Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 0:00

Being able to recognize that grief and joy can coexist, even when they feel like opposites, because they share from the same soil, the emotional soil, right? But what happens is grief deepens our capacity for joy because it reminds us of what matters.

April Snow: 0:22

Welcome to Sensitive Stories, the podcast for the people who live with hearts and eyes wide open. I'm your host, psychotherapist and author April Snow. I invite you to join me as I deep dive into rich conversations with fellow highly sensitive people that will inspire you to live a more fulfilling life as an HSP without all the overwhelm. In this episode, I talk with Angelique Foyer Fletcher about how many places grief shows up in our lives, how to welcome enjoy and play during times of loss, and ways to support others who are grieving. Angelique is a licensed marriage and family therapist and registered play therapist who helps sensitive, neurodivergent adults and caregivers heal through her four pillars of books, nature, play, and connection. As an INFJ, HSP, and Enneagram4, Angelique brings curiosity, ritual, and deep empathy into her work. For more HSP resources and to see behind the scenes video from the podcast, join me on Instagram, TikTok, or YouTube at Sensitive Strengths, or sign up for my email list. Links are in the show notes and at sensitivestories.com. And just a reminder that this episode is for educational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for treatment with a mental health or medical professional. Let's dive in the world.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 2:09

Thank you, thank you. I'm so excited to be back here, April. Yeah.

April Snow: 2:12

Yes. So folks might remember you were on episode 61. We talked about cycle breaking and families, but today we're switching gears a little bit. We're going to be talking about grief.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 2:22

Yes.

April Snow: 2:23

Very important topic. And you know, often we associate grief with death, but you know, there's so many ways that grief shows up in our lives, I think, in ways we don't even realize. Could you talk about that? When does grief show up for us? Maybe what does it look like?

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 2:36

Yeah, absolutely right. It does show up anytime we experience loss, like we experience like you talked about, like not just through death, but sometimes it's just through changes in our identity, our relationships, our roles, or even just the seasons of life, right? So I feel like for a highly sensitive empath like myself, it's often layered, right? There's kind of like that quiet ache. Sometimes even just that sudden tearfulness, right? Or numbness. But even that is like our body shutting down, saying, like, I need to slow down. Something meaningful is about to shift.

April Snow: 3:08

Yes. Oh, thank you for putting it into that word. The quiet ache, the layers, right? There's so many ways that that shows up for us because anytime anything could change. And it's not just externally, but also internally.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 3:21

Absolutely.

April Snow: 3:22

Yes, exactly. And so when you're working with grief, whether it's personally or with clients, how are you approaching that? I think you have different pillars that you bring into your work. I'd love to hear more about that.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 3:33

Absolutely. I love this question because I really do believe in the four pillars of healing, and I'll just explain a little bit about what those are. So when I process grief with others, when they are going through that ache, that busyness or experience, I really like to ask the first question, which is their connection. So the number one piece in my kind of my branding is like leaning into safe people. Are we safe with ourselves? Are we safe with our community? Are we feeling connected or feeling that disconnect? Because a lot of times can grief feel like there's a disconnect, this loss, this aching, longing away from someone. So we we want to almost like isolate from others, right? And so then the second one is nature. And I love this, which is allowing the earth to hold our emotions, right? For us highly sensitive empaths, it's like can be as simple as walking and breathing and kind of noticing some of the cycles of decay in rebirth, right? Which is kind of an interesting way to talk about it. So it's more like the ecosystem. Like I do like walk and talks, right? Oh, yeah. I even I even encourage my clients to it sounds silly, but like when they go on their next hike, goes yell in a forest, right?

