Grieving the Death of One’s First Love
Submitted by David Daniels on March 5, 2009 – 11:27 amDr. David Daniels, MD is clinical professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford Medical School, a leading developer of the Enneagram system of nine personality styles, and co-author of T... more
2 CommentsQuestion from Barbara: Question: Is it normal to grieve over someone you have not seen in 30 years? Recently, a guy who was my first boyfriend when I was 15, was murdered. He was 47. I have not seen him since we were 15. I did not expect to feel so much loss. I do not remember how or why we stopped seeing each other, or how long our relationship lasted. I only have about 4 or 5 memories. I don’t understand why I feel such a deep loss. I know he was a great guy then, and know he grew up to be a great man but….I have lost other people that I had seen more recently, and did not grieve like this. It is close to the loss I felt when my father died 4 years ago. I have diaries I kept when we were together and I want to read them, looking for anwers but afraid of what I will read. Is it normal to grieve over someone you have not seen in 30 years?
Dr. David Daniels responds: Barbara, What an interesting and provocative question you ask. Well, it may not be normal “to grieve over someone you have not seen in 30 years,” but it likely is natural and healthy. This was your first love and love generates strong and enduring connections to our limbic system and to the prefrontal lobes in our brains. Newborn infants have strong limbic connection to their mothers and their early caregivers long before there is explicit memory. These connections are measurable physiologically. And infants that do not have loving contact and nurturance don’t grow and thrive. I just mention this to make explicit how enduring, vital, and important early bonds are.
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Then along comes adolescence and our first romantic love connections. These too are rooted in our physiology, in our limbic system and prefrontal cortex, and serve to bond us. So it is not surprising that the passing of your first boyfriend evokes strong and unexpected feeling of loss. Remember the sadness of grief reminds us of how much we care, yes even for someone we have not seen for these 30 years. Thus your grief here likely points to how much this connection means to you. It resembles your feelings concerning your father’s death 4 years ago which simply points to the depth of this connection to your first love. Should it even be otherwise?
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I can still fondly remember my first girlfriend at age 13. We only even kissed once or twice. She is still in my heart. So I suggest that you go ahead and read the “diaries I kept when we were together.” This is nothing to avoid. Let yourself feel grief, joy, love, disappointment – whatever feelings were there. Remember that which is avoided tends to persist. Grief is natural and goes hand in hand with love and care. Thank you for this question that represents the core themes of love and loss.
Dr. David Daniels, MD is clinical professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford Medical School, a leading developer of the Enneagram system of nine personality styles, and co-author of The Essential Enneagram (Harper Collins).? Visit www.enneagramworldwide.com for additional information.
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I feel that Barbara is so lucky to have a diary to read…I too lost my first love. I only found out about a week ago and he has been gone for 3 years. I vaguely remember the picture I had of him, the journals of all that we went through together, including the night I had lost my virginity to this guy. We stopped speaking when I was sixteen. I ran into him once again when I was 23 (7 years ago). I saw that he had a wife and two very beautiful little girls. We didn’t speak. I said hello and he looked so surprised he was speechless. Little did I know when I said hello with such excitement that he was married and that his wife was standing right behind him. She basically told me to keep on going. I guess the was the very paranoid/jealous type.
Unfortunately, that was the last time I saw him. Looking just as he did when we were together. Oh how we loved each other, or at least felt that it was love. Definitely the first love. We wanted to marry…all the dreams we had together.
Finding out three years after his death has been a huge shock. I still struggle to believe it is real. I saw his grave. He still has no headstone and that breaks my heart. I try so hard to not dwell on the “what if’s” or the anger I could feel towards his wife of robbing me of a chance to see him that one last time.
My heart seems shattered. I am single and always like to date, but now I can’t. I just want to be left alone. I can’t seem to bring myself to tell people. I still cry and think about him everyday.
We had separate lives. 7 years of absolutely no contact and me going back to his hometown for work and always hoped to run into him again. Little did I know I wouldn’t. I miss him terribly. Although, he may have changed into someone completely different.
I’m glad to read the response. I say it’s as natural it can get. I wanted to act as though it was sad…but just go on with what I was doing. I find myself holding back tears. Maybe his family has had three years, but to me it just happened. It’s just that finality that makes it so difficult. He only lived to be 28. Suffered tremendously with brain tumors. Makes me wonder if the reasons I wasn’t the wife…I may not have been able to handle it as well as his did. His wife has moved on. Now she is engaged to another man. But I still think, should I visit his mom to offer my condolences even though it has been so long? And his headstone?? It’s been 3 years and I desperately want to get him one. Maybe I didn’t know him 5 years ago, but I knew him 15 years ago and I know the love I had for him.
I wish so desperately I could find the necklace he had bought for me, the ring, my diary, and his pictures…I’ve looked everywhere. Looking for old friends of his on myspace/facebook…maybe just one picture? I feel I have lost him more so. No closure. I missed him even before he was gone. Really, this all is just crushing in such a tremendous way. I feel closed off and I don’t want to be with another man, I don’t want to go to a party with my friends and get hit on by other men. I just want to go back to the cemetery to “see” him. The closet I feel I can ever be to him now.
I’m so frightened to visit his mom…but eventually maybe I will.
I JUST STARTED WRITING LETTERS TO MY FIRST LOVE IN MARCH OF 2010 AFTER 36 YEARS.HE HAD NEVER MARRIED NOR HAD ANY CHILDREN.I WAS HAVING TROUBLE WITH MY SECOND MARRIAGE AT THIS TIME TOO.He and I found out in a matter of 4 months that we still loved each other very much. He told me he was sick on disability and drank beer. he failed to tell me he had cirrhosis of the liver.He probably knew he just hadn’t been to the Dr. I was with him for a week July 3-9 everyday for several hours each day. We really got close in a weeks time. He had a Dr appointment on July 20,2010. When I first saw him on July 3rd he was already very jaundice. I have never seen some one so yellow.He told me that was the first time he was yellow. He was weak, had stomach pain and I dont know what else,I know he had to go to the bathroom during our visits more than normal.I talked to him on July 13,2010. I was in the hospital back in Tennessee He lived in Michigan. He died on July 16,2010 at his home. HE didn’t live to make his dr appointment or to start our future together. My present husband is 100% supportive of me. he knows the whole story and still loves me and I’m medically off work for severe depression not only for the grieving of my first love but also from dealing with an HIV drug addicted daughter that has stressed me out. Anyway i cry everyday and miss my first love as i have never missed anybody in my whole life. Sincerely, Robin Mitchell