Grief and Reciprocity

By Emilee Mabrey

It’s Friday night and I am alone. And for the first time in several months, I am lonely. This is a sign that I need a trip to the mountains. Not a drive, not a hike along the benches or bike paths, I need immersion. I need the ruggedness of a hard climb to a waterfall, a meadow, possibly even a peak.

I’ve lived in Utah for four years. A Midwest girlie at heart, sometimes I miss the simplicity of nature. Every year living in Utah I feel like as soon as I cross off a peak or slot canyon or overlook, I add ten more. Except last summer when my world was turned upside down in a matter of months.

I gave my heart to someone who didn’t know how to care for it. In the very tiny moments he showed care, I loved back until things were beyond repair. I’ve never experienced resentment asking for inclusion or for showing compassion and empathy. Trying to love someone who is disregulated by the very thought of connection wasn’t entirely new to me. Looking back, it has defined many of my romantic relationships, but never to this degree. Instead of being met with avoidance through indifference, I was met with anger and unpredictability.

It’s hard to look back and identify the ways I shrank myself and my needs to minimize conflict and emotionally regulate for two people. I’ve spent the last few months trying to understand the brain chemistry that changes in a person when they are trying to figure out how to act, what to say, and how to show up for someone else in hopes of earning their intermittent love and attention. 

As a person who subscribes to unabashed independence, I feel ashamed for trying to make something work that my heart wanted but every ounce of my nervous system was working on overdrive begging me to leave. I was made to feel like I was not a priority. I was told that I was not thought about when making plans with others. When I expressed hurt, it was turned on me and used against me. My honesty was met with hostility. This was not something I’d ever prepared for. It had me, at many times, questioning my value and my worth not only in the relationship but also in my world.

I made sacrifices and lost track of who I was begging for him to see me. I’m trying to find myself again and reclaim hope after being placed on the sidelines by someone I loved. I’m fighting to remember that love exists beyond the hurt. With caution and patience, I will love again and receive the love that I am worthy of. Guided by the values of reciprocity, I believe that if I give love it will return to me. Maybe not by the one I hoped, but by the one that I need.

The healing process has been painful and I haven’t always felt as if I can persist. It’s an odd feeling knowing that this will be a part of me forever. I tried to heal through therapy, through distractions like travel and exercise, but the grief I experience on many days is often unbearable. My relief has only come from the mountains and their eternal giving through reciprocity.

I was recently given a deeper, indigenous way of understanding reciprocity from Robin Wall Kimmerer. In her book, Braiding Sweetgrass. Kimmerer (2013) explained:

We are all bound by a covenant of reciprocity: plant breath for animal breath, winter and summer, predator and prey, grass and fire, night and day, living and dying. Water knows this, clouds know this. Soil and rocks know they are dancing in a continuous giveaway of making, unmaking, and making again the earth. (p. 383) 

Instead of giving to someone who was unable to give back, I look to the earth. 

The mountains, cliffs, and canyons remind me who I am. Their forgiving embrace heals my heart, dries my tears, and soothes my soul. From sand dunes to slot canyons to caves, I am given peace and solace that reconnects myself to me, and me to the earth. I give the mountains my attention, my love, and accept its ever changing landscape.

Hiking and exploration have allowed me to pick up the pieces. The wild confirms that the decisions I’ve made are the right ones. But when I leave them, I often find myself ruminating and holding on to hope and the potential that I saw in him. I saw his love for the wild - backpacking, hiking, trail running, mountain biking, and I interpreted our shared love for adventure as potential for personal love and partnership. I thought if we could always be in those places together, then he would see me. But he was incapable of reciprocity. The peaks and valleys were far too difficult to navigate both emotionally and physically when I was with him. I know it’s just a summer that I’ll never get back, but the lasting pain has been at times all consuming. 

In the months that we’ve been apart I’ve leaned heavily on the mountains to take care of me and I take care of them. Learning and practicing reciprocity; never taking more than what I can give back, but most importantly never giving more than what I receive. The mountains have taught me to slow down, to observe, to match energy and effort. I got lost in my purpose of care and tried to give what I was not receiving. I felt betrayed.

Realizing that I’ll never be heard or my feelings acknowledged or needs understood makes the wounds feel even deeper. To feel abandoned and pushed away makes it challenging to be present in the spaces I’m in. To have to mask and hide the hurt that’s excruciating is exhausting and often overwhelming. I used to think that I would never find closure, but I am. Adventures in nature ease the discomfort. I’m healing one hike at a time even if it takes a lifetime. The lakes, alpines, and wildflowers ground me and give me relief, hope, and resilience.

I’m reclaiming the spaces that I thought we could share together and am making new memories in the places where I was ignored. In the darkest times when I felt destroyed beyond repair, I turn to the mountains and expressed gratitude and received what I was missing from him - respect, communication, and accountability. I am learning that real love, like the mountains, gives back what it is given.

Kimmerer (2013) wrote:

In a culture of gratitude, everyone knows that gifts will follow the circle of reciprocity and flow back to you again. This time you give and next time you receive. Both the honor of giving and the humility of receiving are necessary halves of the equation. The grass in the ring is trodden down in a path from gratitude to reciprocity. (p. 381)

I will continue to explore with gratitude. I will invite joy and let go of the pain and sadness. I will take this experience and teach others the importance of knowing what they deserve when they give of themselves. I will walk the path and share the love that I have left knowing it will forever return.