The Quiet Reframe That Pulled Me Out Of The Guilt Spiral

When I finally realised grief wasn’t a personal failure.

Photo by Giulia Bertelli on Unsplash

Poppy, my 16-year-old rescue cat, died quickly last Sunday, just before midnight. It broke me as she slipped away, laying between me and the vet.

Finally at peace.

Of course, that doesn’t stop the guilt and self-blame thoughts and feelings. If only I’d booked her heart scan a few months earlier or pushed back on her dental treatment. Her heart wouldn’t be under so much strain.

Bob is the only cat in the house again. Gazing longingly at the hallway waiting for his buddy/nemesis to pad into the kitchen slowly as he plots to steal her tuna when we aren’t looking.

Mixed into this is a small relief that she’s no longer suffering the twice daily meds, tiredness, and impact on her kidneys.

The sight of her fighting to stand right till the end, even though her back legs were paralysed, is burned into my mind’s eye.

But there’s nothing more I can do. And she’s taught me much over the past few months about how grief seeps into every part of life when you don’t realise.

It was also dad’s 4th deathiversary on Thursday, and new grief ignites old grief like nothing else.

I recall the times Poppy and dad mooch about the house, or how she’d wake up when his car pulls into the driveway to greet him on the pavement.

The pangs of guilt and self-blame creep in, as they quietly do, and I wish they were both still here.

Whilst Bob snoozes and snores quietly behind me, I reflect on the practices I’ve used this week to explore these familiar guilty distractions.

I re-listened to Neuroscientist and Psychologist Mary Frances O’Connor’s excellent book, The Grieving Brain (The Surprising Science of How We Learn from Love and Loss), and it inspired today’s healing practice.

One section in particular hit me differently whilst in the ceramics studio, trying to turn over-damp pots on the wheel.

I pause next to my storage shelves and decide to use her “accepting” approach to manage the guilt monster when it inevitably arrives.

What’s driving the guilt monster?

When you’re grieving a lost loved one, your predictive brain tries to regain control from the chaos.

Uncertainty causes your thoughts, feelings, and behaviours to bounce around and latch onto anything that brings relief or a sense of order.

Guilty thoughts and self-blame often offer a taste of control, when you imagine “what I could’ve or should’ve done differently,” as if you have absolute power over events, but didn’t use it.

It makes the world slightly less unpredictable. Psychologists call this avenue of thought processes counterfactual thinking.

Even if it’s illogical or means you failed in some of the infinite scenarios and counterfactual thought loops, failure still gives you a sense of control.

O’Connor’s research also suggests the grieving brain struggles with death’s finality. You try to mentally seek or search for the lost person or loved one as your routines and habits skew off their axes without them.

Guilt fuels that search loop to keep you looking for solutions, and a way to bring them back to life somehow. This is why guilt and self-blame persist because they serve a useful purpose.

They give you the illusion you can still change something in your mental simulations i.e., in this one, the ending will be different and they’ll live.

Plus, when you’re a sensitive over-giver, you’re used to being the responsible, capable, and attuned one.

Loss throws that belief structure out the window and removes your agency. Going from the reliable one to the powerless one is an epic shock. Guilt steps in to bridge the gap.

Even though I know I did my best for Poppy and her care, I can’t let go of the thought that I could have and should have done more medically and emotionally. Done better. Kept her alive and safe.

It’s the same with my dad when I look at the plants I’ve bought in his honour over the years.

If only I’d done xyz, he’d still be here instead of the distracting guilt monster.

Accepting as a simple act in the moment

I knew the waves of grief for Poppy and dad would be strong this week, so I wanted to do something positive with the grief energy.

We bought a houseplant for each to nurture and grow, as that’s my way of creating a ritualised memory box to tend over time.

O’Connor describes how she used the process of “accepting,” shared in her book, when the waves of grief about losing her dad and now being an orphan crashed over her.

She makes a point of using the word “accepting” and not “acceptance.” It’s not forgiveness, approval or moving on.

Nor a grand permanent step that ties a weird but neat bow over everything.

It’s a practical, in-the-moment acknowledgement about what already happened and how you view it now.

Guilt tells you the brain is still questioning the past. Accepting allows you to gently step out of the argument and see it from a new perspective.

O’Connor describes it as setting something heavy down, knowing you might want to pick it back up in the future.

And that resonates, because you’re recognising the painful thought, emotion or feeling, or action in the moment when it appears, not avoiding it.

When the thoughts about not doing enough for Poppy arose, I paused, did the accepting practice, and noticed the tension in my chest soften slightly.

I wasn’t healed, but I stopped fighting enough to let the stress ease a little.

The weight lifted briefly, and I could breathe a bit deeper.

A simple accepting practice to lighten guilt when it spikes

When guilt or self-blame appears, it can happen fast. A sharp, niggly little thought that gnaws away at your psyche pretending to be truth when it isn’t.

A tiny “if only I’d…or I should have…” sneaks in to press against your chest and swipes your breath away. Or the urge to sob uncontrollably appears when you’re doing something unrelated.

I’m using a two-sentence accepting ritual when grief spikes out of the blue, like when you’re moving a barely made pot, unloading the dishwasher, or scrolling for a Black Friday offer.

It’s a simple way to quietly stop your brain from rushing to counterfactual thinking land or self-criticism that keeps you stuck in the past.

This is how the practice works when a grief spike hijacks. Take a pause, and say to yourself:

1. “This has already happened, and nothing I do now can change it.”

2. “I notice this wave of grief is here and I know it will eventually pass.”

That’s it. Noticing what appears in the grief spike, whether it’s a thought, an emotion, a sobbing heave, or something else.

No analysing why you feel or think this way.

No trying to problem-solve whether you “should” feel this sad, confused, or upset.

No barrister-level questioning of every decision you made while they were alive.

Just a pause or break to recognise what’s going on. That it’s real. It’s grief and you don’t have to fix it.

After Poppy died, my brain drifts into counterfactual thinking often. Replaying decisions, looking for clues, trying to find the one moment where I could have done something differently.

This little practice doesn’t stop the sadness or other heavy emotions, and it doesn’t stop the tears.

It just stops me piling on a second layer of self-blame over an already difficult experience.

The grief still appears, but when I notice it’s here and don’t get into a wrestling match with it, it doesn’t last as long.

I’ve tried the same practice when grief waves about dad rise this week, and it’s helped to ease the pain slightly in my mind and body.

A tiny relief is still relief.

Key takeaways

Grief waves will arrive, even when you least expect them. But when a memory or pang of guilt catches you off guard, try this quiet reframe:

• Pause.

• Say the two “accepting” sentences, even if you don’t fully believe them yet.

• Let whatever is happening be there without fighting. Be it tears, tight chest, that hollow drop in the stomach, or coulda/woulda/shoulda thinking.

• When it softens, even slightly, gently bring your attention back to whatever you were doing.

Accepting grief in the moment isn’t resigning yourself to a miserable life without them or avoiding they exist.

It’s acknowledging your loved one is gone, and that regrets and unfinished conversations belong to the past.

You’re allowed to keep living without forgetting them, as grief will hover just out of sight.

You just don’t have to turn every wave into a problem to solve or stick to beat yourself with.

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P.S. I’m working on a 60-minute(ish) on-demand workshop to help you Navigate Grief With Compassion. Hit reply or comment below if you want to be one of the beta users to help me create it.