Many of us feel uncomfortable around people who are grieving. We want to cheer them up but don’t know how. In February, I wrote about how one friend comforted another by cleaning her house. Below, you’ll learn another option.
“She lived a long, full life.”
It was one of those pat things that people say when trying to comfort the grieving.
In some respects, it was true. Kathleen’s mother had lived to 91, a full 15 years longer than the average person.
Yet, those words did little to remove the pain. Her mother had dementia, and the final three years of the disease were brutal. Plus, Kathleen had lost her sister two years before her mother—and her father seven years before her sister.
“I felt very alone,” says Kathleen. “It wasn’t just about my mom leaving. It was about my family being gone.”
Kathleen (right) with her mother, Dorothy (left).
Then, a friend reached out.
Decades before, Ronnie had lost her father. She knew the pain of grief, along with helpful expressions like, “he’s better off now” and “at least he’s out of his pain and misery.” Ever since she’d been thinking about better ways to console the grieving.
So, rather than offer advice or try to cheer Kathleen up, Ronnie asked her to lunch, suggesting Kathleen bring photos of her mother and share her favorite stories about her.
“I wanted to honor the person who had passed and my friend who was grieving,” says Ronnie. “In sharing these stories, the person lives again. I think that’s incredibly important.”
In the days leading up to the lunch, Kathleen worried.
Would she cry the whole time?
Nonetheless, she persevered. On the day of the lunch, she brought the photo book she’d made for her mother’s memorial service, along with other pictures. As Kathleen described the backstory of various photographs, Ronnie asked follow-up questions.
Her mother had been a feminist who’d grown up very poor, Kathleen explained.
“She identified with marginalized people. Her best friends in high school lived in a Japanese internment camp during WWII,” Kathleen said.
The family lived in Milford in southern Delaware. That’s where Kathleen’s mother started the first integrated Girl Scout troop. When Kathleen went to college, her mother went back to school for nursing, against the wishes of her husband. She eventually got a nursing job in Northern Virginia. A year later, her husband quit his job so he could move to Virginia to live with her.
That was just the beginning.
Kathleen mentioned that her mother loved camping and cats and that she had a crazy, dry sense of humor. As Kathleen talked, the more recent memories of her mother with dementia began to fade, allowing her to feel more in touch with memories of her mother before the disease had set in.
“A lot of times, people tell you they are sorry. Or they tell you about someone they lost and how hard it was. But they don’t ask you about that person. It helped me process so much. Focusing on those experiences helped me shake the memories of dementia mom from my head, allowing me to remember the mother who’d been there for most of my life,” says Kathleen.
The lunch lasted two hours. Afterward, Kathleen felt unburdened and less alone. It was as if someone else knew and remembered her mother, too.
Advice for Others
Know that only some people want to talk. It can take time to be ready to open up, smile, or laugh, says Ronnie.
Keep checking in on people. Many people express condolences in the days or weeks after someone has passed away. Grief, however, knows no timeline, says Kathleen. Many people continue to feel a deep sense of loss for many months or years.
Avoid making it about you. Avoid sharing your own stories of loss. This isn’t the time for that. Keep your friend at the center of the conversation, says Ronnie.
Use photos. They help spark memories. Also, ask questions like, “What were they like?” and “What are your favorite memories?”
Finally, Ronnie says, “Try to find the light in people. It can take longer to find in some people, but you can always find it.”
Once you see it, it can help you feel more positive and relaxed about the experience, she says.