April Snow: 4:40

It's powerful.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 4:42

It is, right? And so I wanna I encourage that and actually want them to embody it in our session. So that's like the second pillar. The last two, which is so important, which you know, as a registered play therapist, I have to talk about play, right? Like, can we even experience joy with grief? Well, yes, you can reclaim it through play, right? So softening a little bit of that rigidity that happens with grief, right? Mm-hmm. Through an expression of creativity, so coloring, maybe listening to a song that you or think about that loved one, you know, and mourning and allowing the tears to flow. Maybe you're just kind of drawing art, writing, journaling, just being able to express the emotion in a way that's playful, right? And last but not least is books. I'm a big book girly. I love to read books. One of my favorite ones for grief is Crying at Hmart.

April Snow: 5:37

Oh, yes. Uh-huh.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 5:39

A wonderful book that talks about a young lady who's lost her mother, and she's just explaining, like, we do this everyday thing of you know, going to a marketplace and yet we're crying, right? Because maybe a song comes on, or you pick up a favorite food. And so I encourage my clients in the fourth pillar of grieving through books, reading others' pain so you don't feel so alone.

April Snow: 6:03

Yeah, I feel like you're shaking up the idea of what grief can look like with these four pillars. First off, kind of bringing in a little bit of levity, joy.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 6:14

Right.

April Snow: 6:15

Connection, and connection can look a lot of different ways, whether you're reading it on the page or connecting through nature, you're connecting through other people that are safe. But you're kind of filling those holes that are creative, reminding yourself, I'm safe, I'm connected, I'm not alone here. And play, which I would never think about with grief, but it makes sense that you need to be able to reclaim those parts of yourself, that they're not gone forever, that there can be comfort in that. And play for adults, I assume as well, not just kids.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 6:46

Right, exactly. And I mean, even with uh kiddos, like I like to use sand tray, and if I see immediately when a kid is talking about grief, they may not shave it with me, like I lost my father, but they'll put a tombstone in the sand tray.

April Snow: 7:02

Can for maybe folks who don't know what a sand tray is, who haven't done that in therapy or haven't experienced that, could you describe a little bit about what a sand tray is?

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 7:12

So I will tell you that true disclaimer fashion here is like everyone can do sand tray. So I just want to say that adults, kids, everything. And so what it is, it's just a small pit of sand. It's that it's just a small container of sand. Think about folks who used to kind of rake, like have the little mini comb and rake and the zen and the rock and stuff. But what it actually looks like in true form is the container of sand, blue cloth underneath to represent water, right? Right to be underneath the sand tray. And so a lot of times a play therapist like myself would say, create your world, and we open it for that, we open it for that reason. And so you get to go pick mini figurines, little toys that represent what your world looks like. And we we don't ever ask the questions of, well, what does that mean? Does that mean your mom? Does this mean that? That's does that take away the process? But really, it's a space to ask the question, oh, I wonder what this means, or I'm curious about that. So, you know, I love to use it with my adults who maybe have a hard time even processing and sharing out loud what they're feeling.

April Snow: 8:14

Right.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 8:15

So just the feeling of sand, yeah.

April Snow: 8:17

Yeah, it's I mean, I love it because it's sensory, you can dig your hands in and you can work out that emotion without words. But also, right, you can whether you are aware of it or not, you're might be drawn to certain symbols, whether it is that more obvious tombstone or it's something a little maybe indirect. Yeah, yeah. Are there other ways we can kind of do some of that? Because I'm thinking, if I'm in nature, what if I'm drawn to a leaf or a stick or a rock? Could that also bring in some of those elements of imagery or metaphor?

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 8:51

Absolutely. I love that piece because I really encourage my clients to do a nature journal.

April Snow: 8:57

What is that?

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 8:57

So nature journaling is just how it sounds, where you go outside and you can collect pieces of earth, like you said. So the rocks, the I mean, if you're near a beach, you know, seashells. I'm I'm landlocked, so I'm not really quite able to get the seashells. But I got acorns and all those things that I just love to collect with my kiddos, of course, and then kind of creating art. So again, creating art that symbolizes a leaf falling off a tree and it represents death, decay, right? But it's very sensory-based. So, and you can journal about your experience, feeling the coolness, cool air coming from your lungs, all those kind of things.

