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Good Grief\\u2014Featuring Mike Christensen

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Mikes\' beloved friend, Kris Yip, word-ranked bicyclist who suddenly and tragically died.

Mikes\' beloved dog and best friend, Josie, who died the day before the podcast was recorded

In today\\u2019s podcast we feature one of our favorite people, Mike Christensen. Mike is a Certified Level 5 Master TEAM CBT Therapist and Trainer, and is the Director Feeling Good Institute, Canada.

Mike is a Registered Clinical Counsellor with the British Columbia Association of Clinical Counsellors and holds a Master of Arts in Counselling Psychology degree. His diverse background in business, community organizations, and family support roles has provided Mike with a wide array of experience in leadership, administration, parenting training, and team building.

He provides advanced level online training with the Feeling Good Institute for therapists around the world and is currently co-authoring a book with Maor Katz on Deliberate Practice of TEAM-CBT. Mike specializes in treating depression and anxiety, with experience and training in addictions, PTSD, and relationship challenges.

Today, Mike comes to us today with a personal issue, grief and loss. The day before the recording Mike\\u2019s beloved dog, Josie, died, and this came on the heels of the death of one his best friends, Kris Yip, a month earlier. Kris had died suddenly and unexpectedly at the age of 47. Kris was 7 or 8 years younger than Mike, and appeared to be the perfect example of health and fitness, so his loss was an unexpected and devastating punch in the gut.

Mike explained that Kris was a celebrity in the bicycling community. He was the Canadian national champion and war ranked 59^th in the world. However, he was humble and never promoted himself. Instead, he always focused on others, encouraging even those who were just beginners.

Mike has also been a competitive bicyclist, and Kris had invited Mike to join an online racing team consisting of four friends who got together daily on stationary bikes linked by videos on the internet so they could talk while biking.

In January of 2023, while riding, Kris\\u2019s heart suddenly stopped. A friend of Kris called Mike to say, \\u201cKris is gone!\\u201d This was devastating to Mike, who said: \\u201cHe was the fittest of our group. The impact was profound.\\u201d He had trouble sleeping and was in disbelief. He said, \\u201cIt felt surreal. It felt like something is wrong. He told himself, \\u201cI should be able to keep it together without falling apart.\\u201d Mike also told himself that Kris, was too young to go, and missed him tremendously.

Mike thought of Kris\\u2019s mom, and how much she was suffering, so he spent a week with Kris\\u2019 family and friends in Prince George. Which was where Mike was born, and his brother and his other biking\\xa0buddies live.\\xa0 He said, \\u201cWe cried together and were together.\\u201d

He explained, \\u201cWhenever I got on my bike to ride, Kris was always there. He\\u2019d always say, \\u2018Let\\u2019s ride.\\u2019 I miss his voice.\\u201d

He also said that during his rides, you could see Kris\\u2019 face on the video feed, and he was always struggling, digging deep, suffering, but loving it!

Mike said that all of his losses, including his sister, his son, and Kris,\\xa0 were actually double losses, because \\u201cI lost not only what had been, but what was to come in the future, and didn\\u2019t.\\u201d

Mike said, \\u201cKris was so humble, so I want to brag for him. He always cared and made all of us feel so encourage and inspired!\\u201d

Mike mentioned some of the positives he saw in the pain of grief:

• It honors the depth of the love and the depth of our relationship with Kris.

• Our grief has motivated us to cherish our riding group and to cling together even more closely.

• Tears can be the purest form of love.

• Tears allow us to keep the other person alive in our hearts and minds.

I mentioned how I talk to three people I\\u2019ve lost every day when I do my \\u201cslogging:\\u201d my beloved cat Obie, and two dear colleagues I\\u2019ve lost, Ann Hantz in Philadelphia and Marilyn Coffy from Oakland.

Mike described how touched he was when visiting Kris\\u2019 family, and how his mom had arranged all of Kris\\u2019 bicycles in the garage, ready to be ridden, with all of his racing jerseys on display.

Mike confessed that also felt angry and often thought: \\u201cYou bugger. It\\xa0 should have been someone else!\\u201d

Mike has endured many tragic losses in his life, including the devastating death of his older sister when he was just 15, and the tragic loss of his son, Graeme Michael, who died shortly before birth.

Mike reminded us about the various conceptualizations we use in TEAM-CBT, which can include individual mood problems (like depression or anxiety), personal relationship problems, habits and addictions, and \\u201cnon-problems.\\u201d A non-problem refers to people who do not have distorted negative thoughts or problems that need to be solved\\u2014they just have strong and appropriate negative feelings, and the job of the therapist is simple: resist trying to \\u201chelp,\\u201d and instead use the Five Secrets of Effective Communication to listen and give the grieving person the chance to vent and expression their feelings.

With this in mind, Mike described the support he received from colleagues at the Feeling Good Institute, including one who told him to make sure he was feeling sad! He greatly appreciated this!

