Strange grief

Processing my feelings about my co-worker Al's death has turned out to be somewhat strange. He started work at the company about two months before I did, so we worked together for the better part of ten years. However, we didn't work in the same department, and I never got to know him beyond work either. In fact, whenever we interacted it often struck me that we were polar opposites in many ways. He was outgoing, stylish, and apparently an absolute riot at parties, while I'm a mousy introvert who's not great at socialising. While our interactions were always friendly, I never really felt that we "vibed" - which is totally fine, by the way.

When we got the news of his passing though, I cried. It was just an awful situation all around, plus my waterworks get going quite easily - you bet they were going to do their thing when something of this magnitude happens! I was sitting next to another co-worker who was pretty much best friends with Al and was naturally hit the hardest by the news, so we leaned in on each other and cried together.

I now get the impression that this has signalled to everyone else on the team than I'm more affected than I really am (since I wasn't really that close to him) - which leads to this weird feeling of "not being sad enough" and somehow "doing it wrong". I know that line of thought is absolute insanity to go down, as everyone experiences these things differently and grief is not a freaking competition, but that doesn't necessarily stop my brain from doing its thing, even as I am sad and will miss Al.