Ep #318: How Black-and-White Thinking Can Hijack Life After Loss

Welcome to The Widowed Mom Podcast, Episode 318: How Black-and-White Thinking Can Hijack Life After Loss.

Welcome to The Widowed Mom Podcast, the only podcast that offers a proven process to help you work through your grief, to grow, evolve, and create a future you can truly look forward to. Here’s your host, Master Certified life coach, grief expert, widow, and mom, Krista St-Germain.

Hey there, welcome to another episode of the podcast. Today, we’re talking about black-and-white thinking. Something that might be showing up in your grief experience without you even realizing it. And we’re going to cover what it actually is, where it might come from, how it could influence the way that you think about grief and healing and even your identity, and why shifting to a more flexible kind of thinking, what I call “and” thinking, can be so powerful. 

And this is not about getting it perfect or fixing your thoughts; there’s no such thing. It’s about noticing patterns that might be adding unnecessary suffering and giving yourself permission to see things in a new way.

Before we jump in, a little update from my neck of the woods. It has been some wild weather in these parts this last week. I got… awaken? Woken? English. 3:30 in the morning on Monday night, I had to go to the bathroom and then I got this notice that said 90-mile-per-hour winds were on the way. And I had my youngest’s car parked in the garage. The second car garage was all full of stuff that I’ve been using to work on the house. Ran out there in my pajamas, moved all the stuff in the garage, got the car in, moved all the lawn furniture. It was wild. My neighbor’s lawn furniture ended up flying off their second balcony deck into my yard. All kinds of tree limbs down.

Fortunately, I had just trimmed a bunch of my trees. My dad and I had been working pretty hard to make the trees look better, and so a lot of the dead branches were already gone, but wow, still so many. And limbs, trees down everywhere. It was wild. And then it did something similar the next day, not as bad, but. So that’s been kind of wild. And of course, I had scheduled pictures to be taken of the house because I’m listing it. And I had scheduled those pictures for Friday, and wouldn’t you know that a storm would roll in Monday night and then again on Tuesday. Makes for interesting trying to get your lawn to look nice, but it’s done.

Pictures were taken. Video looks amazing. Technology is fantastic, what they can do. So I’m really happy with the way that it all turned out and, perfect segue into this episode, also so incredibly sad to watch the video that they made on the house. So proud that it looks as good as it does, and also so sad because a part of me really hates to leave this house. Another part of me, probably we would call that my higher self, knows that it is the right decision, but God, it is so hard. And I’m just being honest about that.

So, first showing was today, just happened, kind of caught me off guard, but it looks like it went really well, and I’m just letting myself have feelings about that. I also may or may not have spied on the people visiting the house with my Nest camera. I’m not above that. But they seemed really pleased with it, so things are off to a good start.

Okay. Black-and-white thinking. This is something that I have struggled with. In fact, the reason I decided to do this episode was because a black-and-white pattern was brought to my attention by someone coaching me on Friday. I didn’t even see this black and white pattern. And I know that I tend to have a lot of black-and-white thinking. And of course, I’ve coached people with a lot of black-and-white thinking, but I’ve never really talked about it on the podcast. So, what is black-and-white thinking?

Black-and-white thinking is often referred to as a cognitive distortion. And there’s a long list of cognitive distortions, and that term comes from cognitive behavioral therapy. But cognitive distortions are patterns of thinking that tend to be exaggerated, rigid, or unhelpful. They’re not wrong, necessarily. It’s not about right or wrong, but they are worth noticing because they can really color how we interpret what we’re experiencing, especially when we’re in pain.

Black-and-white thinking is also called all-or-nothing thinking. And it’s when our brain really frames things into extremes or opposites. So there’s this or that, right? I’m either doing really well or I’m falling apart, doing amazing or I’m a hot mess. I’m crying every day or I’m totally over it. If I’m laughing, then I’m disrespecting their memory, right? There’s no room for nuance with black-and-white thinking. It simplifies complex experiences into very tidy categories.

But what do we know about grief? Grief is not tidy. We know this. And trying to make it tidy can actually make things harder on us. So, why does black-and-white thinking happen after loss? I can’t say that I honestly know, but I have some suspicions. I have some theories.

So a couple of my theories. One, brains like certainty. Humans like certainty. After the chaos of loss, black-and-white thinking can create that illusion of control, that structure, rules to follow, certainty. If I believe there’s a right way to grieve or a clean way to think about something, it’s this or that, then that can feel safer than sitting with ambiguity.

Also, grief is overwhelming, emotionally overwhelming, physically overwhelming, cognitively overwhelming. And when everything feels heightened and unfamiliar, the brain might try to reduce that overwhelm by simplifying things into this or that. Right? So partially, I think we like certainty, I think grief is overwhelming. 

And then lastly, we might have internalized some thinking patterns culturally, from our family, from our faith organization. They can come from a variety of places, right? But we might have internalized some ways of thinking that reinforce those black-and-white thoughts, those black-and-white frameworks. And so that could be messages about strength or motherhood, what it means to move forward or even what it means to be a good partner or a good wife.

So, when the brain offers thoughts like, “If I miss them, I must not be ready to live again.” If I miss them, I must be doing grief right or wrong, right? “If I feel better, that must mean I’m forgetting them.” If this, then that. Right? It’s one or the other. Then it can be, I think, our brain’s way of trying to make sense of something that’s really complex, but in a way that uses a pretty limited toolkit.

And what I want you to hear is that those thoughts, all thoughts really, but black-and-white thoughts aren’t facts. They’re just sentences in your brain, in your mind. And when we believe those thoughts without question, we will start to collect evidence to support them. That is how our brain works. Our brain filters all the data that’s around us, right? Because we can’t process it all, and interprets it to match what we already believe. 

