Welcome to the twelfth day of the 2018 Love Blog Challenge! Today’s prompt is Challenges. Check out the announcement post for all the prompts and rules this month. You can still join the link-up for yesterday’s topic, Tradition.
It’s been 2 1/2 years since my mother died. I’m still grieving, and I don’t think I’ll ever stop. Time doesn’t erase grief; it only makes grief easier to bear.
When the grief is still new and raw, however, loved ones can help. My loved ones helped me when my mom first died. I couldn’t have survived that early grief without my friends and family. If your friend is grieving the loss of a close family member or friend, these are some ways to help.
Keep in mind this list is neither exhaustive, nor necessarily appropriate for every single person. You know your friend better than a blogger on the Internet! More than anything else, to help a grieving friend, you just need to be a good friend.
1) Take cues from your grieving friend
This takes precedent over anything else on this list. Pay attention to what your friend says or does, and respond accordingly.
If you ask your friend how they’re doing and they don’t immediately confide in you the depths of their grief, accept their answer. They might not be ready to talk about their grief, or they might not want to talk to you about it. Don’t push them to open up right away.
When my mom first entered hospice care, and then again when she died, I noticed a stark difference among people offering their sympathy. My best friends accepted “fine” or “okay” as an answer for how I was doing. Other people did not, and those people just made me feel worse. Since then, I have talked to most of my friends at different points about different aspects of my grief. Just because I wasn’t ready to talk then doesn’t mean I didn’t want to talk eventually.
If your friend asks about you, respond just like you would at any other time. I needed to hear daily chatter and exciting news from my friends to distract me from my pain. I could still feel happiness for them, which was a nice temporary change of pace from my usual despair.
2) Be Present
This can be really hard, but it is so important. Just be there, physically if you can, or on the phone or video chat if you can’t. Accept your friend’s grief as it is, right now. Don’t tell them life will get better in the future–accept their pain as it is in the present.
Let your friend cry, or yell, or express their grief however they need. Listen to your friend talk. Be a shoulder to cry on. Keep showing up, even though it’s hard. Keep showing up, even when your friend isn’t showing up for you.
As time goes by, keep checking in. Send a quick text or Facebook message. Let your friend know that you are there.
About a month after my mom died, I started to feel abandoned. The rest of the world moved on while my entire world remained shattered. My best friends and my aunt kept sending me cheerful cards and random messages of love. I needed those. To be honest, I still need those around my mom’s birthday and around the anniversary of her death.
3) Avoid platitudes
No matter how sincerely you might mean it, “She’s in a better place,” comes off as insincere and hollow. So does, “At least he’s no longer in pain.”
When I say how much I miss my mom, or how much I wish she were still with me, I’m not comforted by anyone saying something like, “Your mom is with you always.” I understand the intention, but it’s not the same, and everyone knows it’s not the same.
That said, you can agree with your grieving friend if they say something along those lines. If your friend is deeply religious, they might appreciate a few comforting words about being together again. Even so, let them lead the conversation.
Oh, and don’t use logic, science, or atheist arguments to respond to someone expressing an emotional belief. There are times when I feel like my mom sends me butterflies to comfort me, and I don’t want to hear from anyone who thinks that’s stupid.
4) Don’t try to fix anything
Grief cannot be fixed. Grief can only be felt. Time makes grief easier to bear, but the pain is still there. The pain never truly heals or goes away. You just learn to live with it.
My husband likes to fix my problems. When my phone chargers started to wear away, he bought me new pink ones. When my Crohn’s is bad, he buys me Gatorade, cooks gentle meals, and watches Disney movies with me. But he can’t fix my grief. He does like to do things that make me smile, but a small happy distraction is not a cure for grief. When my mom died, I mostly just needed my husband to be with me, to hold me while I cried.
