11th annual holiday grief column, similarly have had 11 friends with losses since around Thanksgiving. It appeared in The Times up until last year when I decided to blog due to the length.
DOES YOUR GRIEF FEEL LIKE A BROKEN ORNAMENT?
If you're grieving due to a recent loss, you may wonder how to get through the holidays and if mourning ever really ends. As time goes on, it will erupt less frequently. You can run from it, but you can't hide. And you shouldn't run from it.
Bono sang, “There is no end to grief . . . and there is no end to love.”
Grieving is a process, not an event, and there are no rewards for speed. Dose yourself in embracing the pain in this uncharted territory. You may go from acute to integrated or abiding grief (people think you are doing well), perhaps back to complicated grief (stuck in a black whirlpool). Someone said she was suspended in aspic and pushed along in a stream. It was as if someone had taken a can opener to her edges and rolled back her skin, exposing her insides to air and microbes and every other invasive thing. Her eyeballs and skin hurt when she went outside.
There will be a multitude of emotions, likely to come in waves. Grievers often use these words: Doleful. Debilitating. Lonely. Listless. Longing for what might have been. Raw. Gutted. Touchy. Bereft of hope. Heaviness. Heartache. Fear. Uncertainty. They say they have lost their cool, yelled, stomped, thrown up, thrown things, used a punching bag, drawn the blinds and wailed.
Grief doesn't come with a handbook. I've written this column for ten years and here is what I've learned from some well known names since last year's:
Sheryl Sandberg's childhood friend, who is now a rabbi, told her the most powerful one-line prayer he has ever read is: “Let me not die while I am still alive.” Sandberg says you can give in to the void, the emptiness that fills your heart, your lungs, constricts your ability to think or even breathe. Or you can try to find meaning. She said she lived 30 years in 30 days. "I am 30 years sadder. I feel like I am 30 years wiser."
One colleague admitted she’d been driving by Sandberg's house frequently, not sure if she should come in. Another said he was paralyzed when Sandberg was around, worried he might say the wrong thing. One of her favorite cartoons is an elephant in a room answering the phone, saying, “It’s the elephant.” Address the elephant and kick him out of the room.
Sandberg learned gratitude for every smile and hug and no longer takes every day for granted. When a friend told her he does not celebrate birthdays, she reminded him he was lucky to have each one.
Similarly, from Norman Cousins: Death is not the greatest loss in life. The greatest loss is what dies inside us while we live.
Mohegan Sun chief Bruce Two Dogs Bozsum on "Undercover Boss" admitted he can't get over his father's death after 25 years and still gets choked up.
Alfre Woodard was featured on "Who Do You Think You Are?" researching her ancestry and pouring libations for her deceased parents. This is a ritual for the dead.
Bob Baffert lost his father and mother not far apart from one another and during TV interviews he would play to them watching back home, pulling his son into the shot. Now, he is sad that there is nobody out there.
Dolly Parton thought she could die from her own grief over her baby brother, and felt all alone in a large family.
Those who have faced loss deal with empty beds. They recall the medicines, procedures, operations, doctors, hospitals or Hospice. They don't like cooking for one or seeing the favorite dress.
They may see pennies with special years and cars with the license plate one digit off of their loved one's. I read about someone who kept an old sock under the bed in a Ziploc to preserve her husband's smell, lined up all the gifts he gave her as a memorial display on her first birthday after his death, listened to his music that she didn't like and ate grilled cheese for a month. It was said that if you were happy, carefree and exuberant, that would be abnormal. Some people may think what she did is.
Journal what you miss, feel, see beauty in, have become, find difficult, wish your family knew, wish you could say, what you have learned, what you are thankful for, what you want to remember and forget, when you smile, what you pretend to do and your deepest desire. Make a list of a few states of mind, attitudes or commodities that your loved one would want for you to attain. Write, talk, think, paint, dance. You must express yourself.
Write yourself a letter like you would to a friend who is grieving, not that anyone does this anymore. How would you comfort and encourage him? Now substitute yourself for that friend. You are worthy of those words. Keep writing if necessary. Avoid thinking you are so strong or solid that you don't need help. Make appointments with yourself to do this if need be. If you don't want to do something, say you have to check your calendar even though it may be your "movie appointment."
One lady who had to say goodbye to her stillborn baby before barely saying hello wrote words to help other mothers in similar losses. She said healing crept in after she found ways that she could share her story.
It helps for grievers to receive condolence calls and letters that contain messages of encouragement, love and hope. People get so hurt when they don't receive acknowledgement in this day of easy contact--texts, Facebook and online obituaries. I'm still trying to not harbor a grudge regarding the professional, well-educated people who ignored me after my father died in 2005 and my mother in 2007 . Death and grief can cause us to re-write our address books in more ways than one.