In my clinical experience, \\u201cnon-problems\\u201d were actually rare, but there were several patients who only needed to vent and receive support. one of my favorite chapters In my first book, Feeling Good, was Chapter 3. entitled Sadness is not Depression. I described my experience as a medical student with a terminally ill elderly man in the Stanford Hospital who reminded me of my grandfather. His extended family had gathered around the bedside as he was slipping into a coma from liver failure due to metastatic kidney cancer, and asked \\u201cWould it be okay for you to remove his catheter? It was a bit uncomfortable for him, and we\\u2019re not sure if he still needs it.\\u201d

I was very inexperienced and asked at the nursing station if it would be okay to remove it, and if so, how would I do it. They said he was, in fact, dying, and would not last much longer, and explained how to remove the catheter.

I pulled the curtain around his bed, and did that and told the family, with tears in my eyes, \\u201cHe can still hear you, but not for much longer, so it\\u2019s time to tell him how much you love him and say goodbye.\\u201d

Tears were flowing down my cheeks and they began to cry as well, and began saying good bye. I went to the room where the medical students and resident make their notes, and wept.

The family later told the department chairman how much they appreciated what I did for them. I was a pretty terrible medical student, and for the most part had a bad attitude, but that was on moment I still feel very proud of.

There are several differences between sadness and depression. First, the thoughts that trigger depression, like \\u201cI\\u2019m defective. There must be something wrong with me,\\u201d are distorted. Depression, as I\\u2019ve often said, is the world\\u2019s oldest con. In contrast, Mike\\u2019s thoughts, like the thoughts that trigger healthy grief, are not distorted, like \\u201cI miss Kris. I admired him and loved him, and he made a tremendous difference in my life, and the lives of all who knew him.\\u201d

Second, depression can go on and on endlessly. I\\u2019ve had patients who told me that they\\u2019d never had even one happy moment in their entire lives.

Healthy grief, in contrast, only needs to be accepted and expressed, and runs its course naturally, If grief is extended, or impairing the person\\u2019s life, then it\\u2019s a certainty that distorted thoughts are present and preventing the person from healthy grieving. In this case, treatment can be enormously helpful.

Finally, depression robs us of joy, hope, and productivity. Life often seems meaningless and worthless. Grief, in contrast, though painful, enriches us and provides us with a deeper level of meaning and gratitude for life.

Rhonda and I are very sad for Mike\\u2019s many losses, now and in the past as well. But we are both grateful to have him as a friend, and cherish him tremendously.

Thank you, Mike, for letting us in today!

Warmly,

Mike, Rhonda and David

Following the session, I emailed Mike to ask a couple questions about peoples\\u2019 names, and also find out if we might have perhaps let him down during the podcast, not given him enough space to grieve, and so forth. When I get worried about things like that, I have found that checking it out usually beats \\u201cMind-Reading\\u201d by a pretty huge margin.

Here\\u2019s the wonderful email that Mike sent. It will give you a deeper view of his inner warmth and depth.

Hi David,

Thank you for your kind words. I experienced\\xa0our time together\\xa0as deeply\\xa0moving and came out of it with a renewed\\xa0sense of purpose\\xa0in the sadness. I guess my hope was that we might be able to illustrate and share\\xa0the value in empathy and the positive reframe\\xa0in our grief\\xa0work. That was enhanced to a new level for me with the way you guided me to explore\\xa0some aspects I had missed. I wouldn\'t change a thing\\xa0about it.

It also opened up the way in which your stories\\xa0and the journey\\xa0we go on with clients can provide\\xa0healing for others. I am so grateful\\xa0that you were willing to take that time to revisit\\xa0them.

Our son\'s name was Graeme Michael. He was in between\\xa0our oldest (Thomas now 25) and our middle daughter (Janae now 22). We (my wife Janna and I) never had the opportunity to hear his voice or see him smile. We were informed\\xa0that it\\xa0was a chord\\xa0accident. Janna knew something\\xa0was wrong\\xa0and an ultrasound confirmed that she would have to deliver\\xa0him knowing he was already gone. The first time we held him was also the last. Whenever\\xa0people ask me how many children I have I say 3 (Thomas, Janae & Caelyn -19\\xa0 & you will\\xa0meet\\xa0soon)\\xa0 but in my mind\\xa0it is always 4. Thank you for asking.

My wife Janna is a nurse and the director of a pregnancy\\xa0outreach program. She has been blessed with the opportunity to work with at-risk pregnant\\xa0moms and young\\xa0families for 17 years and our experience has brought\\xa0incredible\\xa0connection\\xa0and support to so many (I also worked there\\xa0for 7 years part time with the young\\xa0dads). While we would never wish our journey\\xa0on anyone, the suffering of loss has given us insight, motivation, inspiration, understanding and opportunities that we would never have without it. The sadness\\xa0has deep purpose and meaning and continues to be an expression of our love for Graeme and all the young families\\xa0we meet.

Mike