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By Donna Douglas |
It's a long journey between finding out that somebody important to you is dead, and saying goodbye. In between are many months of sadness, spinning emotions, and exhaustion. And, while other people around you are feeling the same loss of the same person, the journey we take is one we take alone. There's no quick way to heal ourselves, either. Along the route, we are angry, we yell in outrage at our belief system which has let us down, we despair at being left behind, we are guilty for what we haven't said or done, guilty for even being left to live. We search for a reason, bargain with the powers that be to turn things around. We're exhausted, lonely, bewildered. We're afraid.
Sarah and Paul lost six friends when a Friday night car-train crash killed three high school and three public school kids in a small Canadian town.
Sarah recalls: "I found out from my friends on Saturday morning. Saturday afternoon I went to the mall with my friends. You could just see the anguish--everybody was just walking , not talking. Reporters were trying to interview people. Adults were sad, too.
"On Monday, the day of the first funeral, nobody talked. It was bad. Everybody looked so much older, like they had grown up on the weekend. The next day, the sixth kid died. It was so overwhelming."
Paul looks back on his loneliness because he was visiting his dad out of town when he heard. "I sat around crying and on Sunday I went home to my mom. Monday it was a big relief to really talk to people. I went to the guidance office and stayed there all week. I hadn't been speaking to Kim, one of the girls who died, but, I got dressed to go to her funeral. I couldn't go. My friends said I should go to say I was sorry.
"The first days at school, it was like a morgue. Nobody talked, we just cried. the third day was a bit better. By Friday, people had cried it out."
And after the crying...then what?
Anger. Denial. Bargaining. Guilt. Depression. Guilt. Smiles. Guilt. Anger. Fear. Fear.
And so it goes...one day the pieces of the puzzle seem to fit into place. The next day tears overflow before the day even begins.
Going through funerals, seeing dead friends in open caskets, watching Hearses carry coffins, watching coffins lowered into ground, smelling flowers, trying to remember a special grin, or the sound of a voice.
We're the video generation. Things happen fast. Whole weeks pass by in a half hour TV show. The sheer pace of our lives is the single biggest hurdle to the grieving process. It takes time. Lots of time. But Canadians live at a fast pace and we respect someone mourning a loss for a couple of months, but then it's time to get going again.
It's confusing to be still hurting a year later. We get so many messages from people around us..."Don't cry. Bear up well. Depression Is unacceptable. Accept the loss. Don't be angry. Don't. Don't. Don't"
Rev. Kay Rice says grieving is like being in a tornado. "It's a spiral of feelings that include disbelief, denial, anger, depression and acceptance.
"Nobody tells us it's okay to be angry. Often we get blocked right there and that's dangerous."
So many things crumble when somebody we love dies. Our faith in the future, in an anticipated order of things, takes a nosedive. Suddenly we realize that we won't be graduating with that friend, or we won't be going on that holiday with Mom. Suddenly we feel vulnerable, like it's not safe anymore. There are no guarantees about our future. And by losing somebody when they die we come face to face with the ultimate loss in our own lives-our own death.
Having a belief system is some comfort for people left behind, but it's not the whole answer to grief.
Kathy, whose pre-teen daughter died of cancer, says her Christian belief helps, but it's still hard work.
"You're fortunate you've got your faith! So many people said that to me. That's horsefeathers! You've got to work through it. You have to accept and carry on and it takes a long, long time."
Talking helps. Talking with someone who's feeling the same pain is more helpful than listening to someone who's trying to make you feel better by telling you how you should be feeling.
"What kind of God would let this happen?" "Life's the pits." "Why should I care?" "What does it matter?" These feelings surface most when we're angry that somebody has died, or is going to die. We feel someone must have let this happen.
Harold Kushner, a rabbi whose son died in his teens, explores anger and blame in his book, When Bad Things Happen to Good People. "Laws of nature treat everyone alike." he reasons. "A drunk driver steers his car over the centre line and collides with the green Chevy rather than the red Ford. There's no reason for those particular people to be afflicted rather than others. These events don't reflect God's choices. They happen at random and randomness is another name for chaos.