April Snow: 9:38

Yeah, when I think about doing those types of things, it's like anchors me back here, reminds me I'm safe, I'm not alone, I'm kind of part of something bigger than myself.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 9:46

Exactly.

April Snow: 9:47

Yeah, it's so therapeutic. And just also just moving your body and is you know, being in bed and grieving in that sense of kind of shutting things down is helpful to a point. But after a while, I find that I need to re-engage with the world in a way that's accessible.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 10:05

And we know that grief is different for everybody, right? And the way we process grief has to look different, is different, and it's not linear, right? The misnomer here is like we use the five stages of grief, but that typically was made for someone in hospice. So like the stages within the next place. Right. Right. It's not a fluid motion, it's not linear, right? Yeah. And it shows up differently with kids. They're saying there's routine, there's loss, there's no sense of safety and structure anymore. Because either I lost my favorite animal, right? Or I'm wrestling with my own identity, right, in this family, right? And then sometimes there's no words to like share that with. So love to just invite sand tree as an alternative, or let's go a walk and talk because that bilateral stimulation, or for folks on a call not familiar with that, it's just your brain being able to process and think while you're moving your legs right in front of you, right?

April Snow: 11:05

So helpful that back and forth, side to side. Yeah. Mm-hmm. With the four pillars that use connection, nature, play, books. It made me think of this because you just talked about the five stages of grief not being linear. Like you're gonna move into denial, to anger, to acceptance, back and forth over and over.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 11:24

Yeah, bargaining, yeah.

April Snow: 11:25

Bargaining, right? Depression. For your four pillars, if someone is in the grieving process, are we doing all four? Are we picking and choosing? What would you say?

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 11:36

That's a wonderful question. And I love that I want to give the person the choice. All right. There is no, okay, let's do play for one session, then we're gonna go walk and talk. There is no like one, two, three, four step. It's just I integrate those practices as part of the healing.

April Snow: 11:54

Yeah.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 11:55

With grief, not from grief, because grief moves through different stages, right?

April Snow: 12:02

So it's more of a menu than a checklist.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 12:06

It's a menu. Yeah, so I'll could be a la carte. Uh-huh. Right.

April Snow: 12:11

Could be four-course meal.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 12:13

Three core force, hey, whatever you want. But that's just what I my big thing is moral injury. That's like a really big are you familiar with moral injury?

April Snow: 12:22

I don't think so. Could you tell me what it is?

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 12:25

So I'll as a side, that might take you off a little bit from the grief, but that's okay, yeah. So moral injury, the basic term to operational define it, it really means when someone bear witnesses to someone in leadership or something in the world or something in their family that violates their inner moral code.

April Snow: 12:48

Right.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 12:49

Right. And we have found, especially now, given kind of this presidency and all that kind of stuff, bearing witness to ice raids, bearing witness to no king's protests, bearing witness to just this constant political, sociopolitical. And for some folks it might be joy, and some folks it might be grief. So I'll put that there. That's true. We're seeing both sides. Yeah. But for others, it may feel like that moral injury of violating, like, oh, I don't believe in this, and yet it's happening.

April Snow: 13:22

Right, right. Yes.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 13:25

And so there's a grief because now you're disenfranchised, right? Your grief is like, where do I put this place of like I don't feel safe anymore to walk the streets freely or something like that, you know?

April Snow: 13:34

Right, right. That's a big loss of personal autonomy, freedom, safety. And a great example that grief can happen outside of our immediate worlds, outside of ourselves, our families, even sometimes our communities. Like on the grander scale. Yeah. And it still can impact us just as deeply as if we lost someone close to us.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 13:56

Yeah. Yeah. And so a lot of times it's like the injury happens and it's not seen. A lot of times it's like the PTSD is like hypervigilance and all those kind of things. But they coined that term moral injury about 10 years ago and said it's actually not only is it the vicarious trauma that someone experiences, but it's like, you know, it's not acknowledged, right? And it was it goes beyond just the hypervigilance and flashbacks and all those kind of things. You know what I'm saying? And I just I did a study on that. I mean, they're making it now in a DSM 5 TR, which is awesome.

