is to me. As I cannot control my wife’s body nor the fetus that was to be our child then I should be indifferent to its loss and conduct my grieving process in such a way that I retain my virtue and align my action in accordance with nature.

This, admittedly, is a seemingly harsh attitude to take. However, what it allows me to do is to skip several of the grieving steps. I don’t deny that we lost the baby because doing so would not be in accordance with my nature as a rational being. I didn’t get angry because there was nothing that my wife or I could have done to prevent this loss from occurring and thus it is irrational to get angry with my wife, at the indifferent universe, or at the seemingly cruel nature of Fortune. I don’t see the need to bargain as the universe and Fortune are indifferent to any pleas that I make and whatever will be, will be. 

I did, for a couple of days, experience the depressive state where I felt empty and weighed down by the world. However, not being mentally and emotionally burdened with the preceding 3 steps (which in my opinion serve to make our response to the situation worse than it has to be because they go against our nature as rational beings) I was able to overcome the worst aspects of the depressive state in a day or two rather than it being a prolonged affair. This does not mean that I don’t occasionally experience bouts of sadness--indeed I nearly cried while writing this--but it is not a prolonged or persistent.

What the teachings of Epictetus allowed me to do was to start the grieving process with the final step (acceptance) which made the first three steps  (denial, anger, bargaining) irrelevant and lessened the impact of the fourth step (depression). For that, I will be ever grateful.

May Fortune favor you.