I've read that one-third of people will turn out to be truly empathetic helpers. Another will be neutral in their response to your grief. And the final will be harmful in your efforts to heal. It may not be intentional, but they may judge your timeline or anhedonia.
Hopefully, the right people will come forth to help you reach resolution, recovery, reestablishment, reconstitution and reorganization on the grief journey.
In a beautiful devotional on pain during the holidays by a lady named Ellie, she says the first step should be to focus on the true meaning of Christmas. Christ IS the reason we celebrate and the one from whom we draw comfort, hope and healing. The second step is to recognize the days are going to be tough emotionally, physically and at times, spiritually. Be realistic in your expectations, and don’t fight the added emotions or burdens. Accept them, let them come, and undergird yourself with prayer and dependence on God.
She said Psalm 10:14 reminds us again of His desire to comfort us; “But You, O God, do see trouble and grief; You consider it to take it in hand. The victim commits himself to You; You are the helper of the fatherless.”
God is going to deal with you exactly where you are and He will do it little by little, she wrote. You may not feel the differences, but they are happening because God promises He’s going to sustain you. He knows you inside and out—your struggles, your fears and your feelings.
Grieving people do not need to be fixed; they need prayers, hugs, kindness and compassion and a listening ear.
Other thoughts accumulated:
Read scriptures of comfort. Christians always have a reason to rejoice. Our hope is not in this world. I love the St. Paul's Episcopal Church funeral programs with artwork that says, "Transferred to the Church Triumphant."
Don't fake the tough outer shell.
Create a memorial garden.
Become an organ and tissue donor.
Make donations. One mother asked for money to be donated to a children's arts program in Treme because her son loved musical toys.
Light a fire in the barbecue pit and throw in reasons you are angry into the ashes.
Don't be stuck on the death date if you can help it.
Remember that your loved one has been untied, freed into eternal life. One of the Charleston church victim's relatives said everything he will do is because of his relative watching over him. After the Lafayette movie shooting, someone said, " If God had any sense, he would pick Jillian." Comments made during current events strike me. As do individual ones I see in various places. "My friend, I was in your shoes years ago. There is no doubt power in prayer, and the God we serve can and will deliver you. Trust and believe, and get ready to receive. In prayer I stand."
Appropriately, a friend's Morning Offering on the day of his brother-in-law's death was this inspirational quote. "If you suffer with Him, you will reign with Him. If you cry with Him, you will have joy with Him. If you die with Him on the cross of tribulation, you will possess the eternal dwelling place in the splendor of the saints. And your name, written in the book of life, will be glorious among men." — St. Clare of Assisi
Look around. Some action or statement will help you. You will catch your breath, regain your footing and new walk and forge your new identity.
You may be surprised by a wish you make in the bathtub for the soothing water to cleanse and absorb the loss, as one woman in Guideposts wrote. Her late mother loved the night, and then a comet appeared before her daughter that gave her joy and applause. Another woman wrote of seeing what had to be her late husband's hand on the bathroom mirror fog on the death anniversary and then his name on a boat on some pictures she took with her son.
Whether it's an airport gate or seat number, you may see some communication through numbers like 34, young Shreveporter George Cloutier's hockey number, said his father.
I'll end with this story from the Huffington Post. Finding a $20 bill at a Cracker Barrel in February 2014, 8-year-old Myles Eckert was reminded of a father killed weeks after he was born and gifted the bill to another customer, Lt. Col. Frank Dailey, with a hand-written note. "Dear Soldier -- my dad was a soldier. He's in heaven now. I found this 20 dollars in the parking lot when we got here. We like to pay it forward in my family. It's your lucky day! Thank you for your service. Myles Eckert, a gold star kid." Little did Myles know that his pay it forward gesture would ultimately touch millions of lives via reports in the media. Myles appeared on Ellen and visited with former President George W. Bush.
The loss is still palpable as he yearns for a father to nurture him, provide love and counsel, attend sporting events and enjoy decades of milestones together.
But in honor of their fallen hero, the Eckert family is now taking their humanitarian work to another level through their founding of the "Power of 20" non-profit organization. With the support of everyday citizens who have been moved by Myles' story, the Eckert family hopes to significantly expand their giving opportunities for charities and families facing obstacles nationwide. Most recently, they spearheaded an effort to provide a dying soldier his final wish of attending a Green Bay Packer playoff game. Only one week after his dream came to fruition, Sgt. Robert Monroy died from the cancer he acquired working the burn pits in Iraq.
Attending a funeral is challenging enough for most adults, but for a young boy who was thinking about the void left by his own father's passing, a funeral would be even tougher to bear. But Myles went. On their way home, he and his sister stopped for a pick-me-up ice cream sundae at the very same Cracker Barrel that inspired this unforeseen journey.
What will you do to help or honor those grieving? What's your 20?