April Snow: 14:29

That is good.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 14:31

Just moving towards some progress there. But to just reclaim that to repair is through some sense of joy, which is through movement through play.

April Snow: 14:44

Yes.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 14:45

Through the ability and the freedom to read books and narratives and literature that speak to your experience, right? Yeah. That I like to embody in my sessions.

April Snow: 14:56

Mm-hmm. And so you're saying, you know, despite how intense the grief is, or maybe how outside of your control it is, you still have that option of bringing in joy and mixing in with the grief process. But you know, those often feel like opposites.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 15:15

Right. You're right.

April Snow: 15:17

So how can we make them coexist? Is it, you know, you're laying out the how, like, okay, play, connection with nature, books, people. But are there ways we can kind of work through maybe some resistance to holding joy? Because sometimes feeling joy when you're grieving, it maybe feels like you're betraying the person or the situation.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 15:36

Yes, yes.

April Snow: 15:37

So how can we let it be okay that we're having joy?

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 15:40

Right. It reminds me of this quote by Billy Bob Thornton. You know, can you believe I'm quoting Billy of Thornton?

April Snow: 15:46

But wasn't on my bingo card for today.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 15:50

But he has this fascinating. I play this video all the time with all my clients going through grief because it talks about how can we both feel grief and joy at the same time. So a little bit of background with him. Like I said, it's a five-minute video he shared with Oprah that talked about him being 12 years old losing his brother, who died at a very young age from a disease. And he didn't understand it. It was lots of processes. So he said, Forever from that point on, I was 50% happy and 50% sad. So every time I, and it touches me so much because it's like every time I have tears or shed tears for him, that's me saying, I'm honoring him. I'm showing up, right? The joy I have of having a memory when they play together, right? Sharing an inside joke, those kind of things. I mean, he's like 56 years old, but he was able to say from that point on my life, I had to accept the fact. And for folks on the call, yeah, it is hard to be able to say, I don't I have that radical tolerance that 50% of my life moving forward of losing a loved one, losing autonomy, losing identity is like I'm gonna always feel this way. And I would like to say that, you know, being able to recognize that grief and joy can coexist, even when they feel like opposites, because they share from the same soil, right? The emotional soil, right? Here I go with my plants, I gotta do my plant-based. We gotta go with the theme here. So they share the same emotional soil, right? But what happens is grief deepens our capacity for joy because it reminds us of what matters, right? So the this it's the meaning, yes. So joy isn't the absence of grief. Okay, it's just this gentle light that enters once we stop fighting the darkness.

April Snow: 17:37

Wow. If we welcome in the grief, we welcome in the joy, and vice versa.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 17:42

Exactly. Again, sharing in the same garden, maybe not the soil, maybe they share in the same garden, right?

April Snow: 17:48

Yeah, they're in different beds or plots. Right.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 17:52

And a lot of times people kind of will look at a dead bed, right? Like you see a bunch of sunflowers growing, flourishing, you know. Oh, someone's really taking gentle care of them. Oh, like all that. But what about the ones that were dying? Why don't we honor what they've given to us, right?

April Snow: 18:06

Right. The seeds and the beauty.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 18:10

Right.

April Snow: 18:10

Right, it's not embraced.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 18:13

Yeah, and I would say with highly sensitive people, especially, you know, we feel both fully, right? And it's really kind of expanding our own nervous system to hold both truths at once. Yes. And we can hold both fully because we hold up, we have full capacity. The beauty and the pain in living in this life is being able to feel the full spectrum of emotions. And that includes grief, and that includes joy.

