Secondhand Therapy | Ep. 109: "When Grief Finds You - Grief Part III"

Podcast: Secondhand Therapy
Hosts: Louie Paoletti & Michael Malone
Date: November 24, 2025

Episode Overview

In this episode, Louie and Michael take a deep, candid dive into the complexities of grief and emotional processing, focusing especially on how the past and loss can resurface unexpectedly. Both hosts reflect on personal experiences with grief—Louie talks about losing his partner, while Michael unpacks his longstanding struggles with layered and unprocessed bereavement. The conversation is raw, self-aware, and at times combative but always underpinned by humor and vulnerability.

Theme:
How grief resurfaces unexpectedly, the nuanced differences in how people process loss, and the messy, nonlinear path toward emotional healing.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Differentiating Dream Processing and Meaning in Grief

• Dreams as Subconscious Processing:

  • Louie's stance: Dreams about deceased loved ones don't necessarily hold profound meaning; often, people are searching for significance that may not exist.

  • Michael points out the value of sometimes leaning into the emotional resonance of dreams, even if it’s just for comfort or insight.

    "When you dream of the dead, you want it to mean a visit or a connection... I'm not saying there's a blanket statement. I just don't know if I believe that."
    — Louie (11:03)

    "What if, instead of writing it off, you looked into it? You weren't even going to bring this up to your therapist."
    — Michael (12:22)

• Dream Example:

  • Louie recounts a dream set in a western saloon where he visited his late partner. Her father (who’s still living) was present and taking care of her, mirroring dynamics from real life after her passing.

  • Michael interprets this as meaningful, tying the dream’s details to real-world circumstances and unresolved roles.

    "For me, that's connection in the dream that has meaning in real life. Maybe it doesn't help you with resolve, but it's definitely connected..."
    — Michael (21:22)

2. Grief Acceptance vs. Lingering Pain

• Louie’s Journey:

  • He feels he’s accepted his partner’s death and is no longer angry about it; the real pain resides in actions or words from when she was alive.

    "I feel that I have accepted her death... It is a really sad, unfortunate thing that happened and there's nothing I could have done to change it."
    — Louie (15:36)

• Pain from the Living Past:

  • The most acute wounds are from unresolved conflicts or behaviors during the person's life, not from their actual loss.

    "The pain and the anger that I have with regards to her are things that happened when she was alive."
    — Louie (17:07)

3. The Nature of Moving Forward

• Emotional Debate:

  • Louie urges Michael to consider “moving forward” instead of “living for the dead,” arguing that holding onto grief becomes its own burden.

  • Michael shares the challenge of facing “a mountain” of accumulated and unprocessed grief, much of which began in childhood and was only fully recognized when life slowed down during the pandemic.

    "You live for the dead. I got tired of doing that. That's all I'm saying. It's not an insult. It's an observ[ation]."
    — Louie (44:03)

    "There's a giant pile of grief starting since I was ten. I never learned how to process that grief as a child. So then we flashforward to adulthood..."
    — Michael (42:08)

Metaphor for Grief: The Weightlifting Bench

• Michael likens his struggle with grief to lifting enormous weights at the gym, while Louie has a much lighter barbell—Louie suggests trying new ways to move the weight instead of fixating on lifting it the “right” way.

  "You're trying one way to move it, and it's not moving. What if you tried a different way?"
  — Louie (48:05)

  "I'm also at the gym...but it's, there's a pile of weight here..."
  — Michael (46:15)

4. When Grief Finds You

• Spontaneous Emotional Triggers:

  • Michael recounts being overcome by grief at Whole Foods when Christmas music, food smells, and a stranger calling for her son reminded him of his mother.

    "Sometimes it just finds you—I was at Whole Foods...I started crying and I had to get out of there. That is it finding me. I wasn't searching for it."
    — Michael (51:20)

• Avoidance vs. Feeling Through:

  • Louie challenges Michael’s tendency to “change the song” in moments of pain, suggesting that sitting with discomfort is a muscle that needs exercise.

    "How do you expect to learn to lift 300 pounds if you don't even try to lift 5?"
    — Louie (53:53)

5. Processing "Safe Passage" of Memories

• Louie shares his therapist’s advice: when painful memories can pass through without overwhelming emotional or physical reactions, that’s a sign substantial progress has happened in healing.

  "If your brain or your...body can have that memory arrive and not have a large emotional or physical reaction...then you've done a pretty good job of working through it."
  — Louie (54:59)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments (Timestamps)

• On Dream Interpretation

  • "The dream...would drive other conversation related to the trauma of my last partner's death. It wasn't to read into the metaphors." — Louie (08:14)
  • "What if you looked into it? Like, you weren't even going to bring this up to your therapist." — Michael (12:22)

• On Accepting Loss

  • "I truly feel like I've accepted it...There's nothing I could have done to change it." — Louie (15:36)
  • "It's still sad, but it's okay." — Louie (16:36)

• On Carrying the Past

  • "One of us has a little trouble leaving the past behind, and one of us doesn't. I don't think that's a coincidence." — Louie (21:27)

• On Grief Accumulating

  • "It's been a part of my life and I've had to deal with and carry and never really taught how to process..." — Michael (32:45)

• Grief & Moving Forward

  • "You live for the dead. I got tired of doing that." — Louie (44:03)
  • "I don't know if I've consciously [decided] it's important to move forward." — Michael (43:58)

• Metaphor, Weightlifting and Grief

  • "You're trying one way to move it, and it's not moving. What if you tried a different way?" — Louie (48:05)
  • "There's a pile of weight here...I'm trying to lift weights..." — Michael (46:15)

• On Avoidance and Sitting with Emotion

  • "How do you expect to learn to lift 300 pounds if you don't even try to lift 5?" — Louie (53:53)
  • "I don't like that." — Michael (54:01)

• Learning to Let Memories Pass

  • "If [memories of grief] get safe passage through your system ... then you've done a pretty good job of working through it." — Louie (54:59)

Key Segments & Timestamps

• [07:47] Therapy and Dream Interpretation
• [14:16] Acceptance of Partner's Death & Shifting Grief Focus
• [17:07] Living with Regrets from the Living, Not the Dead
• [21:09] Analyzing Dream Details and Their Possible Significance
• [29:08, 32:06] Debate: Connecting Dream Elements to Past and Moving Forward
• [35:42] Grief Pile-up & Realization During the Pandemic
• [46:05] Extended Weightlifting Metaphor for Grief Processing
• [51:14] When Grief Finds You in Everyday Life
• [54:01, 54:59] Reflections on Avoiding Pain and Letting Memories Pass

Tone and Dynamic

The tone is honest, probing, and sometimes tense, but leavened throughout with humor and warmth typical of close friends who know one another deeply. Louie’s approach is more pragmatic and challenging, while Michael’s is emotional, reflective, and cautious. Their contrasting approaches provide a fuller spectrum of grieving experiences and showcase how difficult, vulnerable, and interpersonal the healing journey can be.

Summary Takeaways

• Grief is highly individual, messy, and never truly finished; the past can reappear unbidden.
• The way people try to assign meaning (or not) to dreams about the dead reflects their broader approach to processing loss.
• Moving forward from grief doesn’t mean forgetting; it means allowing memories to pass without lingering pain.
• Supporting someone in grief means accepting their method—even if it doesn’t match your own.
• Sometimes all you can do is sit with the discomfort, and that's when true healing begins.