5) Share your own grief journey
What really helped me when my mom died was hearing from other people in their 20s and 30s who had lost a parent. Knowing that they had survived the initial crushing pain of grief gave me hope that I could get through those first few days and weeks. If you have been in a similar position of your grieving friend, describe how you felt, and when you started to feel better. Tell your friend that you’re available to talk whenever they want.
6) Don’t compare your grief
Hearing from people in a similar situation to me helped. Having other people tell me, “I know exactly how you feel,” did not help. Each person’s grief is unique. Don’t presume to know how your grieving friend feels.
Related: Please Don’t Compare Your Grief to My Own
7) Follow the Ring Theory
Most of the people who attended my mother’s memorial service didn’t just love my family–they loved my mom. They were there to celebrate my mother’s life, to grieve her death, and to comfort my family. What did they not do?
They didn’t dump their grief on my family. They provided us with comfort while looking elsewhere for their own comfort.
How does the Ring Theory work?
It comes from psychologist Susan Silk and mediator Barry Goldman.
Draw a circle. This is the center ring. In it, put the name of the person at the center of the current trauma… Now draw a larger circle around the first one. In that ring put the name of the person next closest to the trauma. Repeat the process as many times as you need to. In each larger ring put the next closest people. Parents and children before more distant relatives. Intimate friends in smaller rings, less intimate friends in larger ones. When you are done you have a Kvetching Order…
Here are the rules. The person in the center ring can say anything she wants to anyone, anywhere. She can kvetch and complain and whine and moan and curse the heavens and say, “Life is unfair” and “Why me?” That’s the one payoff for being in the center ring.
Everyone else can say those things too, but only to people in larger rings.
When you are talking to a person in a ring smaller than yours, someone closer to the center of the crisis, the goal is to help. Listening is often more helpful than talking. But if you’re going to open your mouth, ask yourself if what you are about to say is likely to provide comfort and support. If it isn’t, don’t say it.
Apply the Ring Theory to your situation. If you are grieving alongside your friend, where do you fall within the Ring Theory? If your friend’s family member just died, your friend needs your comfort, even if you’re grieving the family member too.
In my family’s situation, my mom entered the center ring with her cancer diagnosis. Even after she died, the Ring Theory still works with her at the center since the other rings are all based on relationships with my mom.
My dad, my brothers, and I are all the next ring. My mom’s siblings are the ring after that. The next few rings aren’t as easily defined, but they’re a mix of in-laws, cousins, nieces, and nephews.
8) Don’t post on social media
This follows the Ring Theory. Don’t post anything about the death until someone in a more central ring posts first. My brothers and I all posted to Facebook about our mother’s death around the same time. We waited until we had notified close family and friends personally.
If your grieving friend is a private person, they may prefer you not post to social media at all. Use your best judgment, and err on the side of discretion.
9) Send a personal sympathy card
If you knew the person who died, share a personal anecdote. Tell your grieving friend how much you admired their loved one. Be sincere, but try to be personal.
If you didn’t know the person who died, you can still write a personal sympathy note. Express to your grieving friend how sorry you are for their loss. It’s okay to say that you don’t know what to say. Tell them how much you love them.
One of the best sympathy cards I received came from a sorority sister and her husband (also a friend of mine), neither of whom I’ve seen since we all graduated. It was genuine and heartfelt, and I truly felt like they still cared about me, even though we haven’t been close friends in many years.
On the other hand, another sympathy made me laugh, which I decided was a better reaction than ripping it into shreds. It was addressed to my husband, except with “Mrs.” added in front of his name. I didn’t change my last name when I got married, which this person knew considering my husband, my mother-in-law, and I all explained so separately. It really felt like she only sent me a sympathy card because it was the proper etiquette to do so, not because she cared for my feelings as a person.
10) Give restaurant gift cards
My family received so many gifts of food when my mom died that we probably wasted at least a third of it. There’s only so much food six people can eat in a week. And sometimes we wanted pizza or Chick-fil-A.
The food mostly stopped coming shortly after my mom’s memorial service. That didn’t mean we were ready to cook or even to buy groceries.