April Snow: 18:40

Mm-hmm. And you're right, as HSPs, we we feel both equally. We know our emotional spectrum is a lot longer, larger. And you're so right that there's beauty wrapped up in the grief. I think it was David Kessler who added on the sixth stage of grief, meaning which makes sense because it's not that we accept and move on, it's that we remember what happened, how it impacted us. And yeah, if that bed of sunflowers is past, right? Doesn't mean they never existed.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 19:16

Exactly. Exactly. There was growth there. You know, April, I love that. And I love that last piece, that meaning, because if I had to be transparent here, I went into play therapy to cultivate joy, right? Like I recall two years ago when I had my training, I was scared to do grief. I was like, I'm not a grief counselor, I'm not a grief counselor. Because I was at the time I didn't have anyone close to me who died. And that's what I had in my mind. I thought that's the only way that grief happens. Someone has someone close to me and had to die. And I'll never forget, she's such a great teacher. My supervisor and teacher at the time for plate therapy said, Well, Angela, it's grief is for anyone who's ever loved someone, loved something and it's gone. If you ever loved anything and now it's gone, that's grief. And I was like, wow. So she expanded my mind.

April Snow: 20:10

Yeah.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 20:11

Right. And it was such a beautiful. So I was able to kind of go into play therapy, that using that modality to understand that I can help a child, even an adult, with processing whatever, whoever they once loved that's no longer here, that's gone.

April Snow: 20:29

Right. Right. Because by that definition, we've experienced grief probably by the age of one or two, you know, losing our binky or our favorite toy, or whatever it is, right? You know, that ability to be carried around by a parent 24-7. Just there's losses around every corner of something we've loved or been attached to.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 20:52

That's right. That's right. So you reminded me of being on it, like again, acknowledging where I was coming from, like not knowing, being scared of, right? And I imagine there's some listeners here who feel as though like if I say it out loud, then that means it's real.

April Snow: 21:12

Yeah. It can be scary to say it out loud.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 21:15

I lost a home. Right? Maybe I wasn't really attached to the home, but because right?

April Snow: 21:23

Right, still lost it.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 21:25

The meaning behind it. Or I lost, you know, a friendship that didn't serve me well.

April Snow: 21:31

Right. Or like you said, parts of self, parts of identity or autonomy or health.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 21:39

Health, yeah, exactly. Exactly. Who am I now?

April Snow: 21:42

Right. Who am I now? And HSP's we are thinking about these deeper questions. We are feeling into the nuance. Because you know, as you describe grief opening up, like we put grief in this box, we put trauma in this box. But grief is more than having a death. Trauma is more than going to war, right? It's so much more layers to it. And as HSPs, we're feeling all those layers. So to actually have it recognized and validated and create space for it so we can actually sit with it and work with it. Yeah, it's important.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 22:18

Dealing with the rupture and the repair.

April Snow: 22:20

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So I will I appreciate you kind of opening it up for us and seeing that, well, one, grief shows up throughout our whole lives in many different ways, whether we're aware of it or not. Right. And two, there's so many ways to welcome grief in and to sit with it and but not let it consume us. We can have the grief and we can have other parts of our experience. So when we're carrying around a sense of loss, what are some gentle ways we can reconnect with our joy? Are there other ways that we haven't talked about yet?

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 22:53

Well, a couple things that we shared about, you know, the daily nature walks, mindful movement, being able to like listen to music that honors your mood. So if you want to listen to an angry playlist, say cancer, right? I had one when my sister was going through cancer. I was like, cancer. So I had a playlist to get all my emotion, that energy out because music is energy, it is a being, right? And so I think like metal, you know, some people they want to get a mosh pit, they want to, you know, disrespect their surroundings safely, obviously. But you know, kind of feel something creating small rituals, that's a big one. Lighting a candle, writing a letter, goodbye letter. I don't say grief letter, I say goodbye letter. What are the things I miss about you? I remember this time, you know, like really allowing the child, and they do that with children as young as like five years old being able to say that, or they use toys or puppets to kind of symbolize that, right? Planting something.