It’s called confirmation bias. I’ve talked about this on the podcast before. But we end up reinforcing the very black and white thought patterns that might be keeping us stuck because we’re thinking them, our brain is looking for evidence of how they’re true, they’re being reinforced, and then it’s difficult to see something any other way. So it’s self-reinforcing.

So in real life, we might be kind of harsh on ourselves with black-and-white thinking or harsh on others with black-and-white thinking. So if I’m not grieving the way other people expect or if I’m not doing it the way they think that I should be doing it, then I must be doing it wrong. Their expectations equals wrong. If I feel joy, I must not have loved them enough. If I don’t cry on the death anniversary or if I cry too much on the death anniversary, then something’s wrong with me. If I want companionship, I’m moving on too fast. Right? If I never want to date again, then I’m broken. Something’s wrong with me. It’s “this means that.”

And it’s not that these thoughts are always obvious either, because sometimes they’re very subtle. And this is why I wanted to talk about it, because it was brought to my attention that I was having some black-and-white thinking. That black-and-white thinking was sitting underneath a decision I was about to make. Very much altering my experience of that decision, altering the way that I was approaching that decision, would have, if not caught, altered the way that I made that decision.

And so I was so grateful that it was pointed out to me, and this is one of the many reasons that I’m a huge fan of coaching, right? Is because sometimes we can’t see our own thoughts. It feels so real to us when we’re in it that we can’t actually see it as optional. It did not occur to me until a coach pointed it out that my thinking was black and white. And when I saw it, hmm, right? My awareness went up, and I realized, “Oh, I do not want that thought to drive the car. No, that is actually really going to make this decision challenging.” And it also amazed me a little bit because I had been thinking that thought for a while, and the fact that it was so black and white and it was so obvious to me once someone showed it to me kind of blew my mind a little bit.

So, it’s important that we notice our black-and-white thinking. If we don’t notice it, we can be making decisions from that way of thinking. We can judge ourselves really harshly. We can miss opportunities for connection, for growth, even for joy. We can stay in this loop of questioning, doubting, overanalyzing, right? And all of this adds suffering on top of our grief, on top of the pain that is already there. And so I think our awareness around black-and-white thinking really matters.

Also, not so we can eliminate these thoughts. We’re not going to be able to eliminate thoughts, but we do want to be able to see them as thoughts. We do want to be able to recognize them when they show up as optional, things that we don’t have to choose to think anymore. That’s what happened to me on Friday. I was like, “Oh, I don’t have to believe that anymore. I can make space for nuance. I can find how the way that I was thinking about that particular thing is actually a spectrum. It’s not one or the other. It’s a spectrum.” And I was making it black and white.

And this is where “and” thinking can become a really powerful tool. And “and” thinking, which I’ve talked about on the podcast before, is really just the idea that we can allow multiple, seemingly contradictory truths to coexist. I can be happy and sad. I can miss them deeply and want a full, beautiful life. I can feel lonely and still enjoy a moment of peace. I can cry in the morning and laugh in the afternoon. Right? We talked about grief a couple of episodes ago. I can grieve and feel grateful. Both can coexist. I can want love again and still carry them with me, right? We’re making use of two opposing ideas and allowing them to coexist peacefully together.

“And” thinking makes room for our humanity, our full humanity. It creates space. It softens judgment. It gives us options. And I’m not saying that it means that if we embrace “and” thinking and we get rid of black-and-white thinking or don’t have so many black and white stories that are driving the car, that we won’t ever feel uncertain or uncomfortable. Yes, we still will. 

Sometimes “and” thinking is harder than black-and-white thinking because it can require us to hold the tension that exists. But I want to offer that tension is where growth happens. And that tension is where compassion is fostered. And that tension is sometimes where you can begin to step into the next version of yourself that you want to become. “And” thinking is challenging and also expansive.

So, here’s what I want to leave you with today. Black-and-white thinking is very common in grief. There’s nothing wrong with you if you’re doing it. And it can create unnecessary suffering if you don’t recognize it. Noticing it is powerful. We don’t need to change all of the black-and-white thinking. We want to be able to notice it and diffuse from it. Coaching can help you notice it. It helps me and has helped me many times, and it is something I see in clients all the time.

If you use “and” thinking, it’s not going to fix your grief. That’s not a thing. We don’t fix grief because grief isn’t a problem. But it can expand what is possible for you inside of your grief, in your human life. So, you are allowed to feel conflicted. You are allowed to hold a paradox. You are a human, after all. And I hope that really helps you. If you notice yourself thinking about something in black and white ways, ask yourself, how could there be more than two possibilities here? Where is the spectrum? Where is the space for more than just this or that?

And if you want help spotting the thoughts that are keeping you stuck, whether they are black and white or otherwise, then that is one of the many things we do inside of Mom Goes On. So, you can learn more about that by going to CoachingWithKrista.com, clicking on the Work With Me tab, and you will learn all about it there. 

All right. That’s what I have for you this week. Remember, I love you. You’ve got this. Take care, and I’ll see you next week.

If you like what you’ve been hearing on this podcast and want to create a future you can truly get excited about even after the loss of your spouse, I invite you to join my Mom Goes On coaching program. It’s small group coaching just for widowed moms like you where I’ll help you figure out what’s holding you back and give you the tools and support you need so you can move forward with confidence. 

Please don’t settle for a new normal that’s less than what you deserve. Go to coachingwithkrista.com and click Work With Me for details and next steps. I can’t wait to meet you.