"They don't make exceptions for good people. A bullet has no conscience; neither does a malignant tumor or an automobile gone out of control. That's why good people get sick and get hurt as much as anyone."
Kushner asks us to consider what would happen if bad things happened only to bad people. Would the world be any better off?"
Sarah and Paul talk about the mess of their schools in the days following their friends' deaths. Students took their anger out on the walls, lockers, books.
Anger manifests itself in strange ways. Sarah felt anger towards the lone survivor in her town's tragedy. "I feel angry that she lived. That's not fair of me to feel. But she lived and other people I cared about died."
Mixed with anger is fear. We fear saying and doing the wrong things when we're around the family of the dead person, fear of seeing adults break down and cry at a funeral (or after), fear or not being able to control our own destinies.
We might want desperately to put our arms around our friend's mother when we see her at the shopping centre. But instead we duck into the nearest shop. Fear keeps us from expressing our loss lest we make her cry. We're scared to go to the funeral and scared not to. We lose faith in the world's fairness and we realize that one day we too will die. We're afraid because we're not ready.
Jealousy also creeps up on us when we're feeling angry, afraid and guilty. We become jealous of other people who aren't hurting like we are, who aren't suffering a loss.
The final stage in our process of grief is saying goodbye.
We are able to accept that our loved person is gone, that the car accident, the sickness, the bullet took them away.
The anger, the frustration will always be there. But by accepting that it has happened, our minds work through the grief journey and we come out of the other end of the tunnel. The feeling of healing doesn't mean forgetting. We still think of them, we whish they were here to share a certain moment. But that sick, heavy , deep pain is gone.
In saying goodbye, it's often helpful to think of the dead person and tell them what you'd like to say to them today.
Paul: "I'd tell them I love them. That I wish they could some back."
Sarah: "I'd tell them that they were important. That I care."
The grief journey isn't straight. We may turn back and re-experience many times feelings we thought we already dealt with. But, by taking time for ourselves and being able to forgive the world and the people in it for not being perfect, we'll come through and forgive ourselves.
What can I do?
The feeling better comes from helping and sharing our grief with others. Drop in and visit the family of the person who died. If the person was young, the parents are missing the atmosphere of having young people around.
"In a way it hurts when Debbie's best friend comes bouncing in and she's not here," says Kathy of her daughter's death. "But it's better than not seeing her friends at all. I miss her other friends. Two kids dropped in one day and we looked at picture albums and talked. You miss the atmosphere, the fridge door opening and closing, the noise while they made some treat. I made sure Debbie's friends received things that would remind them of her."
Sharing tickets for a school play, stopping in to visit and talk about the person who died can help you and the family Saying how you're feeling is the best approach..."I was working on my car Saturday and sure could have used Dan's ability with engines" or "Marty was so funny when she was reciting limericks; I missed her this year while we got ready for the school play."
Fear freezes us on the steps of a funeral home. What do we say? How do we handle the tears of other people? With our own.
Saying nothing but "I'm sorry..." is more comforting than any attempt to find a reason for death. There are no miraculous words that will help.
Holding a hand. Giving a hug. Looking into someone's' eyes will let them know you care.
Kathy said many helpful gestures helped her share her grief. He daughter's class wrote and shared poems, the school planted a tree on her birthday people called and sent flowers the first day of school, knowing it would be a hard time.
"The human connection is very important. Knowing that someone is thinking of you really helps a grieving person.
Screw up your courage and go. Don't avoid those people. Say "I'm sorry. I'm thinking about you." Establish the connection. It's much worse to be avoided." says Kathy.
Ask how a person is and be prepared to listen, saying nothing. Listen again and again, holding a hand, touching a shoulder if it feels comfortable.
Tears are a tender tribute to lost affection. Paul and Sarah both testify to the value of tears. Sarah talks about the first of her friends' funerals. "People who used to seem like real jerks, weren't. One boy went with a bunch of boys and wouldn't get into the car after the funeral because he was crying. One of his buddies got out of the car, put his arm around him and they both cried."
With tears comes healing. Sarah and Paul reflect on their whole grieving process. "We became better friends. We opened our arms up to love people and we knew how to be friends."
©1999 TG Magazine/Le Magazine TG
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