April Snow: 23:50

Oh good one, yeah.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 23:52

So a nice container bed, or you know, even just a nice plant inside. Just what does that mean for you? What are you growing? What are you nurturing, right? I think sharing stories or laughter with other people. Maybe if you have a small community or no community, watch, listen to your favorite comedian podcast.

April Snow: 24:10

Yeah, I like that too, right? There can be those connections from afar.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 24:15

Mm-hmm. And you know, most importantly, I want to share that joy doesn't demand we just move on. It invites us to move with, like I told you, we move with grief to understand that love can transform shape but not disappear, right? And so that self-love we go into ourselves is just as important, right?

April Snow: 24:38

Yeah.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 24:39

And some in the small ways, creating those rituals.

April Snow: 24:42

Mm-hmm. Right. And rituals for me, they provide a sense of kind of stability, safety for me, like a little bit of containment. I'm not just out here swimming in the grief untethered. I've got something to plant my feet on the ground. Okay, every morning I'm lighting this candle. I'm taking a moment to acknowledge the grief, but I'm not letting it fill up my whole day, every moment take over.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 25:07

Really helps. One more thing, too. I encourage folks to say, talk to the person you loved. Talk to them out loud, right? I remember I had a clown who says she called her mother every single day. She's in like an early 50s, and she missed that, right? The ritual of waking up and talking. And I was like, Well, she's not gone, right? She's just it just looks different. Right. So have a conversation with her. It's like I'm making coffee today. And so it's like she's just there with you, whoever that person is. Maybe it's a cat and they have a collar, you know.

April Snow: 25:39

Right. That you can keep out and revisit.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 25:44

Mm-hmm.

April Snow: 25:45

Mm-hmm.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 25:46

So those are things I like to encourage. And it's tough because grief, people feel like it's one of those things you don't talk about, and well-meaning people at work, right?

April Snow: 25:58

Yeah, saying like, oh, it's gonna be fine, they're not suffering anymore, whatever it is. You know, the niceties that people think are making you feel better are actually invalidating. Is that what you're referring to?

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 26:12

I am.

April Snow: 26:12

Yeah.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 26:13

So maybe for folks who are listening and say, you know, maybe I haven't experienced grief or loss, but I know someone who is, and I'm kind of stuck. Yeah, I really love this advice that someone shared with me. One is ask the person, how are you feeling right now at 6 36 p.m.? That's my time. So literally asking them because grief is a teacher, right? And the lessons that grief has taught me is presence. And so being reminded of like, how do you feel right now at this time? How is grief showing up for you right now? Right? It's phenomenal. Like, that's a what's the word? Let me know when you need something, let me help you. Do it, just do it, just do it.

April Snow: 26:56

Drop a meal off. Yeah, just show up because otherwise it puts the burden on the person grieving.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 27:03

Correct. Yeah, but I wanted to put that out there, like some of the ways to support someone at work, maybe you're a manager, maybe your people leader, whatever, and you have a colleague who's experiencing it, or maybe even just going into the season, you know, we're coming back from the holidays. Yeah, and you may have some people who are gonna be a little bit more sad, right? And that's comes from their feelings of family estrangement, right? Financial loss, all the things. And it's like being mindful of like, if they don't want to come back to the happy hour, don't yeah, let them, let them skip it.

April Snow: 27:45

Don't give them a hard time.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 27:47

Put an invitation, don't show up. We know this is a hard time for people. If you don't need a show, don't show. Less burden.

April Snow: 27:54

That's such an easy way to offer support by giving permission slip to the person to take care of themselves. Yeah, so if you don't know how to support someone, make it easier for them, right? Tell them we're having this gathering, you don't have to come. We want people to take care of themselves. I don't know, if you could give them the day off or whatever it is, right? Or just do something.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 28:19

Change a bereavement plan. I'm kidding, but that's another story.