Gift cards to restaurants can feed a family during those first few weeks of grief.
11) Provide paper goods
Paper plates and napkins, plastic utensils, food storage containers, trash bags, facial tissues, paper towels, and even toilet paper can all help a grieving friend.
I personally didn’t mind doing dishes right after my mom died, but it would have been overwhelming if extended family had eaten in our home. Your grieving friend might not mind doing the dishes, but they’ll appreciate not having dishes to do.
All of that extra food needs to be stored. Tears and sniffly noses need to be wiped.
In a small town, going to the store myself meant running into people who wanted to talk to me about my mom before I was ready. A supply of paper goods meant that wasn’t necessary.
12) Think about the kids
My mother died without ever becoming a grandmother. I guess the upside is that none of us had to worry about children while we were grieving my mother.
But if your grieving friend has children, those children need help too. Offer to baby-sit. Bring them age-appropriate toys and entertainment. Show up with kid-friendly food. My family appreciated the freezer casseroles and soups, but kids probably wouldn’t have eaten those meals.
13) Offer specific help
Pretty much everyone told my family or me something along the lines of, “Let me know if I can do anything.”
Guess how many times I actually asked for help.
Two.
I asked two of my local-ish friends to bring breakfast foods to my house the weekend of my mom’s service so we could feed my extended family the next day.
I asked a few times for help in my mom’s garden… One friend helped me prune the morning of my mom’s service. Another visited a week or so later and helped me with weeding and pruning.
That’s it.
When you’re grieving, especially in those first few weeks, you’re not thinking of all the things that need to be done and exactly who could help do them. You’re just surviving from day to day.
These are some things that you can offer to do in the first month or two after a death:
- Bring in the mail each day and sort it
- Clean the bathrooms every Saturday afternoon
- Spend an hour weeding the garden once per week
- Take the kids to a movie
- Bring over dinner and clean the kitchen every Sunday
You don’t need to offer to do something big or even frequent. Helping out with a chore just once would make a difference. When you offer to help out, suggest two or three days/times when you’re available so your grieving friend can easily choose one.
14) Send flowers, cards, and gifts later
Hitting the one-month anniversary of my mother’s death was incredibly hard. Not only was that the first major milestone, but that was also about when people stopped asking me how I was doing. Flowers, cards, and gifts all basically stopped, with only a few exceptions. My pain was still raw and rough, but I felt like no one saw it anymore.
Sending flowers, cards, small gifts, or meals a month or later after a death reminds your grieving friend that you’re still there. Your friend will appreciate that someone still sees their pain.
A family friend sent my dad flowers on my mom’s first birthday and my parents’ first wedding anniversary without her. That December was so hard for me. I slept about 12 hours per day. At times I cried so hard that I was in hysterics. That bouquet of flowers helped a lot.
15) Give grace
Grief is powerful, terrible, and all-encompassing. When your friend is grieving, they might struggle to be a good friend to you. I didn’t return the majority of personal emails and Facebook messages for at least a year after my mom died. As in, I’ve just never replied to them. I also didn’t acknowledge the majority of sympathy cards I received. I struggled to return phone calls and text messages.
During that first year, I basically sleepwalked through life, vaguely aware of the world spinning around me. The smallest things overwhelmed me. Even today, I struggle to focus in a way that I didn’t before my mom died.
Give grace to your friend in grief. They might not be able to be a good friend to you, not for awhile. They are struggling in a way that I hope you never experience firsthand.
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Brita Long is the pink and sparkly personality behind the Christian feminist lifestyle blog, Belle Brita. While her first love will always be Paris, she lives happily with her husband Daniel Fleck in the Atlanta area.
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Losing my mom has been the worst challenge of my life. I couldn’t have gotten through it without the support of my friends and family.
If your friend is grieving the loss of a loved one, they need your love and support. From my own experience, these are all ways to help a grieving friend.
