How do I help my grieving friend?
My dear friend lost her mother. We are well into adulthood and neither of us has ever experienced a death like this. I’ve been to funerals, but I’m a little embarrassed to say they’ve never been for people or relatives I was particularly close to, and they were all elderly people who lived long lives. I know it’s normal to lose parents and other loved ones as we grow older, but I have no idea how to comfort my friend. What do I say? What do I do?
You, my friend, are perfectly normal. Children losing parents and parents losing children are out-of-order deaths that happen to a very small percentage of our population. Somewhere between 5-15% of kids lose a parent before the age of 18. As horrific and painful as that is, and despite the life-long scars and struggles those losses can create, most of us in America (thankfully) have absolutely no idea what it’s like to grieve a death or how to respond! So, you’re in good company, and you’re asking a really good question.
Grief and loss professionals (ahem, like myself) may ask a lot of questions like: is your friend a man or woman? Was the death anticipated or sudden? Were there additional visual or physical traumas (for example, finding the body after a suicide, or surviving the accident that killed the loved one)? What was their mental health like before the death? What is their support system like? We would want to know these things to provide relevant information about more the probable reactions or experiences of the bereaved. However, none of that information is really necessary to be a good friend to someone who is grieving.
“Grief” - is a normal response to a loss. Supporting people who are grieving isn’t like treating a mental illness - because grief is normal - grieving people mainly need their community to be brave enough to bring it up, strong enough to tolerate the discomfort of being around people who are hurting, and loving enough to keep showing up.
Dr. Alan Wolfelt (who is super-famous and someone I like to think of as the Elvis of the grief and loss world) boils all of grief and loss research and results down to a very simple and doable concept: companioning. I’m not sure if that’s really a verb, but Mr. Wolfelt uses the term to describe a beautiful way to support our hurting friends. “Companioning” means walking alongside them, and resisting the impulses to either ignore their pain or try to pull them out of their valley of the shadow.
We naturally want to help our suffering friends heal. If there were magic words that could make the pain of loss come into immediate perspective and enrich all of us with a deeper appreciation for life, I would give them to you, because I want to help grieving people feel better too. There are no short cuts through grief. One of the ways we can truly help is to be fully and completely present for them, without judgement or expectation.
Grieving people are typically overwhelmed by statements like, “Call me if there’s ANYTHING I can do!” As well as observations like, “At least….she lived a long life.” Or, “At least…she’s not suffering anymore.” Or “At least…it was a quick death.” Brene Brown wisely stated, “no truly helpful statement ever started with ‘at least.’” Yet these are the things all grieving people typically hear.
Companioning might sound like: “I can’t really understand how hard this is. Can we take a little walk and you tell me how you’re doing?” Or a concrete offer, “I can bring by a meal, help you clean your house, or run the kids around to stuff - what would be most helpful for you this week?” Or just showing up for a long hug and a cup of tea.
In the first few weeks after a death, grieving people are surrounded by flurries of people and tasks. Then, it often seems like there’s an imaginary 3 month mark where no-one ever mentions the death again. A companion might say, “It’s been a few months since your mom passed. What is life like right now?” If you knew the person they lost, it’s often good to share specific memories: “I remember how your mom loved Thanksgiving! I am going to miss her this year - what do you want to do for the holidays?” Or, “Holidays will be different without your mom - what are you thinking about for this year?”
You can tell your friend, “I don’t know how to do this!” and ask them, “How’s your heart?” Or, just sit with them. Engage in your favorite shared activities (fishing? curling? needlepoint?) and be by their side as a friend, and a companion.