April Snow: 28:23

Oh, sure. But you know, it's something to put a little nudge for people. Right. This is something people often don't know how to do. Even, you know, I've tried to think about how I'm talking with people that are going through grief actively or maybe more long term. You know, I'm making sure I'm not putting the burden on them to take care of me. I'm not saying, oh, I'm so sorry, or whatever it is. Instead, I'm just, oh, that must be hard. Or I'd be happy to do XYZ for you. Right. Instead of making them do more work. And I think it's such a small change, but it can make a big difference. And people that are feeling so heavy in that moment. So yeah, I appreciate this layer of the conversation because it's not just us, it's how can we support others going through grief too.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 29:10

Right, right. And then knowing that we don't have to rush to fix the problem.

April Snow: 29:15

Yeah.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 29:17

A lot of times people think you gotta rush and perform and rush to fix and perform resilient, you know. But grief really just asks us to pause, feel, and remember our connectedness.

April Snow: 29:30

It's just a good reminder to kind of slow everything down and just be with the person in the moment. Yeah, I love that. So, Angelique, you're saying grief is a teacher, right? It's here as a way to show us more of the layers. But what, and we might have already tapped in this a little bit, but what lesson do you think it's offering us right now, collectively?

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 29:53

It's a great question. I think it's calling us back to collective care, reminding us that healing. Happens in community and not in isolation. We saw what happened with COVID. That's a big thing. Huge grief.

April Snow: 30:06

Yeah.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 30:07

Not in just the losses of people who die by COVID, but also the social political climate, the sense of safety, the sense of community, you know, isolation. And I really truly believe that kind of grief this collective grief we're experiencing is really telling us how disconnected we are. Right. And that healing can only happen in not only happen. One of the ways it can really happen is in relationships, right? Healthy relationships, systems that aren't that are broken, but you know, there is some solution on the way, you know what I mean? And we're not seeing that right now. And it's just gets people to be more isolated, to feel unheard, unloved, unsupported, not supported, right? And I broke my practice to care for the brokenhearted.

April Snow: 31:02

That's beautiful.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 31:04

Who tends to the heartbroken person? Yeah.

April Snow: 31:07

Exactly. And you're right that the last five years or so have really shown us a lot of collective grief and those deficits in our community connections. I think we need that more now than ever. Yeah. So any final thoughts or messages for the HSP listeners who are grieving in one way or another.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 31:29

Yeah. You know, a lot of us folks out there always feel like you gotta toughen up, right? Probably was told that all the time. Oh, things will get better. Don't think about it, all those things. But I'm here to remind you that your sensitivity is your strength. So again, in the words of Billy Bob Thornton, right? You're gonna feel 50% happy and 50% sad, and it's okay that the tears, the mood shift, all those things is honoring that. You're showing up for yourself deeply. But pace yourself gently, right? You know, I feel like it's this message I always want to share with others, and I wish I would have had as my inner child to myself, is like you're not broken for feeling too much. You're wired to notice the beauty and the pain in equal measure, right? And be sure to let that sensitivity guide you towards that compassion, right? And not that self-playing.

April Snow: 32:27

Yeah, I appreciate that reminder that it's both. I think we focus more on feeling pain and stress more deeply, but we also have the other side of it, which is beauty and joy, all happiness, all of it. So yeah, I appreciate that reminder. Just let it all in.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 32:45

It reminds me of this Japanese author. So Hirataki, I'm gonna butcher the name, but I'm no, he's a Japanese author who talked about the male loneliness back in the 80s. We're seeing it now. And he has this quote that I love, which is like, life is full of pain, suffering is optional.

April Snow: 33:01

Exactly. Yes, that's right.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 33:04

So I think I may I may have said in my last one, but that's something that really resonates with me is understanding like I can be sensitive to the fact that, you know, life is pain. Yeah, there are painful moments, but the suffering of it, which sometimes people grief, think that, oh, if I grieve or allow myself, that's suffering. No, it's actually part of the pain and the beauty of this thing called life, right?

