Hi, person with psych degree here to remind you that there have been studies that prove that grief changes your brain, sometimes for years or even for life. This is ESPECIALLY bad during teenage years because your brain goes through so much change in that time (almost as much change as that happens during the first 3 years of life). So it’s especially impactful on behavior, mood, personality. The brain is already trying to process all the changes it’s going through, and then adding several major life stressors: death of a beloved parent, moving houses, having your surviving parent shut you out, having said parent pay a “life coach” to “fix” you basically, is seriously harmful.
Lydia’s still a child and children need ample opportunities to process the loss how they feel comfortable (although adults need this too). In Lydia’s case, she needed to talk about it and those needs weren’t being met, which made her grief worse.
She even goes through a lot of the 5 stages of grief:
Denial: “are you really in the ground? Cuz I feel you all around me”
Anger: many examples in the original post
Bargaining: trying to connect with her in any way possible, going to the netherworld to try to find her
Depression: her suicide attempts, mentioning wanting to die
Acceptance: the end (the one part in Jump in the Line where it’s the same melody as Dead Mom but the lyrics are more positive)
Anyway, I’m just trying to say that the writers created a realistic character who acts EXACTLY the way a child might act under those circumstances.
(Y’all better not say it’s not that deep or you can catch these hands)
