“I wanna hold you close but never hold you back,
I’ll be the banks to your river”
- NEEDTOBREATHE, Banks
I lost two loved ones to cancer last month. The grief is like a flood that inundates immediately and then spreads out and wanes overtime. Picturing this in my mind, it looks like a river and its floodplain.
The floodplain is an area of land next to a river that allows the water to spread out when there’s too much of it and doesn’t fit in the riverbed. When a river spreads out into the floodplain, it slows the water’s flow and allows nutrients and sediment to drop out, cleaning the water. These nutrients left behind feed the soil. Fertile farmlands like the Red River Basin were built by the floodplains of the Red River and the remains of Lake Agassiz.
When there’s not a floodplain, for example – a ditch, the river shoots straight without slowing down or settling. It scours and erodes the riverbank, creating scars.
Where there’s a dam, it blocks the river flow and can trap things behind it like sediment and fish. These things can build up, but the water always wins. It needs to go somewhere. A river is most healthy when there are no blockages and it’s able to spread out in its floodplain.
Just like a floodplain near a riverbank, our friends and family buffer us from life’s floods. They allow us to spread out our grief and worries and expose them and let them settle out, slowing their flow. If we dam them up they spill out over the sides because they need to get released for us to be able to move forward. Other things get caught behind a damn too like taking care of ourselves and our own health. We can get stuck. Like a river, we are most healthy when there are no blockages, our emotions are flowing freely, and we have the support of family and friends.
Together with friends and family, I’ve been able to spread out and share the grief I’ve been feeling. Who are the banks to your river?
Moriya Rufer is a water quality professional with 20 years experience working with lakes in northern Minnesota.
Rivers Playlist
- Banks, NEEDTOBREATH
- River, Jason Isbell
- The River, Garth Brooks
- River, Leon Bridges
- River, Joni Mitchell
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