April Snow: 33:30

That's it. It is woven into the fabric of life. It's not something that is optional, it's something that's always going to be there so we can sit with it and welcome it in and let it intermix with other experiences. Yeah, I love that. Right. It's a good reminder.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 33:46

Thank you. Yeah, this is lovely.

April Snow: 33:49

It's been lovely. Thank you so much for this conversation. I think it's so important to open the perspective on grief and look at other ways in. I see we have a kitty visitor, which I love. Oh, I always love a cat visitor. So for folks who want to dive more into your resources, I'll make sure I share all of that. You have the offer in the show notes, your website, your social media, you have a new Joy Revenge book list, which I'm excited about. Can you tell listeners a little bit more about what the book list is and working with you?

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 34:18

Yeah. So earlier I alluded to like the four pillars of healing, right? And so I found this, gathered a list of books because all my clients are like, what podcasts are I listen to? What books? So I said, let me just put a book list together. I love it. That talks about how do we get the, you know, in this way as adults, we can reclaim joy in kind of a revengeful way, like despite kind of the pain, despite all this stuff happening, how can I gain that? And so some of this aligns with my pillars of like, okay, maybe I want to learn more about play or you know, nature. And I have just a book list of that. So if you can download it on my website at foyfletsherapy.com.

April Snow: 34:54

Perfect. That's great. Yeah, because it's true that I feel like some as therapists, we have access to a lot more resources just because we're exposed to it through trainings, through colleagues. And so I think it's always important to pass those resources along. And it you've made it a lot easier. So thank you for that.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 35:11

Thank you, thank you. Yes, yes. I'm excited to share that offering. And you know, some people think they have to be a resource or be a source versus being a resource when it comes to grief.

April Snow: 35:24

I love that that shift in perspective. And if folks want to work with you one-to-one or face-to-face, what are the options for that that you have available?

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 35:35

Yeah, so again, you can visit my website at FOIFletherapy.com and you can click the book a consult, and I'm happy to talk with you for free 15 minutes to talk through my services or whether walk and like for folks who live in the Missouri area, Kansas area, I do offer in-person walk and talk or virtual sessions. If you're like a parent or a caregiver of someone of even an aging parent, right? And you're experiencing ambiguous loss.

April Snow: 36:00

Right.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 36:01

Right. Or anticipatory grief, right? That's a real I offer those sessions as well. That's 15 minutes. So yeah. And you can email me at Angelic at Foy Fletcher Therapy.com and Perfect. Yep, you'll see it in the notes.

April Snow: 36:16

Yep, I'll be sure to include that. So you have a variety of options for folks who are local to you, but also maybe who are around the country.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 36:25

Yep. And do workshops as well. I can customize and do virtual workshops on topics like grief and play therapy.

April Snow: 36:32

Perfect. I love it. Well, thank you so much again. I always appreciate connecting with you, Angelique.

Angelique Foye-Fletcher: 36:38

Yeah, thank you. This is wonderful.

April Snow: 36:47

Thanks so much for joining me and Angelique for today's conversation. I hope you will remember that it's okay to feel joy during times of loss, and that grief is more common than you think. Give yourself space to honor it. If you need support to process grief in any of its forms, join Angelique for one of her Rest and Rejuvenate virtual sessions, or work with her one-to-one. All details are at Foyer Fletcher Therapy.com, Foyer spelled F-O-Y-E. Links are also in the show notes. If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe to the Sensitive Stories podcast so you don't miss our upcoming conversations. Reviews and ratings are also helpful and appreciated. For behind the scenes content and more HSP resources, you can sign up for my email list or follow Sensitive Strengths on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube. Check out the show notes or sensitive stories.com for all the resources from today's episode. Thanks for listening.