"One day you'll learn how to grieve" part 2

Because of how I was raised, it has caused me to bury my feelings of distress. I've gotten so good at compartmentalizing that I can actually carry on a normal conversation as if everything is right in the world after being told my aunt is dead, my grandmother's dying, and I need surgery. Believe me, I've done it...just last week in fact.
Of course I know this isn't healthy, that I need to process and work through things but let me submit this to you: have you ever wondered if you learned how to grieve?
When you lost someone in your family, did you band together to talk, to cry, to remember?
Well, in my family...that just didn't happen. I never learned how to process anything and after a while it seemed as though each attempt I made to do so, something bad, something worse, would befall me or my family and I was back to square one.

With years of this process continuing it's no shock that I've got alot of issues dealing with things.
I suck with change of any kind, in many cases small changes can make me feel out of control and as if the world is falling down around me. In most cases I just withdraw don't speak to anyone, emotionally, everything begins to feel numb and as if I don't exist. Sometimes I find relief in going out and drinking with friends, sometimes I focus on working obsessively, sometimes I read for hours even days on end (to the point of avoiding sleep just to finish "one more chapter"), sometimes sleeping is all I can manage to do. I withdraw until the storm passes, then, I get up, go to work, and go back to things as normal.
One would think with all the therapy I've had over the years I'd be better at coping and processing, but no. I'm not very well equipped to deal with things, which, if you talk to MAC she'll tell you alll about it. She's a fighter who's kick ass mentality often stops the hemorrhaging and asks questions later. I wish sometimes I was more like Eve, connected and sure of what I need to do or say, to have instincts like hers but because we're split I can only attempt to learn from her, from them.
I know there are 7 stages of grief, I don't know what they are, but as pathetic as this sounds I intend to read a book about it so I can attempt to work through the trauma in my life which is not limited to those who've recently died, nor is it limited to death at all. Every single day of my life I want to live for something, I want to become the person I was born to be, and I want to be strong and healthy from the inside out. It's a goal with which I'll set my heart to, to force myself to move forward while dealing with the past. I know it's going to hurt, I know the alters will be part of it, but I also know that the only way I can become the person I'm supposed to is by unraveling who I've been, why, where, and who has been involved in my life, touched it, poisoned it, and uplifted it. To be this incredibly open and savagely honest is probably the scariest thing I've ever attempted to do since everything inside of me tells me to run, to hide, to preserve my semblance of a life. But a small part of me knows that change is breaking through, that I'm ready to commit myself to breaking down the walls I've surrounded myself in, if only block by block. I have no idea who I'll become at the end of this, who I believe I'm going to be...maybe that's the scariest part? Regardless of the risks of which there are many, I'm ready to do the work, tirelessly, until I have healed myself from the past.
I know that the alters will play an integral role in taking this journey because certainly I'm far from alone. I hope they offer their support, their knowledge, experience, their memories, everything I need to propel me forward.
I can feel the storm descending.
-Divided Mind-